Habakkuk 2:13

Absalom and all the men of Israel said, “The counsel of Hushai the Archite is better than the counsel of Ahithophel.” For Yahweh had ordained to defeat the good counsel of Ahithophel, to the intent that Yahweh might bring evil on Absalom.

When Ahithophel saw that his counsel was not followed, he saddled his donkey, arose, and went home, to his city, and set his house in order, and hanged himself; and he died, and was buried in the tomb of his father.

I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and behold, all is vanity and a chasing after wind.

Set up a banner on the bare mountain! Lift up your voice to them! Wave your hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles.

I declare the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done. I say: My counsel will stand, and I will do all that I please.

Yahweh brings the counsel of the nations to nothing. He makes the thoughts of the peoples to be of no effect.

For what does a man have of all his labor and of the striving of his heart, in which he labors under the sun?

What profit has he who works in that in which he labors?

This also is a grievous evil, that in all points as he came, so shall he go. And what profit does he have who labors for the wind?

You will carry much seed out into the field, and will gather little in, for the locust will consume it.

I hated all my labor in which I labored under the sun, because I must leave it to the man who comes after me.

You will sow, but won’t reap. You will tread the olives, but won’t anoint yourself with oil; and crush grapes, but won’t drink the wine.

You have sown much, and bring in little. You eat, but you don’t have enough. You drink, but you aren’t filled with drink. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm, and he who earns wages earns wages to put them into a bag with holes in it.”

“But God said to him, ‘You foolish one, tonight your soul is required of you. The things which you have prepared—whose will they be?’

I also will do this to you: I will appoint terror over you, even consumption and fever, that shall consume the eyes, and make the soul to pine away. You will sow your seed in vain, for your enemies will eat it.

The counsel of Ahithophel, which he gave in those days, was as if a man inquired at the inner sanctuary of God. All the counsel of Ahithophel both was like this with David and with Absalom.

Unless Yahweh builds the house, they who build it labor in vain. Unless Yahweh watches over the city, the watchman guards it in vain.

For my sword has drunk its fill in the sky. Behold, it will come down on Edom, and on the people of my curse, for judgment.

who frustrates the signs of the liars, and makes diviners mad; who turns wise men backward, and makes their knowledge foolish;

Behold, all you who kindle a fire, who adorn yourselves with torches around yourselves, walk in the flame of your fire, and among the torches that you have kindled. You will have this from my hand: you will lie down in sorrow.

“For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the spring of living waters, and cut out cisterns for themselves: broken cisterns that can’t hold water.

“Keep your feet from being bare, and your throat from thirst. But you said, ‘It is in vain. No, for I have loved strangers, and I will go after them.’

Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? Then may you also do good, who are accustomed to do evil.

Yahweh of Armies says: “The wide walls of Babylon will be utterly overthrown. Her high gates will be burned with fire. The peoples will labor for vanity, and the nations for the fire; and they will be weary.”

What do you plot against Yahweh? He will make a full end. Affliction won’t rise up the second time.

But if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow it, and you would be found even to be fighting against God!”

And the tongue is a fire. The world of iniquity among our members is the tongue, which defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature, and is set on fire by Gehenna.

There shall not be found with you anyone who makes his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, one who uses divination, one who tells fortunes, or an enchanter, or a sorcerer,

On that day, King Ahasuerus gave the house of Haman, the Jews’ enemy, to Esther the queen. Mordecai came before the king; for Esther had told what he was to her.

let briers grow instead of wheat, and stinkweed instead of barley.” The words of Job are ended.

Yahweh, how my adversaries have increased! Many are those who rise up against me.

The humble shall eat and be satisfied. They shall praise Yahweh who seek after him. Let your hearts live forever.

Yes, my own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, who ate bread with me, has lifted up his heel against me.

For he sees that wise men die; likewise the fool and the senseless perish, and leave their wealth to others.

A worthless person, a man of iniquity, is he who walks with a perverse mouth,

There are many plans in a man’s heart, but Yahweh’s counsel will prevail.

For to the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge, and joy; but to the sinner he gives travail, to gather and to heap up, that he may give to him who pleases God. This also is vanity and a chasing after wind.

He who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he who loves abundance, with increase: this also is vanity.

Take counsel together, and it will be brought to nothing; speak the word, and it will not stand, for God is with us.”

“The bricks have fallen, but we will build with cut stone. The sycamore fig trees have been cut down, but we will put cedars in their place.”

For Yahweh of Armies has planned, and who can stop it? His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?”

A workman has cast an image, and the goldsmith overlays it with gold, and casts silver chains for it.

But I said, “I have labored in vain. I have spent my strength in vain for nothing; yet surely the justice due to me is with Yahweh, and my reward with my God.”

Yahweh says, “Don’t let the wise man glory in his wisdom. Don’t let the mighty man glory in his might. Don’t let the rich man glory in his riches.

I will satiate the soul of the priests with fatness, and my people will be satisfied with my goodness,” says Yahweh.

Shout against her all around. She has submitted herself. Her bulwarks have fallen. Her walls have been thrown down, for it is the vengeance of Yahweh. Take vengeance on her. As she has done, do to her.

I will execute judgment on Bel in Babylon, and I will bring out of his mouth that which he has swallowed up. The nations will not flow any more to him. Yes, the wall of Babylon will fall.

I will make you a bare rock. You will be a place for the spreading of nets. You will be built no more; for I Yahweh have spoken it,’ says the Lord Yahweh.

For they sow the wind, and they will reap the whirlwind. He has no standing grain. The stalk will yield no head. If it does yield, strangers will swallow it up.

Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Edom, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because he pursued his brother with the sword, and cast off all pity, and his anger raged continually, and he kept his wrath forever;

and those who use the world, as not using it to the fullest. For the mode of this world passes away.

Yes, and for this very cause adding on your part all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence; and in moral excellence, knowledge;

then I will give you your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.

Absalom sent for Ahithophel the Gilonite, David’s counselor, from his city, even from Giloh, while he was offering the sacrifices. The conspiracy was strong; for the people increased continually with Absalom.

For your iniquity teaches your mouth, and you choose the language of the crafty.

Vindicate me, God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation. Oh, deliver me from deceitful and wicked men.

Surely men of low degree are just a breath, and men of high degree are a lie. In the balances they will go up. They are together lighter than a breath.

There is no wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against Yahweh.

“Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher; “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.”

So I hated life, because the work that is worked under the sun was grievous to me; for all is vanity and a chasing after wind.

Why do you spend money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which doesn’t satisfy? Listen diligently to me, and eat that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in richness.

They will not labor in vain nor give birth for calamity; for they are the offspring of Yahweh’s blessed and their descendants with them.

I saw, and behold, the fruitful field was a wilderness, and all its cities were broken down at the presence of Yahweh, before his fierce anger.

They have sown wheat, and have reaped thorns. They have exhausted themselves, and profit nothing. You will be ashamed of your fruits, because of Yahweh’s fierce anger.”

But they say, ‘It is in vain; for we will walk after our own plans, and we will each follow the stubbornness of his evil heart.’ ”

The king cried aloud to bring in the enchanters, the Chaldeans, and the soothsayers. The king spoke and said to the wise men of Babylon, “Whoever reads this writing, and shows me its interpretation, shall be clothed with purple, and have a chain of gold about his neck, and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom.”

Those who regard lying vanities forsake their own mercy.

Her rich men are full of violence, her inhabitants speak lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their speech.

Whereas Edom says, “We are beaten down, but we will return and build the waste places;” Yahweh of Armies says, “They shall build, but I will throw down; and men will call them ‘The Wicked Land,’ even the people against whom Yahweh shows wrath forever.”

For being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, they didn’t subject themselves to the righteousness of God.

Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the lawyer of this world? Hasn’t God made foolish the wisdom of this world?

For you yourselves know, brothers, our visit to you wasn’t in vain,

This wisdom is not that which comes down from above, but is earthly, sensual, and demonic.

The beast was taken, and with him the false prophet who worked the signs in his sight, with which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image. These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulfur.

Your strength will be spent in vain; for your land won’t yield its increase, neither will the trees of the land yield their fruit.

Man sets an end to darkness, and searches out, to the furthest bound, the stones of obscurity and of thick darkness.

She deals harshly with her young ones, as if they were not hers. Though her labor is in vain, she is without fear,

“Surely every man walks like a shadow. Surely they busy themselves in vain. He heaps up, and doesn’t know who shall gather.

A worthless man devises mischief. His speech is like a scorching fire.

What does man gain from all his labor in which he labors under the sun?

Then I looked at all the works that my hands had worked, and at the labor that I had labored to do; and behold, all was vanity and a chasing after wind, and there was no profit under the sun.

When goods increase, those who eat them are increased; and what advantage is there to its owner, except to feast on them with his eyes?

The blacksmith takes an ax, works in the coals, fashions it with hammers, and works it with his strong arm. He is hungry, and his strength fails; he drinks no water, and is faint.

You are wearied in the multitude of your counsels. Now let the astrologers, the stargazers, and the monthly prognosticators, stand up and save you from the things that will happen to you.

You were wearied with the length of your ways; yet you didn’t say, ‘It is in vain.’ You found a reviving of your strength; therefore you weren’t faint.

Friends deceive each other, and will not speak the truth. They have taught their tongue to speak lies. They weary themselves commiting iniquity.

She is weary with toil; yet her great rust, rust by fire, doesn’t leave her.

Won’t all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against him, and say, ‘Woe to him who increases that which is not his, and who enriches himself by extortion! How long?’

Don’t work for the food which perishes, but for the food which remains to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For God the Father has sealed him.”

Someone told David, saying, “Ahithophel is among the conspirators with Absalom.” David said, “Yahweh, please turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness.”

Then you shall say, ‘Thus will Babylon sink, and will not rise again because of the evil that I will bring on her; and they will be weary.’ ” Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.