Habakkuk3chapter 3

Habakkuk 3:1-2

A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet upon Shigionoth turns the book from dialogue to worship, a musical term the bench reads as a wild, irregular ode fitting the terror and joy both about to follow. O Lord, I have heard thy speech, and was afraid answers chapter 2's vision with reverence rather than argument, and the prayer's center follows at once, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in wrath remember mercy, judgment accepted and mercy still asked for in the same breath. Calvin and Henry read the plea as the whole book's turn, complaint become petition, the prophet no longer demanding an answer but asking God to act mercifully within the answer already given.

Habakkuk 3:3-4

God came from Teman: God came from Teman, and the Holy One from mount Paran pictures the Lord advancing from the same southern wilderness of the exodus and Sinai, the first of the chapter's three Selahs marking a pause for the picture to sink in. His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise sets creation itself as the theater and the choir, and his brightness was as the light describes a splendor the prophet can only compare to light itself, with horns coming out of his hand keeping the hiding of his power veiled even in its display. Keil and Pusey read the Teman theophany as deliberately recalling Sinai, the God who once came down in fire and cloud coming again to act in Habakkuk's own generation.

Habakkuk 3:5-7

Before him went the pestilence, and burning coals went forth at his feet, pictures the Lord's advance as an army with its own vanguard, plague and fire clearing the ground ahead of him. He stood, and measured the earth, drove asunder the nations, and the everlasting mountains were scattered, a power large enough to make ancient landmarks tremble, mountains the ancient world called perpetual bowing at his passing. I saw the tents of Cushan in affliction, and the curtains of the land of Midian did tremble, bringing the vision down to particular, recognizable peoples that Pusey and Keil read as the same regions the exodus generation once crossed, shown here shaking at the memory of the God who led Israel through them long before.

Habakkuk 3:8-9

Was the Lord displeased against the rivers, was thine anger against the rivers, recalls the exodus and Jordan crossings directly, the prophet asking whether the ancient wonders were really about the waters themselves rather than the salvation they served, riding upon thine horses and thy chariots of salvation naming the true target of every plague and parted sea. The second Selah falls after thy word, marking the oath that follows, thy bow was made quite naked, according to the oaths of the tribes, the covenant promises to the patriarchs read as a drawn weapon ready in God's own hand, and thou didst cleave the earth with rivers closes the unit on the same historical ground. Keil and Barnes read the whole passage as poetic recollection of the exodus deployed here as present hope, the ancient rivers standing for every deliverance still to come.

Habakkuk 3:10-12

The mountains saw thee, and they trembled extends the theophany's reach from ancient rivers to the created order at large, the deep itself lifting up his hands on high like a creature startled awake. The sun and moon stood still in their habitation openly recalls Joshua's long day, the same God who halted the sky over Gibeon again commanding light itself at the light of thine arrows and the shining of thy glittering spear. Thou didst march through the land in indignation, thou didst thresh the heathen in anger keeps the theophany pointed at a purpose. Henry and Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown read the whole cosmic display as instrumental to a specific act of judgment and deliverance rather than spectacle for its own sake.

Habakkuk 3:13-15

Thou wentest forth for the salvation of thy people, even for salvation with thine anointed states the theophany's purpose plainly after eleven verses of storm and mountain, every image in the chapter serving Israel's rescue and the anointed one's cause. Thou woundedst the head out of the house of the wicked, by discovering the foundation unto the neck pictures a decisive, total defeat, and the third Selah falls immediately after, marking the pause before the closing violence, they came out as a whirlwind to scatter me, their rejoicing was as to devour the poor secretly. Thou didst walk through the sea with thine horses, through the heap of great waters returns the vision to the exodus crossing one final time. Keil and Pusey read the repetition across the chapter as deliberate, the Red Sea remembered as the pattern every future deliverance follows.

Habakkuk 3:16

The vision's effect on the prophet himself closes the theophany before the prayer turns to resolve, when I heard, my belly trembled, my lips quivered at the voice, rottenness entered into my bones, physical terror answering a display too large for a human frame to absorb calmly. That I might rest in the day of trouble marks the turn, the prophet choosing to wait quietly for an invasion he now knows is coming, when he cometh up unto the people, he will invade them with his troops naming the Chaldean advance from chapter 1 as the trouble he now waits to rest through. Henry and Calvin read the trembling honestly, faith here is not the absence of fear but the decision to wait through it rather than flee it.

Habakkuk 3:17-19

The chapter's summit strips away every prop faith might lean on: although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines, the labour of the olive shall fail, and the flock shall be cut off from the fold, the total collapse of an agrarian economy's every resource named in one sentence. Against total loss stands the answer, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation, joy chosen rather than caused by circumstance, which Pusey and Henry read as the summit of Old Testament trust and the book's own answer to the complaint it opened with in chapter 1. The Lord God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds' feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places closes the book on agility rather than collapse, the note to the chief singer on stringed instruments handing the whole prayer to Israel's worship.