Habakkuk
Chapter 1
1 The message that the prophet Habakkuk saw.
2 God, how long must I call for help, but you do not listen? I cry to you about violence, but you do not save.
3 Why do you show me wrongdoing, and make me see trouble? Destruction and violence are in front of me; there are people who start fights and arguments.
4 So the law fails, and fair judgment is not carried out because the wicked surround the good; that’s why unfair decisions are made.
5 Look among the nations, watch, and be amazed: for I will do something in your time that you won’t believe, even if someone tells you.
6 Look, I am bringing the Chaldeans, a fierce and quick-moving people, who will spread across the land and take over homes that do not belong to them.
7 They are frightening and awful: they make their own rules and honor.
8 Their horses are faster than leopards and fiercer than night wolves. The riders will spread out, and they will come from far away. They will swoop down like eagles rushing to feed.
9 They will all come to do violence: their faces will be eager like the east wind, and they will collect captives like the sand.
10 They will mock the kings, and laugh at the princes. They will make fun of every fortress, because they will pile up dirt and capture it.
11 Then he will change his mind, cross over, and do wrong, giving credit for his strength to his god.
12 Aren’t you eternal, my God, my Holy One? We will not die. God, you have appointed them for judgment; and, mighty God, you have set them up for discipline.
13 You have purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrongs. So why do you watch those who are dishonest and stay silent when the wicked swallows someone more righteous than himself?
14 You make people like fish in the sea, like crawling creatures with no one to lead them.
15 They catch all of them with a hook, trap them in their net, and collect them with their netting; so they are happy and joyful.
16 So they offer sacrifices to their nets and burn incense to their fishing dragnets, because these things give them rich and abundant food.
17 Will they then keep emptying their net, never stopping the killing of nations?