Habakkuk — Chapter 2

¹I will stand at my watch, and set myself on the ramparts, and will look out to see what he will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint.

²Yahweh answered me, "Write the vision, and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it.

³For the vision is yet for the appointed time, and it hurries toward the end, and won`t prove false. Though it takes time, wait for it; because it will surely come. It won`t delay.

⁴Behold, his soul is puffed up. It is not upright in him, but the righteous will live by his faith.

⁵Yes, moreover, wine is treacherous. A haughty man who doesn`t stay at home, who enlarges his desire as Sheol, and he is like death, and can`t be satisfied, but gathers to himself all nations, and heaps to himself all peoples.

⁶Won`t all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against him, and say, `Woe to him who increases that which is not his, and who enriches himself by extortion! How long?`

⁷Won`t your debtors rise up suddenly, and wake up those who make you tremble, and you will be their victim?

⁸Because you have plundered many nations, all the remnant of the peoples will plunder you, because of men`s blood, and for the violence done to the land, to the city and to all who dwell in it.

⁹Woe to him who gets an evil gain for his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the hand of evil!

¹⁰You have devised shame to your house, by cutting off many peoples, and have sinned against your soul.

¹¹For the stone will cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the woodwork will answer it.

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

¹³Behold, isn`t it of Yahweh of Hosts that the peoples labor for the fire, and the nations weary themselves for vanity?

¹⁴For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of Yahweh, as the waters cover the sea.

¹⁵"Woe to him who gives his neighbor drink, pouring your inflaming wine until they are drunk, so that you may gaze at their naked bodies!

¹⁶You are filled with shame, and not glory. You will also drink, and be exposed! The cup of Yahweh`s right hand will come around to you, and disgrace will cover your glory.

¹⁷For the violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you, and the destruction of the animals, which made them afraid; because of men`s blood, and for the violence done to the land, to every city and to those who dwell in them.

¹⁸"What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols?

¹⁹Woe to him who says to the wood, `Awake!` or to the mute stone, `Arise!` Shall this teach? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in the midst of it.

²⁰But Yahweh is in his holy temple. Let all the earth be silent before him!"