Navarre Bible Commentary (RSV) ********************************************************************************
From: Habakkuk 1:12-2:4
The prophet’s second complaint
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[12] Art thou not from everlasting, O Lord my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O Lord, thou hast ordained them as a judgment; and thou, O Rock, hast established them for chastisement. [13] Thou who art of purer eyes than to behold evil and canst not look on wrong, why dost thou look on faithless men, and art silent when the wicked swallows up the man more righteous than he? [14] For thou makest men like the fish of the sea, like crawling things that have no ruler. [15] He brings all of them up with a hook, he drags them out with his net, he gathers them in his seine; so he rejoices and exults. [16] Therefore he sacrifices to his net and burns incense to his seine; for by them he lives in luxury, and his food is rich. [17] Is he then to keep on emptying his net, and mercilessly slaying nations for ever?
[1] I will take my stand to watch, and station myself on the tower, and look forth to see what he will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint.
God’s reply
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[2] And the Lord answered me: “Write the vision; make it plain upon tablets, so he may run who reads it. [3] For still the vision awaits its time; it hastens to the end -- it will not lie. If it seem slow, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay. [4] Behold, he whose soul is not upright in him shall fail, but the righteous shall live by his faith.
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Commentary:
1:12-2:1. Here the prophet gives full expression to his confusion.
He admits that God is the sovereign Lord who has raised up the Chaldeans “as a judgment” and “for chastisement” (1:12). The chastisement is valid, but what he does not understand is the method God uses: How is it possible for the Lord, who is the immortal Holy One (1:12), to choose a treacherous and unbelieving nation to carry out the punishment (1:13)? And he then goes on to explain in what this treachery and faithlessness consists. He describes the treachery by using the analogy of fishing: men, the righteous (cf. 1:13), are like fish that are living in their natural habitat, the sea, and the in invader is like the fisherman who catches them with his hook, net and seine (1:15) and then kills them. But this treachery turns into irreligion; for the invader delights in what he does; worse still, he adores what gives him power (1:16-17; cf. 1:11). There may be a reference here to some Eastern peoples who had the custom of offering an annual sacrifice to their sword, taking it as a symbol of their god of war (Herodotus, History, 4, 62), but in biblical tradition the seduction of power is often likened to or described as idolatry: “Idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honours and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons (for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money, etc. Jesus says, ‘You cannot serve God and mammon’ (Mt 6:24). Many martyrs died for not adoring ‘the Beast’, refusing even to simulate such worship. Idolatry rejects the unique Lordship of God; it is therefore incompatible with communion with God” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2113).
But the prophet is a man of faith; even though he does not understand what God is telling him, he continues to listen carefully, because he knows that God will not fail him: “Listen to the words of Habakkuk: I will take my stand to watch, and station myself on the tower, and look forth to see what he will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint. We too, my beloved brothers, should be watchmen, for the day of battle has come. Let us enter into the depths of our hearts, where Christ lives and awaits us. May we refine our spirits and be prudent, never trusting to our own strengths, but concentrating on keeping our watch and weak guard” (St Bernard, Sermones de diversis, 5, 4).
2:2-4. As if admitting that the prophet is right, God answers his questions. The first point he makes clear is that when he promises something, it will happen: time may pass, but his word will not pass away unfulfilled (vv. 2-3). And this delay is a test of people’s faithfulness (v. 4).
The last verse here (“Behold ... the righteous shall live by his faith”) is important in both the Jewish and Christian biblical traditions. Some rabbis saw it as a summary of all 613 commandments of the Law; the writers of the Qumran commentary understood it to mean that he who kept the Law would escape the Judgment; and in the New Testament it is quoted on a number of occasions in connexion with the power of faith and the need for fortitude.
However, the verse is difficult to translate; this can be seen in various translations and even in the way the text is quoted in the New Testament. The Letter to the Hebrews 10:38 quotes this passage, working from the Greek translation, to exhort Christians to persevere in the faith they have received: “My righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.” Although the author of Hebrews inverts the order of the original, the meaning is unchanged. Similarly, “faith” (“faithfulness”: note d) translates a very common word (‘emunah) which means stability, faithfulness, faith. It is a quality of God (Deut 32:4) and also of those who honour him (2 Chron 19:9) and who are righteous in his eyes (Prov 12:22). In Romans 1:17 and Galatians 3:11, St Paul quotes the second part of the Habakkuk verse (“the righteous shall live by his faith”) applied to the individual, to ground his teaching on justification by faith rather than by the works of the Law. St Paul’s use of the verse means that it is very important from a Christian point of view.
St Jerome’s interpretation takes account of both the original audience and the Christian readership: “If your faith is weak and you begin to doubt that what was promised will come about, you will cause my soul great displeasure. But the just man, who believes in my word and never doubts the promises I make, will receive eternal life as his reward [...]. It is clear that these words contain a prophecy of the coming of Christ. The problem they contain will be resolved by him: sin will triumph and punishment be never-ending until He comes” (Commentarii in Abacuc, 2, 4). The verse is similar in style to a proverb (or maxim) and can be readily applied to the Christian life. For example, just as the New Testament says of St Joseph that he was a just man (cf. Mt 1:19), the Habakkuk passage can be applied to him as a sign that justice implies faith: “To be just is not simply a matter of obeying rules. Goodness should grow from the inside; it should be deep and vital -- for the just man lives by faith’ (Hab 2:4). These words, which later be- came a frequent subject of St Paul’s meditation, really did apply in the case of St Joseph. He didn’t fulfill the will of God in a routine or perfunctory way; he did it spontaneously and wholeheartedly. For him, the law which every practising Jew lived by was not a code or a cold list of precepts, but an expression of the will of the living God. So he knew how to recognize the Lord’s voice when it came to him so unexpectedly and so surprisingly” (St Josemarla Escrivá, Christ Is Passing By, 41).
Catena Aurea by St. Thomas Aguinas
17:14–18
14. And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him a certain man, kneeling down to him, and saying,
15. Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is lunatick, and sore vexed: for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water.
16. And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him.
17. Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him hither to me.
18. And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour.
ORIGEN. Peter, anxious for such desirable life, and preferring his own benefit to that of many, had said, It is good for us to be here. But since charity seeks not her own, Jesus did not this which seemed good to Peter, but descended to the multitude, as it were from the high mount of His divinity, that He might be of use to such as could not ascend because of the weakness of their souls; whence it is said, And when he was come to the multitude; for if He had not gone to the multitude with His elect disciples, there would not have come near to Him the man of whom it is added, There came to him a man kneeling down, and saying, Lord, have mercy on my son. Consider here, that sometimes those that are themselves the sufferers believe and entreat for their own healing, sometimes others for them, as he who kneels before Him praying for his son, and sometimes the Saviour heals of Himself unasked by any. First, let us see what this means that follows, For he is lunatic, and sore vexed. Let the physicians talk as they list, for they think it no unclean spirit, but some bodily disorder, and say, that the humours in the head are governed in their motions by sympathy with the phases of the moon, whose light is of the nature of humours. But we who believe the Gospel say that it is an unclean spirit that works such disorders in men. The spirit observes the moon’s changes, that it may cheat men into the belief that the moon is the cause of their sufferings, and so prove God’s creation to be evil; as other dæmons lay wait for men following the times and courses of the stars, that they may speak wickedness in high places, calling some stars malignant, others benign; whereas no star was made by God that it should produce evil. In this that is added, For ofttimes he falls into the fire, and oft into the water,
CHRYSOSTOM. is to be noted, that were not man fortified here by Providence, he would long since have perished; for the dæmons who cast him into the fire, and into the water, would have killed him outright, had God not restrained him.
JEROME. In saying, And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not heal him, he covertly accuses the Apostles, whereas that a cure is impossible is sometimes the effect not of want of power in those that undertake it, but of want of faith in those that are to be healed,
CHRYSOSTOM. See herein also his folly, in that before the multitude he appeals to Jesus against His disciples. But He clears them from shame, inputing their failure to the patient himself; for many things shew that he was weak in faith. But He addresses His reproof not to the man singly, that He may not trouble him, but to the Jews in general. For many of those present, it is likely, had improper thoughts concerning the disciples, and therefore it follows, Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you, how long shall I suffer you? His How long shall I be with you? shews that death was desired by Him, and that He longed for His withdrawal.
REMIGIUS. It may be known also, that not now for the first time, but of a long time, the Lord had borne the Jews’ stubbornness, whence He says, How long shall I suffer you? because I have now a long while endured your iniquities, and ye are unworthy of My presence.
ORIGEN. Or; Because the disciples could not heal him as being weak in faith, He said to them, O faithless generation, adding perverse, to shew that their perverseness had introduced evil beyond their nature. But I suppose, that because of the perverseness of the whole human race, as it were oppressed with their evil nature, He said, How long shall I be with you?
JEROME. Not that we must think that He was overcome by weariness of them, and that The meek and gentle broke out into words of wrath, but as a physician who might see the sick man acting against his injunctions, would say, How long shall I frequent your chamber? How long throw away the exercise of my skill, while I prescribe one thing, and you do another? That it is the sin, and not the man with whom He is angry, and that in the person of this one man He convicts the Jews of unbelief, is clear from what He adds, Bring him to me.
CHRYSOSTOM. When He had vindicated His disciples, He leads the boy’s father to a cheering hope of believing that he shall be delivered out of this evil and that the father might be led to believe the miracle that was coming, seeing the dæmons was disturbed even when the child was only called;
JEROME. He rebuked him, that is, not the sufferer, but the dæmons.
REMIGIUS. In which deed He left an example to preachers to attack sins, but to assist men.
JEROME. Or, His reproof was to the child, because for his sins he had been seized on by the dæmons.
RABANUS. The lunatic is figuratively one who is hurried into fresh vices every hour, one while is cast into the fire, with which the hearts of the adulterers burn; or again into the waters of pleasures or lusts, which yet have not strength to quench love. (Hos. 7:4, 6.)
AUGUSTINE. (Quæst. Ev. i. 22.) Or the fire pertains to anger, which aims upwards, water to the lusts of the flesh.
ORIGEN. Of the changefulness of the sinner it is said, The fool changes as the moon. (Ecclus. 27:12.) We may see sometimes that an impulse towards good works comes over such, when, lo! again as by a sudden seizure of a spirit they are laid hold of by their passions, and fall from that good state in which they were supposed to stand. Perhaps his father stands for the Angel to whom was allotted the care of this lunatic, praying the Physician of souls, that He would set free his son, who could not be delivered from his suffering by the simple word of Christ’s disciples, because as a deaf person he cannot receive their instruction, and therefore he needs Christ’s word, that henceforth he may not act without reason.
17:19–21
19. Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out?
20. And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.
CHRYSOSTOM. The disciples had received from the Lord the power over unclean spirits, and when they could not heal the dæmoniac thus brought to them, they seem to have had misgivings lest they had forfeited the grace once given to them; hence their question. And they ask it apart, not out of shame, but because of the unspeakable matter of which they were to ask. Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief.
HILARY. The Apostles had believed, yet their faith was imperfect; while the Lord tarried in the mount, and they abode below with the multitude, then faith had become stagnant.
CHRYSOSTOM. Whence it is plain that the disciples’ faith was grown weak, yet not all, for those pillars were there, Peter, and James, and John.
JEROME. This is what the Lord says in another place, Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name believing, ye shall receive. (John 16:23.) Therefore when we receive not, it is not the weakness of Him that gives, but the fault of them that ask. Mat. 21:22.)
CHRYSOSTOM. But it is to be known, that, as ofttimes the faith of him that draweth near to receive supplies the miraculous virtue, so ofttimes the power of those that work the miracle is sufficient even without the faith of those who sought to receive. (Acts 10:4.) Cornelius and his household, by their faith, attracted to them the grace of the Holy Spirit; but the dead man who was cast into the sepulchre of Elisha, was revived solely by virtue of the holy body. (2 Kings 13:21.) It happened that the disciples were then weak in faith, for indeed they were but in an imperfect condition before the cross; wherefore He here tells them, that faith is the mean of miracles, Verily I say unto you, if ye shall have faith as a grain of mustard-seed, ye shall say to this mountain, Remove hence, and it shall remove.
JEROME. Some think that the faith that is compared to a grain of mustard-seed is a little faith, whereas the Apostle says, If I shall have such faith that I could remove mountains. (1 Cor. 13:2.) The faith therefore which is compared to a grain of mustard-seed is a great faith.
GREGORY. (Mor. pref. c. 2.) The mustard-seed, unless it be bruised, does not give out its qualities, so if persecution fall upon a holy man, straightway what had seemed weak and contemptible in him is roused into the heat and fervour of virtue.
ORIGEN. Or, all faith is likened to a grain of mustard-seed, because faith is looked on with contempt by men, and shews as something poor and mean; but when a seed of this kind lights upon a good heart as its soil, it becomes a great tree. The weakness of this lunatic’s faith is yet so great, and Christ is so strong to heal him amidst all his evils, that He likens it to a mountain which cannot be cast out but by the whole faith of him who desires to heal afflictions of this sort.
CHRYSOSTOM. So He not only promises the removal of mountains, but goes beyond, saying, And nothing shall be impossible to you.
RABANUS. For faith gives our minds such a capacity for the heavenly gifts, that whatsoever we will we may easily obtain from a faithful Master.
CHRYSOSTOM. If you shall ask, Where did the Apostles remove mountains? I answer, that they did greater things, bringing many dead to life. It is told also of some saints, who came after the Apostles, that they have in urgent necessity removed mountainsb. But if mountains were not removed in the. Apostles’ time, this was not because they could not, but because they would not, there being no pressing occasion. And the Lord said not that they should do this thing, but that they should have power to do it. Yet it is likely that they did do this, but that it is not written, for indeed not all the miracles that they wrought are written.
JEROME. Or; the mountain is not said of that which we see with the eyes of the body, but signified that spirit which was removed by the Lord out of the lunatic, who is said by the Prophet to be the corrupter of the whole earth,
GLOSS. (interlin.) So that the sense then is, Ye shall say to this mountain, that is to the proud devil, Remove hence, that is from the possessed body into the sea, that is into the depths of hell, and it shall remove, and nothing shall be impossible to you, that is, no sickness shall be incurable.
AUGUSTINE. (ubi sup.) Otherwise; That the disciples in working their miracles should not be lifted up with pride, they are warned rather by the humbleness of their faith, as by a grain of mustard-seed, to take care that they remove all pride of earth, which is signified by the mountain in this place.
https://www.ecatholic2000.com/catena/untitled-24.shtml#_Toc384506924
