Habakkuk was a philosophical prophet. He wrestled with the problem: “Why should a righteous God allow the wicked to prosper and to triumph over the saints?”
The outstanding text: “The righteous shall live by his faith.” 2:4. Twice quoted by Paul-Rom. 1:17, Gal. 3:11. Also noted in Heb. 10:38.
While Habakkuk does not fully answer the question of why the forces of violence and oppression are allowed to swallow up the righteous, he does present one of the higher flights of poetry to be found in all of the Old Testament.
There are four divisions of the book:
A. Why does the God of right permit the rule of wrong?
B. The oracle-why is a foreign nation allowed to plunder the people of God?
C. Woes on the robbers-“greedy as hell, insatiable as death”-selfish plunderers, oppressors, insulting idolaters.
D. A psalm of deliverance.
Habakkuk quotes from Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Hosea.
A favorite verse: “The-Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.” 2:20.
This old problem of evil is dealt with in Job and in many of the psalms- note: Ps. 73.
Habakkuk seems to conclude: “Evil carries in it the seeds of its own destruction.”
The fellowship with God is the greatest of all riches.
Living by faith. “But the righteous shall live by his faith.” 2:4.
Earth filled with the glory of the Lord. “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.” 2:14.