Habakkuk

¹ The oracle that Habakkuk the prophet received.

² How long, O Lord, must I call for help, but you do not listen? Or cry out to you, “Violence!” but you do not save?

³ Why do you tolerate wrong? Destruction and violence are before me; there is strife, and conflict abounds.

⁴ and justice never prevails. The wicked hem in the righteous, so that justice is perverted.

⁵ “Look at the nations and watch— and be utterly amazed. For I am going to do something in your days that you would not believe, even if you were told.

⁶ that ruthless and impetuous people, who sweep across the whole earth to seize dwelling places not their own.

⁷ they are a law to themselves and promote their own honor.

⁸ fiercer than wolves at dusk. Their cavalry gallops headlong; their horsemen come from afar. They fly like a vulture swooping to devour;

⁹ Their hordes advance like a desert wind and gather prisoners like sand.

¹⁰ and scoff at rulers. They laugh at all fortified cities; they build earthen ramps and capture them.

¹¹ guilty men, whose own strength is their god.”

¹² O Lord, are you not from everlasting? My God, my Holy One, we will not die. O Lord, you have appointed them to execute judgment; O Rock, you have ordained them to punish.

¹³ you cannot tolerate wrong. Why then do you tolerate the treacherous? Why are you silent while the wicked swallow up those more righteous than themselves?

¹⁴ like sea creatures that have no ruler.

¹⁵ he catches them in his net, he gathers them up in his dragnet; and so he rejoices and is glad.

¹⁶ and burns incense to his dragnet, for by his net he lives in luxury and enjoys the choicest food.

¹⁷ destroying nations without mercy?