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COMMENTARY ON HABAKKUK, CHAPTER THREE A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet in song (v.1). AVING thoroughly presented the message to the Babylonian, and adequately foretold that those who sacked the holy city and deported Israel in captivity would pay a heavy penalty, he appositely moves to the mystery of Christ. And as though the redemption had already occurred in the case of a single nation individually, he shifts his attention to it in the case of all in general, whereby not only the remnant of Israel was saved but the whole earth was to no lesser degree saved. Cyrus son of Cambyses, remember, released Israel from captivity, destroying the haughty kingdom that was hateful to God, namely, the Chaldeans’. Now, what happened was an image and type of the things achieved by Christ; finding all humanity in captivity, as it were, and subjected to tyrannical rule, since Satan ruled over us through sin, as it were, (118) he freed us from bondage and hardship, released us from the very servitude of wrongdoing, and brought us, as it were, into the holy city, the heavenly Jerusalem. We became, in fact, “citizens with the saints and members of the household of God,” as Scripture says, and thus enrolled in the heavenly homeland. Struck by the force of the mystery, therefore, and admiring the ineffable Incarnation of the Only-begotten, which befitted God, he offers the prayer as though in the form of a song, in keeping with that uttered by David, “My tongue will meditate on your righteousness , on your praise all day long.”1 366 1. Eph 2.19; Ps 35.28. Cyril ignores Jerome’s information that the LXX is wide of the mark in coming up with “song” in 3.1; he generally does not discuss genres, though alert to the comparisons made in figurative language. He is also not inclined to find grounds in the mention of “song” for thinking of Habakkuk as a cultic prophet, as do some modern commentators. Lord, I heard report of you, and was afraid; Lord, I comprehended your works, and was astonished (v.2). The verse could be taken also, if you wished, as directed to the Father and God of all in person as revealing the Son, and the report giving clarification about him from the Spirit, or also properly directed to the Incarnate Word. If you were to say it was perhaps addressed to the Father, we would understand it in these terms: O Lord of all, I am astounded by the revelation or report that has been given about your Son; the account is startling and beggars description, and the Incarnation would surpass all understanding. If I were to scrutinize the force of your works in detail with the eye of my heart, it would be a matter of astonishment, and nothing less. On the other hand, if the verse bears on the Son, we shall propose nothing less in the following manner: O Lord and Ruler of all, (119) even if you were actually made flesh, I am struck with fear on hearing the report of you, or news and revelation. I am astounded, and rightly so, at the magnitude of the event, knowing that, though you share form and equality in everything with the one who begot you, you would willingly empty yourself, become a human being like us from a woman, endure the form of slavery, entitle your own Father as God with us, and become obedient, even to death, death on a cross.2 Accordingly, I heard report of you, and was afraid; I comprehended your works, and was astonished; you brought the good news of sight for the blind; you proclaimed release to captives; you healed the broken-hearted; you brought back the wayward; you bound up the wounded; you became light to those in darkness, a door and way to life and sanctification; you became peace, by faith binding into a single people both those from circumcision and also those from nations; you became “a cornerstone, chosen, precious”;3 you restored the world to the God and Father; you freed from sin those entrapped because of weakness; you delivered them from the devil’s grasp; what was enslaved was enlightened by the grace of adoption; man moved from earth to become a citizen of heaven. And furthermore, this, too, is worth hearing, in my commentary on habakkuk 3 367 2. Phil 2.6–8. 3. 1 Pt 2.6; Is 28.16...

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