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Verse 16

Habakkuk 3:16. When I heard, my belly trembled The prophet, having recounted, for the present encouragement of the faithful, the wonderful works which God had formerly wrought for his people, here returns again to his first subject, namely, the revelation which he had received from God, concerning the calamities which should be brought on the Jewish people by the Chaldeans. My belly trembled, my lips quivered, &c. A consternation and shaking seized me, and I could not speak for grief and astonishment, at being informed what great miseries were coming upon my nation. Rottenness entered into my bones I could no more stand than a person whose bones are rendered rotten by disease. That I might rest in the day of trouble These words are interpreted in different ways: some suppose that the prophet here expresses a desire of being gathered to his fathers in peace, before the king of Babylon should invade Judea, and carry the people away captive; and that he adds, as a reason of his prayer, a description of the desolation which should then come upon the land. In this sense the clause is understood by Mr. Green, who therefore interprets it, O that I might be at rest before the day of distress, when the invader shall come up against the people with his troops! But Noldius, whose interpretation is approved by Lowth, reads, Yet I shall rest in the day of trouble, when he shall come up against the people, even he who shall invade them with his troops. The prophet may be considered as speaking in the person of every truly pious Jew; I shall rest secure under the divine protection, when the Chaldeans shall come to invade Judea. This sense of the clause accords well, perhaps better than any other, with the following verses; in which we have a plain and noble description of the confidence we ought to have in God, in the most trying times, and when involved in the greatest calamities.

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