the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
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Bible Commentaries
Parker's The People's Bible Parker's The People's Bible
God's Vengeance Against Nineveh; His Power and Justice.Chapter 3
Woes and Judgments on Nineveh; Reasons for Its Fall.
- Nahum
by Joseph Parker
Nahum
(b.c. 720-698).
[Note. "The Book of Nahum is a striking illustration of the moral use of prophecy, of its fitness to console (so the name of the prophet implies) the believer, and strengthen him for present duties. Of Nahum himself, nothing is known, except that he belonged to Elkosh, a place now unrecognised, but which Jerome (who lived a thousand years afterwards) asserts to have belonged to Galilee. He probably prophesied in Judah, after the ten tribes had been carried captive, and between the two invasions of Sennacherib. At this period of perplexity, when the overthrow of Samaria must have suggested to Judah many fears for her own safety, when Jerusalem had been drained of its treasure by Hezekiah, in the vain hope of turning away the fury of Sennacherib, and when distant rumours of the conquest of part of Egypt added still more to the general dismay, the prophet is raised up to reveal the power and tenderness of Jehovah ( Nah 1:1-8 ), to foretell the subversion of the Assyrian empire ( Nah 1:9-12 ), the death of Sennacherib, and the deliverance of Hezekiah ( Nah 1:13-15 ). The destruction of Nineveh is then predicted in the most glowing colours, and with singular minuteness; and profane history tells us that these predictions have been literally fulfilled." Angus's Bible Handbook .]
