V. 1. This is the burden that the prophet Habakkuk saw.
It is clear from the text that Habakkuk was long before the Babylonian prison, because he says that he saw the burden. For in the Hebrew language the prophets are called "seers" or "showers", because they see beforehand in the spirit and sound what is to come in the future. Wherefore also Isaiah calleth his book a vision over Judah and Jerusalem, that he should tell of the things to come, which he had seen. And Abadijah calls his book the vision of Abadijah; and Amos writes, that Amaziah hath called him, saying [Cap. 7, 12.], Thou showerer or seer, roll thou into the land of Judah. We must get used to such words, that in Hebrew a prophet is called a seer, as one who sees future and hidden things, which the others do not see. So also here Habakkuk has seen the future calamity over Jerusalem by the king of Babylon, and comforts and encourages the people to faith and hope.
But why does he say, "The burden," if it is to be comfort? Because he comforts rather than presses. It is the way of the prophets that they call their prophecy "burden," in Hebrew massa, and, as Jeremiah indicates, it came from the fact that the prophets commonly punished the people and grieved them with God's wrath, just as it is necessary that a preacher among the people always punish, because the pious are few and the wicked are many. When they did this, it became a proverb, so that the people said, "What did he preach? So they answered: He preached once upon us, but it is always upon us, and it grieves us; as they say now, They make hell hot for us, and the devil black. Now from the same that the prophets always preached something that was to come upon them, they called their preaching a burden, that is, something that would fall upon them, and immediately hung and hovered over them, that would soon strike them. As God's wrath and punishment hangs and hovers every hour
over the wicked, even though they do not feel it. You may read Jer. 23, 33, how they called God's word massa, which God also condemned and forbade. Because Habakkuk also preaches about the future punishment of Jerusalem (although he comforts more than he frightens), he calls his sermon a burden out of the common habit of all prophets and the people, because he is also the first to preach inside, and because he wants to humble and frighten them, if they want to amend and convert, and avert the future punishment.
Lord, how long shall I cry out, and thou wilt not hear? How long shall I cry out to you about injustice, and you will not help?
3 Here he begins to punish the guilt and sin of the people, because of which the wrath of God and the burden had to come upon them. And he began to cry out and pray to God, as if he were angry with God that he had been patient with sin so long, and that the people were so surely in debt; as if he were to say, "I preach a lot, but it doesn't help; my word is despised, and no one improves, but only gets worse and worse. Therefore I know nowhere, but that I complain unto thee: but thou also standest as though thou heardest me not, and seest them not. But Habakkuk does not do this to reprove God or to rebuke him, as the words sound and are to be heard, but to frighten the people and drive them to repentance, and to show how justly the wrath and the burden will come upon them, because they will not turn to any preaching, warning or admonition, or to any prayer that is made against them.
(4) Hereby, he states, first, that he preached very strongly and tried hard to punish the people, but it did not work out. Secondly, that he had great concern and fear for the people, because of the future punishment and burden, and would gladly save them and bring them forward, but they do not respect either, do not believe that there is a burden, nor do they want to let go of sins. For it is the way of sinners that, because they do not feel it, they do not believe that they can be punished and reproached as they please.
V. 3. Why do you make me see toil and labor? Why do you show me robbery and iniquity around me?
5 Then we see that he speaks of the Jewish people and not yet of the king of Babylon. For he complains about how bad things are in his country, how much wickedness is happening around him and among him, and how he has to watch it and cannot stop it. Because of this, he becomes tired of his preaching and weary, as does every pious preacher who would like to avert punishment and make people pious. When he sees that he does not want to go on, but becomes worse, he almost repents of his preaching, but cannot and must not leave it, for the sake of some of the elect.
(6) And this is done and written for our comfort and admonition, that we should not wonder nor think it strange, if any of our doctrines improve, or become worse. For preachers, especially because they are new and have only just come out of the woodwork, think that they should have hands and feet as soon as they say something, and that everything should be done and changed in no time at all. But this is far from the case. The prophet and Christ himself were mistaken. It goes like one says: You are too young to make old husks pious. It is the same with this good Habakkuk, and it distorts him greatly that his teaching does not want to become vain work and deed.
The two Hebrew words Aven and Amal, which I have translated "toil and labor," are often used together, especially in the prophets, and we must be accustomed to them. For they have two usages. One, that they mean unpleasantness and burden, as one speaks in German of heavy: Geschäfte und verworrenen bösen Sachen: Here is toil and labor. Thus the 90th Psalm, v. 10, speaks of old people: "When it is high with them, it is eighty years; what is above that, that is even and even, toil and labor," because old age is a hard, unhappy being and life. The other custom is that they are called injustice, vice and wickedness. And so the prophets use it when they punish the wicked and the evil,
and call their evil nature toil and labor; as the 10th Psalm, v. 7, says of the end-Christ, "Under his tongue is toil and labor." And that is why: because false teachers and evil men with their evil nature and teachings cause much misfortune to others, as they rob, oppress, steal, press, seduce, and also burden and weigh down with useless laws and infallible works.
(8) Just as we use the word "misfortune" in two ways: first, that it means a bad accident and accidental damage that happens without sin. The other way is that it also means badness and knavery. As when we see a knave doing something bad, we say: He will do a misfortune, that is, a bad deed, by which misfortune will come to others and finally to himself. But such a difference and custom must be taken from the occasions and causes of language and stories.
(9) Now Habakkuk shows how it was in the land of Judah when he preached, that there was toil and labor in it, that is, no love, no friendship, no faithfulness, nor faith is among the people, but every man seeks his own, and presupposes over another, stealing, taking, robbing, and stealing where he can.
(10) As he himself interprets it, saying, Why showest thou robbery and iniquity for me? As if he should say, I mean such toil and labor, where one takes from another what is his own, and does violence to him. For in Hebrew the two words "robbery and iniquity" are strong. The first one does not mean to rob badly, but to spoil and make desolate in the same way as one spoils and makes desolate a house or a city. By this the prophet means, as one spoils and makes a beggar of another, that they come from house and farm and all goods as if they were disturbed and desolate. As it is wont to go in cities and countries, where neither law nor order goes, and the rich and tyrants do what they will. Therefore also the other word is called "Frevel", that is, violence, as those ask for no right. These two words we speak in German thus: They do vain violence and corrupt one another in the city.
(11) Yet here you do not see that Habakkuk reproached the Jews for idolatry or other sins committed against God, but only for the sins committed against their neighbor, that at that time there must nevertheless have been pious people who kept the worship pure. But they lacked faith and love, and were possessed by avarice, usury and injustice. Now God does not like any service, however great it may be, where one does harm to one's neighbor; as He says Hos. 6:6: "I do not want the sacrifice, but the good deed," and Matth. 5:24: "Leave your sacrifice before the altar, and go first and make peace with your brother. Because they corrupt one another and do violence to one another, He forbids them to be corrupted again and to suffer violence at the hands of the king of Babylon. For God's way is to judge and punish according to each one's deserts.
Force prevails over law.
Twelfth, he himself signifies what he calls toil and labor, iniquity and destruction, namely, that no right is protected or administered, and that one drives with vain violence. With this he touches the great houses and rulers of the land, and dares it dangerously enough with his preaching and scolding that he so touches the mighty. He should also have been condemned as seditious, as one who wants to make the authorities despised by the subjects. For this is what is called rebellious, when one punishes the rulers with the word of God, and does not let them do as they please, does not praise and honor them in their evil ways. Now it is no one's fault that there is injustice in the land, but the authorities, because they are commanded by God to use the sword and punish injustice, and they not only let injustice get out of hand, but also do it themselves. For where there is strict authority and justice is administered, what would otherwise happen must remain with the subjects.
013 But Habakkuk, fearing not that he should be reproached for his rebelliousness, punisheth sin most of all among the mighty, and blameth them for all the calamities that were to come upon all the land. For,
As it is said, he does not punish them for idolatry and idols, nor for common sins among the people, such as lying, deceiving, adultery, and cheating, etc., but for the violence and injustice of the judgment; that all his preaching goes over the lords and judges, which also proves the punishment afterwards. For the king of Babylon took away all the great things of the land and left only the poor, lowly farmers and gardeners in the land, 2 Kings 25:12, as if God were saying, "The great ones alone deserve it, therefore they too shall suffer the punishment.
(14) And it is common with all the punishments of God that the authorities are most punished and overthrown, and the people remain in the land. For the people must have authority and be subject to it, like a horse to a master. Now he does not much care if his authorities and lords are bad boys, so that another lord comes and repels him, and God says that he is more pious, or even so wicked. So that God's punishment on earth is almost the game of which Mary sings [Luc. 1, 52.]: "He removes the mighty from their thrones, and exalts the lowly."
(15) For from the beginning of the world until now we see how he always casts off one king by another, one lord by another, and sets up others, and leaves the land and the people, without where he wants to destroy [the] land with the people, as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the like. So he overthrew the king of Israel by the king of Assyria, and again, the king of Assyria by the king of Babylon: King to Babylon, the King to Babylon by the King to Persia, the: King to Persia by Alexander, the king in Greek[land],the kingdom in Greek[land] by the Romans, the Romans by the Goths and Turks; the Turks will also find their pushers, shall the world stand longer. And so on, both in large and small dominions, both in emperorships and kingdoms, nothing is seen but falling away and sitting up; just as if the whole world with its authorities were God's tournament and mutiny, since it stings and breaks among itself, and is no longer valid except: He who lies down, lies down; he who sits down, sits down. And all this because of their injustice and violence, that it is their fault where evil and injustice is done in the land.
16. But the devil, the supreme prince of the world, drives them in such a way that they do not use the sword, which is commanded by God, just as the world abuses all other goods of God; and yet the sword must be like food and drink. But God always takes it from one man's fist after another, and gives it to another for the sake of his misuse. So the sword and authority always remain in the world, but the people who sit in authority always have to overreach and stagger, according to what they deserve.
(17) And this deceived and hardened the Jews, that they believed not Habakkuk, that they had not idolatry and idols at that time, and thought themselves to be pious, and to have a gracious God, that they were not aware of his wrath. As is the peculiar way of the people to this day, like all hypocrites and works saints, that they always think that they are the dear children above all others, and cannot believe that they deserve wrath; as it is written in Micah that they say [Cap. 2, 7]: "Should God have such things in mind? Should his spirit have become so short?" etc. For if they had known themselves to be sinners, they would have obeyed Habakkuk, and would have reformed themselves with fear and humility, so that the punishment would not have come upon them, as the Ninivites do. But since they did not do so, it is certain that they considered Habakkuk a fool and a useless preacher, but considered themselves pious, innocent, and the true children of God. Just as we see that even today our clergy do, who, in the most abominable sins and blasphemies, think that they serve God and are pleasing to Him.
(18) Therefore this saying of Habakkuk, "Violence prevails over justice," will remain in the world, and is also a common saying, so that everyone complains and cries out about violence. But we should not be surprised, it must and should go like this, and is the right color of the world. For where it is right, there is no longer the world or the world's rule, but God's own. And if force should not prevail over right, then the devil could no longer be the ruler of the world, and God's rule would be vain. But God does not leave it unpunished, but just as the world does not cease to sin, so does the devil.
God does not cease to punish, and always pushes away one after another, and sets up others; as Daniel Cap. 2, 21. says: "He moves kingdoms and sets up others"; and Solomon in his Proverbs Cap. 28, 2. "For sin's sake in the land there must be many lords, but where the people are sensible and wise, their lord lives the longer."
V. 4. Therefore the law must waver, and no right can come to an end.
19 That is, it is not according to the law of God, but the law must bend and direct itself according to their will. For here he strikes those who pride themselves on the law, and do not want to be seen to be doing anything against the law, but catch some letters and force them to interpret and give what they want. Just as in our day the sharp lawyers do with their strict law when they have wicked, loose matters, and yet they give the law such a nose that the matter must become right and good. This is what Habakkuk means here, that the law wavers, and that all good things are prevented and cannot come to an end. For the right mind of the law is thrown to the winds and despised, and so they go away, having gained by the law, drawn to their mind.
020 Now the world is full of them, and they are called pious men; neither may they be reproached otherwise. But God judges and punishes them all the same, and forbids them that it should not be given to them. Summa, there are few good things among the lawyers or jurists; as they themselves feel and confess. Nor do they [the good things] carry money, and [the lawyers] would have to be beggars, who are now all gold and silk, where evil things would do 1) in law.
For the wicked overpowers the righteous, and therefore wrong judgments go forth.
Twenty-one You see that he means the wicked wiles that are used in law by one against another. Micah also speaks of this [Cap. 7, 3]: "What the ruler demands, that will the ruler tell him.
1) would not be there. In Latin: 81 MAILS eausas non 6886nt.
Judges"; and the great merchants all speak their will, and thus afflict the land. For that he says here, "The wicked overrules the righteous," is what St. Paul says in 1 Thess. 4:6, circumvenire, when one throws the other over the rope, and so surrounds him with wiles, that the righteous must be wrong. Now these are much more wicked than the public thieves and peelers. For the public thieves do freely against the law, so that everyone grasps and feels it, but these want to be pious, and have considered injustice to be right. And so they are two-fold wretches: first, that they do wrong; and second, that they adorn and protect that same wrong with law, which is worse than the first. For since Habakkuk says here that the law must waver and that wrong judgments must be made, he clearly indicates that those who act wrongly with law and judgment are adorning their wrong.
(22) So we have now how it was in the land, that it was full of bad boys, especially among the great merchants, and yet so that they do not want to be boys, and so they damage the others with two kinds of wickedness: one, that they do them wrong; the other, that they also defile and do wrong to those who are right, and under the appearance of pious people are desperate boys. This is then quite grievous, both in the sight of God and the world, therefore God cannot suffer it, but punishes it, as follows.
V. 5 Look among the Gentiles, behold and be amazed; for I will do something in your days which you will not believe when it is spoken of.
(23) Here he begins to punish the aforementioned boys. And first of all, he takes away their defiance and security, in which they relied. For they relied on the fact that they were God's people, and that God dwelt in Jerusalem in His holy temple; which city also until now was sometimes protected by great miraculous signs of God, not only against the surrounding countries, principalities and kingdoms, but also against the empire of Assyria itself, which before had disturbed and carried away all Israel, but before Jerusalem, in the time of King Jehishkiah, with all the shame of the kingdom of Assyria.
And on one night he lost an hundred and eighty-five men, and fled away [2 Kings 19:35, 36; Isa. 37:36, 37].
024 For this reason it was a ridiculous speech and a fool's bargain to the Jews, that Habakkuk and other prophets said how Jerusalem should be destroyed. They could never believe it until the hour when it happened; so firmly did their defiance stand on the fact that God dwelt with them at Jerusalem. And indeed it was not a small defiance, which reason could not forgive. There were false prophets who drew from the Scriptures sayings that God promised Christ in the future, and how glorious David's throne would become, and the like. About this Habakkuk and his like, who say the same contradiction, all must be liars. For it would not rhyme with each other that a glorious kingdom should be, and yet be destroyed.
025 So Habakkuk meets their defiance and throbbing, saying, "Look among the Gentiles, see, and marvel." As if to say, "You look to yourselves, look to yourselves alone, think highly of yourselves, be quite sure and certain that God alone is doing great things with you, that all the Gentiles should marvel, as he has done until now; but now look to it and see what I will do through the Gentiles. I will turn it around once, and through the Gentiles I will also do such a thing, which will also be strange and weird to you, so, 1) that you will not believe it until you experience and feel it, but will consider my prophets, Habakkuk, Jeremiah and their like, as fools and liars, and will not think that it is my word, which they speak to you about it. Just as King Zedekiah could not believe what Jeremiah said about it, so he summoned him and asked if it was God's word, Jer. 38:14 ff. What more wonderful thing could God do than to destroy His throne, His temple, His city and His people through His enemies, the Gentiles, whom He had made glorious and preserved against all the Gentiles and promised to be their God and protector forever?
1) Thus the Jena, Wittenberg and Erlangen: as.
26 But with this he sufficiently shows that he will not let us defy any thing, but only his grace and mercy. For here you see that the Jews do not help that they are God's people, that they are the seed of the fathers, that they have God's law, temple, throne, city, land and people; nor that so many miraculous signs have been performed on them so far; nor that they have God's promise. Why is that? Because all these things can be had without faith and the Spirit. As the Jews had it in part 2. But where it is had without spirit and faith, it does no more, for it makes the greater guilt before God. For who has much, of him much will be demanded [Lnc. 12, 48]. Above this, it makes proud, defiant, sure, presumptuous, hopeful people, who exalt themselves above all others who do not have it, and want to be God's people and His own alone, despising and condemning all others. God does not like that, that one defies something else than His grace, and lets it fail, with all those who defy it. But flesh and blood cannot believe this, it is much too strange for them, their defiance is too sure, until they experience it; as happens to the Jews here. For they did not respect the faith and the spirit, and thought that such things should be enough for them to be called God's people and to be protected. 3) They perish completely because of this.
27 All these things are said unto us also, who have the name and appearance of Christians, and boast of baptism, or spiritual state, and office, above the Gentiles and Jews; and are, yet without faith and spirit, as well as they: that, of course, we also must perish at the last by them whom we now despise, and had worse than ourselves; as was done unto the Jews by the Chaldeans.
The question here is: how does this rhyme with this text, since St. Paul Apost. 13, 40. 41. introduces this saying thus: "Take heed lest that which is spoken in the prophets come upon you: Look, you despisers, and marvel, and perish. For, behold, I do a thing in your days, which ye do not know.
2) In Latin: dollÄ 4u<lÄ6orura park.
3) Thus the Wittenberg; Jena and Erlangen: have been.
if any man shall tell you." Which St. Paul undoubtedly says of Christ's resurrection, as the text there enforces; which the Jews do not believe to this day. But Habakkuk speaks it of the disturbance of the land by the king of Babylon in the future, because of the sin of the people, as we see clearly in his speech. To this it is to be answered that this saying of St. Paul is used as a common speech in the same case. For one may well say of any of God's works that are to come: Behold, God will do something that no one believes, sing or say it; for the world does not believe God's word until it finds it in experience. Therefore Habakkuk needs the saying right on the great work of God, when the land should be disturbed; and Paul also right on the greatest work of God, of the resurrection of Christ, which had happened. For neither was believed.
(29) Even as we have need daily of all the sayings of the Scriptures against the pope and the wicked, which the prophets have spoken of disturbing the Jews. As when I say: God has done to the Pabst that no one would have believed, even if he had said it, and will still do to him that no one believes now, even if one says it, but it will be known. So also here Habakkuk wants to say: Well, God will do something that you do not believe, because it is said, until you realize it. But the fact that St. Paul says, "Behold, ye despisers," and Habakkuk, "Behold among the Gentiles," etc. makes it clear that Paul needs a different interpretation. There is nothing to it, the sum of the meaning is the same.
V. 6, 7: For, behold, I will raise up the Chaldeans, a bitter and swift nation, which shall go forth as far as the earth, to possess dwellings that are not theirs, and shall be cruel and terrible.
(30) This is the threat against the wicked, hardened sinners; but they have had their mockery and laughed, as it is said, even as the sons of Lot did in Genesis 19:14. Although the prophet makes it violent and great, and would have liked to frighten them and make them repent.
drive. For he says that God will not raise up evil enemies against them, but the Chaldeans, that is, the emperor of Babylon; for that same emperor was then in the ascendancy, and was always increasing. It is as if we were now to be threatened with the Turk, who would be too powerful and too evil for us; which is much more terrible than if a lesser prince were to do it in the vicinity of us.
(31) And he saith, It is a bitter people, that is, a wicked, fierce people, which dealeth wrathfully and tyrannically with the land and with the people. For it wants to be feared and despised, and where one refuses, it twists [the Chaldean], 1) and drives through with the head. Therefore the Jews should be afraid and not rely on it, as if the Chaldeans were lazy or obedient.
32 They are also quick about this, hurry, so that the Jews may not think that they are too far away and will not come for a long time. As if he were saying, "Correct yourselves, dear children, and do not rely on your thoughts, so that you think the Chaldeans are not celebrating so fiercely or are still far away; they are especially bitter and bitter to you Jews above all others, and may soon come.
33 Third, he points to their multitude: "For they will go as far as the land," that is, the land will be full of Chaldeans, so that it will teem with enemies in the land. As if he should say: If you are not frightened that such a mighty empire is raised against you, you should be frightened that it is so bitter and angry, and that it is especially grievous to you. If not, let it frighten you that it is so swift, swift and swift against you. If not, think that you are so much, and yours so little, that they would trample you to death with their feet. The Jews must have been very sure and careless that the prophet would frighten them so fiercely and powerfully, for they trusted that they alone were God's people and would not perish like that, as has been said.
34 Therefore the prophet continues and makes it even greater: "It will occupy dwellings," he says, "which are not his.
1) In Latin: erueiat sura.
that is, all your cities and houses, which they did not build, but you built for yourselves, and will not ask about it, nor will it help you that Jerusalem is God's city and dwelling place, on which the Jewish people relied heavily. But it is in vain, the Babylonian people will take everything, even if it is not true, because it is a cruel and terrible people. And Habakkuk finely puts the word "dwellings that are not his", not wanting to say even the dwelling place of God, as Jerusalem and the temple. For at that time it was very dangerous, offensive and blasphemous to say that Jerusalem should be lost, where God Himself dwelt, and the common man could not hear it. Therefore Habakkuk also avoids such words, and yet says so much that everything is understood under them.
For it will judge and press after its kind.
(35) Then he fetters the reason why the Babylonian people are so cruel and terrible, because they do not judge or sit in judgment according to any country's laws or customs, nor will they keep your law, but will deal with you according to their will, and will need victory according to their pleasure; they will not let you set a measure nor a goal, but as they are angry and bitter with you, so will they judge you according to their bitter resentment. And as it judges, so it will also press on and carry out its judgment with you; here it is called "judge and press according to its kind," that is, according to no law, but as it is minded and as it thinks fit. For this is the way the fierce are wont to act: when they have victory, there is no mercy, no justice, no fear of God, no equity, no patience, no recognition of their own sin and deserved punishment, but only, like the wild wolves, chilled according to the evil will of wrath, and smelled themselves in the most horrible way.
36 In our time, take an example from the bishops and the nobility, how they have smelled with all their might, and still daily take revenge on the peasants, and the innocent must suffer with the guilty, and do not let them be satisfied that they have the victory, and are again seated. That they
But if they also realize how guilty they are, and with their sins also well deserved to suffer not only a temporal damage from God, as a small punishment, but also death and hell, as a cheap punishment, then nothing will be out; to the next brighter everything will be restored, and no punishment will be lessened, as if they had never been guilty of nothing before God. Why is that? Because they should have no mercy before God for their sin, but because their hearts are hardened, so that they do not see their sin, and their mouths are closed, so that they cannot pray: Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive etc., and thus finally perish without all mercy. Therefore it is not in vain that the nobility commonly preys on lions, bears, wolves and other wild beasts; it means their kind.
V. 8 His horses are swifter than parrots and more agile than wolves in the evening.
37 I have not seen Parden, but the countrymen write that it is an animal that has many spots on its fur: and they are more gruesome than the "evening wolves", which some interpret: Wolves from the desert. For it both in Hebrew may be taken from the letters. But I hold that it is evening wolves; that the opinion is: the wolf, which by nature is a ravenous, predatory, murderous animal, but in the evening is much more predatory, because he has not run during the day, and is therefore hungry for the evening, that it is said "evening wolves" as much as hungry wolves that have not eaten for a long time, as also Zephaniah Cap. 3, 3. speaks of the false teachers: "Their shepherds are evening wolves, and leave nothing for the morning." So Habakkuk wants the wolves to be fast; not that they are fast-running before other animals, but that they hurry, and it is easy for them to rob when they are hungry, and they tear and rob more mercilessly. Thus he compares the Babylonians to the parrots and hungry wolves, that they hasten and hunt to rob and destroy the Jewish land; but once again to terrify and to amend, to provoke the people with such a parable.
And his horsemen come from afar, and fly along as an eagle hurries to the carrion.
Here a little bit is left out in the text. For thus he shall stand: His horsemen spread out, and his horsemen come from afar etc. And the prophet here pictures the Babylonian army before the eyes of the Jews, as if he saw it marching along. For this is how it is seen when an army comes from afar, that the horsemen are seen at first as a multitude; but the longer they go on, the more they become and come forth, as if they were increasing in number. This is what he means when he says: His horsemen spread out, that is, in the pulling they become the longer the more, if one admits how they come. And "coming from afar" also makes the bunch look bigger, when they move from afar, and one thinks that there is no end to it, and that there is still more in the distance.
39 So also "they fly along like an eagle to the carrion. There he touches the fast train and run, as it seems to him who sees the army coming; especially when he knows that it is meant for him, he thinks that they fly immediately and come all too soon, before one can prepare for defense. So Habakkuk needs the art of painting here, that he paints the approach of the enemies vox the eyes, and shows next to it, how it is to the sense of those, to whom it applies, namely, that they think, it is with them nothing else, but that they must let themselves be eaten, as the eagle eats a carrion, which cannot defend itself.
(40) There we see how subtle and plain the prophets can speak, and how they briefly, yet abundantly, strike out a thing. For that which another would have said in one word, that the Babylonians will come and destroy Jerusalem, Habakkuk speaks in many words, and actually cuts it all out and decorates it with parables. As one must do when preaching to the coarse, hard mob, one must paint, blaspheme and chew it, and try every way to soften them; it still helps as much as it can. But an intelligent man is soon preached to. So he stops even more, and continues to speak:
V. 9. They come only to transgress, like an east wind they go.
(41) I said above [§10] what "iniquity" means; in this way it is also to be understood here, that the prophet wants to say: The Babylonians come, not to do otherwise, but to exercise pure violence; justice or mercy is not respected there, guilty and innocent, one with the other, will have to suffer. As it always happens in a common land punishment, 1) that one cannot separate the innocent; yes, it goes most of all over the innocent.
(42) And here Habakkuk remarks, that the king of Babylon hath no right against the Jews, nor against other countries, which he destroyeth, because he saith, They come only to transgress. But he that committeth iniquity, and goeth by force, doeth not right, neither hath he right. And this, of course, is the title of all the kingdoms on earth, especially those that break out in war; as the 76th Psalm, v. 5, calls them "mountains of mischief"; therefore they must also be destroyed in the end, as happened to Babylon and Rome, so that St. Augustine well and truly says: "What are great kingdoms but great robbery? But God still needs their iniquity, so that he can punish those he wants,
The "east wind" is the wind that comes from the morning, which the Latin Bible calls ventum urentem, that is, the one that blows and is more harmful than the sun's heat, just as the wind from the evening is moist and fertile. The wind from noon brings weather. The wind from midnight makes it beautiful and drives away the clouds, each according to its kind. Just as the east wind withers and takes away the strength and sap of the earth and what grows there, so the Babylonians will come and destroy everything in all the lands. And as no one can resist the east wind, so no one can resist the Babylonians. Cruelly the prophet does it, and paints long over the Babylonian army to soften and frighten the stiff-necked Jews.
It will gather prisoners together like sand.
44 That is, it will catch many people in lands and take them away with everything they have,
1) Original and Wittenberg: landscape. In Latin: iä Huoä xüsruLHUs M in oorumuui oujusäum terrae p06ou.
without distinction, both of the rich and mighty, unmercifully all in a heap among themselves, as one gathers hay or straw together. It is the Hebrew way, when they want to make a thing much, to compare it to the sand. Gen 22:17 God said to Abraham that his seed should be as many as the stars of heaven and the sand of the sea. 7:12, the Midianites were as many in the land as the sand of the sea, and so on. So here also: "It will gather captives together like sand", that is, out of measure much.
V. 10: It will mock kings and laugh at princes; all fortresses will be a joke to it. For it will make rubble, and yet win them.
45 He takes all comfort and defiance, so that the Jews will not rely on any human help. For though kings, princes, and strong cities set themselves against him, as Jerusalem and Tyre, yet the might and power of the Babylonians is too great, that nothing shall help; yea, it shall come to pass so easily, that he shall make a mockery of it, when they shall set themselves against him, and set themselves in defense. So no amount nor power of the people will help, no wall nor fortress will protect. Where he cannot overthrow the walls, he will make such a high rubble around it that he will shoot in and run over the walls. With this, the prophet refers especially to the city of Jerusalem, on which the Jews also relied, because it was so solid and well-preserved that much is said and written about it.
V. 11. Then he will take a new courage, will go on and sin; then his victory must be of his God.
46 Here he describes how the Babylonians will misuse their victory for their pride and blasphemy against God. So that they will sin, that God will have to overthrow and destroy them in the end.
(47) For no human heart is able to do this, that it should not exalt itself and boast when it is well and happy; as all this is not only shown in the holy Scriptures, but also testified to by the Gentiles from experience.
as the poet Virgilius says: 1) nescia mens hominum servare modum rebus sublata secundis, a human heart cannot keep measure when happiness is there. Again, it can also not keep even when it is in trouble, so that [it] should not despair and sink. It is too soft and too weak on both sides, but much weaker. Fortune to bear than misfortune, as one says: A man can suffer all things without good days. And again: It must be even strong legs, which should carry good days. This can also be seen in experience: to whom good, honor, and all kinds of happiness come to him according to his will, he cannot stop strutting, defying, prouding, raving, until misfortune comes and fights him; as it is said: good makes courage, courage makes arrogance, arrogance makes poverty, but poverty is painful, pain seeks good again. 2) This is the course of the world in its ripeness and circle, and the way of man; nothing else turns out differently.
48 Take an example from the next uprising among the peasants. For the sorry example is to be remembered for eternity and never forgotten. Since the peasants got what they wanted, God help them, what defiance, pride, glory, splendor and all the courage and arrogance there was; there was no more hearing nor seeing, no more measure nor wisdom, but with the head through, up out, and nowhere on. Again, the same misfortune, how faint, despondent, and ruinous it makes the overlords, who before had vain lion hearts, there was no courage nor glory, but vain flight and trembling. But now the wheel has turned, and the overlords have prevailed and are fortunate, but the peasants have been slain, and once again there is no measure nor wisdom on either side. The overlords do not know how to cool their courage sufficiently; the peasants are so despondent that they do not know what to do. May God grant that no evil come of it, that both lords and subjects fail, just as happened to these Babylonians in the end, as we will hear later.
49. because the king with his people
1) Vir.]. lid. X, v. 501 8H. cit. according to memory.
2) Lonicer in his Latin translation has given "good" by opss.
when they saw that he was so slimy and happy for his kingdom, and that no king, prince, city, or country could resist them, they grew in courage and took on a new courage (as Habakkuk says here), that is, they first became more defiant and proud than they had ever been before, for the sake of great happiness; they could not measure up, nor recognize themselves, nor give glory to God, when all his happiness was a mere, undeserved gift from God. Just as even now our princes and bishops do not give glory to God, that they remain, nor can they recognize and humble themselves.
(50) But "they go on (says Habakkuk) and sin," that is, they pass through, boasting and defying, truanting, and going along as if they were now sure, and jumped over all mountains, and thus sin with two abominable sins, which shall at last overthrow them most abominably. One sin is the same arrogance that they practice against the people they have overpowered, and they tyrannize against them with all their might. The other is blasphemy, that they do not give glory to God, but make themselves believe that they are so pious and worthy before God, despising and blaspheming those whom they have overcome, as those who have been condemned and rejected by God and deserve it. So they run away and sin against God as well, so that they may burden both God and man, and become untrustworthy of both, and soon perish, which is what they are striving for.
(51) The first sin, pride, committed against men, is grievous to the human heart; but the prophet, like all the saints, is much more grieved by the other sin, blasphemy, which they commit against God. Therefore, he continues to point them out and answer them. The first he calls badly by a common name and says: "They sin with pride. But the others he attacks with bitter and sharp words, and says: "Then his victory must be of his god", that is, he has not enough in his arrogance that he overcomes the people and weighs them down, he must also give glory to his idol in Babylonia, as if the same had given him such power and victory. Yes, yes, the true God of Jerusalem must not have done this.
but, as a much weaker and lesser God, be overcome together with his people, the Jews, and succumb to his Babylonian God. This is the one whose great victory must be called. Where is the God of the Jews now? Just as 2 Kings 18:33-35, the archbishop of the king of Assyria said that his lord had conquered all the gods in the lands around him, and that the God of the Jews would not be able to resist him.
52] This is what greatly perverts the prophet, that the wicked not only do not recognize their power and victory, from whom they got it, but also harden themselves in their wickedness, blaspheme God freely and surely, give to the devil what they have from God, and make their wickedness a virtue, and the people of God sinners and boys. That is why the prophet is so angry and impatient with this sin until the end of this chapter, that the Babylonians should be right and defy it, and the people of God should be wrong, because they suffer misfortune and those have happiness.
(53) The Jews also defied Christ in the same way when they were on top and had crucified Him, blaspheming and saying, "If He is the Son of God, let Him help Him now" (Matth. 27:40,42). Just as if God was on their side and they were right and Christ was wrong. Then their victory and power must also be of their God, that is, of their devil and idol, not knowing and thinking that the right God had thus abandoned Christ and given Him into their hands, and yet loving Christ and being angry with them; as all godless tyrants do, and measure God's grace according to bodily fortune or misfortune.
54. Just as our bishops and princes are doing now: because God has given them the victory against the peasants, and besides that they have many innocent Christians tortured and persecuted, they do not think otherwise that their cause is good and right and pleases God, are defiant and insolent, think they are doing God a service, do not think that their God and cause is vain devilry, because they see that they are lucky and the gospel is unlucky; but do not know that the same persecuted Christians' God and cause is right, and God has given them into their hands, as He did with Christ Himself and all the
Saints has done. Therefore they go on and on, blaspheming and saying: Where is now thy Christ? let him help thee. Then their power and victory must also be of their God, and they are right. This is the true Christian cross, that one not only suffers evil, but must also be wrong, and be reckoned with the wrongdoers, like Christ.
(55) But it shall come to a desolate end with them, and when they have sown their honey, they shall be sour mustard. For because they do not fear God in his judgments and works, and do not humble themselves, he confidently lets them go on, so that they have happiness and victory in abundance, and makes them fools in their cleverness and conceit, so that they fill their sin, and harden themselves, until the hour comes for him to deal with them, as with the Babylonians and the Jews, and all such tyrants. For where are they now who said to Christ, "He hopes in God, who now redeems him, does he delight in him"? [Matth. 27, 43.] Where is their God, to whom they gave the victory? Christ has remained, but they have vanished and flown away like dust in the field.
(56) We may take comfort in this now. For the hour will come very soon, when they will say of our tyrants, bishops and priests: Where are they? Where is their God now? Where is their precious, right cause? Where is their Christian church? Where are they who said, Let thy gospel and Christ help thee? But that they now conquer and rage, defy and strut, and give the victory to their God, as if God were with them against us, this serves to make them confident, foolish, obdurate, and finely ripe for punishment, and when it is already said to them, they should not believe it, but laugh at it, so that they will not convert and be preserved.
V. 12. Who art thou, O Lord, my God, my Holy One, from everlasting. Let us not die, but let him, O Lord, be only a punishment; and let him, O our refuge, chastise us only.
(57) Here he reproaches himself with the sin of the blasphemers, and punishes them, and comforts his own; to say, that the Babylonians prevail and are victorious, but we suffer and are defeated is
Not because the Babylonian God is a right God, to whom they attribute such power, nor because they are so pious and righteous, or because we are sinners and unrighteous; but it is you, O Lord, who do all these things, and trust us, and raise them up; so is your will. They know not this, and fight with it against thee, which thou givest them, even power and victory, and givest it to their god. But there are two reasons why you do this. The first is that you use their wickedness as a rod to chastise your loved ones, as Isaiah Cap. 10:5 says: "Assyria is my rod," and Revelation 3:19: "Whom I love, I chastise. The other is that they will run and become fools over this counsel of yours, which they do not know, and after that they will perish, as is said above (cf. § 10), and as he will continue to say in the third chapter. For thus one speaks: When the father has punished the child, he throws the rod into the fire.
(58) So the prophet prayed that God would keep the punishment and not let the Jewish people fall to the ground, saying instead of the people and with the people, "O Lord, my God, my Holy One! For no people under the sun had or knew the right GOtt, without the Jewish people alone, therefore they alone could say, "my GOtt." But he calls him his "Holy One," as the prophets used to call GOtt the Holy One in Israel, Isa. 1, 4.: "They blaspheme the Holy One in Israel." Psalm 89, 19.: "The Lord is our shield, and the Holy One in Israel is our King." So here also: "My God, my Holy One." And that because they were holy through their God, and nothing else; as he says Deut. 20, 8. 21, 8. 15.23.: "It is I who sanctify you." Just as we now become Christians, that is, saints, through Christ alone, and nothing else, not through our work or merit etc.
59. Further he says, "O Lord, are you not from eternity?" As if he should say: Oh Lord, there is no other God than you, the old, true, eternal God, and not a new, false God, like the one of Babylon and others, who have come and been invented with the time. With this he consoles himself and his own, also defies and mocks the Babylonian god, whom
the Babylonians raise so high. For it gives great courage when one knows and believes with certainty that there is only One God, and that He is our God, our Holy One, and holds with us. What can all the gods on earth do? Since you alone are God and our Holy One, and we are your people, so that everything is in your hands, have mercy on us and do not let us die or even be destroyed by the Babylonians, but only be punished and chastened, so that seed may remain for your people, as you have promised. For this prayer is based on God's promise, since He spoke to the people that He would not completely abandon them, even though He would not keep them all [Isa. 1, 29]. Rom. 9, 29.
60 In Hebrew, this text baß, which can be rendered in German, reads thus: Is it not so, O Lord, that from of old you are my God, my Holy One, that we shall not die? In it, the prophet briefly summarizes and comprehends all of God's promises and miracles that befell the Jewish people. As if to say: Do you also know, or do you not remember, that you promised us to be our God and have never let us perish? So you will not let us perish now. For you are our God, in whom we live and do not die, as you have said to us. And what follows is attached to this passage in Hebrew, and may also be read in interrogative terms, thus: Is it not so, O Lord, that from of old thou art my God, my Holy One, that we shall not die, but use him for punishment, O Lord, and set him for chastening, O our refuge?
(61) He asks God whether he will also do so and only punish; not that he doubts it, but that he may show how faith is challenged, that it seems weak, as if it did not believe, and immediately wants to sink and doubt before the great calamity that oppresses it. For even though faith remains firm, it still cracks and speaks much differently when it is in battle than it does when it has won. So it was hard for the people to believe that they would be preserved in this case of the Babylonian prison, or that they would always come back, and that this would only be a punishment. Therefore follows further:
V. 13. Your eyes are pure, so that you cannot see evil, and you cannot see misery.
(62) As if he should say, "Well then, be pure of eye, that you may not suffer evil, as it is preached of you that you are righteous, and leave no evil unpunished; how then is it that you do much else, and suffer such evil, and do not punish [it]? In Hebrew it reads: Mundare oculis, vel sis plane mundus oculis, et est amara concessio1 ) in opere contrario, as we would say in German of one who would be of good report, and yet would do otherwise: Well, you are pious, but how do you do so? should a pious man do this? So also here: "Well, Lord, you are righteous, they say of you, but where is your righteousness?
With such words Habakkuk shows what thoughts occur to the struggling faith, which thinks that God is righteous, but he consumes so long, and watches the wicked, that one would almost think that he is not righteous, but has pleasure in the boys. Just as we would like to think now that God is persecuting and blaspheming our gospel so miserably that both violence and sectarianism are increasing daily, and we would also like to say, "You are pure of eye and do not like to see violence and injustice, but when will you prove it in action? Methinks thou wilt think us wrong, and them righteous, when we are sure that we are right, and they wrong.
64 Not only the common people had such a weakness or challenge of faith, but also the prophet himself, as well as all other prophets; as Jeremiah Cap. 12, 1. ff. also does, and says: "Lord, you are righteous, if I would be right with you; but yet I must speak to you of the right. How is it then that the wicked prosper so, and all the scornful are so blessed? Thou hast planted them, and they are well rooted; they continue, and are fruitful; thou art near their mouth, and far from their kidneys." And Psalm 73, 2. 3.: "My feet would have almost slid, and my gait would have almost strayed.
1) In the Wittenberg and Erlangen translations: eontsssio. The Jena and Latin translations: eonesssio.
I rejoiced when I saw that the wicked were doing so well" etc. For it grieves us exceedingly that the unrighteous should suffer so long, and at the same time earn so much happiness through injustice, and the righteous earn so much misfortune through their piety. But all this is done so that they may prosper, and our faith may be extended, strong and rich in God. As Habakkuk also says hereafter of the king of Babylon; as also the above-mentioned 73rd Psalm, v. 18, says that God lifts up the wicked, so that he brings them low. And [in] Jeremiah follows swiftly upon the foregoing words, saying [Cap. 12, 3.], "Gather them like sheep to the slaughter, and prepare them for the day of strangulation."
V.13. Why then do you look to the scornful, and keep silent, that the wicked devour him who is more pious than he?
(65) Then the fighting faith clashes with the happiness of the wicked, and tells it one after another. As if he should say: I believe it, and I am sure of it, that you alone are God, and the wicked may do nothing without your will; why then do you watch and keep silent? And uses strong words. He calls the wicked despisers, which means the reprobate, secure, free men who think nothing at all of God's word and work, so that no man can think nothing at all of any thing, which St. Paul calls Eph. 4, 19. apilgicotes \Üðçëãç÷üôåò, which we call "the wicked".
In Latin: qui non solum contemnunt, sed etiam negligunt, quasi indignos habeant, quos contemnant; in Hebrew Boged. Just as we think of the Jews, and the Jews think of us, since one considers the other to be nothing at all. Just as some wicked people now think nothing at all of the gospel, that it is a joke to them, and have nothing more certain than that it is nothing.
Such people, who neither feel nor accept anything, are called Bogdim and apilgicotes, wicked, so that there is no taste or smell, and everything is gone in their hearts. Thus the pagans write of the tyrant Dionysio, when he had robbed the temple, and got good weather to ship, that he boasted and said, Behold, how good
God gives weather to the church thieves. Where there is no Christian patience, flesh and blood should wish that ten thunders would fall on such a one's head and strike nine cubits deep into the earth. We call such a one daring, who waved it freely, 1) and almost agrees with the Hebrew boged, or woged.
67 Secondly, that God does nothing at all to such reckless, wicked people, that he keeps silent, and strengthens them equally, as if it were nothing at all, as they hold, and is also wicked about them, as they are about him, also does not feel, and does not accept anything, that there are two reckless people against each other, God and the wicked: oh, this is a displeasing silence to God, and an unpleasant contempt to the reckless people. So he also shows the Babylonians here, that they were sure of their things and bold, that they might have believed everything before, before they believed that God considered the Jews to be His people and the Babylonians to be His enemies. There was nothing more certain than that we Babylonians are God's children and the Jews are His enemies. They were so deceived by fortune; as it is with all the wicked.
Now, this is not yet beyond measure, when a prophet is to stand for himself in such fighting faith; but when he enters his office, and is to comfort and sustain a whole people in the same fight with him, there is trouble, lamentation and distress; there the people wriggle, and hardly two or three in the whole crowd shall believe and fight with him, the others all get angry at the bold tyrant, and think: Oh, it is nothing with us, God is against us. Do you not see how he lifts and carries those, but leaves and despises us? Yes, preach what you want, I see
1) So in all editions. It seems to us that it should be read: "We call such a one daring, who freely woget'-), and almost agrees with the Hebrew Boged or Woged", so that the opinion is: it is a consonance in the words "vermögen" and "Boged". The Latin translator offers: Hujusinodi nos auüaeom, Hui nullo N6qu6 veuin ne^ne bonnnuin rospeotu Huidvis attontaro audet, Hui non lonAO ab bebrasa voos (bo^sd) ant (VuoAsd) intorvallo distat, vooaN1U8.
that is: dares.
what the opinion is. It is like Moses at the Red Sea [Exodus 14], and at Paran with Korah [Exodus 16], where neither speech nor counsel helps. That is why Habakkuk writes this piece with important and many words, to strengthen and comfort the people.
69 Third, that God gives the wicked such great fortune that he devours those who are more pious than he is, that is, the Jews in particular, along with many other countries and people who have also been more pious than the Babylonians. For so it is, where there is great wealth and power, there is also great sin and injustice. Money makes thieves, fortune makes husks. As has been said, great fortune is too heavy for a man to bear. Now it would be a little easier if the wicked did not eat the pious, but those who are worse or equally wicked. But now God allows them to devour the most pious. Sometimes it would be easier if the wicked alone would punish or do a little harm to the pious; but this is especially wretched, that the wicked devour and even devour the pious, leaving nothing, but destroying everything, as the 79th Psalm, v. 7, says: "Lord, they have devoured Jacob and made his cities desolate" etc. And in addition to all this, they have the glory and honor, as if God were with them, and have done well, as Habakkuk says above [v. 11] with bitter words: "Then his victory must be of his God."
70. All this is quite a cross for the children of God. Their suffering must be done in such a way that they must succumb and be wronged, and see that their enemies lead the victory over them, and still boast of God; as Christ also says John 16:2: "The hour is coming that whoever kills you will think that he is doing God a service. This is how Christ himself was on the cross. But there lies hidden the high and deep wisdom of God, there He is wondrous in His saints [Ps. 4, 4.], even in His enemies. All this goes beyond all reason and experience of human understanding.
V.14. And let men go like fish in the sea, like worms that have no master.
71 All this is still talked about in martial faith, by the godless Babylonian fortune.
about other country and people. How do the fish in the sea go? They have no rule nor order to defend themselves against anyone, but float along; he who sows sows, he who eats has; there is no one to defend or defend, so that such fish are no different than those laid before the eyes of the eaters. Men saw them and eat them, great fish and vipers eat them, eagles, harriers and other birds eat them, beavers and other animals eat them, they are only food, both to 1) men, birds, animals and fish. In the same way you let all the lands and people be to the Chaldeans, that they only saw, eat and gobble. Is it not grievous then, that to such wicked, ungodly men, all godly lands and people should be like kitchen tables, which they saw, slaying and devouring as they will? Just as Paul [Rom. 8, 36.] also leads the saying from the Psalter [Ps. 44, 23.]: "We must die daily for thy sake, yet we are counted as sheep for the slaughter."
The other, "like worms that have no master," is just the same. For he speaks not, in my opinion, of the worms of the land, but in the sea, as there are the small fishes, as Ps. 104:25: "There are worms without number in the sea." For Remes, in Hebrew, means everything that crawls and creeps, which I call worms, although the word is too narrow, but I have no other. We speak: It creeps and swarm. And Habakkuk adds this to indicate which fish he is talking about, namely the small ones, which are poor little worms compared to their eaters. For man has fishing rods, nets, twine, baskets, fish traps and all kinds of gear to sow and eat them, without what birds and large fish do with beaks and claws. All these have no master, that is, they have no order, nor do they know how to keep to anyone, but go astray, only to feed others.
V. 15: He draws it all with his heels, he fetches it with his net, and gathers it with his yarn.
73. he makes fishermen out of the chaldeans, like Moses, Genesis 10:9, out of the nim-.
1) Instead of "the" in the original and in the editions we have put "den". Walch already had: "at the".
rod makes a hunter. And as I have said, man hath divers instruments to see the fishes: so here also he giveth unto the king of Babylon, that he is a mighty and skillful fisherman, who with divers painting draweth, seeth, and gathereth all things unto himself. These "fishes, nets and yarns" are nothing else than his great and mighty armies, so that he has won all the lands and people, and has drawn all the world's goods, jewels, silver and gold, interest and annuity to himself in Babylon, so that he also takes away the vessels in the temple at Jerusalem. For what is it but for a great king to send forth his army over a land, and to gain it, to take all the Baar's burden of money and treasure, and to carry away the people, and at the last to keep interest and rent in the same land, as a fisherman that casteth out his net, and draweth all that he soweth, and keepeth that is good?
He rejoices and is glad.
(74) How perverted it is to the prophet that the wicked Chaldeans have such good fortune, and that they are glad of it, when all the earth and people weep and are grieved. They are in good spirits and think they have done well. How they are tickled by such victory and happiness, and they feel so good, but they do not know that God is fattening them up for the slaughter.
(75) Now all these things are written for our sakes, that such and such an example may be our consolation, when we also see that the wicked are so well off, and they glory and rejoice over us in our misery, and shall not think otherwise, it is fattened cattle. 12, 3.] For the cattle that are fattened are not put forth for pleasure or for custom, but into the kitchen for the meat-bank; but those that are put forth for pleasure and for custom are kept lean and slender. God is a great cook, has also a great kitchen, therefore he fattens great beasts, that is, mighty kings and princes, and fattens them well, that they may have more than all abundance of goods, honor, pleasure and power, makes them merry and dance, even over the necks and bodies of his children, as Herod's daughter danced over St. John. John danced [Matth. 14, 6.], and the world was joyful when Christ said [Joh. 16, 20.],since the apostles were grieved. So tickled the king of Babylon and
He was especially successful in winning over the Jews, who were famous for being unconquerable because of God, 1) and dealt with them more cruelly than with others.
V.16. For this reason he sacrifices to his net and burns incense to his yarn, because through them his portion has become so fat and his food so complete.
76) Above [v. 11] he says: "Then his victory must be of his god", that is, he gives the honor to his idol Bel and Nebo (for so Isaiah Cap. 46, 1. calls the god of Babylon), and not to the right God of Jerusalem. Here he says, "that he sacrifices to his net, and burns incense to his yarn," when we have now said that his net and yarn are to be understood as his army power. How then does he sacrifice the same, and yet at the same time give glory to his God? Answer: The prophet is so inflamed about the Chaldeans that he mocks the king of Babylon and the Shemites, along with their god and worship, for the great zeal he has for God and his people. As if he should say: To whom do you burn incense and sacrifice? If there is no God, then the idol is nothing, as St. Paul says 1 Cor. 10:19. I will tell you 2) to whom such sacrifice and incense is done, that is, to your own net, to your own power. For whoever boasts about a thing and is happy and joyful about it, as you are about such happiness, but does not give thanks to the right God, as you also do, makes himself an idol, gives him the glory himself, does not rejoice in God, but in his power and work. Therefore, even though you call God with your mouth, and sacrifice and burn incense before the idol with your hand, it is nothing in the bottom of your heart, but you think highly of yourselves, and please yourselves that you are able to do such things, and think that you are worthy and deserving. Therefore your net, that is, your power and authority, is your God, to whom you sacrifice and burn incense. For you rely on your power, defy it, boast of it, rejoice in it. If this were not the case, your idol would be of little help or pleasure to you.
2) So the Jenaer and Walch; Wittenberger and Erlanger: also.
77 In the same way, Isaiah Cap. 2, 8: "They worship the work of their hands and the work that their fingers have done"; and Apost. 7, 41. Stephen says: "They rejoiced in the works of their hands." For what a man rejoices in that he relies on is his God; for he should rely on no one but God alone, nor rejoice in any other thing but God. But the wicked must take comfort in their works and violence; that is their God, they cannot do otherwise.
78. Now the prophet will say: How fine a God you have! Your net, your own power is your God, which you do not have, but from our God. He also rebukes blasphemers for not giving glory to God, and accuses them before God for such great ingratitude and perverse, blasphemous idolatry. As if to say: This is the fruit of your not punishing them, and making them so fortunate that they not only oppress men, but also touch you themselves, and give your honor to their net, the violence they have from you. This makes "his portion so fat, and his meat so full," that is, by such violence he has got so great a good and kingdom, and is well fattened. But to be well fattened makes idolatry, as Moses speaks in his song [Deut. 32:5]: "He is fat, and fat, and became complete; therefore he became rebellious." The two divine services, sacrifice and incense, are almost common in Scripture, and
come from the Law of Moses; but whether the Babylonians also had the two, or whether the prophet intended to interpret those services by these names, I leave to each one his own discretion; there is nothing in it.
V. 17 For this reason he still casts his net and will never stop strangling people.
The more money becomes, the greater avarice becomes, that one can never satisfy it with good, but only continues. So also all other human evil airs. The greater honor one has, the more he wants to have, the more land and power, the more desire to increase the same. Thus the pagans write of the great Alexandro that he was not satiated with a whole world. For when he heard from a philosopher that there was much more than one world, he sighed and said, "And I have not yet gained one. So here Habakkuk chides the king of Babylon's insatiable avarice for not allowing him to be satisfied, but because his portion is so fat, he still casts his net to gain more land and people, and is called strangling people. Because to win land and people, there is no other way, one strangles people over it. But there the murderous avarice does not ask, that he is only rich and fat. And here you see for yourself that his violence is to be understood by the net, by which he strangles the people and draws their goods to himself.