MKJV - Habakkuk

Chapter 1

1:1  The burden which Habakkuk the prophet saw.

1:2  O LORD, until when shall I cry and You will not hear? I cry out to You of violence, and You do not save!

1:3  Why do You show me evil, and You look on toil? For destruction and violence are before me; and there is strife, and contention rises up.

1:4  Therefore the law has become helpless, and justice does not always go forth. For the wicked entraps the righteous; therefore justice goes forth, being perverted.

1:5  Look among the nations, and behold and wonder marvelously; for I will work a work in your days which you will not believe, not even if it is declared to you.

1:6  For lo, I raise up the Chaldeans, the bitter and hasty nation, which shall march through the breadth of the land to possess homes not their own.

1:7  He is terrible and fearful; his judgment and his majesty comes forth from Himself.

1:8  His horses also are swifter than the leopards, and are more fierce than the evening wolves. And their horsemen shall spread themselves, and their horsemen shall come from afar. They shall fly like the eagle hurrying to eat.

1:9  All of him shall come for violence; the gathering of their faces is forward; and they gather captives like the sand.

1:10  And they shall scoff at the kings, and the rulers shall be a scorn to them. They shall laugh at every stronghold, for he shall heap up dust and capture it.

1:11  Then he sweeps on like a wind, and he transgresses and is guilty, crediting his power to his god.

1:12  Are You not from everlasting, O LORD my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O LORD, You have ordained them for judgment; and, my Rock, You have established them for correction.

1:13  You are of purer eyes than to behold evil, and can not look upon vexation. Why do You look upon those who deal deceitfully? Will you be silent when the wicked swallows one more righteous than he?

1:14  For You make man like the fish of the sea, like creeping things with no ruler over them?

1:15  He takes up all of them with the hook; he drags him with his net and gathers him with his seine; therefore he rejoices and exults.

1:16  So he sacrifices to his net and burns incense to his seine; because by them his portion is fat and his food rich.

1:17  Shall he then empty his net, and shall he not spare to continually slay nations?

Chapter 2

2:1  I will stand on my watch and set myself on the tower, and will watch to see what He will say to me, and what I shall answer when I am reproved.

2:2  And the LORD answered me and said, Write the vision, and make it plain on the tablets, that he who reads it may run.

2:3  For the vision is still for an appointed time, but it speaks to the end, and it does not lie. Though it lingers, wait for it; because it will surely come. It will not tarry.

2:4  Behold, the soul of him is lifted up, and is not upright; but the just shall live by his faith.

2:5  And also wine indeed betrays a proud man, and he is not content. He widens his soul like Sheol, and he is like death, and is not satisfied, but gathers all nations to himself, and heaps to himself all the peoples.

2:6  Shall not all these lift up a parable against him, and a mocking riddle to him, and say, Woe to him who increases what is not his! Until when, then, shall he load the pledges on himself?

2:7  Shall not those who strike you rise up suddenly, and those who shake you awake, and you become a prize to them?

2:8  Because you have stripped many nations, all the rest of the people shall strip you; because of men's blood, and the violence of the land, of the city, and of all who dwell in it.

2:9  Woe to him who robs evil booty for his house, to set his nest on high, to be delivered from the hand of evil!

2:10  You have planned shame to your house, to make an end of many people, and are sinning in your soul.

2:11  For the stone shall cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber shall answer it.

2:12  Woe to him who builds a town with blood, and establishes a city by iniquity!

2:13  Behold, is it not for the LORD of hosts that the people labor only for fire; yea, the nations weary themselves only for vanity?

2:14  For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.

2:15  Woe to him who gives his neighbor drink, pouring out your wineskin, and also making him drunk, that you may look on their nakedness!

2:16  You are filled with shame instead of glory; drink also, and be seen as one uncircumcised! The cup of the LORD's right hand shall turn on you, and disgrace shall be your glory.

2:17  For the violence of Lebanon shall cover you, and the ruin of beasts shall terrify them because of the blood of man, and the violence of the land, the city, and all those dwelling in it.

2:18  What does an image profit, for its maker has carved it; a molten image, and a teacher of lies? For does the maker trust in his work on it, to make dumb idols?

2:19  Woe to him who says to the wood. Awake! To a dumb stone, Arise, it shall teach! Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and no breath is in its midst.

2:20  But the LORD is in His holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before Him.

Chapter 3

3:1  A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet concerning erring ones:

3:2  O LORD, I have heard Your report; I am afraid. O LORD, give new life to Your work in the midst of years; in the midst of the years make known; in wrath remember mercy.

3:3  God comes from Teman, and the Holy One from Mount Paran. Selah. His glory covers the heavens, and His praise fills the earth.

3:4  And His brightness is as the light; rays from His hand are His, and there was a hiding of His strength.

3:5  A plague went before Him, and lightning went forth at His feet.

3:6  He stood and measured the earth; He looked and shook nations, and the everlasting mountains were shattered; the eternal hills bowed down. His ways are everlasting.

3:7  I saw the tents of Cushan under calamity; the curtains of the land of Midian trembled.

3:8  Did the LORD burn against rivers? Or was Your anger against the rivers? Or Your wrath against the sea? For You ride on horses, Your chariots of salvation.

3:9  You make Your bow naked, according to the oaths of the rods of Your word. Selah. You have cut through the earth with rivers.

3:10  They saw You; mountains trembled. The storm of water passed over; the deep uttered its voice and lifted up its hands on high.

3:11  The sun and moon stood still in their dwelling. At the light of Your arrows they go, and at the shining of Your gleaming spear.

3:12  You march into the land in fury; You thresh nations in anger.

3:13  You went forth for the salvation of Your people, for salvation with Your anointed. You struck the head from the house of the wicked, to bare the foundation to the neck. Selah.

3:14  You pierced the head of his warriors with his shafts; they storm out to scatter me; their rejoicing is to devour the meek in a secret place.

3:15  You trod in the sea with Your horses, the foaming of many waters.

3:16  I heard and my belly trembled; my lips quivered at the voice. Rottenness entered into my bones, and I trembled in myself that I might rest in the day of trouble; to come up against the people; he cuts him off.

3:17  Though the fig tree shall not blossom, and fruit is not on the vines; the labor of the olive fails, and the fields yield no food. The flock is cut off from the fold, and no herd is in the stalls;

3:18  yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will joy in the God of my salvation.

3:19  Jehovah the Lord is my strength, and He will make my feet like hinds' feet, and He will make me to walk on my high places. To the chief singer on my stringed instruments.