Albert Barnes Commentary Habakkuk 3:8

"Was Jehovah displeased with the rivers? Was thine anger against the rivers, Or thy wrath against the sea, That thou didst ride upon thy horses, Upon thy chariots of salvation?" — Habakkuk 3:8 (ASV)

Was the Lord displeased against the rivers? - The prophet asks the question three times, concerning the two miracles of the dividing of the Red Sea and the Jordan River, thereby more earnestly declaring that God meant something by these acts and beyond them. He asks, as Daniel (Daniel 7:16) and Zechariah asked, what was the truth of the things which they saw. God’s dealings with His former people were as much examples of what would be with us (1 Corinthians 10:11) as the visions shown to the prophets.

Hereafter too, there shall be (Luke 21:25; Revelation 8:6) signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring; there shall be deepening plagues upon the sea and the rivers and fountains of waters, and every living soul in the sea shall die (Revelation 16:3). But God’s purpose in them previously was not concerning the sea or the rivers, but for the salvation of His elect; so it shall be to the end.

Mighty as may be the mighty waves of the sea which lift themselves up against the Lord, mightier on high is the Lord (Psalms 93:4). Jerome: “As You did dry up the Jordan and the Red Sea, fighting for us; for You were not angry with the rivers or the sea, nor could things without sense offend You; so now mounting Your chariots, and taking Your bow, You will give salvation to Your people; and the oaths which You swore to our fathers and the tribes, You will fulfill forever.”

You rode upon Your horses - as though God set His army (Psalms 103:12), the Hosts which do His pleasure, against the armies of earth, as the prophet’s servant had his eyes opened to see (2 Kings 6:15), the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha. Jerome: “Yet amidst so many thousands of horses and chariots, there was no rider; He was the Rider and Ruler of those horses, of whom the Psalmist says (Psalms 80:1), You who sit above the Cherubim, show Yourself. With such horses and such chariots was Elijah also taken up into Heaven.”

And Your chariots of salvation - literally Your chariots are salvation. This is not, as in human armies (except insofar as they are the armies of God), for destruction. The end of God’s armies, His visitations and judgments, is the salvation of His elect, even while those who are inwardly dead also perish outwardly. Nor, again, do they merely prepare for the deliverance He intends for them. With God, to will is to do. His chariots are salvation. His help is present help. His chariots are the tokens and channels of His Presence to aid.

And so, those who bore His Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel, chosen vessels to bear it, are, in a yet fuller sense, His chariots, which are salvation. Jerome said that they “are holy souls, upon which the word of God comes, to save them and others by them (Song of Solomon 1:9).

I have compared you, says the Spouse, to a company of horses in Pharaoh’s chariots. However holy the soul, yet compared to God, it is like the chariot of Pharaoh; and a beast, yet still a beast, before You (Psalms 73:23). Yet such a one, as endowed with might and ready obedience, and swiftness and nobleness to bear the Word of God, and through His might whom they bore (not their own, nor making it their own), bearing down everything which opposed itself.

Cyril: “The object of the prophet is to show that the second dispensation is better and more glorious, and of incomparably better things than the old. For in the past He led Israel forth, through the bodily service of Moses, changing into blood the rivers of Egypt, and doing signs and wonders; then dividing the Red Sea, and carrying over the redeemed, and choking in the waters the most warlike of the Egyptians.

But when the only-begotten Word of God became Man, He withdrew the whole human race under heaven from the tyranny of Satan—not by changing rivers into blood, nor pouring forth His anger upon waters, nor dividing waves of the sea, nor bringing destruction upon people. Instead, He destroyed the murderous Serpent himself, took away the sin which had been invented by him and for him, loosed the unconquered might of death, and called all to the knowledge of God through the holy apostles. These apostles, running their course under the whole heaven and carrying the name of Christ, were very rightly held in admiration.

He says then, O Lord, most worthy to be heard are those things of which You Yourself have been the Doer, and what You have done anew is far better than what You did through Moses. For You will not inflict wrath on rivers, nor show Your might on the sea; not in these things will Your divine and marvelous power gleam forth, but You will ride upon Your horses, and Your chariots are Salvation.

What may these horses be? The blessed disciples, apostles, and evangelists; they who took on them wholly the yoke of all His divine will; they, the noble, the obedient, ready for all things, whatever should please Him; who had Christ to sit upon them, of whom one is the blessed Paul, of whom He Himself says (Acts 9:15), He is a chosen vessel to Me, to bear My Name before the Gentiles.

Of fiery speed were these Horses, encompassing the whole earth. So then the chariots of God are said to be ten thousand times ten thousand (Psalms 68:17). For countless individuals, each in their times and after them, became leaders of the people, subjected the neck of their understanding to the yoke of the Savior, bore His glory throughout the whole earth, rightly divided the word of truth, and subdued the whole earth, as with the speed of horsemen.”

His chariots are salvation - Cyril: “For they did not run in vain, but to save cities and countries and nations together, Christ overthrowing the empires of devils, who, so to speak, divided among themselves the whole earth, subduing its dwellers to their own will.”