Wouter Crabeth
Habakkuk and the Angel

Netherlandish, circa 1565
Glass, oxide paint, silver stain, sanguine
The Getty Museum, Los Angeles, California

In Vulgate Daniel 14:32-43, Habakkuk was about to take a bowl of bread and stew to the reapers in a field when an angel came to tell him to take the bowl instead "into Babylon to Daniel, who is in the lions' den." This is the moment presented in the fore- and middle ground, with Habakkuk and hearing the angel's message and the reapers working in the field behind him.

When Habakkuk protested that he knew nothing about Babylon, "the angel of the Lord took him by the top of his head, and carried him…and set him in Babylon over the den" (14:34-35). This is what is pictured in the sky at the top of the image: the prophet continues to hold the bowl pictured below while the angel holds him by his hair and whisks him off to Babylon.

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Photographed at the museum by Richard Stracke, shared under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.