Book of Habakkuk

Overview

The book of Habakkuk is a book of the Hebrew Bible and stands eighth in a section known as the Twelve Minor Prophets in the Masoretic Text and the Septuagint. In the Masoretic Text, it follows Nahum and precedes Zephaniah, who are considered to be his contemporaries.

The book consists of three chapters and it is neatly divided into three different genres:

• A discussion between God and Habakkuk
• An oracle of woe
• A psalm, "Habakkuk's song".

Themes

The major theme of Habakkuk is trying to grow from a faith of perplexity and doubt to the height of absolute trust in God. Habakkuk addresses his concerns over the fact that God will use the Babylonian empire to execute judgment on Judah for their sins. – (Habakkuk 1:12)

Habakkuk openly questions the wisdom of God. In the first part of the first chapter, the Prophet sees the injustice among his people and asks why God does not take action. "Yahweh, how long will I cry, and you will not hear? I cry out to you “Violence!” and will you not save?" – (Habakkuk 1:2)

In the middle part of Chapter 1, God explains that he will send the Chaldeans (also known as the Babylonians) to punish his people. In 1:5: "Look among the nations, watch, and wonder marvelously; for I am working a work in your days, which you will not believe though it is told you." In 1:6: "For, behold, I raise up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, that march through the breadth of the earth, to possess dwelling places that are not theirs."

One of the "Eighteen Emendations to the Hebrew Scriptures" appears at 1:12. According to the professional Jewish scribes, the Sopherim, the text of 1:12 was changed from "You [God] do not die" to "We shall not die". The Sopherim considered it disrespectful to say to God, "You do not die."

In the final part of the first chapter, the prophet expresses shock at God's choice of instrument for judgment, in 1:13: "You who have purer eyes than to see evil, and who cannot look on perversity, why do you tolerate those who deal treacherously, and keep silent when the wicked swallows up the man who is more righteous than he[...]?"

In Chapter 2, he awaits God's response to his challenge. God explains that He will also judge the Chaldeans, and much more harshly. "Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the peoples will plunder you, because of men’s blood, and for the violence done to the land, to the city and to all who dwell in it. Woe to him who gets an evil gain for his house." (Habakkuk 2:8-9)

Finally, in Chapter 3, Habakkuk expresses his ultimate faith in God, even if he does not fully understand: "For though the fig tree doesn’t flourish, nor fruit be in the vines; the labor of the olive fails, the fields yield no food; the flocks are cut off from the fold, and there is no herd in the stalls: 3:18 yet I will rejoice in Yahweh. I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!" Some scholars suggest that the final chapter may be a later independent addition to the book, in part because it is not included among the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Surviving early manuscripts

Some early manuscripts containing the text of this book in Hebrew language are found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, i.e., 1QpHab, known as the "Habakkuk Commentary" (later half of the 1st century BC), and of the Masoretic Text tradition, which includes Codex Cairensis (895 CE), the Petersburg Codex of the Prophets (916), Aleppo Codex (10th century), Codex Leningradensis (1008). Fragments containing parts of this book in Hebrew were found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, including 4Q82 (4QXII^g; 25 BCE) with extant verses 4?; and Wadi Murabba'at Minor Prophets (Mur88; MurXIIProph; 75-100 CE) with extant verses 1:3–13, 1:15, 2:2–3, 2:5–11, 2:18–20, and 3:1–19.

There is also a translation into Koine Greek known as the Septuagint, made in the last few centuries BC. Extant ancient manuscripts of the Septuagint version include Codex Vaticanus (B; ${\displaystyle \mathfrak{G}}$^B; 4th century), Codex Sinaiticus (S; BHK: ${\displaystyle \mathfrak{G}}$^S; 4th century), Codex Alexandrinus (A; ${\displaystyle \mathfrak{G}}$^A; 5th century) and Codex Marchalianus (Q; ${\displaystyle \mathfrak{G}}$^Q; 6th century). Fragments containing parts of this book in Greek were also found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, that is, Naḥal Ḥever 8Ḥev1 (8ḤevXII^gr); (late 1st century BCE) with extant verses 1:5–11, 1:14–17, 2:1–8, 2:13–20, and 3:8–15.

Importance

The Book of Habakkuk is accepted as canonical by adherents of the Jewish and Christian faiths.

Judaism

The Book of Habakkuk is the eighth book of the Twelve Prophets of the Hebrew Bible, and this collection appears in all copies of texts of the Septuagint, the Ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible completed by 132 BC. Likewise, the book of Sirach (or Ecclesiasticus), also written in the 2nd century BC, mentions "The Twelve Prophets".

A partial copy of Habakkuk itself is included in the Habakkuk Commentary, a pesher found among the original seven Dead Sea Scrolls discovered in 1947. The Commentary contains a copy of the first two chapters of Habakkuk, but not of the third chapter. The writer of the pesher draws a comparison between the Babylonian invasion of the original text and the Roman threat of the writer's own period. What is even more significant than the commentary in the pesher is the quoted text of Habakkuk itself. The divergences between the Hebrew text of the scroll and the standard Masoretic Text are startlingly minimal. The biggest differences are word order, small grammatical variations, addition or omission of conjunctions, and spelling variations, but these are small enough not to damage the meaning of the text.

Some scholars suggest that Chapter 3 may be a later independent addition to the book, in part because it is not included among the Dead Sea Scrolls. However, this chapter does appear in all copies of the Septuagint, as well as in texts from as early as the 3rd century BC. This final chapter is a poetic praise of God, and has some similarities with Exodus 19, and with texts found in the Book of Daniel. However, the fact that the third chapter is written in a different style, as a liturgical piece, does not necessarily mean that Habakkuk was not also its author.

Qumran community

A commentary on the first two chapters of the book was found among the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran. The omission of chapter 3 from the version within the Dead Sea Scrolls has been attributed to incompatibilities with the theology of the Qumran sect.

Habakkuk 2:4

The Talmud (Makkot 24a) mentions that various Biblical figures grouped the 613 commandments into categories that encapsulated all of the 613. At the end of this discussion, the Talmud concludes, "Habakkuk came and established [the 613 mitzvoth] upon one, as it is stated: 'But the righteous person shall live by his faith' (Habakkuk 2:4)".

Habakkuk 2:4 is well known in Christianity. In the New International Version of the bible it reads:

See, the enemy is puffed up; his desires are not upright

but the righteous person will live by his faithfulness.

Although the second half of this passage is only three words in the original Hebrew, it is quoted three times in the New Testament. Paul the Apostle quotes it once in his Epistle to the Romans, and again in his Epistle to the Galatians; its third use is in the Epistle to the Hebrews. It became one of the most important of the verses that were used as foundations of the doctrines of the Protestant reformation.

There is controversy about the translation of the verse: the word "emunah" is most often translated as "faithfulness", though the word in this verse has been traditionally translated as "faith".

The word "emunah" is not translated as "belief" other than in Habakkuk 2:4, Clendenen, E. Ray defended the translation of the word as "faith" on the basis of the context of the verse, arguing that it refers to Genesis 15:6, which used the word "he’ĕmin" 'believed' of which "’ĕmȗnāh" is derived from, he also argued that the Essenes in the Qumran community likely understood the verse as referring to faith in the Teacher of Righteousness instead of faithfulness.

Martin Luther believed that Habakkuk 2:4 taught the doctrine of faith alone, commenting on the verse "For this is a general saying applicable to all of God's words. These must be believed, whether spoken at the beginning, middle, or end of the world".

Rashi interpreted the verse to be about Jeconiah.

The Targum interpreted the verse as "The wicked think that all these things are not so, but the righteous live by the truth of them".

Pseudo-Ignatius understood the verse to be about faith.

Habakkuk 2:6-20: the taunting riddle

The melitzah ḥidah, or the taunting riddle, is the oracle revealed to Habakkuk the prophet. It is a mashal, which is a proverb and a parable. It is also known as a witty satire, a mocking and an enigma. The riddle is 15 verses long, from verse 6 to verse 20, and is divided into five woes which consist of three verses each.

Hebrew text

The following table shows the Hebrew text of Habakkuk 2:6-20 with vowels alongside an English translation based upon the JPS 1917 translation (now in the public domain).

Habakkuk 3:1

A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet, according to Shigionoth.

This verse is a heading for the final chapter. The exact meaning of "Shigionoth" is not known. The New Living Translation treats the word as an addition in the Hebrew text which "probably" indicates the prayer's musical setting, and the Jerusalem Bible suggests that the prayer adopts "the tone as for dirges".

Musical uses

Modern Christian hymns have been inspired by the words of the prophet Habakkuk:

• the Christian hymn "The Lord is in His Holy Temple", written in 1900 by William J. Kirkpatrick, is based on Habakkuk 2:20.
• the fourth verse of William Cowper's hymn "Sometimes a Light Surprises", written in 1779, quotes Habakkuk 3:17–18:

Though vine nor fig-tree neither,
Their wonted fruit shall bear,
Though all the field should wither,
Nor flocks nor herds be there;
Yet God the same abiding,
His praise shall tune my voice,
For, while in Him confiding,
I cannot but rejoice.

— William Cowper, 1779

Irish composer Charles Villiers Stanford set slightly revised portions of text from the first and second chapters of Habakkuk in his choral composition for choir, soprano and tenor soloist and organ, "For Lo, I Raise Up".