Habakkuk 2

1I will stand at my watch and station myself on the rampart. I will keep watch to see what he will say to me, and what I should answer when I am rebuked.

2Then Yahweh answered me: Write down the vision; make it plain on tablets, so that the one who reads it may run.

3For the vision still awaits its appointed time; it hurries toward the end, and it will not lie. Though it delays, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not be late.

4Look at the proud one: his soul is not upright within him. But the righteous will live by his faithfulness.

5Moreover, wine betrays him; the arrogant man never rests. He opens his throat as wide as Sheol, and like death he is never satisfied. He gathers all the nations to himself and collects all the peoples for himself.

6Will not all of them take up a taunt against him, with mocking riddles about him, and say: Woe to him who piles up what is not his own—how long will this go on?—who loads himself with goods taken in pledge!

7Will not your creditors rise up suddenly? Will not those who make you tremble wake up? Then you will become plunder for them.

8Because you have plundered many nations, all the rest of the peoples will plunder you, because of the human blood you have shed and the violence done to the land, to the city, and to all who live in it.

9Woe to him who gets evil gain for his house, to set his nest on high and escape the grasp of disaster!

10You have planned shame for your house by cutting off many peoples; you have sinned against your own life.

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

12Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and founds a town on injustice!

13Is it not from Yahweh of Armies that peoples labor only for fire, and nations wear themselves out for nothing?

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

15Woe to him who makes his neighbors drink, pouring out your wrath and making them drunk, in order to gaze on their nakedness!

16You will be filled with disgrace instead of glory. Drink, you too, and be exposed as uncircumcised! The cup in Yahweh’s right hand will come around to you, and utter disgrace will cover your glory.

17The violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you, and the destruction of the animals will terrify you, because of the human blood you have shed and the violence done to the land, to the city, and to all who live in it.

18What good is a carved idol, that its maker should carve it, or a cast image, a teacher of lies? For its maker trusts in what he has made when he makes idols that cannot speak.

19Woe to him who says to a piece of wood, “Wake up!” or to a lifeless stone, “Get up!” Can it teach? It is overlaid with gold and silver, but there is no breath in it at all.

20But Yahweh is in his holy temple; let all the earth be silent before him.