resistless power he
describes in bold and striking imagery. In the second chapter the
prophet appears standing on his watch to see what answer Jehovah will
give to the expostulation with which the preceding chapter closes. He
receives a comforting message, but one that will try the faith of God's
people by its delay. Verse 3. It is an announcement of the overthrow of
the Chaldean oppressor, carried out in a series of bold and vivid
descriptions in which woe upon woe is pronounced against him for his
rapine, covetousness, iniquitous oppression, and idolatry. The third
chapter is a lyric ode in which the prophet, in view of both the
judgments that God is about to execute on his countrymen through the
Chaldeans (chap. 1), and the promised deliverance from them at a future
period (chap. 2), supplicates and celebrates the future interposition of
Jehovah for the redemption of his people in language borrowed from their
past history. Thus this sublime song is both a prayer for the renewal of
God's wondrous works in the days of old and a prophecy of such a
renewal. The apostle Paul quotes the words of Habakkuk: "The just shall
live by his faith" (2:4), and applies them to all believers (Rom. 1:17).

The language of chap. 1:5 implies that the desolation of the
land by the Chaldeans would be a _surprising_ event, which could
not have been the case after the victory of Nebuchadnezzar over
the Egyptians and his capture of Jerusalem in the fourth year of
Jehoiakim, B.C. 606. It was also to be in the day of that
generation--"in your days." Consequently we cannot date the
prophecy earlier than B.C. 640, probably not before B.C. 630.

The dedication of Habakkuk's ode (3:19) "to the chief
musician"--the Hebrew word is the same that so often occurs in
the titles of the Psalms--implies that this ode was to be used
in the solemn worship of God. The added words, "on my stringed
instruments," are most naturally understood of those under his
charge as a leader in the service of song in the sanctuary.
Hence we infer with probability that Habakkuk was a Levite.

IX. ZEPHANIAH.

17. Zephaniah prophesied in the reign of Josiah (1:1), apparently while
his work of reformation was in progress and not yet completed (1:4-6, 8,
9); that is, somewhere between his twelfth and his eighteenth year (2
Chron. 34:3-13).

In the first chapter he predicts the utter desolation of Judah, and with
it t