Habakuk 2:2

The Lord Assures Habakkuk

2:2 The Lord responded: ¹ 

“Write down this message! ²  Record it legibly on tablets,

so the one who announces ³  it may read it easily. ⁴ 

Habakuk 3:10

3:10 When the mountains see you, they shake.

The torrential downpour sweeps through. ⁵ 

The great deep ⁶  shouts out;

it lifts its hands high. ⁷ 

Habakuk 1:11

1:11 They sweep by like the wind and pass on. ⁸ 

But the one who considers himself a god will be held guilty.” ⁹ 

Habakuk 1:10

1:10 They mock kings

and laugh at rulers.

They laugh at every fortified city;

they build siege ramps ¹⁰  and capture them.

Habakuk 2:6

The Proud Babylonians are as Good as Dead

2:6 “But all these nations will someday taunt him ¹¹ 

and ridicule him with proverbial sayings: ¹² 

‘The one who accumulates what does not belong to him is as good as dead ¹³ 

(How long will this go on?) ¹⁴  –

he who gets rich by extortion!’ ¹⁵ 

Habakuk 3:16

Habakkuk Declares His Confidence

3:16 I listened and my stomach churned; ¹⁶ 

the sound made my lips quiver.

My frame went limp, as if my bones were decaying, ¹⁷ 

and I shook as I tried to walk. ¹⁸ 

I long ¹⁹  for the day of distress

to come upon ²⁰  the people who attack us.

[2:2]  ¹ tn Heb “the Lord answered and said.” The redundant expression “answered and said” has been simplified in the translation as “responded.”

[2:2]  ² tn Heb “[the] vision.”

[2:2]  ³ tn Or “reads from.”

[2:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “might run,” which here probably means “run [through it quickly with one’s eyes],” that is, read it easily.

[3:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “a heavy rain of waters passes by.” Perhaps the flash floods produced by the downpour are in view here.

[3:10]  ⁶ sn The great deep, which is to be equated with the sea (vv. 8, 15), is a symbol of chaos and represents the Lord’s enemies.

[3:10]  ⁷ sn Lifting the hands here suggests panic and is accompanied by a cry for mercy (see Ps 28:2; Lam 2:19). The forces of chaos cannot withstand the Lord’s power revealed in the storm.

[1:11]  ⁸ tn The precise meaning of v. 11a is uncertain. The present translation assumes the first line further describes the Babylonian hordes, comparing them to a destructive wind. Another option is to understand רוּחַ (ruakh) as “spirit,” rather than “wind,” and take the form וְאָשֵׁם (vÿ’ashem) with what precedes (as suggested by the scribal punctuation). Repointing this form as a geminate verb from שָׁמַם (shamam, “be astonished”), one could then translate the line, “The spirit passed on and departed, and I was astonished.” In this case the line would describe the cessation of the divine revelation which began in v. 5. For a detailed defense of this view, see J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 97-100.

[1:11]  ⁹ tn Heb “and guilty is the one whose strength is his god.” This assumes that אָשֵׁם (’ashem) is a predicate adjective meaning “guilty” and that it relates to what follows.

[1:10]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “they heap up dirt.” This is a reference to the piling up of earthen ramps in the process of laying siege to a fortified city.

[2:6]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Will not these, all of them, take up a taunt against him…?” The rhetorical question assumes the response, “Yes, they will.” The present translation brings out the rhetorical force of the question by rendering it as an affirmation.

[2:6]  ¹² tn Heb “and a mocking song, riddles, against him? And one will say.”

[2:6]  ¹³ tn Heb “Woe [to] the one who increases [what is] not his.” The Hebrew term הוֹי (hoy, “woe,” “ah”) was used in funeral laments and carries the connotation of death.

[2:6]  ¹⁴ tn This question is interjected parenthetically, perhaps to express rhetorically the pain and despair felt by the Babylonians’ victims.

[2:6]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “and the one who makes himself heavy [i.e., wealthy] [by] debts.” Though only appearing in the first line, the term הוֹי (hoy) is to be understood as elliptical in the second line.

[3:16]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “my insides trembled.”

[3:16]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “decay entered my bones.”

[3:16]  ¹⁸ tc Heb “beneath me I shook, which….” The Hebrew term אֲשֶׁר (’asher) appears to be a relative pronoun, but a relative pronoun does not fit here. The translation assumes a reading אֲשֻׁרָי (’ashuray, “my steps”) as well as an emendation of the preceding verb to a third plural form.

[3:16]  ¹⁹ tn The translation assumes that אָנוּחַ (’anuakh) is from the otherwise unattested verb נָוָח (navakh, “sigh”; see HALOT 680 s.v. II נוח; so also NEB). Most take this verb as נוּחַ (nuakh, “to rest”) and translate, “I wait patiently” (cf. NIV).

[3:16]  ²⁰ tn Heb “to come up toward.”