Desolate! Desolation and ruin! Hearts melt and knees tremble; anguish is in all loins; all faces grow pale!
Nineveh was at the height of its power, and Nahum announces that it is already gone — plundered, hollow, shaking. The verse piles up three words for ruin. Then it walks down the body — heart, knees, loins, face — to show what the loss does to people.
Everything hoarded, gathered for someone else
Silver and gold had piled up in Nineveh without end. One writer says who all that hoarding was really for.
William KellyAll the vast store of what feeds the pride of life, everything that served selfish enjoyment and vanity, was now shown to be laid up for the conquerors. It had all been gathered together for utter destruction, unless those who took the city carried it off. Such indeed is the history of man generally.
Wealth gone, courage gone
The emptying is not only of streets and storerooms. The same moment that strips the city strips its people of nerve.
Arno Clemens GaebeleinThe city is emptied; hearts melt, courage is gone; there are tottering knees and pale faces.
Past tense, a century early
Nahum writes in the past tense about a city still standing. Some argue that a prophet who describes an event as present must be writing after it happened. One writer answers them from this very verse. (Older translations render the opening words "she is empty, and void, and waste.")
J. N. DarbyThey say that when Isaiah speaks of Jerusalem lying desolate, this proves the Jews were already exiles and Jerusalem was already destroyed. Yet of Nineveh it is said, she is empty, and void, and waste! But here they do not think of saying it was past. It is clear enough that in both cases it is the prophetic Spirit making the thing present in vision.
Another writer turns it into a question. Nahum described this fall a century before it happened.
W. W. FeredayWho told Nahum about the great disaster? Many in our day reject the whole idea. But if God is God, it is as easy for Him to speak of the future as of the present.
Judgment that began at God's own house
God's judgment did not start with Nineveh. One writer sets out the order: God had already ruined Jacob, His own people, and He did not stop there.
J. N. DarbyGod permitted the total devastation and ruin of Jacob because the time of judgment had come. That judgment would not stop there. He began, no doubt, at His own house, but would He stop there? No. What, then, should be the end of the enemies of God's people, if He no longer put up with evil in His own people? Let Nineveh, then, defend herself now if she could.
The city God once spared
God spared Nineveh once, when the city repented under Jonah's preaching. Then He held back for a long time. One writer reads that delay as proof of His patience, not indifference.
Other AuthorsGod had waited for a century and a half before stepping in with judgment. That proved He was longsuffering in grace. But the time for judgment was at hand.
But the city's later generations threw that mercy away.
W. W. FeredayNineveh was favoured with a special message from God, and she submitted to it. But the generations that followed gained nothing from it, and went back to the old vomit… Favour that God grants and people then despise brings heavy judgment from Him.
Ruin that was never undone
The ruin announced here was final.
W. W. FeredayThe city was taken and destroyed by the Medes in 625 B.C. There has been no effort to rebuild it since that time, and it is not the will of God that it should ever be rebuilt.
A larger pattern still ahead
Commentators do not stop at ancient rubble.
Other AuthorsAll this is, no doubt, a figure of what will take place on a still larger scale at the end of the age. The "Assyrian" of the last days will be Israel's great foe. Nahum's prophecy certainly looks on to his destruction, and to the deliverance of the people of God that follows.
Summary
- Gathered. Nineveh's endless store of silver and gold piled up for her conquerors to carry off — the usual end of what people hoard.
- Emptied. When the wealth goes, the nerve goes with it: melting hearts, knees that will not hold, faces drained of colour.
- Foretold. Nahum wrote of the ruin in the past tense a century early. The prophetic Spirit sets the future before the eye as present.
- Ordered. God judged His own house first and did not stop there. If He would not put up with evil in His own people, Nineveh's turn was certain.
- Warned. Nineveh heard Jonah and God spared her. He then waited 150 years in grace. Mercy despised makes the final blow heavier — and no one has rebuilt the city since.