1: The burden which Habakkuk the prophet saw. 2: O LORD, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt not hear! [even] cry out to thee [of] violence, and thou wilt not save! 3: Why dost thou show me iniquity, and cause [me] to behold grievance? for devastation and violence [are] before me: and there are [that] raise strife and contention. 4: Therefore the law is slackened, and judgment doth never go forth: for the wicked doth encompass the righteous; therefore wrong judgment proceedeth. 5: Behold ye among the heathen, and regard, and wonder marvelously: for [I] will work a work in your days, [which] ye will not believe though it be told [you]. 6: For lo, I raise up the Chaldeans, [that] bitter and hasty nation, which shall march through the breadth of the land, to possess the dwelling-places [that are] not theirs. 7: They [are] terrible and dreadful: their judgment and their dignity shall proceed from themselves. 8: Their horses also are swifter than the leopards, and are more fierce than the evening wolves: and their horsemen shall spread themselves, and their horsemen shall come from far; they shall fly as the eagle [that] hasteth to eat. 9: They shall come all for violence: their faces shall sup up [as] the east wind, and they shall gather the captivity as the sand. 10: And they shall scoff at the kings, and the princes shall be a scorn to them: they shall deride every strong hold; for they shall heap dust, and take it. 11: Then shall [his] mind change, and he shall pass over, and offend, [imputing] this his power to his god. 12: [Art] thou not from everlasting, O LORD my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O LORD, thou hast ordained them for judgment; and O mighty God, thou hast established them for correction. 13: [Thou art] of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity: why lookest thou on them that deal treacherously, [and] keepest silence when the wicked devoureth [the man that is] more righteous than he? 14: And makest men as the fishes of the sea, as the creeping animals [that have] no ruler over them? 15: They take up all of them with the angle, they catch them in their net, and gather them in their drag: therefore they rejoice and are glad. 16: Therefore they sacrifice to their net, and burn incense to their drag; because by them their portion [is] fat, and their food plenteous. 17: Shall they therefore empty their net, and not spare continually to slay the nations?
