namo signifies "Embracing," and is taken personally to mean either "one who embraces" or" one who is embraced." The latter seems more probable. St. Jerome explains it also in the sense of one who wrestles with God, as Jacob, in prayer. But this sense is not generally allowed, and many com- mentators assume that the appellation is virtually equivalent to Theophilus, "Beloved of God." The name is written by the LXX. 'Ap,{3aKovp,. Other forms also occur. In the apocryphal addition to Daniel, entitled ' Bel and the Dragon,' a prophet in Jewry, named Habakkuk, carries food to Daniel in the ii.en of lions; and the title of this legend in the Septuagint itself (not in Theodotion) is, "Part of the prophecy of Habakko.k, the son of Jesus, of the tribe of Levi." Bat the whole account is plainly unhistorical, and its connection with the canonical writer cannot be maintained for e. moment. In calling himself a "prophet" Habakko.k claims Divine inspira- tion and mission, and to have exercised his office in his appointed sphere. Whether he was called from some other occupation, as .A.mos, or whether he was trained in the schools of the prophets, is unknown. Some ground for supposing him to have been a Levite is given by the musical direction in eh. iii. I, and the conclnsion of the psalm, "For the chief musician on my stringed instruments," which woo.Id perhaps' imply that he was qualified to take part in the temple services, and himself accompanied his hymn with instrumental mu.sic. Bat recent critics have thrown grave doubt on this inference (see Exposition). Legend has snpplemented the silence of authentic history concerning the liie of Habakkuk by certain details, some of which may have some elements of truth. Thus rabbinical tradition asserts that he was the son of the Shn.nammite woman whom Elisha restored to liie. This, 0£ course, is altogether unfounded. Christian writers, too, have not been backward in developing hints into facts. Pseudo-Epiphanius (' De Vit. Prophet.') and Pseudo-Dorotheus (' Chron. Pasch.,' p. 250) assert that Habakkuk was of the tribe of Simeon, and born in a place called Bethitouchar, perhaps Bath-Zacharias, famous in the history 0£ Judas Maccabmus (I Mace. vi. 32), that at the capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar he fled to Ostracine, a town on the sea-coast of Egypt, some sixty miles east of Pelusiu..m, and remained there till the Chaldeans departed, when he returned to his own country, and died two years before the end of the Captivity. His tomb is said to have been long shown at Keilah in the hill-country of Judah, and at Chu.kkok in Naphtali.
§ III. DATE. 'rhe time when Habakkuk prophesied can be gathered only from hints scattered in the book itself; and the limits thus obtained are a period before Babylon had obtained its independent position and so was able to menace its neighbours, and of course before the invasion of Judah, B.c. 605, twenty years later, Modern critics who do not believe in the possibilit1 iv INTRODUCTION 'l'O
of supematural prediction, at once settle the question of the prophet's date by affirming that his assertion concerning the punishment of Jerusalem at t-be hands of the Chaldeans must have been uttered after the event, or else so short a time previous, that natural acuteness could foresee the result so certa.in to occur. But this does not dispose of his prediction touching the overthrow of Babylon, which human foresight could not have taught ; and if TI"e must allow the predictive element in one case, why must we refuse it in another ? But neglecting the theories of these critics, as based on an erroneous principle, we find very great difficulty in coming to any satigfactory decision. Two theories are upheld by great names respectively. The first assigns our prophet to the time of Manasseh, immediately succeeding Nahum-a theory which is countenanced by the position of the book in the Hebrew and Greek canon. The general iniquity of which Habakkuk complains may certainly be predicated of that period in Jewish history. That the Chaldeans had not yet invaded the land, and that their ~ppearance was not expected, we learn from eh. i. 5, "I will work a work in your days, which ye will not believe, though it be told you." The words, "in your days," imply, says Pusey, that he is speaking to adults, many of whom would survive the invasion of Nebµ- chadnezzar, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, and who, if he prophesied about the close of the reign of Manasseh, would be about sixty years old at the time of the Chaldean attack. Some time later, when the Baby Ionian empire was well established, it would have been nothing incredible that destruction should menace Judrea from that quarter. It seems probable, too, that Zephaniah, who executed his office in the days of Josiah, adopted some of the words of Habakkuk (comp. eh.ii. 20 with Zeph. i. 7). Jeremiah likewise made use of his prophecy (Jer. iv. 13; Zeph. iii. 3; and eh. i. 8). Habakknk, on the other hand, employs the language of Isa. xi. 9 in eh. ii. 14. These arguments would apply with equal force to the earlier part of Josiah's reign. Thus critics would place our prophet between, B,C. 650 and 635, according to the usual reckoning, or about B.C. 626 in revised chronology . .A.nd this seems the most probable opinion. The other theory makes him a, contemporary of Jehoiakim, between B.C. 609 and 598, grounding the opinion upon the idea that his account of the violence and oppression committed by the Chaldeans could only have been written by one familiar with their proceedings, and that it would have been injudicious prematurely to fill the minds of the people with fear of these foreign invaders. This is further snpported by the tradition mentioned above, that he lived to see the Babylonian exile. The force of these arguments will not be allowed by any one who believes in the supernatural inspiration of the prophets of God.
§ IV. GENERAL CHARACTER.
There is something very striking in the style of Habakkuk. In grandenr and magnificence it is perhaps equalled by other of the prophets; langnage THE IlOOK OF HABAKKUK. V