TEXT [Commentary]

black diamond   5.   The fourth taunt: the perverting Babylonians will be disgraced (2:15-17)

15 “What sorrow awaits you who make your neighbors drunk!

You force your cup on them

so you can gloat over their shameful nakedness.

16 But soon it will be your turn to be disgraced.

Come, drink and be exposed![*]

Drink from the cup of the LORD’s judgment,

and all your glory will be turned to shame.

17 You cut down the forests of Lebanon.

Now you will be cut down.

You destroyed the wild animals,

so now their terror will be yours.

You committed murder throughout the countryside

and filled the towns with violence.

NOTES

2:15 You force your cup on them. This line is filled with difficulties in the original text and thus is rendered variously in the English translations. The basic idea is that of pouring out a cup (of wrath) until the guest is drunk. The NLT has reorganized the first two lines so as to yield the necessary image in simplicity.

2:16 be exposed! This graphic comparative literally means “show yourself as uncircumcised.” Not even in the marks of his body could a Babylonian claim covenant relationship with Yahweh. Naked and without grounds for leniency, the Babylonians faced certain doom.

shame. The NLT combines two Hebrew nouns: qalon [TH7036, ZH7830], “shame” (from qalah [TH7034, ZH7829], “be light”) and qiqalon [TH7022, ZH7814], “[utter] disgrace” (from qalal [TH7043, ZH7837], “be slight”); (cf. Akkadian qalalu, “be light”; qullulu, “despised”). Laetsch (1956:339) suggests that qiqalon is derived from the root qi’ [TH6958, ZH7794] (spit, vomit), here used of shameful vomiting. Thus he remarks, “Dead drunk, the proud Chaldean shall lie naked on the floor in his own vomit, an object of horror and ridicule for all the world.”

2:17 Lebanon. Habakkuk is probably referring to Nebuchadnezzar’s exploitation of Lebanon’s forests for his many building activities. As Roberts (1991:125) remarks, “Because Nebuchadnezzar had cut down these forests, Babylon would be covered, not by the shade of the cedars (Ps 80:11 [80:10 in English Bibles]) in their fine buildings, but by the same violence that had desecrated the sanctity of God’s forests.”

wild animals. The Hebrew noun behemah [TH929, ZH989] is used of cattle in general, here representing the whole animal kingdom much as Lebanon, with its cedars, represents the natural world. This word behemah was also doubtless employed because of its use in contexts that contrast animal and human behavior (cf. Ps 73:22) and because it is frequently paired with ’adam [TH120, ZH132] (“human[kind]”; cf. Gen 2:18-20; Ps 49:12, 20), a combination that appears here.

their terror will be yours. Translators have debated whether the single verb of the original text has to do with the terror the Babylonians inflicted on the animal kingdom (NASB, KJV, NKJV) or the terror that will come upon the Babylonians. Since the latter idea assumes that the Babylonians’ terror will be because of that which they perpetrated against the animal kingdom, the NLT has included both ideas in its translation. The verbal form yekhithan (“will terrify”) is anomalous but probably is a remnant of an old energic form from the root khathath [TH2865, ZH3169]. For the existence of the energic verbal form in Northwest Semitic, see Gordon 1965:1.72-73. For the utilization of the energic in Hebrew, see Cross 1950:51 and Meyer 1969:2.100-101.

violence. God points out the Babylonians’ wanton disregard of the value of the natural world, the animal kingdom, and civilized humanity. Once more, the subject of violence surfaces. Habakkuk had complained about the violence around him (1:2-3), and God had warned him that still greater violence lay ahead (1:9). God had already laid the charge of violence against the Babylonians (2:8); here he reiterates it with yet another instance of the Babylonians’ ruthless activity. The natural and animal worlds are often made unwilling participants in man’s sin and greed (cf. Joel 1:19-20; Rom 8:22). It is a crime that has increasingly plagued human society.

COMMENTARY [Text]

The fourth taunt song emphasizes the shame the Babylonians had brought upon others. Having sought their own honor and wealth at the expense of others, it would soon be their turn to feel that same shame. Once again the theme of equal retribution comes to bear upon the case (cf. 2:8). Woe to the Babylonians!

The song begins with an invective formed with a strong metaphor. The Babylonian is a man who gives his neighbor (strong) drink in seeming hospitality. The metaphor quickly gives way to allegory. The apparently innocent cup contains a draught of wrath, for it is designed to make the partaker drunk. Drunkenness is not the only misdeed of this untrustworthy friend: Having got his neighbor drunk, he denudes him.

As invective turns to threat, the allegory depicts the giver of the drink as one who is forced to imbibe his own drink and suffer the disgrace of exposure. Several familiar biblical motifs and expressions are contained in 2:15-16. The cup as a motif of judgment is well attested elsewhere (e.g., Pss 11:6 [MT]; 75:8; Isa 51:17, 22; Jer 25:15-28; 49:12; Ezek 23:31-34). Particularly enlightening is Jeremiah’s use of the cup to portray God’s relation to Babylon (Jer 51:6-8). For Jeremiah, Babylon is God’s cup, a golden cup (cf. Daniel’s interpretation of the head of gold, Dan 2:36-38), which had passed God’s judgment to the nations. Those who drink of that cup lose all sense of perspective and become oblivious to the danger they are in. But Babylon will become a broken cup, for it will be smashed and never repaired.

Habakkuk makes the same point, although the image is slightly different. The Babylonians will be God’s cup of judgment (cf. 1:5-11), but rather than being conscious of their privileged responsibility, the Babylonians will use their position to take advantage of others and enslave them politically and economically.

The image of shame is heightened by the double figure of drunkenness and nakedness (cf. Gen 9:21-23). The first is condemned both by our Lord (Luke 21:34) and elsewhere in the Scriptures (e.g., Prov 23:29-35; Eph 5:18). Nakedness is likened to a shameful thing (cf. Gen 2:25 with Gen 3:7), and he who was stripped of clothing felt degraded (2 Sam 10:4; Ezek 16:39; 23:29). Both figures are used elsewhere to symbolize divine judgment (Nah 3:5, 11). All three symbols occur together in Lamentations 4:21, where Jeremiah portrays the Israelites’ taunt of Edom. That nation, which had so often taken advantage of Israel’s misfortune, would be given the cup of judgment, become drunk, and be stripped naked.

Habakkuk thus points out that the Babylonians will pour out a cup of wrath but in turn will drink it themselves. Indeed, they will drink it more deeply. The Neo-Babylonian Empire would come to know what every divinely employed agent must learn: When carrying out God’s will is twisted to selfish advantage, the executor of divine justice must himself be judged (cf. 2 Kgs 10:28-31 with Hos 1:4). Modern day nations would do well to learn the lesson of the fourth song.