| International Standard Version | New Living Translation |
| 1The pronouncement that the prophet Habakkuk perceived. | 1This is the message that the prophet Habakkuk received in a vision. Habakkuk’s Complaint |
| 2"How long, LORD, must I cry out for help, but you won't listen? I'm crying out to you, 'Violence!' but you aren't providing deliverance. | 2How long, O LORD, must I call for help? But you do not listen! “Violence is everywhere!” I cry, but you do not come to save. |
| 3Why are you forcing me to look at iniquity and to stare at wickedness? Social havoc and oppression are all around me; there are legal conflicts, and disputes abound. | 3Must I forever see these evil deeds? Why must I watch all this misery? Wherever I look, I see destruction and violence. I am surrounded by people who love to argue and fight. |
| 4Therefore, the Law has become paralyzed, and justice never comes about. Because criminals outnumber the righteous, whenever judgments are issued, they come out crooked." | 4The law has become paralyzed, and there is no justice in the courts. The wicked far outnumber the righteous, so that justice has become perverted. The LORD’s Reply |
| 5"Look out at the nations and pay attention! Be astounded! Be really astounded! Because something is happening in your lifetime that you won't believe, even if it were described down to the smallest detail. | 5The LORD replied, “Look around at the nations; look and be amazed! For I am doing something in your own day, something you wouldn’t believe even if someone told you about it. |
| 6Watch out! For I am bringing in the Chaldeans, that cruel and impetuous people, who sweep across the earth dispossessing people from homes not their own. | 6I am raising up the Babylonians, a cruel and violent people. They will march across the world and conquer other lands. |
| 7They are terrible and fearsome; their brand of justice and sense of honor derive only from themselves! | 7They are notorious for their cruelty and do whatever they like. |
| 8Their horses are swifter than leopards, and more cunning than wolves that attack at night. Their horsemen are galloping as they approach from far away. They swoop in like ravenous vultures. | 8Their horses are swifter than cheetahs and fiercer than wolves at dusk. Their charioteers charge from far away. Like eagles, they swoop down to devour their prey. |
| 9"They all come to oppress— hordes of them, their faces pressing onward— they take prisoners as numerous as the desert sand! | 9“On they come, all bent on violence. Their hordes advance like a desert wind, sweeping captives ahead of them like sand. |
| 10They make fun of kings, deriding those who rule. They laugh at all of the fortified places, constructing ramps to seize them. | 10They scoff at kings and princes and scorn all their fortresses. They simply pile ramps of earth against their walls and capture them! |
| 11Then like the wind sweeping by they will pass through— they're guilty because they say their power is their god." | 11They sweep past like the wind and are gone. But they are deeply guilty, for their own strength is their god.” Habakkuk’s Second Complaint |
| 12"Haven't you existed forever, LORD my God, my Holy One? We won't die! LORD, you've prepared them for judgment; Rock, you've sentenced them to correction. | 12O LORD my God, my Holy One, you who are eternal— surely you do not plan to wipe us out? O LORD, our Rock, you have sent these Babylonians to correct us, to punish us for our many sins. |
| 13Your eyes are too pure to gaze upon evil; and you cannot tolerate wickedness. So why do you tolerate the treacherous? And why do you stay silent while the wicked devour those who are more righteous than they are? | 13But you are pure and cannot stand the sight of evil. Will you wink at their treachery? Should you be silent while the wicked swallow up people more righteous than they? |
| 14"You have fashioned mankind like fish in the ocean, like creeping things that have no ruler. | 14Are we only fish to be caught and killed? Are we only sea creatures that have no leader? |
| 15The adversary captures them with a hook, gathering them up in a fishing net. He collects them with a dragnet, rejoicing and gloating over his catch. | 15Must we be strung up on their hooks and caught in their nets while they rejoice and celebrate? |
| 16Therefore he sacrifices to his fishing net, and burns incense in the presence of his dragnet, because by them his assets increase and he gets plenty of food. | 16Then they will worship their nets and burn incense in front of them. “These nets are the gods who have made us rich!” they will claim. |
| 17Is he to continue to empty his fishing net? Will he ever stop killing entire nations without mercy?" | 17Will you let them get away with this forever? Will they succeed forever in their heartless conquests? |
The Holy Bible: International Standard Version® Release 2.1 Copyright © 1996-2012 The ISV Foundation
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INTERNATIONALLY. | Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. |
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