Habakkuk 1 — Hebrew and Greek compared
Disparate in this chapter: 1:3, 1:5, 1:9, 1:11, 1:12
Each card keeps the independently rendered source readings above their shared comparison and reception notes. The badge records the source’s governing classification; disparate readings are marked in red. Each reading retains its original reference.
Chapter 1
Complaint, the Chaldeans and the unanswered violence
Verse 1:1 Same
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:1 The oracle that Habakkuk the prophet saw.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:1 The oracle that Habakkuk the prophet saw.
Classification & Notes
Same. Text: Both identify the prophetic oracle and visionary.
Verse 1:2 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:2 How long, YHWH, have I cried for help and You do not hear? I cry to You, “Violence!” and You do not save.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:2 How long, Lord, shall I cry and You will not listen? I shall cry to You while being wronged, and You will not save?
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew's cry naming violence becomes Greek's explicit first-person experience of injustice; the lament over unanswered appeal agrees.
Verse 1:3 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:3 Why do You make me see wrongdoing, and why do You look upon misery? Destruction and violence are before me; strife arises and contention lifts itself up.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:3 Why did You show me toil and pain, to look upon misery and impiety? Judgment has come against me, and the judge takes.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew describes social destruction, strife and contention; Greek introduces adverse judgment and a judge who takes, leaving the object unstated. The complaint's concrete situation changes. Hebrew tabbit addresses God as the one looking; the English repeats the subject to distinguish it from the prophet being shown wrongdoing.
Verse 1:4 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:4 Therefore instruction grows numb, and justice never goes forth; the wicked surrounds the righteous, so justice goes forth twisted.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:4 Therefore law has been scattered, and judgment is not brought to completion; the impious oppresses the righteous, so judgment will go forth distorted.
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: Both describe ineffective law and corrupted judgment caused by oppression. Hebrew numbness/surrounding becomes Greek dispersal/oppression.
Verse 1:5 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:5 Look among the nations and observe; be utterly astonished! For a work is being done in your days that you would not believe if it were told.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:5 Look, you despisers, observe, marvel at wonders and vanish! For I am doing a work in your days that you will certainly not believe if someone recounts it.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew addresses observers among nations; Greek addresses despisers and adds a command to disappear. Greek also explicitly names the first-person worker. Saints: Acts 13:40–41 explicitly reuses this warning in Paul’s preaching about forgiveness and justification; its quotation is shorter and is not substituted for Habakkuk [ACT13].
Verse 1:6 Divergent
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:6 For look, I am raising up the Chaldeans, that bitter and impetuous nation, who traverse the breadth of the earth to possess dwellings not their own.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:6 For look, I am raising up against you the Chaldean warriors, the bitter and swift nation, who traverse the breadth of the earth to possess dwellings not their own.
Classification & Notes
Divergent. Text: Greek adds “against you” and “warriors,” making the threat's target explicit; the nation's character and seizure of others' dwellings agree.
Verse 1:7 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:7 Dreadful and fearsome are they; their judgment and dignity proceed from themselves.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:7 Fearsome and conspicuous are they; their judgment will come from themselves, and their claim will proceed from themselves.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew dignity/elevation becomes Greek lēmma, here claim, whose precise sense is uncertain. Both depict self-derived authority. Claim remains a provisional contextual rendering of lemma, not a securely established technical title.
Verse 1:8 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:8 Their horses are swifter than leopards and fiercer than wolves at evening. Their horsemen spread out; their horsemen come from afar, flying like an eagle hastening to eat.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:8 Their horses will leap beyond leopards and be fiercer than the wolves of Arabia. Their horsemen will ride out and rush from afar, flying like an eagle eager to eat.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew evening wolves become Greek Arabian wolves; Greek leap/rush differs from Hebrew speed/spreading. The eagle comparison agrees.
Verse 1:9 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:9 All of them come for violence, their faces pressing eastward; they gather captives like sand.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:9 An end will come upon the impious who stand facing them in opposition, and they will gather captives like sand.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew presents the invaders' violent advance; Greek foregrounds destruction of opposing impious people. Hebrew's difficult direction phrase is provisionally eastward, not harmonized.
Verse 1:10 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:10 They mock kings and make rulers a laughingstock. They laugh at every fortress, heap up earth and capture it.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:10 They will revel among kings, and tyrants will be their toys; they will mock every fortress, throw up a mound and seize it.
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: The same scorn for rulers and capture by an earthwork agree; Greek emphasizes play and reveling.
Verse 1:11 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:11 Then they sweep on like wind and pass through, and incur guilt—those whose own strength is their god.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:11 Then the spirit will change and pass through and make propitiation. This strength belongs to my God.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew guilt and self-deifying strength become Greek propitiation and strength assigned to “my God.” The changed spirit's agency remains uncertain; no moral harmony is supplied. The lowercase spirit does not identify the referent as the Holy Spirit; the subject and sense of the compact sequence remain disputed.
Verse 1:12 Disparate
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:12 Are You not from of old, YHWH my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. YHWH, You appointed him for judgment; Rock, You established him for correction.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:12 Are You not from the beginning, Lord, my holy God? We shall certainly not die. Lord, You appointed him for judgment, and He formed me to reprove his discipline.
Classification & Notes
Disparate. Text: Hebrew addresses God as Rock and speaks of establishing the invader for correction; Greek says “He formed me” for reproving discipline. Both retain “we shall not die”; no alternate Hebrew reading is adopted. The final Greek autou has an uncertain antecedent; lowercase his keeps that uncertainty visible rather than deciding it through divine capitalization. The supplied He for the forming agent retains the contextual reference to God. V3: both source texts read a singular object here: the two Hebrew verbs each carry a third-person masculine singular suffix, and the Greek has the singular auton. The plural them has therefore been corrected to him in both columns; the columns now agree in number, and no difference of number is claimed at this point. Disparate is retained after re-testing, on the strength of the second half of the verse, where the Rock addressed as establishing the invader becomes a third-person forming of the prophet.
Verse 1:13 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:13 Your eyes are too pure to see evil, and You cannot look upon misery. Why do You look upon the treacherous and remain silent when the wicked swallows someone more righteous than himself?
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:13 Your eye is pure, not to see evil things, and You cannot look upon distress. Why do You look upon despisers? Will You remain silent when the impious swallows the righteous?
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Greek omits Hebrew's comparative “more righteous than himself,” making the victim simply righteous; treacherous people become despisers.
Verse 1:14 Same
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:14 You make humanity like the fish of the sea, like creeping things with no ruler over them.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:14 You will make people like the fish of the sea and like creeping things with no leader.
Classification & Notes
Same. Text: The defenseless fish/creeping-things analogy and absence of government correspond.
Verse 1:15 Similar
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:15 They bring all of them up with a hook, drag them in their net and gather them in their dragnet; therefore they rejoice and exult.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:15 They hauled up an entire catch with a hook, dragged it in a casting net and gathered it in their seines; therefore they will rejoice and their heart will be glad.
Classification & Notes
Similar. Text: The fish-catching domination and ensuing joy agree. Greek explicitly adds the heart as the subject of gladness.
Verse 1:16 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:16 Therefore they sacrifice to their net and burn incense to their dragnet, for through them their portion is rich and their food plentiful.
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:16 Therefore they will sacrifice to their seine and burn incense to their casting net, for through them they fattened their portion, and their foods are choice.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: The net labels are assigned differently to sacrifice/incense; both portray worship of the instruments that enrich the conqueror.
Verse 1:17 Different
Hebrew–English: Literal-Smooth (Rabbinic Priority)
1:17 Will they therefore keep emptying their net, continually slaughtering nations without pity?
Greek–English: Literal-Smooth (Saints Priority)
1:17 Therefore they will cast their casting net and will not spare nations from continual killing.
Classification & Notes
Different. Text: Hebrew asks about repeated emptying; Greek declares casting and merciless killing. The question versus assertion and fishing action differ.