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1. Inscription. 2–4. The prophet's complaints or complaints to God about the unpunished reign of untruth and wickedness in the country. 5–11. The first Divine response to the prophet’s complaints is the announcement of the terrible disaster of the enslavement of the Jews by the Chaldeans. 12–17. The impression of the answer to the prophet, new perplexities, new complaints and new questions to his God. Hab.1:1. Prophetic vision seen by the prophet Habakkuk. The book of the prophet Habakkuk, like the book of the prophet Nahum, begins in the Hebrew original with the word mass, one of the main meanings of which is “burden”, “burden”. Blessed Jerome here, as in the book of the prophet Nahum, transfers this word to the Latin onus, burden. But in relation to the book of the prophet Habakkuk, the mass has a more neutral meaning (prophecy in general) than a special one (announcement of threats, disasters) - since in this book the formidable and comforting elements penetrate each other especially closely. Therefore, here the translation of LXX is more consistent with the content: λημμα, which Blessed Theodoret explains as follows: “Vision (λημμα) calls the admiration of the mind and the transition from human affairs to Divine revelation. Therefore, if the prophet said this through the action of the Spirit, then, obviously, he himself did not suffer from bewilderment, but exposes the scab of those who are sick with it, and applies medicine” (p. 23). The masses here, apparently, are partly inclined towards this general or neutral understanding. Jerome, when he notes: “It should also be noted that the vision of the prophet is a lifting or burden, which, as we have already said, signifies grave (disasters) and that he clearly understands his vision (p. 131). We must also keep in mind that the title mass of Hab 1.1 can and does only refer to the content of the first two chapters of the book of the prophet Habakkuk, since the third chapter has its own special title or inscription: tefallah, prayer. This further confirms the neutral meaning of mass. Both in the first inscription (Hab 1.1) and in the second (Hab 3.1), the name nabi, προφητη, prophet, which is also found in the inscriptions of two prophetic books Haggai (Hag 1.1) and Zechariah (Zechariah 1.1), is added to Habakkuk’s own name. But this circumstance in itself cannot at all indicate the later origin of the inscription of the book of the prophet Habakkuk (as Marti, s. 331), but simply aims to indicate the title of Habakkuk among the members of the Old Testament church - he was a prophet both by ministry (munus propheticum), and not only by gift (donum propheticum), - and together to present a guarantee of the fidelity of all revelation, to give evidence of his origin from above - that “he does not speak from the heart, but communicates the word of God, as a prophet and filled with God’s grace for this” (St. Cyril of Alexandria. See in Prof. Golubeva, p. 706). This latter corresponds to the basic meaning of the word nabi, according to which “a prophet is a person who does not speak on his own, but proclaims the will of God and His revelation to people, moreover, chosen by God and receiving divine authority from Him; the prophet is an explainer and interpreter not of anything at all, but only of the will and words of the Divine, he is a mediator between God and people, a trusted representative of God (Ex. 7:1–2, 4:15–16; Gen. 20:7; Jer. 26.9). (M. Verzhbolovich, Prophetic ministry in the Israeli (ten-tribe) kingdom. Kyiv. 1891, pp. 5–6. See more in R. E. Laur, Die Prophetennamen des Alten Testamentes. Ein Beitrag zur Theologje des Alten Testamentes. Sreiburg (Schteiz) 1903, s. 2, especially ss. 11–42). Hab.1:2–4. How long, Lord, will I cry, and You will not hear, I will cry out to You about violence, and You will not save? Why do you let me see villainy and look at disasters? Robbery and violence are before me, and enmity arises and discord arises. As a result, the law has lost its force, and there is no correct judgment: since the wicked overcomes the righteous, then a perverse judgment occurs. The complaints of the prophet depicted here in his appeal to the God of the covenant - Jehovah, were caused, in the opinion of some Jewish interpreters, as well as Blessed Jerome, and some new commentators (Philippson, Maurer, Rosenmuller, Ewald, etc.), by the expected or already actually committed violence of the Babylonians or Chaldeans in Judea. “Prophet,” says the blessed one. Jerome cries out against God regarding why Nebuchadnezzar will destroy the church and Judah, why Jerusalem will be destroyed, although it is the city of God. Why does the prophet cry out, but God does not listen to him? he cries out to the Lord, oppressed by the Chaldeans, but does not receive salvation? (p. 133) “the wicked king Nebuchadnezzar prevailed against the righteous Judah (2 Kings 24.1)... and the righteous king Josiah will be killed by the king of Egypt (2 Kings 23.29), and Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah will be in slavery (Dan 3), and the ruler of Babylon will be ruler” (p. 135). In favor of this understanding, its new supporters point out that the words found in Art. 2 and 3: Hamas, violence, and Amal, oppression, also found below in vv. 9 and 13, where they undoubtedly signify the tyrannical actions of the Chaldeans. But besides these words, in the section under consideration in Art. 3 the prophet also used the words riv, litigation, quarrel, and madon, abuse, discord; In addition, in Art. 4 says that the law, the Torah - obviously the Mosaic Law, has lost its force, that the truth does not prevail, that the judgment is happening perversely: all these features, without any doubt, are applicable only to the internal life of the people of Judah, as a people of the positive law, the Torah, moreover, who sinned with frequent deviations from the latter - and, on the contrary, are completely inapplicable to the Chaldeans - a people who did not recognize any other law except their own will ( Hab.1:7) and the power deified by him (v. 11, cf. v. 16). Moreover, if we agreed with the interpretation of Art. 2–4, then the following, art. 5–10, the announcement of the invasion of the Chaldeans as a completely new and incredible event, and a detailed description of them would not make sense, remaining completely incomprehensible. On the contrary, when explaining Art. 2–4 regarding the internal decomposition of the religious, moral and legal side of life of the Jews themselves, contemporary with the prophet, it is quite clear, first of all, the general attitude of this section to the subsequent art. 5–11: this is the relationship of cause to effect, crime and punishment; then, in particular, the mentioned similarity of the names (Hamas, Amal) of the crimes of the Jews and the way of action of the Chaldeans is deeply based on the idea of ​​correspondence between divine retribution and the sin that caused it, according to the word of the Wise One: “Whoever sins by these is tormented” (Wis. 11.17) the sin of the Jews consisted of oppression, various types of trampling on the law ( Hab.1:2–4), the punishment of God in the form of the invasion and violence of the Chaldeans (Hab.1:5–11) consisted of the same thing, just as these latter, for their godless oppression of the people of God (Hab.1:12), awaited, according to the judgment of God, a similar disastrous fate (chap. II). See prof. Golubeva, s. 699–701 approx. Thus, the prophet Habakkuk in v. 2–4, like the prophet Micah (Mic. 7), expresses his deep sorrow at the wickedness prevailing among his people in public life. As a deeply believing member of a theocratic society, moreover, as a God-appointed guardian of the theocracy (cf. Hab. 2.1), the prophet is in holy zeal for the “numb” (Heb. pug) as it were law, for the trampled truth of God (Hab. 1.4). with prayerful boldness (like the psalmists, for example Ps. 21:2, 88:15) he calls on God for the long-awaited Divine intervention in the lives of his fellow citizens, which do not comply with the Divine law. Of course, the prophet complains about the general direction of life, and not about individual wicked people, much less about his personal oppressors. Hab.1:5–11. Look among the nations and look closely, and you will be greatly amazed; For I will do such a thing in your days that you would not believe if it were told to you. For behold, I will raise up the Chaldeans, a cruel and unbridled people, who walk across the breadths of the earth to take possession of villages that do not belong to them: He is terrible and formidable; from himself comes his judgment and his power. His horses are faster than leopards and quicker than wolves of the evening; his cavalry gallops in different directions; His horsemen come from afar, they fly like an eagle rushing at its prey: All of it goes for robbery; turning his face forward, he takes away captives like sand: And he mocks kings, and princes serve as a laughing stock to him; He laughs at every fortress: he builds a siege rampart and takes it: Then his spirit is puffed up, and he walks and rages; his strength is his god. To the sorrowful bewilderments of the prophet, a Divine answer is given here - without any deliberate preliminary - with the goal of convincing the prophet and all his contemporaries that the inattention of providence to what is happening in the area of ​​human relations (vv. 2-4) is only apparent, and that the judgment of God is soon ready to open on the unworthy generation of the chosen people of God. In his answer to the prophet, God first of all (v. 5) demands from the Jews attention to his revelation and thus already shows its extreme importance: terrible events are already hanging over their heads, such as their life and history have never known before and which are capable of amaze and terrify those on whom they break out (this supposed here unexpectedness of the approaching calamity of the invasion of enemies clearly shows that earlier, in vv. 2-4, it was not about Chaldeans). Second word of Art. 5 – according to the accepted Hebrew text baggoim, among the nations. Vulg. in gentibus, LXX (as well as Peshito) read differently, apparently: bogedim, treacherous, evildoers (as below Hab.1:13, cf. Zeph 3.4; Jer 12.1) and conveyed: καταφρονηται, glory. contempt. Blessed Theodoret, accepting this reading of the LXX, in his explanation says: “God calls disdainful those who fearlessly violate the law and suffer from insensibility” (p. 23), and Blessed Jerome, who himself was inclined towards the current reading of the Hebrew text and conveyed the word in question in genlibus in his translation, at the same time in his interpretation he mentions two nameless codes, of which in one the beginning Art. 5 read: “Look, scoffers!”, and in the other: “Look, apostates!”, and notes that with such reading “these words expose the insolence and contempt for God of the people on whose behalf the prophet exclaimed, their bold rebellion against the greatness of God, their reckless speeches, their censure of the providence of God and their apostasy from God, denouncing Him of injustice” (p. 136–137). Thus, the beginning of the 5th Art. in the LXX it has more expressiveness than in the accepted Jewish text, the meaning of which, as the same blessed Jerome explains, is “for the prophet to look closely and see among the nations that untruth which, in his opinion, exists only among Israel alone, and that not only Judah and Israel, but also all the surrounding nations, are betrayed to the Chaldeans” (p. 137). Then, in the opened “case” (poal art. 5), the following points are indicated: its main beginning is the will of God, pronouncing its judgment on the fate of the wicked; its visible instrument, the executor or executor of God's destinies at a given historical moment is the people - the Chaldeans, as harsh as they are cruel, as quick and powerful in the execution of their cruelties (Hab. 1: 6-10), and finally, its consequence for the executors themselves, which all together comprehensively depicts the enormous power of the terrible disaster. The main idea of ​​the first Divine answer is what is expressed at the beginning of Art. 6th provision that the coming invasion of enemies on Judea is not an accidental phenomenon, but is destined to take place according to the omnipotent will of God; It is God who will raise up the Chaldeans against Judea, He will arm them with invincible power, but they must consider themselves only His instrument, and forgetting this will be disastrous for them. In the name of "Chaldeans", Heb. Kasdim. LXX: χαλδαιοι, among the prophets, starting with prophet. Habakkuk (Hab 1.6–11) and Jeremiah (Jer. 21:4, 24, etc.) denotes a people known in cuneiform monuments under the name Kaldu. Initially, this tribe lived in the south of the biblical valley of Shinar or Mesopotamia, along the shores of the Persian Gulf, but in the 7th century it became extremely stronger, extended its aggressive aspirations to the north, and in 625, the leader of the Chaldeans Nabopolassar, on the ruins of already dying Assyria, laid the foundation for the Chaldean-Babylonian or New Chaldean kingdom. These Chaldeans were Semites, as the Bible testifies (Gen. 22.22), and therefore cannot be identified with the Chaldeans of Kurdistan and Armenia, who were Aryans. Both according to the Bible (Gen. 22.22; Gen. 11.28), and according to wedge-shaped documents, the name of the Chaldeans was known several hundred years before their emergence as world-wide conquerors, but in this capacity they appear for the first time in the prophecy of Habakkuk 1, and that is why he, first of all, deliberately warns his listeners and readers about the terrible event of their invasion (Hab. 1:5), and then in great detail characterizes the properties of these terrible conquerors (Hab.1:6–11). These properties, to a certain extent, completely correspond to the criminal properties of the Jews, and in this one cannot help but see the punitive action of God’s Providence. “Against you 2, who live in untruth and lawlessness, for whose sake those who do not know the laws of Providence are grieved, I will bring the cruel and uncontrollable Chaldeans, who, out of greed for the things of others, take up arms against all nations” (Blessed Theodoret, p. 24). To characterize the belligerence of the Chaldeans, the passage in question must be considered as classical as Isaiah 5.26–30 gives the classical characterization of the Assyrians. “A cruel people”, Heb. gagoi-gammar - bitter as wormwood, for all who taste communication with him - a formidable people, alien to humanity, mercy (cf. Jer 50.42; Deut. 28.50); “unbridled”, gannimgar, proper. fast, LXX: ταχινον, Vulg.: velocem, who walks across the latitudes of the earth in order to take possession of villages that do not belong to him” (cf. Hab 2.6) - a people alien to settled life and culture, on the contrary, accustomed to predation and robbery; “a most warlike and unstoppable people, whose strength and military courage are witnessed by almost all the Greeks who wrote the history of the barbarians. And his business is not to cultivate the land with a plow, but to live by sword and robbery, and to capture cities that do not belong to him” (Blessed Jerome, p. 138). Indeed, in the depiction of the Chaldeans, for example. in Xenophon (Cyropaed. III, 2), the gaiters of the prophetic description of the Chaldeans are reproduced very accurately. Naturally, such a people is “terrible and formidable” for all surrounding nations - “for cruelty, for indomitability in anger, for the inaccessibility of the heart, for the ferocity in punishments” (St. Cyril Alexander.), - mainly because they do not recognize any other law over themselves and believe that only to themselves, and to no one else, they owe their superiority over other peoples: “from himself (and not from God, as in Ps 16.2 ) there is a judgment (mishpat, rule, norm of activity) of him and power (sows, greatness, LXX: λημμα, slav.: “taking”, Vulg.: onus) of him” (v. 7) - “turns into law what comes to his mind” (Blessed Theodoret, p. 24): like their ancient ancestors, who dreamed of building for themselves the Tower of Babel name (Gen. 11.4), and especially following King Nebuchadnezzar, who idolized himself (Isa. 14.13), the Chaldeans do not recognize that power and authority were given to them from the Lord (see Hab. 1:11–12). The more unlimited their strength seemed to the Chaldeans, the more lively and unhindered their desire for prey: “his horses are faster than leopards” - an animal as predatory as a lion (Jer 5.6; Isa 11.6; Hos 13.7), but gifted with greater ease of running, in comparison with him, like a whirlwind, so that it is almost impossible for the prey to escape from it; “and quicker than the wolves of the evening” - exhausted by a long day of hunger and a vain search for food, and with the greater greed rushing to the prey found in the evening and leaving nothing of it by morning (in the LXX here, as well as in Sophia 3.3, instead of “evening”, Hebrew erev, there is “Arabian”, της Αραβιας, so the Slav. LXX was obviously read not by the Yerev, but by the Arab, Arabia). The long journey (“from afar”, i.e. from Babylon, Isa. 39.3; cf. Jer. 5.15) does not tire them; on the contrary, like eagles, they quickly fly to rich prey and, like eagles, they take possession of it without difficulty (v. 8, cf. Deut. 28:49; Jer. 4:13, 5:16; Ezek. 17:3). “With all this the Prophet depicted their strength, courage and speed. For such among birds is the eagle, to which he likened horsemen, and such among beasts are lynxes and Arabian wolves, whose speed he likened to the speed of horses” (Blessed Theodoret, p. 24). The success of the Chaldeans is undoubted and decisive: “all of them (without exception) go for robbery; the aspiration (Hebrew megammat) of their faces is forward” (kadima) - they rush further and further in greed for someone else’s (v. 9). The first half of Art. 9th, very dark as in Hebrew. In the Masoretic text, both in the LXX and in the Vulgate, Symmachus expressed it more clearly: “everything will become the prey of covetousness, the sight of their faces will be a scorching wind. Just as the prophet depicted the speed of horses and riders in likenesses, so the brutality of the faces resembled the scorching wind; for just as this wind scorches naked bodies, so one sight of the Chaldeans is enough for all that is brilliant to fade away in those who see them” (Blessed Theodoret, p. 24). – “He takes away captives like sand” (v. 9 cf. Hab 2.5), that is, a great multitude (cf. Gen. 32:12, 28:14; Hos. 1, etc.). The hopes of the Jews for alliances with the kings of the earth, for the support of princes, for the inaccessibility of fortresses will be in vain - nothing will frighten, nothing will stop the aggressive movement of the enemy, who laughs at any attempt to defend against him (v. 10). “By playing more than by making any effort, he will destroy both legal kingdoms and illegal dominions! by encircling the trenches and using battering machines, they will destroy every strong stronghold to the ground” (Blessed Theodoret, p. 25); “He will be so powerful and proud that he will imagine defeating nature itself and taking by force the troops of his city, the most fortified. For he will come to Tire and, having made a mound in the sea, will make a peninsula out of the island and prepare for himself from the earth an entrance into the city between the waves of the sea. Therefore he will laugh at every fortification” (Blessed Jerome, p. 139). In all this indestructible power of the world victor, of course, the omnipotence of God - Jehovah, the Lord mighty in battle (Ps 23.8) influences. But the winner will not understand this. As earlier Assyria (Isaiah 10.5–15), so this new conqueror will forget to see in himself only the rod or instrument of God’s wrath: “then - following extraordinary successes - his spirit will change, transgress (the limit of modesty, humility) and sin; his power will become his god” (v. 11) or, as Blessed Jerome explains (p. 140), “when nothing else will be hinder his powers, then his spirit will change to pride, and, thinking that he is God, he will erect a golden image for himself in Babylon, and will call all nations to worship him,” so the greatest wickedness of the enemy - the winner will be that he will not thank for his power God Almighty, who owns the kingdom of men and at his own will gives the kingdom, and the power, and the strength (Dan 4:14, 2:37, 47; see Hab 3.14–15), but he will deify his very power, make it an object of reverence and cult (cf. Hab 1:16), and finally, as it were, declare himself a god (cf. Job 12.6; Ezekiel 28.2). This mention of the manifestation of the greatest wickedness of the victorious enemy, as a consequence of his greatest power, ends the transmission of God’s first, formidable answer to the prophet’s complaints. Hab.1:12–17. But were you not of old, Lord my God, my Holy One? we won't die! You, Lord, only allowed him for the sake of judgment. My rock! You appointed him for punishment. It is not natural for Your pure eyes to look at atrocities, and You cannot look at oppression; Why do you look at the wicked and remain silent when the wicked devours the one who is more righteous than him, and you leave people like fish in the sea, like reptiles that have no ruler? He drags them all with his fish, captures them in his net and takes them into his nets, and therefore rejoices and triumphs: Therefore he sacrifices to his net and burns cense to his net, because from them his part is fat and his food is luxurious: Is it really for this that he must empty his network and constantly beat up peoples without mercy? Upon receiving God’s strange answer (Hab. 1:5-11), in the prophet’s spirit, which does not comprehend the destinies of God, although he is deeply religious, a new bewilderment involuntarily arises, why did God decide to punish the Jews precisely through the Chaldeans, whose greater criminality, compared with the first, is revealed already from the first Divine report? How can the destructive work of the wicked be reconciled with the Divine election of Israel, with the holiness, mercy and Justice of God? Feeling this bewilderment, the prophet once again, with the boldness of faith, asks God: to what extent will the dominion of the wicked pagans extend over God’s chosen people (vv. 12–17), as he previously asked about the predominance of the wicked over the righteous in his own people (Hab. 1:2–4). The basis for the prophet’s new bold appeal to God is the special, gracious relationship of Jehovah God to Israel, which began long ago - under the Sinai Covenant (Exodus 19.4-6), as well as the true concept of God and His properties, given in the Old Testament revelation and eminently inherent in the prophets. The highest, infinite perfections of God serve for a theocratic society as the surest guarantee and guarantee of its salvation by the power and mercy of God. The true God of Israel exists “from the beginning” of Hebrews. mikkedem, Greek απ αρχης, Vulg. a principio, - this property of His is known to Israel from the first moment of its existence (cf. Ps. 73.12), but it is always inherent in Him, as the eternal God (Deut. 32.27). He, further, is Jehovah - a unique being and in all words and deeds equal to Himself, faithful and unchangeable (Ex. 3:14, 6:2; 1 Cor 1.9), “exceeding all things” (Blessed Theodoret, p. 25). In the liveliest feeling and consciousness of his belonging to God's chosen people, to whom the terrible threat of God is uttered, the prophet calls Jehovah his God, his Holy One, meaning himself, of course, not in an individual sense - against which the immediately following plural verb would speak. part “we will not die” - but as a representative of an entire people, on whose behalf, as the people of the covenant, he appeals to the God of the covenant: “Are you not, O Lord my God, my Holy One,” and this is said with a feeling of meekness, humility and repentance, “not You, who created us from the beginning and by whose mercy we are held to this day” (Blessed Jerome, p. 144). But the main support of the hope of the prophet (and in his person the entire people of God) is the property of God’s holiness: “My Holy One,” that is, the Holy One of Israel - an expression found especially often in the prophet Isaiah (Is. 1:4, 30:11, 43:3, 14, 49, etc.). The holiness of God means not only the inaccessibility, the endless eminence of God above all earthly things (1 Sam. 6.20) and the horror and reverence He inspires in people (Ps. 99:3, 5, 9, 110:9), but also the fact that His name cannot be dishonored with impunity (Ezek. 39.7) and He does not tolerate sin and loves only righteousness (Isa. 5.16), but also in general the highest perfection of God (Isa. 6.3), and more particularly the boundless goodness, love and mercy of God (1 Sam. 2.2; Is. 57.15; Hos. 11.9). The holiness of God is a mortal horror for a sinner, but for a believer, for a righteous person, it is the basis of hope “in the holy name” of God (Ps 33:21), hope for life from God, - therefore the prophet for himself and all believers in his people (cf. Hab 2.4) confidently cries out: “we will not die!” It cannot be that we, the people of the Holy and Living God, have completely perished, and the word of God’s promises have not been fulfilled for us because of the greed of our enemies, “we will not die!” . Many ancient and new interpreters saw in this “lo namut” one of the examples of the so-called “pikkunim-soferim”, proofreadings of the scribes; it was assumed that the original reading was: lo tamut - You will not die, and then this expression, which seemed seductive, was replaced by the one in the text (see A. Geiger. Urschritt u. Uebersetzungen der Bibelfn ihrer Abhfngigkeit, V, d. inner Entwicklung der Sudenthums. Breslau 1857, p. 309). However, this guess is not confirmed by anything; on the contrary, the ancient translations were obviously read by namut, so the LXX has ου μη αποθανωμεν. In the second half of Art. On the 12th, the prophet develops the same confidence from the positive side: like other divinely inspired people of his people (cf. eg Ps 117.18; Jer 46.28), he expresses the conviction that the grave disaster of the Chaldean enslavement will only be temporary, pursuing the goal of correction, the admonition of Israel, and not its destruction. Here he connects this hope with the name of God - Tzur, rock, stronghold, a concept that figuratively designates the same thing that is directly expressed in the name Jehovah (cf. Deut. 32:4, 37; 2 Sam. 22:2; Ps. 17.32). Starting from Art. 13, the prophet, from looking at the chosen people (v. 12), turns to the wicked people - the instrument of Jehovah’s wrath, and in this way he is even more confirmed in his bold prayer to the One who judges righteously the peoples and tribes of the earth (Ps 65.5). And first of all, dwelling on the property of God’s holiness mentioned earlier (v. 12), the prophet affirms (like the psalmist Ps. 5.5-6) ​​that everything morally unclean is unworthy of the sight of the brightest eyes of the Holy God, and from here (as above v. 3) he concludes that God cannot look with indifference at extreme oppression (devouring, Heb. bala in II) the wicked Jews, who, despite all their guilt before the righteousness of God, are still more righteous than their enslavers. “This does not mean that the oppressed is completely righteous, but only that he is more righteous than his oppressor” (Blessed Jerome); “just as Sodom and Gomorrah seem righteous in comparison with Jerusalem (cf. Matt. 11.24), and just as the publican in the Gospel is justified more than the Pharisee (Lk 18.10–14), so here the one who is tormented is truly a sinner; however, he is more righteous than the one who oppresses him” (aka, p. 149). This prophetic (and together with the entire people) bewilderment is revealed further, until the end of the chapter (vv. 14-17). In Art. 14–15, the concept of the complete defenselessness of peoples in general and Israel in particular before the predation of the Chaldeans is expressed in a figurative comparison of the victims of their predation with a fish, living as if in anarchy, and therefore easily caught (cf. Am 4.2). If these two verses figuratively express a thought that was directly expressed in part already above in Art. 10, then verse 16 represents a similar figurative expression of the thought about the self-deification of the Chaldeans, expressed earlier in Art. 11; nothing is known from history that the Chaldean-Babylonians actually made sacrifices to the instruments of war (as is known, for example, about the Scythians in the Sarmatians, from the messages of Herodotus, Histor. IV, 59, 62, and Clement Alexander, Protrept. 64). Blazh. Theodoret in explanation of Art. 16 says “having fallen into the passion of arrogance, the reason for what is being done (the enemy - the Chaldeans) considers his own strength alone, and commands that Divine honor be given to it. The Divine Daniel revealed this to us more clearly, saying that the king of Babylon built a golden image, and forced the entire multitude of his subjects to worship it” (p. 23). Art. 17 presents the conclusion summarizing the previous questions of bewilderment of the prophet: “will there be no end to the slaughter of the nations?” In the book of the prophet Daniel (Dan. 2:2, 5, 10, 4:4, 5:7, 11), the class of Chaldean sages - astrologers - is named after the Chaldeans, since Chaldea was considered the fatherland of astrology: in this sense, this term is also known among the classics. The addition εις υμας, on you, is essentially correct (cf. 2 Kings 12.11; Am 6.14), appears in the LXX codices: 26, 106, 239 in Golmes. You might be interested in: