Babel, ἑκ προφητείας Ἀμβακοὺμ υἱοῦ Ἰησοῦ ἐκ τῆς φυλῆς Λευΐ́, which has been preserved in the Cod. Chisian. of the lxx from Origen's tetrapla, and has passed into the Syrio-hexaplar. version; even if this statement should not be founded upon tradition, but simply inferred from the subscription to Hab 3:19. For even in that case it would prove that בּנגינותי was understood in ancient times as signifying that the prophet took part in the liturgical singing of the temple.[1]
On the other hand, the rest of the legends relating to our prophet are quite worthless: viz., the circumstantial account in the apocryphal book of Bel and the Dragon of the miraculous way in which Habakkuk was transported to Daniel, who had been cast into the lions' den, which is also found in a MS of the Midrash Bereshit rabba; and also the statements contained in the writings of Ps. Doroth. and Ps. Epiph. de vitis prophet., that Habakkuk sprang from the tribe of Simeon; that he was born at Βηθζοχήρ (Sozomenus, Χαφἀρ Ζαχαρία, the talmudic כּפר דכרין), a hamlet to the north of Lydda, near to Maresha on the mountains; that when Nebuchadnezzar came to Jerusalem, he fled to Ostrakine (on the promontory now called Ras Straki, situated in the neighbourhood of Arabia Petraea); and that he died on his native soil two years after the return of the people from Babylon, and was buried at the spot between Keila and Gabatha, where his grave was still shown in the time of Eusebius and Jerome (cf. Onomast. ed. Lars. et Parthey, pp. 128-9).
- ↑ There is not much probability in this conjecture, however, since the lxx have not understood the subscription in this sense, but have rendered it incorrectly τοῦ νικῆσαι ἐν τῆ ὠδῆ αὐτοῦ, which has led the fathers to take the words as belonging to the psalm itself, and to understand it as relating to the songs of praise which the church would raise to God for the deliverance which it had received. Theod. Mops. explains it in this way: “He sets us higher than all the rest, so that nothing else becomes us than to continue in the songs and hymns which are due to God, because, against all human hope, He has given us the victory over our enemies.” Cyril of Alex. and Theodoret give similar explanations. Even Jerome, in his rendering “et super excelsa mea deducet me victori in psalmis canentem,” connects the words with the preceding sentence, and interprets them as referring to the songs of praise which “every righteous man who is worthy of the election of God” will raise at the end of the world to the great conqueror “Jesus, who was the first to conquer in the fight.” With such an explanation of the words as these, it was impossible to see any intimation of the Levitical descent of the prophet in the expression בּנגינותי
