The Pulpit Commentary — Nahum — Section 43

EXPOSITION. CHAPTER m which they never kept, t.o induce nations to submit t.o their yoke. Suoh, doubtless, were Vers. 1-19.-Pa.rt Ill. Tim CAUSE OF those of Rabshakeh (Isa. xxxvi. 16). Raw- '1'BB Jt:DGMENT-TIIE SINS OF THE CITY, linson, " Falsehood and treachery . . . are WJDOB BRING 1.NEVTTA.BLE PUNJSlll[l!:h'T. often employed by the strong, as furnishing short cuts to success, and even, where the Vera. 1-7.~ 1. The prophet specifies the moral standard is low, as being in themselves erimes tDhich haflll brought thi, ruin upon creditable (see Thucyd., iii. 83). It certainly Niner:eh. wa.s not necessity which made the Assyrians covenant-breakers; it seems to have been in Ver. 1.-The bloody my; literally, city of po.rt the wantonness of power-because they bloods, where blood ie shed without scruple 'despised the cities, and regarded no man' (comp. Ezek. xxiv. 6, 9; Hab. iL 12). 'l'he (Isa. xxxiii. 8); perhaps it was in po.rt also cruelty of the Assyria.ns is attested by the their imperfect moral perception, which may mouu.ment.s, in which we see or read how have failed to draw the proper distinction prisoners were impe.led alive, fia~·ed, be- between craft and cleverness" (' Ancient headed. dragged to death with ropes passed Monarchies,' i. 305). Robbery; rather, through rings in their lips, blinded by the rapine, or rending in pieces. The figure king's own hai;d, Lung up by hands or feet applies to the way in which a wild beast lo die in slow torture (see Bonomi, pp. 168, kills its prey by tearing it to pieces. So de., 190, etc., 225). Others have their brains the three crimes of Nineveh here enume- beaten out, or their tongues torn out by the rated are bloodshed, deceit, and violence. roots. wLile the bleeding heads of the slain In the uncertainty concerning the word are tied round the necks of the living, who (pereq) rendered "robbery," which only ure reserved for further torture (Le.yard, occurs in Ohad. 14, where it mee.ua "cross- • Ninevel, and llabylou,' p. 456; Rawlinson, way," the LXX. translates, a.~11ct1Xs 1rll.tJp1'/s, • Ancient Monarchies,' ii. 503, etc., edit. "full of unrighteousness." The Vnlgate 1864). The royal inscriptions recount with is correct, dilaceratione plena. The prey exultation the number of the enemies slain departeth not. 'l'hey go on in the so.me u.nd of captives carried away, cities levelled way, gathering spoil into the city, naver with the grounn, plundered, and burnt, lands ceasing from this crime. The monuments deva.stated, fruit trees destroyed, etc. It is continWllly record the booty that was all fnll of lie■ ; illl.71 ,j,Ev~f,s, ·• all lie" (Septua- brought to Nineveh (see, for instance, the gint). ThP Assyrians used treachery in ' Annals of .A.ssurbanipal,' passim; ' Re- furthering their conquests, made prowises cords of the Past,' vol. 1x.; Schl'&.der, OIi. ltl. 1-19,] TIIE BOOK OF NAHUM. 41