When was Nahum written?

Nahum's history is unknown. All we know of him is that he was an Elkoshite. His name means "comforter." Some have identified Elkosh with a village of similar name which is in existence today, not far from the site of ancient Nineveh, on the eastern banks of the Tigris. There the grave of Nahum is shown, adored alike by nominal Christians and the followers of Mohammed. But careful research has shown this to be absolutely without any foundation whatever. No one knew anything about that grave till about the sixteenth century of our era. It is the Elkosh which existed in Galilee and which is still known as a little village. Nahum, like Jonah, was a Galilean.

The Date of Nahum

The opening verse does not give a hint as to the time Nahum lived and prophesied. Critics, on account of some Assyrian expressions found in the book have put the date later. From internal evidences we can ascertain the date without difficulty. Judah and not Israel is addressed by Nahum. There is no reason to assume that he lived in exile and uttered his prophecy in the land of Assyria. He spoke in the land of Israel, probably in Jerusalem. The most significant passage which gives us important information is chapter 1:11: "There is one come out of thee (out of Assyria) that imagineth evil against the LORD, a wicked counsellor." Who was this wicked counsellor, who imagined evil against the Lord? There can be but one answer. A wicked counsellor came out of Assyria, the mouthpiece of its reigning King Sennacherib. His name was Rab-shakeh. He blasphemed and defied the God of Israel. His vile words are recorded in 2 Kings 18:26-27. The description of Nahum fits this Assyrian villain. We are justified in placing Nahum in the period of Hezekiah; he was therefore contemporary with Isaiah and Micah.

There is an interesting link between Jonah, Micah and Nahum. Jonah was sent with the message to Nineveh about one hundred and fifty years before Nahum prophesied. Through his message Nineveh turned to the Lord. Isaiah and Micah prophesied concerning the same Assyrian power, the capital of which was Nineveh. They witnessed the Assyrian attack upon Jerusalem and Jehovah's intervention in behalf of His people. They saw the downfall of the kingdom of Israel through Assyria and were well acquainted with the wickedness of the Assyrian. And then came Nahum from Galilee, and the Spirit of God gave through him the great message of the coming complete destruction of Nineveh.

We only know little of Nahum - the 7 th of the twelve Minor Prophets. His name means “comforted”. Not even the exact place where he came from is known. Some researchers assume it to be the village Alkush at the river Tigris near Mossul and others suppose a place in Galilee near Capernaum. Others again think it to be Capernaum itself ( Kephar-Nahum = village of Nahum) and finally some believe it to be a village in Judea as the Fathers of the church also testify it. The facts that the kingdom of the 10 tribes (in which Galilee lies) was already in Assyrian captivity at Nahum’s time and that Nahum directly speaks to the kingdom of Judah (chap. 1:15b) would speak for the last possibility.

Exact or approximate indications of time are totally missing in Nahum’s book. Chapter 3:8-10 however mentions the destruction of No of Amon ( Thebes) capital of Upper Egypt. This took place in 663 BC by Assurbanipal king of Assyrians. Nineveh was destroyed by the Medes under Cyaxares and by the Babylonians under Nabopolassar in 612 BC. Nahum’s time of labour would lie between these two events.

Nothing is known of the personal history of this prophet: he is called 'the Elkoshite,' which is supposed to refer to a place named Elkosh in Galilee. There is no reference to dates in the prophecy, but it is generally placed at about B.C. 714, when Sennacherib invaded Judaea. 2 Kings 18:13. The prophecy is against Nineveh, and foretells its destruction, though, like other prophecies, it has an application to the future, when 'Assyria' will again be the open enemy of Israel.

H. Dr. Williams says he "cannot quote Nahum, denouncing ruin against Nineveh, or Jeremiah against Tyre, without remembering that already the Babylonish power threw its shadow across Asia, and Nebuchadnezzar was mustering his armies." Now, all this vague language is very convenient to make mere human foresight out of divine prophecy. But there is no manly grappling with the subject. According to the best research, theological and other, Nahum lived in Hezekiah's reign. This is drawn from reference to historical facts alluded to in the prophecy in connection with Assyria, Egypt, and Philistia, and Isaiah 20. Now, Jeremiah was more than a hundred years afterwards. In Nahum's time Babylon did not cast its shadow over the East, and Nebuchadnezzar was not born. Merodach-Baladan reigned in Babylon, and cherished, probably, ambitious views against Assyria, Babylon having been long a capital before Nineveh. But, though he revolted, in the confusion of Sargon's usurpation, as it appears, he was attacked and driven from Babylon into the marshes; and, though a party of his own race held to him and his family, so far was Babylon from rising then, that Esarhaddon ruled without any subject king at all in Babylon; and Assyria under Sennacherib and Esarhaddon was at a pitch of splendour it had never reached before. After that it began to decline; but it was not Nebuchadnezzar who attacked it. The last king — as to whose name there is some difficulty — sent Nabopolassar against Cyaxares, king of Media; but he joined him, married his daughter, and they attacked Nineveh together. Then, a hundred years after the prophecy, as Nahum had said, the gates of the rivers were opened, the Tigris washed away the brick defences, and the king burnt the palace over his head. Modern research has proved in detail that the fire devoured her palaces. The statement, therefore, as regards Nahum, is entirely groundless.

This arrangement is not chronological. Joel precedes Hosea, while Hosea, Amos and Jonah were nearly contemporary; Obadiah is difficult to place. The introduction to the book enters into the question of date. Micah, the Morasthite, ministered between the years 757 and 699 B.C. Nahum, the complement and counterpart of the book of Jonah, also prophesied during the period of Isaiah. Habakkuk is later than the preceding prophets. He speaks of the invasion of the land by Chaldeans as imminent; his prophetic office was probably exercised during the second half of Manasseh's reign. Zephaniah prophesied under the reign of Josiah, between 642 and 611 B.C. Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi are post-exilic.

A knowledge of Assyrian history, and its great capital, Nineveh, is needed for a better understanding of Nahum's prophecy. It is strange that ancient writers like Ctesias, the physician of Artaxerxes, Mnemon, and Diodorus Siculus have but little to say about Assyria, and many identified Assyria with Babylonia. The infidel critics have seen their defeat in this respect. Not believing the Bible, they trusted in the historical accounts of pagan writers, and assuming that they were right discredited the Word of God, only to find out afterward that the Bible is right and the heathen historians were wrong. For instance, Isaiah mentions in chapter 20 Sargon, king of Assyria. Because the secular historians know nothing of such a king, they sat in judgment upon the Word of God. They denied that such a king ever existed, thinking that the statement by Isaiah is an invention. It was then proven that Sargon was a great warrior, the father of Sennacherib, and that Isaiah gave a true record.

Hezekiah, the King of Judah, under whom Nahum as well as Isaiah and Micah prophesied, had paid tribute for many years to Assyria. When he revolted an Assyrian army appeared in the land, by which over forty Judean cities were captured. Jerusalem itself was saved by divine intervention (Isa. 37:36). Sennacherib, who had sent the expedition against Jerusalem, being murdered by his own sons in 681 B.C. (Isa. 37:38). His successor was Esarhaddon, who besieged Sidon and carried its treasures to Nineveh. Asshurbanipal succeeded him to the throne and made his son Shamash-shumukin regent of Babylon, for Babylon was then an insignificant power. Here we must remember that when Babylon was next to nothing in world history, Isaiah had predicted its coming greatness and conquest of Jerusalem by the Babylonian power. Under Asshurbanipal the ancient and great capital of Upper Egypt was captured, which is mentioned by Nahum in chapter 3:8, 10; that is, No-Amon is Thebes. Asshurbanipal conquered many countries and nations; he razed Susa, and immense treasures were carried off to Nineveh. During his reign every year saw a cruel war, and ruin and carnage were spread in every direction. The captives were treated in a horrible manner, with all kinds of torture. The nations suffered terribly under this wicked monarch, so that when finally Assyria fell the nations rejoiced, as mentioned by Nahum at the conclusion of his prophecy. "All that hear the bruit of thee shall clap hands over thee; for upon whom hath not thy wickedness passed continually?" After Asshurbanipal Assyria declined. He was followed by Asshur-etil-ilani and Sin-shar-ishkun, and finally Assyria and its great and proud capital were conquered by Nabopolassar, the father of Nebuchadnezzar and Cyaxares. This happened about 625 B.C., just about ninety years after Nahum announced the destruction of Nineveh.

But this is not all. "Jehovah is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble." Now we come to that which is in relation to the righteous. He is patient even as respects the wicked, whom He will finally judge, but He has given a strong hold. "He knows them that trust in him. But with an overrunning flood he will make an utter end of the place thereof, and darkness shall pursue his enemies." Then comes a challenge. "What do ye imagine against Jehovah? he will make an utter end: affliction shall not rise up the second time." There may be perhaps an allusion here to a blow which had already fallen on the Assyrian. "Affliction shall not rise up the second time; for while they be folden together as thorns, and while they are drunken as drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry." But we must bear in mind that the Spirit of prophecy sees and declares things that are not as though they were. I have therefore said "perhaps;" for either way the believer need feel no difficulty. The destruction of Nineveh by Cyaxares and Nabopolassar is generally put B.C. 625; as Nahum is by most considered to have flourished near a century before.

After this comes a direct allusion to the enemy, which draws out this magnificent description. "There is one come out of thee that imagines evil against Jehovah, a wicked counsellor. Thus says Jehovah; Though they be complete, and ever so many, yet thus shall they be cut down, when he shall pass away." It is thus plain that there are two elements God has combined in these revelations — the judgment on the one hand of what was wrong in His own people, and on the other of merciless adversaries, who knew not the gracious purpose of God to chasten His people. He would not leave them unpunished; but could He permit a full end? Thus on the one hand the chastening was measured, and its end was according to the goodness of God. On the other hand, God lets the adversary pour out without scruple or bound hatred on His people; but He does not merely use their animosity against them for the good of His own people, and for the punishment of their unfaithfulness, but would surely turn on the malignant foe when His purpose was accomplished. For does God sanction implacable hatred of Israel? utter indifference not to pity only but righteousness, nay, contempt and pride against Himself? turning the fact that God permitted them so to ravage the land and people of Israel into a delusion that there was no God at all, or that they had gained an advantage against the true God? Jehovah accordingly would righteously turn round on the adversaries and destroy them, as surely as He had used them in the first instance to deal with what was faulty in Israel. This we may find everywhere in the prophets, and in none more conspicuously than in the use made of the Assyrian. Nahum also looks like the rest to the end.

Thus the first blow was, I suppose, Sennacherib; the second would be not from the threatening of the Assyrian rebuked but the destruction of Nineveh; and the destruction of Nineveh is the type of the final judgment of the great Assyrian in the last days, the king of the north. Though Jehovah had broken down Israel by the enemy for their good, there would be no such trouble more. The passage looking onward to the end: "Though I have afflicted thee, I will afflict thee no more. For now will I break his yoke from off thee, and will burst thy bonds in sunder. And Jehovah has given a commandment concerning thee," — now He turns to the Assyrian, and addresses him, — "Jehovah has given a command concerning thee, that no more of thy name be sown. Out of the house of thy gods will I cut off the graven image and the molten image: I will make [it] thy grave; for thou art vile." I think that "thee" in verse 12 means Israel, and in verse 13 means the Assyrian. Hence Jehovah is represented as addressing each personally in turn.

These studies would scarcely be complete without some reference to the after history of Nineveh, the great city in which Jonah preached, with results that will never be forgotten. It was founded by Asshur not long after the flood, apparently as a rival to Nimrod's Babylon (Gen. 10:11). The latter was built on the Euphrates, and the former on the Tigris (otherwise Hiddekel), both rivers being branches of the river which watered the Garden of Eden (Gen. 2:13-14). But where is Nineveh to-day? Opposite the town of Mosul there are miles of ruins from which many objects of interest have been excavated, and which are now in the Museums of Europe and America. The city was taken and destroyed by the Medes in B.C. 625. 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. Its destruction was predicted with much detail by Nahum remarkably, a Galilean prophet, as was Jonah. Nahum's book was written about 100 years after Jonah's mission, and the ruin therein foretold was still another century ahead. Who told Nahum about the great disaster? The very principle is largely discredited in our time; but if God be God, it is as easy for Him to speak of the future as of the present. This was His challenge to the deities of the heathen: "Let them bring forth and show us what shall happen: let them show the former things, what they be, that we may consider them and know the latter end of them; or declare us things to come" (Isa. 41:22).

Nahum's book begins thus: "The burden of Nineveh." The word "burden" occurs a number of times in the books of the Old Testament prophets. It means a heavy message, a message of judgement, a message which tends to weigh down the soul of him who has to deliver it. Nineveh was the capital of the Kingdom of Assyria. It is the city rather than the Kingdom that is denounced in Nahum; whereas in Isaiah the Kingdom is condemned, with no special mention of its capital. This distinction is important. In the wonderful ways of God Assyria is to be restored and blessed in the Kingdom age (Isa. 19:23-25), but its proud capital will never rise again. Why is this? The reason is that Nineveh was singularly favoured by God in its day. He sent Jonah there on a special mission, and the whole population trembled at the preaching, and cried to God for mercy. It does not appear to have led the Ninevites to the knowledge of Jehovah, as the great storm led the sailors in Jonah's vessel: but the merciful Creator does not despise national repentance at any time. What wonderful results might be seen to-day if any of the contending nations were to humble themselves before God! In His righteous Government He is chastening many nations as we write, for all deserve it in a greater or lesser degree. What joy it would give to the hearts of those who know God could we hear that any King, President or Premier has called upon his people to repent, and that all have humbly responded!

Nahum prophesied in Palestine, and nearly a century and a half after Jonah his predecessor, in testimony to and of Nineveh.

In Nahum 1:11 we find the one so often mentioned by the prophets — the Assyrian, who imagines evil against Jehovah. verse 12, although obscure, applies, I think, to Israel. Israel, too, alas! boasting of their security and strength according to the spirit of the world, will undergo the invasion, the overflowing of the great waters, the scourge of God. But when this passes through the land (that is, of Israel), they shall be cut down (compare Isaiah 28:18-19; 14:25). But this scourge completes the judgment of God; and the deliverance of Israel, the prophet says, should now be complete and final (compare Isaiah 10:5, 24, 25). The yoke of the Assyrian should be broken for ever, and the proud and hostile power of the world destroyed, as the anti-christian corruption and rebellion had already been judged. The good tidings of full deliverance should be spread abroad, and Judah should keep her solemn feasts in peace.

I doubt not that the invasion of Sennacherib was the occasion of this prophecy; but most evidently it goes much beyond that event, and the judgment is final. This is another instance of that which we have so frequently observed in the prophets — a partial judgment, serving as a warning or an encouragement to the people of God, while it was only a forerunner of a future judgment, in which all the dealings of God would be summed up and manifested.