THE BOOK OF HABAKKUK

Lesson 9, Chapter 3 Concluded
END

As we conclude our study of Habakkuk today, we’ll begin with where we left off last time, which was chapter 3 verse 8. I’ll ask you to recall that while chapter 3 as a whole is of a very different nature than chapters 1 and 2, verses 8 – 15 of chapter 3 are also quite different from all other parts of chapter 3.

It seems to many commentators and Old Testament scholars, and I agree with those many, that verses 8 – 15 are a unified composition that is very likely much older than all other parts of Habakkuk. That is, this was very likely an independent, archaic poem or song that had been written centuries earlier, but it seemed appropriate to Habakkuk’s message for him to simply insert it here. Perhaps it was as a reminder that Israel’s God of the ancient past was still the same, and operated the same, as in Habakkuk’s day. Or, that it helped to remind Israel of the mighty deeds and actions of their God, in the past. At the same time, due to vastly different cultural contexts and circumstances between when that poem was written and Habakkuk’s era, Hebrew vocabulary and the way Hebrew terms were used had evolved.

We, today, find ourselves in a similar circumstance. It can be most challenging to transpose into our modern lives and cultures what was written thousands of years ago in a world that looked and behaved nothing like it is in the 21st century. Even so, our duty is to translate and integrate those archaic Hebrew and Aramaic terms, within their historical context, and apply them in the same spirit and intent to our everyday lives. Make no mistake… the challenge can be daunting. Even so, the solution is not to give up and decide that we can just ignore all historical contexts and circumstances and decide that even the spirit and intent of God’s laws and commands, and what He told the Prophets, has changed dramatically or been entirely negated. So, let’s continue to work diligently to extract all we’re capable of understanding at this point in history from Habakkuk’s divine prophetic words in order that we can all live out God’s will for us.

RE-READ HABAKKUK CHAPER 3: 8 – end

Verse 8 speaks of God’s wrath against the rivers and seas of the earth. This is not symbolic nor ought we to spiritualize this way as is the tendency for Christianity. At the same time, these are not any particular rivers or seas, such as those that had such great impact on Israel long ago, like the Nile or the Red Sea. It is the rivers and seas in general. On the other hand, this does not mean that at various points in history, as each fulfillment of this prophetic song comes about, that certain rivers and seas won’t be the more specifically targeted. Keep in mind the poetic nature of what we’re reading and so pay attention to the emotions and visual images that are provoked by these words more than to seeing this as a revelation of specific information, geographic location, and hidden clues. Therefore, after this question about God’s wrath over the seas and the rivers, we come to an equally strange question that asks:

CJB Habakkuk 3:8 Is that why you ride on your horses, and drive your chariots to victory?

First, even though this entire sentence is based on metaphorical horses and chariots, let’s be clear that it is NOT that God is actually riding on horses, and then alternately riding on chariots. Rather, it is that chariots are drawn by horses that are harnessed to them. So, the visual is of God standing on a war chariot, reigns in hand, to symbolize the idea of going to war.

The question has to do with the purpose of riding those chariots to war, which is not merely a show of force but rather it is to achieve victory. However, we need to look at that Hebrew word that is translated as victory in some Bibles, and salvation in others. The word is yeshua. Yes, it is same word that is our Savior’s Hebrew name, but by no means is it meaning to directly refer to Him personally, other than in the broadest sense of what will happen in the far future. People in Habakkuk’s day would never have understood this as a saving Messiah.

In a war situation, yeshua leans more towards indicating victory, or equally, deliverance from a current oppression. While it is not wrong to use the word salvation, in our English vocabularies it carries a far too spiritual-ized tone of being saved from our sins by our Messiah. And while that certainly applies to God’s Son, it is not quite the same as meant here in Habakkuk. So, what is depicted is Yehoveh in the mode of Israel’s Warrior God, going to battle against the corrupted elements of earth… from land, to mountains, to rivers and seas. Everything that forms the surface of our planet. Despite that, God is actually on a rescue mission for people… His people… those who are faithful to Him. And, like any war, that means mass casualties and the earth itself will be scarred. As for the enemy, these are always defined as those who have NOT been faithful to God, which as we have read over and over includes those who outright deny Him as well as those who claim allegiance to Him, but in fact are double-minded, accept other gods, create and obey manmade doctrines that override God’s written laws and commands, and who pay only lip service to their supposed sincerity and obedience.

CJB Habakkuk 3:9 You brandish your naked bow and order it filled with arrows. (Selah) You split the earth with river.

Here is another verse that presents such translation matters that no 2 Bible versions entirely agree. So, this is the YLT version’s interpretation.

YLT Habakkuk 3:9 Utterly naked Thou dost make Thy bow, Sworn are the tribes — saying, 'Pause!' With rivers Thou dost cleave the earth.

There is only one word in the first couple of its phrases that be counted on to be properly understood… and it is the word “bow”! All the remainder use such an archaic style of Hebrew that it isn’t far from throwing darts at a board to try to extract each individual word’s meaning. Likely, some part it is an expression, and we just don’t know what it stands for.

In an attempt to try our best to avoid systematic theology and the typical injection of doctrinal beliefs, Jewish and Christian, to gain meaning, we’ll look at the Hebrew very closely. The first two words to begin the sentence are eryah te-or. Eryah means nakedness, and te-or means “made exposed”. The bow-holder is Yehoveh. So, obviously this bow is a symbolic metaphor. A bow is meant to symbolize a weapon that is part of God’s arsenal of weapons (just as is a horse-drawn chariot part of His arsenal). In fact, the riders of chariots used them as weapons platforms, with the weapons being a combination of bow and arrow, and spears. I won’t bore you with the problems of syntax, the several compound meanings of the words that follow eryah te-or, because there’s not enough evidence to prove one decisively over another. That said, when we back away from this poem and look at it from a more panoramic view, and since we already know from verse 8 that this is the depiction of a Warrior God racing into battle, then I feel like we can have some comfort in accepting the CJB interpretation as pretty much on the mark. God is pulling His bow from its bow-case and preparing to fire it. So, the bow is made bare (naked in ancient thinking) because it is now exposed outside of its case.

From a different perspective, this is God swinging into action; no more warnings and threats. He has loaded His bow, directed his chariot into battle formation, thundering towards the enemy, and there is nothing left but to let the arrows fly. It’s decided. There is no deterrence remaining. The promised vengeance that is the other side of His mercy and compassion, is now underway. This is Holy War described from a Heavenly viewpoint. It is a long ago promised Holy War taken from Deuteronomy.

CJB Deuteronomy 32:40-43 40 "'For I lift up my hand to heaven and swear, "As surely as I am alive forever, 41 if I sharpen my flashing sword and set my hand to judgment, I will render vengeance to my foes, repay those who hate me. 42 I will make my arrows drunk with blood, my sword will devour flesh- the blood of the slain and the captives, flesh from the wild-haired heads of the enemy."' 43 "Sing out, you nations, about his people! For he will avenge the blood of his servants. He will render vengeance to his adversaries and make atonement for the land of his people."

The next word that I’d like to look at is selah. It is a word that is used to instruct the choir or music director on how to play or sing a song. We’ll regularly find this word in Psalms, because Psalms were often vocalized along with music to make them a song. This adds to the contention that Habakkuk was possibly a Levite, and in particular one who served at the Temple as a musician and/or choir director, meaning he would not have had the role of a priest. OR… it was that this song of verses 8 – 15 was written long ago by someone who was in that role, and it had no bearing on Habakkuk at all. Further, Habakkuk may have known of this song because he had heard it on occasion at the Temple and thought it would be appropriate to use it in the communication of God’s oracle to him. Frankly as plausible as any of these are, none can be pointed to as highly probable.

The final few words about splitting the earth with rivers are just as enigmatic. This could well be referring back in time to when God split the earth and underground rivers of water shot forth to create rivers and seas for the first time. Or that at the quaking of the earth, the seas overflow their banks and remake the landscape by creating new rivers and relocating old rivers. I opt for the latter because of what comes in the next verse, as it speaks of mountains convulsing.

CJB Habakkuk 3:10 The mountains see you and tremble; a torrent of water streams by; the deep thunders forth, as it raises enormous waves.

This continues the scene of the earth reacting to the terrible appearance of God coming in His wrath. And, frankly, most of this is recognizable as rather standard biblical references to what happens to God’s creation when He shows up. I think we can and should take it as quite literal, and that at this point in the End Times, when God comes, the earth will experience a violent shaking… a literal earthquake… unlike anything humans have ever witnessed. When we read of God returning to Israel at that time, and His foot steps onto the Mt. of Olives, we read this happens:

CJB Zechariah 14:3-6 3 Then Yehoveh will go out and fight against those nations, fighting as on a day of battle. 4 On that day his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which lies to the east of Yerushalayim; and the Mount of Olives will be split in half from east to west, to make a huge valley. Half of the mountain will move toward the north, and half of it toward the south. 5 You will flee to the valley in the mountains, for the valley in the mountains will reach to Atzel. You will flee, just as you fled before the earthquake in the days of 'Uziyah king of Y'hudah. Then Yehoveh my God will come to you with all the holy ones. 6 On that day, there will be neither bright light nor thick darkness

This must be the same event we are reading about in Habakkuk. Only in Habakkuk it is spoken of in universal terms, while in Zechariah it is spoken of in terms of its direct locational effect on Jerusalem and the Holy Land.

As for the statement that the “deep thunders forth as it raises enormous waves”. What else can this be but a tsunami? We never knew until very recent times that it was earthquakes deep under the ocean that caused tsunamis, but now we know it with a certainty. Who can ever forget the devastating tsunami that hit the Indian Ocean coastline on December 26, 2004, causing unthinkable damage and casualties in 14 nations. Nearly a quarter-million people were killed. Clearly what is described biblically are tsunamis in several places on earth at the same time. The consequences are not something the human brain can calculate.

CJB Habakkuk 3:11 The sun and moon stand still in the sky at the light of your arrows speeding by, at the gleam of your glittering spear.

This calls to mind a similar event from hundreds of years earlier when the sun and the moon stood still.

CJB Joshua 10:11-14 11 As they fled before Isra'el down the road to Beit-Horon, Yehoveh threw huge hailstones down on them all the way to 'Azekah, and they died; more died because of the hail than because Isra'el had killed them with the sword. 12 Then, on the day Yehoveh handed over the Emori to the people of Isra'el, Y'hoshua spoke to Yehoveh; in the sight of Isra'el he said, "Sun, stand motionless over Giv'on! Moon, you too, over Ayalon Valley!" 13 So the sun stood still and the moon stayed put, till Isra'el took vengeance on their enemies. This is written in the book of Yashar. The sun stood still in the sky and was in no rush to set for nearly a whole day. 14 There has never been a day like that before or since, when Yehoveh listened to the voice of a man; it happened because Yehoveh was fighting on Isra'el's behalf.

As much of Christianity and the secular world want to make this just a biblical fairytale, we’re being told in Habakkuk that the same sort of thing is going to happen AGAIN once God’s wrath starts being poured out on earth on Israel’s behalf in the End Times. God controls the movement of the earth, the sun, the moon and anything that exists in the skies above. All of God’s creation is going to be affected at this End Times apocalypse. I can’t even imagine those who aren’t prepared for this. They don’t know it’s coming. They don’t know that many will be here to experience it. And they will not know how to understand what and why it is all happening. No matter who is left, it will be terrifying. But to know that it is God that is behind it all, and that there is divine eternal meaning and purpose is far better than knowing nothing at all, or supposing it is just “fate”.

The earth now enters an even more chaotic state because the heavens have joined in. I don’t want to begin a debate on the precise meaning of the light of the arrows or gleam of the glittering spear because these are rather extreme, hyperbolic metaphors for what God is throwing at the universe and the earth as symbolized weaponry. It is just better to get the overall picture of the Universe and earth all undergoing great stress at the direction of God’s power.

I want to look at verses 12 and 13 together because they provide the explanation for all that is happening.

CJB Habakkuk 3:12-13 12 In fury you stride across the land, in anger you trample the nations. 13 You come out to save your people, to save your anointed one; you crush the head of the house of the wicked, uncovering its foundation all the way to the neck.

Even if a Bible student wants to name the One who is doing this… that is, God as The Father Yehoveh, or as The Son Yeshua… we are clearly not reading about compassion, mercy, meekness, or gentleness. Verse 12 makes it emphatic that this is divine fury and anger that has been stored up in Heaven for eons, now explosively released. There is no human vocabulary sufficient to describe it, because it is not within human experience at any time in history to have something to properly compare it to. Thus, a poem is far better suited for expression of it than is narrative and prose. A poem uses hyperbole as a standard method. Poetry attempts to express the otherwise un-expressible.

Note (from what I said a minute or so ago) that at the same time cosmic destruction is being unleashed on earth, the ultimate purpose is to SAVE God’s people. Righteous justice demands that if the righteous are to be saved and delivered, then the unrighteous must be rounded-up and destroyed. Tolerance for the unrighteous is a purely modern times, human invented virtue that has burrowed its way deeply into the psyche of Christians and their Church doctrines. Hold it if you wish; but at your own peril. God certainly doesn’t uphold tolerance, and the world will learn that when all we’ve been reading about happens.

We see the term “the land” held in contrast with “the nations”. The land means eretz Israel; the nations mean everyone else. To be clear, as concerns “the nations” this is totally generalized. It is not referring to Babylon or Rome or any specific oppressor of the past. The phrase “house of the wicked” makes it all inclusive. And it also is inclusive of all times in history. This is the meaning of “uncovering it’s foundation, all the way up to the neck”. This is a merism. Every aspect of wickedness from the most distant past to the present and everything in between will be uncovered and dealt with; there is no hiding, and there is no holding someone else up as a shield or a scapegoat. All will bear their accountability.

The military nature of the vocabulary continues in verse 13 with “You come out”. It is synonymous with “you marched out”. It means to leave your home to go to war. I also refer you to another important word, yesha. We saw this same word in a slightly different form earlier… yeshu’ah. The difference is slight. However, in this case yesha is better translated overall as deliverance, since it could be said that yesha is being accomplished for the purpose of yeshu’ah in other cases. That is, deliverance is happening for the sake of salvation. But that is not what is happening here. Or at least that is not what is being described in this one verse. But, after saying that God came out to save His people, now it is said that He is coming to save His messiah. Yes, mashiach is the word here. Does it mean what our knee jerk reaction thinks it means? Is this really speaking of saving or delivering Yeshua… who is Himself the Savior? You can only imagine the debate that has gone on between Christians and Jews (and within each group) for centuries on account of this. Let’s see if I can shed some light on it.

First, I’ll remind you that this is still part of that very ancient poem that Habakkuk apparently chose to insert into His prophetic book. It very likely goes back to around the time when the first Temple was built or perhaps a bit earlier to the time of Israel’s first king, Saul. So, we have to understand the meaning and extent of the purpose of the word mashiach at that time. It was not at all thinking of a Christ-like figure. It was not thinking of some future Redeemer. It all had to do with the present. Just as ben-Yehoveh meaning “son of God” pointed to His anointed Israelite king, so mashiach meant “anointed one” that essentially was also referring to a king of Israel, since they had to be literally anointed with oil to be officially chosen or confirmed. These anointings were also assumed to be physical ceremonies indicating and symbolizing God’s choices.

Second, let’s look at a much earlier time, when Saul was anointed as king to see how this term mashiach was used then.

CJB 1 Samuel 2:10 those who fight Yehoveh will be shattered; he will thunder against them in heaven- Yehoveh will judge the ends of the earth. He will strengthen his king and enhance the power of his anointed."

The term “his anointed” at the end of this verse is all about the king He chooses, and the term used is mashiach. This entire section of 1 Samuel is about the anointing of a king and the protection of that Israelite king and of God’s people. That is why, more often than not, reputable Bible versions will say, “his anointed” rather than “his messiah”. It works the same way here in Habakkuk.

Third, the conclusion then is that God saving the people and the anointed one means delivering the people and their king from their enemies… with their enemies defined as “the wicked” who stand in opposition to God’s people “the righteous”. God doesn’t need to save the Messiah, so obviously this is not talking about Yeshua of Nazareth, except in the most fuzzy or allegorical sense!

CJB Habakkuk 3:14 With their own rods you pierce the head of their warriors, who come like a whirlwind to scatter us, who rejoice at the prospect of devouring the poor in secret.

Now let’s look at this same verse in the Young’s Literal Translation.

YLT Habakkuk 3:14 Thou hast pierced with his staves the head of his leaders, They are tempestuous to scatter me, Their exultation is as to consume the poor in secret.

While the YLT might immediately sound a bit different from the CJB, they are actually quite close and similar in meaning. In fact, most Bible versions generally agree. At the same time, Christian scholars going back hundreds of years agree that this verse is nearly unintelligible in Hebrew. The first half is better than the last half, but we need to be cautious assigning any certainly to any part of this passage.

The first part seems as though it is depicting this battle of God against the leaders of the wicked ones. The word matteh is translated in the CJB as rod. However, in normal biblical context, the term “rod” is referring to a king’s scepter, so it is unlikely He is using their scepters to hit them in the head with. The other word matteh can legitimately be translated to is “stave”, which is a weapon of war. So, the question boils down to whether we’re talking here about a king’s scepter… the symbol of his authority… or are we talking about a lethal weapon of war. Considering that we are still reading words from that very ancient poem from before Habakkuk’s day, and thus far this has been about God marching forth to do battle on Israel’s behalf, then with no other evidence to the contrary, this has to be continuing on with characterizing God as the ruthless warrior, wandering the earth and attacking His enemies at will with weapons that were usual and customary at the time this was written.

The last part of the verse, as we examine it word by Hebrew word, literally suggests eating the poor in secret… which makes no sense. Is the text corrupt? Assuming this part of chapter 3 was indeed ancient even to Habakkuk, and he deliberately selected it and inserted it himself, then there is no chance that the original poem was corrupt. But, now inserted as part of Habakkuk’s prophetic message, has it become corrupted by copyist errors since that time? I’ve mentioned how the Septuagint from the 3rd century B.C. was a Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. And when we look at the Greek as we have it today and translate it back to Hebrew, it sounds very much like what we are reading in English that was translated from Hebrew texts, without going through the Greek stage. That is, they match. So, it doesn’t appear that this ancient poem has suffered at the hands of the copiers over the centuries. While different scholars have taken a couple of different approaches of what to do about it, and have considered why this passage is so unreadable, I think it is obvious. It uses expressions and idioms of that era (which is likely the era of Saul or David), and so far, scholars have found it impossible to identity them. If we were to do so with any accuracy as idioms (I think the passage about eating the poor is probably an idiom), what did that mean? Unless something is unearthed in the future to help us, or maybe some cognate language to Hebrew that we do know the meaning of the words better (like one of the Canaanite languages) comes to the rescue, we may never understand what is being said.

Verse 15 completes this inserted poem.

CJB Habakkuk 3:15 You tread down the sea with your horses, churning up the mighty waters.

Structurally, this Hebrew poem has a natural ending with verse 15 that returns to the original theme begun in verse 8, and once again invokes the images of horses.

CJB Habakkuk 3:8 Yehoveh is it against the rivers, against the rivers that your anger is inflamed? Is your fury directed at the sea? Is that why you ride on your horses, and drive your chariots to victory?

There is no new information or revised visual image presented; it is just a proper literary way to end the poem. I very much like the way F. Anderson put in retrospect how we are to take the purpose of this admittedly odd poetic section that differs so much the rest of the Habakkuk. He says this:

“To sum up: vss. 8 – 15 describe a foray by YHWH in language that is largely mythological.”

A bit later in his statement he says:

“Numerous incidents in Israel’s past… Creation, Flood, exodus, the crossing of the Jordan, the Battle of Beth-Horon, the Battle of Kishon… supply memories that are echoed in this poem”.

He then goes on to emphasize the extreme archaic nature and content of this poem and how the content matches well the ideas and thoughts harbored by the Hebrew Israelites at that stage in their history. I would add that in a sense Habakkuk was, since chapter 1, asking God to battle chaos. God had created order, giving specially detailed order to Israel by means of the Law of Moses, but they had subsequently abandoned it to the point that they weren’t substantially different from the pagan nations. Therefore, the old poem Habakkuk inserted was about an ancient theme of the War against Chaos by various gods that is very Canaanite and Mesopotamian in its origins and had deeply infected the religion and thoughts of the Israelites that settled in the former Canaanite territories.

So, now verse 16 begins the final section of Habakkuk, and consists of 4 verses. It is all about Habakkuk’s personal emotions and thoughts to the coming theophany of God, who is coming to avenge and rescue His people. In many ways that takes us back to his thoughts of verse 2. In that verse Habakkuk speaks of the reports of God (meaning the historic events that have been handed down over the ages about His great deeds), and that it has put him in a state of awe, but also of trembling.

CJB Habakkuk 3:16 When I heard, my whole body trembled, my lips shook at the sound; weakness overcame my limbs, my legs gave way beneath me. But I wait calmly for the day of trouble, when it comes upon our assailants.

When Habakkuk heard from God who told him what was coming, and He listened to the elders who spoke of what had happened to Israel and to the nations in the centuries past, it struck him hard. It made every part of him tremble, and so in poetic hyperbolic fashion says that his insides, his mouth, and even his bones began to quake. This, of course, is essentially mimicking how the earth itself and the cosmos will react to the appearance of the Lord (using the same descriptive but metaphorical words we found in this ancient poem).

Without doubt, Habakkuk was not thinking in terms of time like the End Times that we rightly do. He was thinking far more immediate and no doubt directly of the Chaldeans. Judah and the Judean people were going to suffer greatly. How much solace there was in knowing that sometime later Babylon would pay an even greater price for what they would soon do to him and his people, and that restoration would eventually come to Israel, is hard to gauge. But he was a human and I don’t imagine it was all that much comfort.

This is what all of us ought to be feeling, right now. Yes, God is soon coming for us. Yes, He is going to vindicate us. Yes, He is going to wipe out those who trouble us so badly with their wickedness. Yes, it will finally result in His Kingdom coming and us being part of it. But we are going to suffer tremendous tribulation in the process that will include our family and friends. What are we to do today in response to this knowledge? It is to take our cue from Habakkuk. We know what is coming, we know why, and there is not one thing we can do to delay, change or stop it. So, we need to wait calmly, soberly, prayerfully for that day.

CJB Habakkuk 3:17-18 17 For even if the fig tree doesn't blossom, and no fruit is on the vines, even if the olive tree fails to produce, and the fields yield no food at all, even if the sheep vanish from the sheep pen, and there are no cows in the stalls; 18 still, I will rejoice in Yehoveh, I will take joy in the God of my salvation.

For Israelites of Habakkuk’s day, as agriculturalists and pastoralists, the fig tree, fruits of the trees, olives, the harvest of the fields, the flourishing of flocks of sheep and herds of cows were the heart and necessities of everyday life and abundance. These, in their abundance, are God’s blessings. When they become scarce or unavailable, this is the reverse; it is serious life-threatening tribulation with great discomfort. There’re no tricky Hebrew words in what he is saying. It is quite straightforward and simple to understand. He is proclaiming that although this coming tribulation will mean deprivations of all kinds that remove the vibrancy of life, still he can rejoice in one thing. And please notice: the rejoicing is NOT in some long range, pleasant and blissful outcome. It is simply rejoicing in the Lord Himself. For Habakkuk, as do we all who worship Yehoveh and His Son Yeshua, we have a great loving God who is unmatched, and is not defeatable. He has a plan that includes a wonderful life that will take away death and will bring on a lack of toil and trouble for all who trust in Him and obey Him. God will be the sole and sufficient object of Habakkuk’s existence.

CJB Habakkuk 3:19 ELOHIM Adonai is my strength! He makes me swift and sure-footed as a deer and enables me to stride over my high places. For the leader. With my stringed instruments.

Although we can know with certainty what troubles are coming, nonetheless we can continue our journey and not stagger or stumble. We can have that proverbial “peace without understanding” that we’ve all heard about so often. A peace that can only come from God, and we all ought to learn to say it like this: “shalom without understanding”. It is a well-being that we won’t, and can’t, conjure up within ourselves. It is not bestowed upon us by men of letters and powers. It comes only from Heaven. It is a spiritual gifting.

It is wonderful how the agitated, sharp-tongued, frustrated Habakkuk of chapter 1 has evolved through this process of interacting with God, asking Him very tough questions (that is amazing to say the least) but it has resulted in a calmed assurance, based upon trust in God, but without getting the answers he had hoped for. He will not rely on what he sees happening all around him, nor on abundant blessings in his personal life to give him peace and joy because such abundance can be taken away at the blink of an eye. But the Lord can never be taken from us, and provided we stay faithful and devoted to Him, He will never leave us.

My final comment is this: the last words of this book say, “for the leader, with my stringed instruments”. It is this more than anything else that lends itself to being good evidence that Habakkuk was a Levite and may even have at one time (before his prophetic career) been a leader of the Levite choir and musicians. Yet, this is not concrete proof of itself that Habakkuk actually performed that duty. He might well have simply composed this psalm or song that is chapter 3, with the idea that it was to be a hymn of praise and so, if anyone was to take it up from among the Levite musicians, instructions for singing it and playing it with instruments is provided. This concludes our study of Habakkuk.