therefore, behold, I am against you and against your streams, and I will make the land of Egypt an utter waste and desolation, from Migdol to Syene, as far as the border of Cush.
The verse answers a boast. Pharaoh had called the Nile his own work. God's reply turns against the river and marks the whole land, north to south, for ruin.
The River He Claimed to Make
God sets Himself against the streams because the streams were the boast. One writer shows how the Nile actually served Egypt, and where Pharaoh's claim breaks down.
Frederick W. GrantThe practical thing is that the river is there, always there. It overflows at a certain regular time, most convenient for man's purposes. It gives him little to think about — only how best to guide the supply here and there so that it becomes his own. Indeed he values himself on this, that he can direct this abundant water with great wisdom to meet his own needs. So Pharaoh can say, as we see him doing here: "The Nile is mine, and I made it." Practically it is the reverse of this; it is the river that has made him.
A Second Reason for the Sentence
Pride was not the only charge. The same writer links the ruin of Egypt's farmland to how Egypt failed Israel, and explains the two place names.
Frederick W. GrantThis Pharaoh invited Israel's confidence in himself, and he could not justify it. When Israel leaned on him, he gave way under them and tore all their shoulder and lamed all their loins. So he must be put in the place where he belongs, and God Himself must break the staff that broke and so hurt His people. Egypt's famous fertility must therefore be turned into deserts and desolation, from one end of the land to the other. Migdol was on the eastern border of lower Egypt. Syene was on the border of upper Egypt, where it met Cush, or Ethiopia.
Older translations read "from the tower of Syene." A better reading takes it as a span between two towns:
Morrish Bible DictionaryTown in the south of Egypt, bordering on Ethiopia. Ezek. 29:10; Ezek. 30:6. The expression "from the tower of Syene" is better translated "from Migdol to Syene," even to the border of Ethiopia, as in the margin.
Nothing Left Standing
The threat strikes Egypt where it was richest — at the river, and at the harvests it fed.
William KellyEgypt should be not only struck, but most of all in what was its chief boast, its river. That granary of the world, that garden of the earth, should become a wilderness for forty years. The Egyptians would be scattered exiles. So great was the chastening Nebuchadnezzar would inflict.
The Instrument and the Evidence
God used a human army to do it. What we know of that campaign matches the reach this verse names.
Frederick W. GrantGod uses Nebuchadnezzar's hand to inflict this upon Egypt. What follows almost at once makes that plain. Critics have doubted whether Nebuchadnezzar himself was ever in Egypt. But Egyptian and Babylonian records together now prove that he was there twice, and they even state that he ravaged the land as far as Syene. It was completely in his hand.
Commentators differ on how much of this history we can trace. One writer admits the details may be lost, and rests the case elsewhere:
Arno Clemens GaebeleinEgypt had such a period of forty years' devastation, though we may not know its exact history. Prophecy is not learned by historical events; history is revealed in prophecy. We believe prophecies not because history has measured up to them, but because they are the inerrant Word of God.
The Warning Behind the Map
Egypt lived off a river that never seemed to need heaven. One writer finds our own natural state pictured there.
Frederick W. GrantEgypt worshipped her river. The river came to her so constantly that she was practically independent of heaven; yet heaven was the source of her supply. She did not see the blue hills that shed down the blessing they received. And they worshipped only the river. It is our state by nature, away from God.
Ruin That Stops Short of the End
The sentence is severe but limited. The same chapter promises a restoration, and one writer marvels at how precisely God named it in advance.
William Kelly"For thus says the Lord GOD: At the end of forty years I will gather the Egyptians from the peoples among whom they were scattered… and they shall be there a lowly kingdom." How wonderful, and how exactly fulfilled! Yet no cleverness of man could have forecast it in any of its parts. It was the reversal of its own experience, and no other nation had a similar destiny or sentence.
Summary
- Boast. Pharaoh said he made the river. In truth the river made him — so God turns against the very streams he trusted.
- Breakage. Egypt was also a staff that broke under Israel and wounded them. So God breaks the staff.
- Borders. Migdol in the north to Syene in the south means the whole land. The granary of the world becomes a wilderness.
- By whose hand. Nebuchadnezzar's army carried it out; records place him in Egypt as far as Syene.
- Boundary. After forty years the people return, but only as a lowly kingdom. The judgment ends the pride, yet leaves room for mercy.