D. Yahweh’s Response: The Certainty of Babylon’s Destruction (2:2-20)
God’s answer begins with a “vision” (hāzôn, niv’s revelation [v.3]), which stresses the importance, imminence, and certainty of the events about to be described. Then Yahweh agrees with Habakkuk that the Babylonians are a most wicked nation, consumed with pride and avarice (vv.4-5). By contrast, God mentions the righteous individual (ṣaddîq) who will live faithfully (lit. “by his faithfulness”). Hebrew has no abstract word for faith, and the meaning here is “the temper which faith produces of endurance, steadfastness, integrity” (G. A. Smith, 142). The righteous person will remain loyal in his commitments to God regardless of the circumstances of his experience. This concept of steadfast loyalty influenced NT authors (see introduction).
The next unit (2:6-20) is a series of oracles each introduced by the word woe (vv.6, 9, 12, 15, 19). This cry of grief and sorrow introduces a standard prophetic speech pattern that accuses the nation of sin and announces judgment. In most cases this speech pattern is used against Israel (Isa 5:8, 11, 18, et al.), but here it is spoken against the foreign conqueror (Westermann, 189-94). Habakkuk’s speeches of doom are intended as encouragement and comfort for Judah, because they emphasize the judgment of God’s enemies. In this context the woe oracles take on a more profound significance. They state unequivocally the judgment of Babylon that was only alluded to in vv.4-5. Thus they establish the hope that justice will ultimately be accomplished, though the people of God must faithfully endure the present injustice.
V.6 ties the five woe oracles to the preceding paragraph by explaining that the very nations who fell victim to Babylon (v.5c) will sing of her destruction. They will taunt (lit. “raise a proverb”) and ridicule Babylon, words associated with mockery. The word translated scorn in NIV is really “enigmatic saying” and may betray a didactic purpose for v.6a; the Babylonians became an object lesson (“proverb”) by means of perplexing and allusive speech (Armerding, 516).
Each oracle that follows is marked by a juxtaposing of the sin with its appropriate and inevitable judgment. Each punishment is made to fit the crime. In vv.6b-8, the exploited victims rise up and turn the tables on the Babylonians, making them the victims. The irony is sharpened by the use of “plunder” in v.8; the plunderers become the plundered. Greed is also the crime described in vv.9-11, where the rapacious Babylonians use their ill-gotten gains to build a house (i.e., royal dynasty) and to make it secure as a high nest. But, as before, the punishment is fitted to the crime: shame for self-motivated pride.
The third woe oracle (vv.12-14) mocks Babylon for strengthening her position by violence because her futile attempt actually weakens her position before God. The Lord Almighty (lit. “Lord of Armies”) is more impressed with knowledge of his glory than with the military domination of one’s neighbors. The next judgment speech (vv.15-17) moves to a new crime. The Babylonians have humiliated their victims by inducing drunkenness and exploiting their vulnerability, all in the interest of self-glory (kāb̠ôd, v.16). But “Now,” the prophet warns, “it is your turn!” (v.16). That which the Babylonians have sown is what they shall reap. The cup of the Lord (figure of judgment) is coming, and the Babylonians shall drink and be exposed. Lebanon (v.17) may be a symbol of the Holy Land but is probably a reference to the violent destruction of Syria-Palestine at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar when he claimed the land of Lebanon (Keil, 88-90).
The final oracle (vv.18-19) changes the pattern of the previous four. It begins, not with a woe expression, but with a statement of the futility of idol worship. Human effort and resources are wasted on such impotent and worthless images. The futility of this idolatry is exposed ironically in the phrase idols that cannot speak, which is babbling nonsense phonetically ('elîlîm 'illemîm, Armerding, 519). The irony climaxes in the picture of the Babylonian idolater commanding his breathless idol to become lively and active. But abruptly our attention is directed to Yahweh’s incomparable presence (v.20). While the idolater vainly appeals to his deity to come to life, all the earth is silent before God.