CRITICAL NOTES.]
Habakkuk 2:6. These] “nations” and “people” (Habakkuk 2:4). Parable] A derisive song (Isaiah 14:4; Micah 2:4), some; ode, given by others, enigmatical in character. Woes] fivefold given, a song raised by the oppressed over the fall of the oppressor. First woe, ill-gotten gains. Increaseth] i.e. seizes what does not belong to him. How long] will he do this with impunity? Ladeth] To make heavy by a weight or load upon one. Thick clay] (mass of dirt) Lit. a cloud of clay, which will cause her ruin. Many render “a burden of pledges gained by usury,” taken by an unmerciful usurer, which he will be compelled to give up (Deuteronomy 24:10).
Habakkuk 2:7. Shall] Answer to question, How long? Bite] of a snake; the enemy like savage vipers (Jeremiah 8:17). Rise] Shake or rouse up from possession.
Habakkuk 2:8. Because] Reason for woe. Many] Boundless the spoil. Remnant] Only a remnant left, will be sufficient to punish. “Blood, land, and city] Understood generally, and not restricted to the Jews with their country and its metropolis” [Hend.].
THE SIN OF THE AVARICIOUS.—Habakkuk 2:6-8
The first woe is pronounced, and the sentence passed, upon avaricious men in these words. The fundamental thought is like that expressed concerning the Chaldæan, in Isaiah 14:12-14. Ambition manifests itself in cruelty, and proud edifices built upon the ruins of others.
I. Avaricious men increase their guilt. The covetous and those who thrive unlawfully in the world are under woe. They multiply their sins and their judgments. They break God’s commands, and add injustice to their apostasy (1 Timothy 6:10). “Great abundance of riches cannot of any man,” says Erasmus, “be both gathered and kept without sin.” “A faithful man shall abound with blessings; but he that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent.”
II. Avaricious men increase their enemies. “Shall they not rise up suddenly that shall bite thee?” &c. God will not long permit their conduct to prosper. Enemies will suddenly rise up to disturb their rest. When they are most secure and least prepared nations will retaliate; “the remnant of the people,” whom they have despised, or whom God has hid from their fury, will rise against them. Those whom they have oppressed shall taunt them. Nations and “many nations” will destroy them. Covetous and ambitious men turn God and their fellow-creatures into their enemies. “For many nations and great kings shall serve themselves of them also, and I will recompense them according to their deeds, and according to the works of their own hands.”
III. Avaricious men increase their dangers. Men haste to be rich and rush into danger.
1. They heap up booty for others. “Thou shalt be for booties unto them.” Notwithstanding their labour and strength, the enemy will easily overcome them. Their wealth gotten by vanity will be diminished. Men collect and foster what they cannot keep. They brood over ill-gotten gains which forsake and disappoint them. “As the partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not; so he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool.”
2. They insure fearful retribution. As they had spoiled others, they would be spoiled themselves. “Refrain from covetousness,” says Plato, “and thy estate shall prosper.” Innocent blood which they had shed would be avenged upon the land, the city, and the people (Habakkuk 2:8). “When thou shalt cease to spoil, thou shalt be spoiled; and when thou shalt make an end to deal treacherously, they shall deal treacherously with thee.”
HOMILETIC HINTS AND OUTLINES
1. Ambitious men become contemptible to others. They are ignominious, a taunting proverb, a public derision. “Shall not these take up a parable against him?”
2. Ambitious men have no right to the possession of that which they illegally acquire. Unjust conquest brings a curse. “Woe to him that increaseth that which is not his.”
3. Ambitious men will be stripped of all their unjust acquisitions. To what end does the conqueror sweep all nations together. Not for himself, but for others. “Riches do not exhilarate us so much with their possession as they torment us with their loss” [Gregory].
Riches are often—
1. Connected with covetousness.
2. With violence,—oppression, robbery, cruelty.
3. With folly. What is that heaped up?—only “clay.” What results from all toil and vexation?—a burden for themselves; “ladeth himself.” “A bag of gold from a Western steamer was found bound to the neck of the robber, his treasure having sunk him” [Van Doren]. “A great fortune is a great slavery” [Seneca].
Habakkuk 2:8. People shall spoil thee. Avaricious men are spoiled:
1. In their friends; who fall away, taunt, and help to strip them.
2. In their dignities; which are tainted by sin and fall into dust.
3. In their reputations; their names are a proverb in the land, and hated by all men.
4. In their posterity; who are cursed by the sins of their fathers, and cut off from the earth. “God loves to retaliate, to spoil the spoilers by a remnant of the people, by such as were of no note, and much unlikely to do such exploits. Thus he spoiled these Babylonians, by Cyrus and his Medes; the Persians, by Alexander and his Macedonians. So the Roman empire was miserably rent and torn by the Goths, Vandals, Huns, Lombards, people not before heard of, and the Greek empire by Turks, Tartars, Saracens, Scythians” [Trapp].
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 2
Habakkuk 2:5-6. Desire. Could you change the solid earth into a single lump of gold, and drop it into the gaping mouth of avarice, it would only be a crumb of transient comfort, a cordial drop, enabling it to cry a little louder, “Give, give” [Royal Preacher].