The Pulpit Commentary — Nahum — Section 8

Lord God will do nothing but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets " (Amos iii. 7). Compare the eumples of Abraham (Gen. xviii. 17), Moses (Numb. xii. G), Samuel (l So.m. iii.11), Elijah ~l Kings xviii. 36), Jeremiah (xi. 18), Daniel (ii. 19), etc. The detu.ils given in Nahum s prophecy concerning Nineveh are such that they must have been obtained either by direct personal knowledge or by Divine revelation. But inasmuch as the former hypothesis--the ground upon which some scholars and critics locate Elkosh in Assyria-is rendered impossible by the time when Nahum iived (shortly after the, destruction of No-Amon), it can only have been by the latter method that he acquired his information. II. 'rHE BURDEN OF NINEVEH. 1. The city. Nineveh; in Assyrian Ninua, or Nina, equivalent to "Station," "Dwelling," if the word be of Semitic origin; equivalent to "Fish-house" if derived from the Accadian (Delitzscb). A city remarkable for: (1) Its antiquity. Founded by Asshur, who went forth out of the land of Shinar, or Bahylon,.and builded Nineveh, the present-day Kouyunjik and Nebbi Yun'U,.!, opposite Mosul on the Tigris (La.yard, Smith, Schrader); Rehoboth Ir, the site of which is unknown; Calah, represented by the mounds of Nimrud (La.yard, Smith, Schrader); and Resen, or Selamiyeh (La.yard, Smith, Schrader), between Calah and Nimroud (Gen. x. 11, 12). "The foundation of Nineveh, the modem Kouyunjik, probably goes back to as early an age as that of Assur (Kalah Shergat, the original capita.I), but it was not until a much later period that it became an important city, and supplanted the older capital of the kingdom" (Sayce, ' Assyria: its Princes,' etc., p. 22). (2) Its size. Even from earliest times it was regarded as a great city, including Calah, Rehoboth Ir, and Resen, as well as Nineveh proper. In Jonah's day it was" a great city" (i. 1), "an exceeding great city of three days' journey" (iii. 3). This accords both witn the statements of classical writer~ne of whom gives its circumference as four hundred and eighty stadia, or twelve geographical miles-and with the discoveries of moderu research, according to which Nineveh appears to have been used to designate at one time Nineveh proper, at another time the four large prominent cities--Nineveh, equivalent to Kouyunjik and Nebbi Yunus; Calah, Nimroud; Resen, Selamiyeh; and Dur-Sargina of the inscriptions, Khorsabad. These four cities "formed a trapezium, the sharp angles of which lay towards the north and south, the long sides being formed by the Tigris and the mountains, the average length being about twenty-five English miles, and the average breadth fifteen" (Delitzsch, on Jonah i. 1). "The circum- ference of these four quarters or towns has been given by the English Jones at almost ninety English miles, which may correspond to a circuit of three days' journey" (Schrader, 'Die Keilinschriften,' p. 448). (3) Its population. In Jonah's time it contained over a hundred and twenty thousand young persons at and under seven years of age (Jonah iv. 11), which would give q. population of six hundred thousand (Niebuhr, Delitzsch, Keil) or seven hundred thousand (Schrader) souls-a number exceeded by many modern cities. (4) Its wealth. Nahum speaks of Nineveh as having multiplied her merchants above the stars of heaven (eh. iii. 16); and that this was so her situation "at the culminating point of the three quarters of the globe, Europe, Asia, and Africa" (0. Strauss), might naturally lead one to expect. That Nineveh con- tained immense stores of gold and silver (eh. ii. 9) accords with the statements of ancient writers, which represent the spoil of Nineveh as having been unparalleled in extent. So completely also was it plundered that "scarcely any fragments of gold and silver have been found in its ruins " (Kitto's 'Cyclopredia,' iii. 334), thus verifying the prediction that she should be "empty, and void, and waste" (eh. ii. 10). (5) Its power. The crowned ones, i.e. nobles, and the marshals, i.e. the captains, of Nineveh were as plentiful as the locusts and great grasshoppers (eh. iii. 17); in which case what must have been the number of the common soldiers? To these-the levied and selected ones (for war) and the soldiery-rather than to the princes and commanders, according to another interpretation (Keil), the prophet's language refers. The shields and scarlet coats of her mighty men, the rattling of her war-chariots, and the prancing of her horses are vividly depicted (eh. ii. 3; iii. l); as well as the fierceness and destructiveness of her warfare (eh. ii. 11, 12). (6) Its wickedness. This, which in Jonah's time was so aggravated as to call forth against it a threatening of Divine punishment (Jonah i. 2; iii. 4, 8, 10), was not less conspicuous in the days of Nahum. The " blo,idy city, full of lies and rapine" (eh. iii. 1), had fully justified her designation by the mannur in which  8 'l'lIE BOOK OF NA H'OM. [en, I, 1-16,