Since this chapter was in print Nowack’s _Die Kleinen Propheten_ in the “Handkommentar z. A. T.” has been published. He recognises emphatically that the disputed passage about the Chaldeans, chap. i. 5-11, is out of place where it lies (this against Kuenen and the other authorities cited above, p. 117), and admits that it follows on, with a natural connection, to chap. ii. 4, to which Budde proposes to attach it. Nevertheless, for other reasons, which he does not state, he regards Budde’s proposal as untenable; and reckons the disputed passage to be by another hand than Habakkuk’s, and intruded into the latter’s argument. Habakkuk’s argument he assigns to after 605; perhaps 590. The tyrant complained against would therefore be the Chaldean.—Driver in the 6th ed. of his _Introduction_ (1897) deems Budde’s argument “too ingenious,” and holds by the older and most numerously supported argument (above, pp. 116 ff.).—On a review of the case in the light of these two discussions, the present writer holds to his opinion that Budde’s rearrangement, which he has adopted, offers the fewest difficulties.
[313] Except one or two critics who place it in Manasseh’s reign. See below.
[314] See next note.
[315] So Pusey. Delitzsch in his commentary on Habakkuk, 1843, preferred Josiah’s reign, but in his _O. T. Hist. of Redemption_, 1881, p. 226, Manasseh’s. Volck (in Herzog, _Real Encyc._,² art. “Habakkuk,” 1879), assuming that Habakkuk is quoted both by Zephaniah (see above, p. 39, n.) and Jeremiah, places him before these. Sinker (_The Psalm of Habakkuk_: see below, p. 127, n. 2) deems “the prophecy, taken as a whole,” to bring “before us the threat of the Chaldean invasion, the horrors that follow in its train,” etc., with a vision of the day “when the Chaldean host itself, its work done, falls beneath a mightier foe.” He fixes the date either in the concluding years of Manasseh’s reign, or the opening years of that of Josiah (Preface, 1-4).
[316] Pages 53, 49. Kirkpatrick (Smith’s _Dict. of the Bible_,² art. “Habakkuk,” 1893) puts it not later than the sixth year of Jehoiakim.
[317] _Einl. in das A. T._
[318] _Beiträge zur Jesaiakritik_, 1890, pp. 197 f.
[319] See Further Note on p. 128.
[320] _Studien u. Kritiken_ for 1893.
[321] Cf. the opening of § 30 in the first edition of his _Einleitung_ with that of § 34 in the third and fourth editions.
[322] Budde’s explanation of this is, that to the later editors of the book, long after the Babylonian destruction of Jews, it was incredible that the Chaldean should be represented as the deliverer of Israel, and so the account of him was placed where, while his call to punish Israel for her sins was not emphasised, he should be pictured as destined to doom; and so the prophecy originally referring to the Assyrian was read of him. “This is possible,” says Davidson, “if it be true criticism is not without its romance.”
[323] This in opposition to Budde’s statement that the description of the Chaldeans in i. 5-11 “ist eine phantastische Schilderung” (p. 387).
[324] It is, however, a serious question whether it would be possible in 615 to describe the Chaldeans as _a nation that traversed the breadth of the earth to occupy dwelling-places that were not his own_ (i. 6). This suits better after the battle of Carchemish.
[325] See above, p. 121, n. 322.
[326] See above, pp. 114 ff.
[327] Pages 49 and 50.
[328] See above, pp. 118 f.
[329] Wellhausen in 1873 (see p. 661); Giesebrecht in 1890; Budde in 1892, before he had seen the opinions of either of the others (see _Stud. und Krit._, 1893, p. 386, n. 2).
[330] Cornill quotes a rearrangement of chaps, i., ii., by Rothstein, who takes i. 2-4, 12 _a_, 13, ii. 1-3, 4, 5 _a_, i. 6-10, 14, 15 _a_, ii. 6 _b_, 7, 9, 10 _a_ _b_ β, 11, 15, 16, 19, 18, as an oracle against Jehoiakim and the godless in Israel about 605, which during the Exile was worked up into the present oracle against Babylon. Cornill esteems it “too complicated.” Budde (_Expositor_, 1895, pp. 372 ff.) and Nowack hold it untenable.