Why does a good God permit evil in His world? This is the one question that has occupied mankind since the garden of Eden. Many poets, playwrights, philosophers, and theologians have made a good living trying to answer it. The book of Habakkuk rises above these voices and offers a surprising yet definitive answer that might not satisfy the philosopher but will surely comfort the faithful.

We know almost nothing about Habakkuk, other than that he ministered just before the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians. His book is unique in that it is mostly the story of the interaction between God and the prophet, in a series of questions and answers, as Habakkuk wrestled with the “problem of evil.”

The prophet wastes no time getting to the one question at the beginning of the book. He asks, in essence: why so much evil and so little justice? (Hab. 1:2–4). God’s response is that He would raise up the Babylonians, an even more violent and evil nation, to punish the sins of Judah (1:5–11). In other words, the problem of evil was about to get worse—a lot worse.

Habakkuk then gets a bit more daring in his line of questioning (Hab. 1:12–17). He knows that God is good: “You are of purer eyes than to behold evil.” But he cannot understand how a good God can permit such evil to unfold in this world: “Why do You look on those who deal treacherously, and hold Your tongue when the wicked devours a person more righteous than he?”

There is a dramatic pause before God’s reply to this bold remonstrance. Habakkuk anticipates not only being answered but being “corrected” (Hab. 2:1). He must have sensed that he was out of his depth, like the clay questioning the potter (Rom. 9:19–21).

God’s answer, which echoes through the ages as one of the central truths of Scripture, comes with a preface that highlights its importance: “Write the vision, and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it” (Hab. 2:2). What God says here must be recorded for all ages, and runners must be sent to proclaim it: “Behold the proud, his soul is not upright in him; But the just shall live by his faith” (v. 4). Habakkuk stopped asking questions.

There is indeed a problem of evil, but it is our problem. It is pride and a crooked soul. Evil is not some esoteric abstraction that we have to somehow explain; rather, it is a very human problem from which we need deliverance. The answer to the one question—the only answer that concerns us—is salvation by faith alone. It doesn’t matter who appears worse in our own eyes—Judah or Babylon (you or your neighbor), because the problem of evil affects us all, and none can be justified before God in themselves.

One of those who “ran” with this message was Paul, who quotes this verse as being the heart of the gospel (Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11). The answer to the problem of evil (a very personal problem) is salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone (a very personal Savior).

Chapter 2 of Habakkuk is taken up by five “woes” pronounced by God on the wicked. Still answering Habakkuk’s question, God assures the prophet (and us) that He does not countenance evil, and justice will prevail at last. The “problem” may not be explained to the satisfaction of the curious, but it will be solved by the justice of a righteous God. With that assurance, chapter 2 concludes with “Let all the earth keep silence before Him.”

But the humbled prophet can’t help himself, and the silence is broken by a hymn of praise that concludes the book. “In wrath remember mercy,” pleads Habakkuk (Hab. 3:2), before launching into a praise-filled reminiscence of God’s great works in the past for His people. The prophet who was first vexed by the problem of evil concludes with a joyous praise for the solution of salvation: “Yet I will rejoice in the Lord, and will joy in the God of my salvation” (v. 18).

The answer to the one big question is the gospel of Jesus Christ, “for in it, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, ‘The just shall live by faith’” (Rom 1:17).