Bible Commentaries
Nahum 1

Verse 1

THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET NAHUM

Chronological Notes relative to this Book, upon the supposition

that it was written about seven hundred and thirteen years

before the commencement of the Christian era

-Year from the Creation, according to Archbishop Usher, 3291.

-Year of the Julian Period, 4001.

-Year since the Flood, 1635.

-Year from the vocation of Abram, 1208.

-Year since the first celebration of the Olympic games in Elis by the Idaei Dactyli, 741.

-Year from the destruction of Troy, according to the general computation of chronologers, 471.

-Year since the commencement of the kingdom of Israel, by the Divine appointment of Saul to the regal dignity, 383.

-Year from the foundation of Solomon's temple, 299.

-Year since the division of Solomon's monarchy into the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, 263.

-Year since the restoration of the Olympic games at Elis by Lycurgus, Iphitus, and Cleosthenes, 172.

-Year from the foundation of the kingdom of Macedon by Caranus, 102.

-Year from the commencement of the reign of Ardysus over Lydia, 84.

-Year since the conquest of Coroebus at Olympia, usually called the first Olympiad, 64.

-Fourth year of the sixteenth Olympiad.

-Year from the building of Rome, according to the Varronian computation, 41.

-Year from the building of Rome, according to Cato and the Fasti Consulares, 40.

-Year from the building of Rome, according to Polybius the historian, 39.

-Year from the building of Rome, according to Fabius Pictor, 35.

-Year of the era of Nabonassar, 35.

-Year since the destruction of the kingdom of Israel by Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, 9.

-Year before the birth of Christ, 709.

-Year before the vulgar era of Christ's nativity, 713.

-Cycle of the Sun, 25.

-Cycle of the Moon, 11.

-Eleventh year of Zeuxidamus, king of Lacedaemon, of the family of the Proclidae.

-Twelfth year of Eurycrates, king of Lacedaemon, of the family of the Eurysthenidae.

-Sixth year of Gyges, king of Lydia.

-Tenth year of Hippomenes, decennial archon of the Athenians.

-Second year of Cordiccas, governor of the Medes, according to some chronologers.

-Seventeenth year of Perdiccas, king of Macedon.

-Third year of Numa Pompilius, the second king of Rome.

-Fourteenth year of Hezekiah, king of Judah.

CHAPTER I

This chapter opens the prophecy against the Assyrians and their

metropolis with a very magnificent description of the infinite

justice, tender compassion, and uncontrollable power of God,

1-8.

To this succeeds an address to the Assyrians; with a lively

picture of their sudden overthrow, because of their evil device

against Jerusalem, 9-11.

Then appears Jehovah himself, proclaiming deliverance to his

people from the Assyrian yoke, and the destruction of the

Assyrian idols, 12-14;

upon which the prophet, with great emphasis, directs the

attention of Judah to the approach of the messenger who brings

such glad tidings; and exultingly bids his people to celebrate

their solemn feasts, and perform their vows, as a merciful

Providence would not suffer these enemies of the Jewish state

to prevail against them, 15.

NOTES ON CHAP. I

Verse Nahum 1:1. The burden of Nineveh. — משא massa not only signifies a burden, but also a thing lifted up, pronounced, or proclaimed; also a message. It is used by the prophets to signify the revelation which they have received from God to deliver to any particular people: the oracle-the prophecy. Here it signifies the declaration from God relative to the overthrow of Nineveh, and the commission of the prophet to deliver it.

As the Assyrians under Pul, Tiglath-pileser, and Shalmaneser, three of their kings, had been employed by a just God for the chastisement of his disobedient people; the end being now accomplished by them, God is about to burn the rod wherewith he corrected Israel; and Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian empire, is to be destroyed. This prediction appears to have been accomplished a short time after this by Nebuchadnezzar and Cyaxares, the Ahasuerus of Scripture.

Nahum, נחום Nachum, signifies comforter. The name was very suitable, as he was sent to comfort the people, by showing them that God was about to destroy their adversaries.

Verse 2

Verse Nahum 1:2. God is jealous — For his own glory.

And - revengeth — His justice; by the destruction of his enemies.

And is furious — So powerful in the manifestations of his judgments, that nothing can stand before him.

He reserveth wrath — Though they seem to prosper for a time, and God appears to have passed by their crimes without notice, yet he reserveth - treasureth up - wrath for them, which shall burst forth in due time.

Verse 3

Verse Nahum 1:3. The Lord is slow to anger — He exercises much longsuffering towards his enemies, that this may lead them to repentance. And it is because of this longsuffering that vengeance is not speedily executed on every evil work.

Great in power — Able at all times to save or to destroy.

The Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm — These are the effects of his power; and when they appear unusual, they may be considered as the immediate effects of his power: and although he be in them to punish and destroy, he is in them to direct their course, to determine their operations, and to defend his followers from being injured by their violence. The pestilential wind which slew one hundred and eighty-five thousand of the Assyrians did not injure one Israelite. See 2 Kings 19:35.

The clouds are the dust of his feet.] This is spoken in allusion to a chariot and horses going on with extreme rapidity: they are all enveloped in a cloud of dust. So Jehovah is represented as coming through the circuit of the heavens as rapidly as lightning; the clouds surrounding him as the dust does the chariot and horses.

Verse 4

Verse 4. He rebuketh the sea — The Red Sea, and the rivers: probably an allusion to the passage of the Red Sea and Jordan.

The description of the coming of Jehovah, from the third to the sixth verse, is dreadfully majestic. Nahum 1:3-6 He is represented as controlling universal nature. The sea and the rivers are dried up, the mountains tremble, the hills melt, and the earth is burnt at his presence. Bashan, Carmel, and Lebanon are withered and languish: streams of fire are poured out, and the rocks are cast down to make him a passage. If then, the seas, the rivers, the mountains, the hills, the rocks, and the earth itself, fail before Jehovah, or flee from his presence, how shall Nineveh and the Assyrian empire stand before him?

Verse 7

Verse 7. The Lord is good — In the midst of judgment he remembers mercy; and among the most dreadful denunciations of wrath he mingles promises of mercy. None that trust in him need be alarmed at these dreadful threatenings; they shall be discriminated in the day of wrath, for the Lord knoweth them that trust in him.

Verse 8

Verse 8. But with an overrunning flood — Bishop Newcome thinks this may refer to the manner in which Nineveh was taken. The Euphrates overflowed its banks, deluged a part of the city, and overturned twenty stadia of the wall; in consequence of which the desponding king burnt himself, and his palace, with his treasures. - Diodor. Sic., Edit. Wessel., p. 140, lib. ii., s. 27.

Darkness shall pursue — Calamity. All kinds of calamity shall pursue them till they are destroyed.

Verse 9

Verse 9. Affliction shall not rise up the second time. — There shall be no need to repeat the judgment; with one blow God will make a full end of the business.

Verse 10

Verse Nahum 1:10. While they be folden together — However united their counsels may be, they shall be as drunken men-perplexed and unsteady in all their resolutions; and before God's judgments they shall be as dry thorns before a devouring fire.

Verse 11

Verse Nahum 1:11. Imagineth evil against the Lord — Such were Pul, 2 Kings 15:10, Tiglath-pileser, 2 Kings 15:29; Shalmaneser, 2 Kings 17:6; and Sennacherib, 2 Kings 18:17; 2 Kings 19:23.

A wicked counsellor. — Sennacherib and Rabshakeh.

Verse 12

Verse Nahum 1:12. Though they be - many — Sennacherib invaded Judea with an army of nearly two hundred thousand men.

Thus shall they be cut down — The angel of the Lord (a suffocating wind) slew of them in one night one hundred and eighty-five thousand, 2 Kings 19:35.

Verse 13

Verse Nahum 1:13. Now will I break his yoke from off thee — This refers to the tribute which the Jews were obliged to pay to the Assyrians, 2 Kings 17:14.

Verse 14

Verse Nahum 1:14. No more of thy name be sown — No more of you shall be carried away into captivity.

I will make thy grave; for thou art vile — I think this is an address to the Assyrians, and especially to Sennacherib. The text is no obscure intimation of the fact. The house of his gods is to be his grave: and we know that while he was worshipping in the house of his god Nisroch, his two sons, Adrammelech and Sharezer, smote him there that he died, 2 Kings 19:37.

Verse 15

Verse Nahum 1:15. Behold upon the mountains — Borrowed probably from Isaiah 52:7, but applied here to the messengers who brought the good tidings of the destruction of Nineveh. Judah might then keep her solemn feasts, for the wicked Assyrian should pass through the land no more; being entirely cut off, and the imperial city razed to its foundations.