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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Habakkuk 3:6 - 3:6
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“He stands, and sets the earth reeling: He looks, and makes nations tremble; primeval mountains burst in pieces, the early hills sink down: His are ways of the olden time. Hab 3:7. I saw the tents of Cushan under affliction: the curtains of the land of Midian tremble.” God coming from afar has now drawn near and taken His stand, to smite the nations as a warlike hero (cf. Hab 3:8, Hab 3:9, and Hab 3:11, Hab 3:12). This is affirmed in עָמַד, He has stationed Himself, not “He steps forth or appears.” This standing of Jehovah throws the earth and the nations into trembling. יְמֹדֵד cannot mean to measure here, for there is no thought of any measuring of the earth, and it cannot be shown that mâdad is used in the sense of measuring with the eye (Ros. and Hitzig). Moreover, the choice of the poel, instead of the piel, would still remain unexplained, and the parallelism of the clauses would be disregarded. We must therefore follow the Chaldee, Ges., Delitzsch, and others, who take מֹדֵד as the poel of מוּד = טוּט, to set in a reeling motion. It is only with this interpretation that the two parallel clauses correspond, in which יַתֵּר, the hiphil of נָתַר, to cause to shake or tremble, answers to יְמֹדֵד. This explanation is also required by what follows. For just as Hab 3:7 unquestionably gives a further expansion of יַתֵּר גּוֹיִם, so does לוֹלָם ... יִתְפֹּצְצוּ contain the explanation of יְמֹדֵד אֶרֶץ. The everlasting hills crumble (יִתְפֹּצְצוּ from פּוּץ), i.e., burst and resolve themselves into dust, and the hills sink down, pass away, and vanish (compare the similar description in Nah 1:5 and Mic 1:4). הַרְרֵי־עַד (= הַרְרֵי קֶדֶם, Deu 33:15) in parallelism with נִּבְעוֹת עוֹלָם are the primeval mountains, as being the oldest and firmest constituents of the globe, which have existed from the beginning (מִנִּי עַד, Job 20:4), and were formed at the creation of the earth (Psa 90:2; Job 15:7; Pro 8:25). הֲלִיכוֹת עוֹלָם לוֹ is not to be taken relatively, and connected with what precedes, “which are the old paths,” according to which the hills of God are called everlasting ways (Hitzig); because this does not yield a sense in harmony with the context. It is a substantive clause, and to be taken by itself: everlasting courses or goings are to Him, i.e., He now goes along, as He went along in the olden time. הֲלִיכָה, the going, advancing, or ways of God, analogous to the דֶּרֶךְ עפולָם, the course of the primitive world (Job 22:15). The prophet had Psa 68:25 floating before his mind, in which hălı̄khōth 'ĕlōhı̄m denote the goings of God with His people, or the ways which God had taken from time immemorial in His guidance of them. As He once came down upon Sinai in the cloudy darkness, the thunder, lightning, and fire, to raise Israel up to be His covenant nation, so that the mountains shook (cf. Jdg 5:5); so do the mountains and hills tremble and melt away at His coming now. And as He once went before His people, and the tidings of His wondrous acts at the Red Sea threw the neighbouring nations into fear and despair (Exo 15:14-16); so now, when the course of God moves from Teman to the Red Sea, the nations on both sides of it are filled with terror. Of these, two are individualized in Hab 3:7, viz., Cushan and Midian. By Cushan we are not to understand the Mesopotamian king named Cushan Rishathaim, who subjugated Israel for eight years after the death of Joshua (Jdg 3:8.); for this neither agrees with אָֽהֳלֵי, nor with the introduction of Midian in the parallel clause. The word is a lengthened form for Such, and the name of the African Ethiopians. The Midianites are mentioned along with them, as being inhabitants of the Arabian coast of the Red Sea, which was opposite to them (see at Exo 2:15). אָֽהֳלֵי כ, the tents with their inhabitants, the latter being principally intended. The same remark applies to יְרִיעוֹת, lit., the tent-curtains of the land of Midian, i.e., of the tents pitched in the land of Midian.