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If it seems slow,
wait for it;
it will surely come;
it will not delay.
- Habakkuk 2:3

Habakkuk Part 4

1182 words long.

Published on 2024-03-30

The Incomprehensible Remedy

God’s answer in the second section was to confirm that Judah would be punished for its wickedness and that the Chaldean invaders were to be the agents of that discipline. Thus when God speaks again in the fourth section, one must imagine that Habakkuk was expecting good news that God would soon restore Judah. The anticipation builds throughout the section. There are four parts to the section with the first three being composed of four parts and the fourth breaking pattern and being composed of one. In a book styled with such precise mathematical structure, a departure from pattern arouses notice.

And the Lord answered me:

(A) “Write the vision;
(B) make it plain on tablets,
(C) so he may run
(D) who reads it.
- Habakkuk 2:2

The first quartet is instructions for preparing and delivering the message. It must be copied onto many tablets so runners may go out in every direction. Surely the message is of supreme importance!

(A) For still the vision awaits its appointed time;
(B) it hastens to the end, it will not lie.
(C) If it seems slow, wait for it;
(D) it will surely come; it will not delay.
- Habakkuk 2:3

In the second quartet, we are told in four ways that the fulfillment of the vision will be exactly when the Lord determines using these time phrases: “awaits its … time”, “hastens”, “seems slow” and “not delay”. In parallel fashion we find four assurances to counter doubt: “appointed”, “will not lie”, “wait for it” and “surely come”. God invites the hearer to place faith in Him.

(A) Behold, his soul is puffed up;

it is not upright within him,
(**) but the righteous shall live by his faith.

(B) Moreover, wine is a traitor,

an arrogant man who is never at rest.

(C) His greed is as wide as Sheol;

like death he has never enough.

(D) He gathers for himself all nations

and collects as his own all peoples.”
- Habakkuk 2:4-5

The third quartet describes four qualities of the wicked, with something else slipped in about the righteous. Each wicked quality comes in a couplet. They are pride, arrogant treachery, greed, and oppression (which subsumes theft). Notice how the progression is from inward corruption at the start, through traitorous scheming, via escalating greed until finally bursting forth in conquest and enslavement. Evil grows.

Then the message ends. What? Where is the hoped for rescue? That is where the injected verse comes in. Tucked in between pride and arrogance is faith. The righteous must live among the wicked. By faith he will be rescued from a world dominated by evil.

The hidden message is that this reveals the character of the five civilizations to follow before Israel would be reborn. It does this cleverly by intermixing the four wicked qualities with the righteousness of faith to arrive at number five. It is actually conveying qualitative and quantitative information.

  • The first, puffed up empire was Babylon, personified by Nebuchadnezzar and his head of gold.
  • The second was Persia. By faith Queen Esther and Mordecai saved their people. This interval was the most beneficial to the Jewish people, as they were permitted to rebuild the temple and Jerusalem.
  • The third was Greece. “Wine is a traitor” was prophetic. Alexander the Great died after excessive drinking at a banquet. In Peace, evidence was given (based on Job 20) that Alexander was poisoned by one of his generals.
  • The fourth was Rome. The greed of Rome was unparalleled. It lasted longer and stole more than any other empire. Consider its civilizational offspring, the ten toes (Daniel 2:41-42) that represent the ten European colonial empires. They collectively conquered most of the world. Worse than this, though, the greed of Rome was literally as wide as Sheol. They stole the life of the savior and tried to imprison him in the grave, with soldiers posted by the tomb to prevent Christ’s escape.
  • The fifth and last was the Islamic Empires. In this description there is irony. Even as the Ottoman Empire tried to gather for itself all nations, it ended up facilitating the ingathering of the Jews. Their 19th century land reforms enabled the Jews to start buying up the land and return to their homeland.
  • As a young man, only two parts of Habakkuk resonated with me. The first was the psalm in 3:17-19. The second was the short phrase “the righteous shall live by his faith”. This part of God’s message is the tiny word of hope that finally connected with Habakkuk, enabling him to pen that final psalm. Salvation by grace through faith is the most important message that humanity has ever received. It is the heart of Habakkuk.

Hebrew poetry is often structured as a chiasm. Habakkuk forms a chiasm of seven parts with this as its heart. Here is that structure:

(A) Questions of doubt
    (B) Wicked fight now in haste and win a victory
        (C) The lawless ensnare people who are 
            “like crawling things that have no ruler”
            (D) Faith will preserve the life of the righteous 
                amid a world of evil
        (C’) God, the ruler of the universe, pronounces woe
             upon lawbreakers to enforce his laws
    (B’) God in the future will patiently win the final victory
(A’) Trusting Praise of Faith

The whole book is a call to faith. However, let us not criticize Habakkuk for the tough questions he put to the Lord. Only a man of faith stands upon the ramparts and waits patiently for an answer from God. His small faith was rewarded by greater faith. God showed up. In the end, the vision did not lie.

Links to the other articles in this section:

  1. Connections to other books The scope of inquiry is given. The riddle is connected to Genesis, Psalms 34 and 119, Jeremiah 32, Habakkuk, John 21, Matthew 13, and Revelation 9.
  2. Defining 153 Noah's Flood is shown to have lasted precisely 153 days.
  3. Fear 153 is connected to the Fear of the Lord through Psalms 24 and 119, Luke 12 and 2 Kings 17.
  4. Hope Jeremiah connects a related victory number, seventeen (17), to hope. Then the themes of John 21 are connected to Habakkuk.
  5. Habakkuk: Part 1 Analysis of Habakkuk 1:1-4. Habakkuk puts questions to God.
  6. Habakkuk: Part 2 Analysis of Habakkuk 1:5-11. God doubles down: the bitter and hasty Chaldeans are coming.
  7. Habakkuk: Part 3 Analysis of Habakkuk 1:12-2:1. Habakkuk complains with three threes about innocent people caught in a cruel net.
  8. Habakkuk: Part 4 Analysis of Habakkuk 2:2-5. God offers a fourfold assurance to the faithful.
  9. Habakkuk: Part 5 Analysis of Habakkuk 2:6-20. Five woes are pronounced against lawbreakers.
  10. Habakkuk: Part 6 Analysis of Habakkuk 3:1-16. Prophecy of God's coming six-ply war against the wicked.
  11. Habakkuk: Part 7 Analysis of Habakkuk 3:17-19. Six laments over a barren harvest and a seventh praise of God in faith.
  12. The Fifth Trumpet of Revelation The Revelation 9 Plague of Locusts lasts 153 Years.
  13. Habakkuk's War Revisits the sixth section of Habakkuk with a final insight into God's battle plan.

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