Habakkuk 1:12-2:1--Habakkuk's Second Complaint

Habakkuk 1:12-2:1
English Standard Version

Habakkuk's Second Complaint
12 Are you not from everlasting,
    O LORD my God, my Holy One?
    We shall not die.
O LORD, you have ordained them as a judgment,
    and you, O Rock, have established them for reproof.
13 You who are of purer eyes than to see evil
    and cannot look at wrong,
why do you idly look at traitors
    and remain silent when the wicked swallows up
    the man more righteous than he?
14 You make mankind 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 dragnet;
    so he rejoices and is glad.
16 Therefore he sacrifices to his net
    and makes offerings to his dragnet;
for by them he lives in luxury,
    and his food is rich.
17 Is he then to keep on emptying his net
    and mercilessly killing nations forever?

2 I will take my stand at my watchpost
    and station myself on the tower,
and look out to see what he will say to me,
    and what I will answer concerning my complaint.

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Habakkuk comes back to the LORD certain that He will fulfill all the promises and prophecies made to the people of Israel and Judah, so it is not possible for this judgment to end in their total annihilation.  He also does not try to argue with the LORD about His decision to judge Israel and Judah.  He understands that dye has been cast.  He knows the LORD abhors evil, cannot look on it and must punish it, and that the people of Israel and Judah have done evil.  However, he's also aware that there are other ways that the LORD has dealt with the evil of His people in the past.  He has used the system of sacrifices to purify them so that their sins would not be counted against them.  Habakkuk would like to know why that plan has changed and why the LORD feels it necessary to use a wicked Gentile nation to carry out His just punishment against His people.  Can He not execute the judgment Himself?  Can He not use a more righteous people than the Chaldeans?

Will the LORD judge His people for their iniquity and remain silent about the atrocities committed by the Chaldeans and Babylonians?  Will the LORD allow the few righteous that remain to be swept up in the judgment? Habakkuk knows that if this came directly from the hand of the LORD that the righteous would be spared, but is that the case when the LORD uses a human agent to execute His judgment?

The Babylonians literally worshiped a fish-god and fileted their enemies and put hooks in their mouths or faces or put them in huge fishing nets to drag them away into captivity.  The men of other nations were literally treated like fish to be caught and carried away.  The Babylonians then made sacrifices to this god as it appears their god is powerful and bringing them success as long as the nets full of their enemies continue to come in and be emptied.  Habakkuk asks how long the LORD will let this continue because of the way they torture other people and the way in which this perpetuates their delusion that their god exists and is worthy of worship.  Habakkuk is sure the LORD will answer him, so he takes his place waiting to see what the LORD will do and waiting to hear what the LORD will say, and he promises to report everything he sees and hears like a watchman on a watchtower who looks to giver early warning of the coming invasion because he sees or hears something and sounds the alarm.