Habakkuk 2:17
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For your violence against Lebanon will overwhelm you, and the destruction of animals will terrify you, because of your bloodshed against men and your violence against the land, the city, and all their dwellers.
Commentaries
Excerpts gathered from published commentaries to ground the reading.
Destruction of the Ungodly World-Power - Habakkuk 2 After receiving an answer to this supplicatory cry, the prophet receives a command from God: to write the oracle in plain characters, because it is indeed certain, but will not be immediately fulfilled (Hab 2:1-3). Then follows the word of God, that the just will live through his faith, but he that is proud and not upright will not continue (Hab 2:4, Hab 2:5); accompanied by a fivefold woe upon the Chaldaean, who gathers all nations to himself with insatiable greediness (Hab 2:6-20).
Open source ↗In this chapter we have an answer expected by the prophet (Hab 2:1), and returned by the Spirit of God, to the complaints which the prophet made of the violences and victories of the Chaldeans in the close of the foregoing chapter. The answer is, I. That after God has served his own purposes by the prevailing power of the Chaldeans, has tried the faith and patience of his people, and distinguished between the hypocrites and the sincere among them, he will reckon with the Chaldeans, will humble and bring down, not only that proud monarch Nebuchadnezzar, but that proud monarchy, for their boundless and insatiable thirst after dominion and wealth, for which they themselves should at length be made a prey (Hab 2:2-8). II. That not they only, but all other sinners like them, should perish under a divine woe. 1. Those that are covetous, are greedy of wealth and honours (Hab 2:9, Hab 2:11). 2. Those that are injurious and oppressive, and raise estates by wrong and rapine (Hab 2:12-14). 3. Those that promote drunkenness that they may expose their neighbours to shame (Hab 2:15-17). 4. Those that worship idols (Hab 2:18-20).
Open source ↗Original language
The Hebrew and Greek words behind this passage, with Strong's numbers — from openscriptures (CC BY-SA).
Cross-references
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Because you have plundered many nations, the remnant of the people will plunder you— because of your bloodshed against man and your violence against the land, the city, and all their dwellers.
Open your doors, O Lebanon,that the fire may consume your cedars!
But You, O God, will bring them down to the Pit of destruction; men of bloodshed and deceit will not live out half their days. But I will trust in You.
O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction, blessed is he who repays you as you have done to us.
A man burdened by bloodguilt will flee into the Pit; let no one support him.
Before your very eyes I will repay Babylon and all the dwellers of Chaldea for all the evil they have done in Zion,” declares the LORD.
Listen to the fugitives and refugees from the land of Babylon, declaring in Zion the vengeance of the LORD our God, the vengeance for His temple.