Albert Barnes Commentary Nahum 2:13

"Behold, I am against thee, saith Jehovah of hosts, and I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword shall devour thy young lions; and I will cut off thy prey from the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall no more be heard." — Nahum 2:13 (ASV)

Behold I, Myself, am against you - (Literally, “toward you”). God, in His long-suffering, had, as it were, looked away from him; now He looked toward him, and in His sight what wicked one could stand? Saith the Lord of hosts, whose power is infinite and He does not change, and all the armies of heaven, the angels, evil spirits, and men are in His Hand, to which He directs or overrules them. And I will burn her chariots in the smoke. The Assyrian sculptures attest how greatly their pride and strength lay in their chariots. They exhibit the minute embellishment of the chariots and horses.

Almost inconceivably light for speed, they are pictured as whirled onward by the two or, more often, three powerful steeds with eyes of fire, the bodies of the slain (or, in peace, the lion) under their feet, the mailed warriors, with bows stretched to the utmost, shooting at the more distant foe.

Sennacherib gives a terrific picture of the fierceness of their onslaught. “The armor, the arms, taken in my attacks, swam in the blood of my enemies as in a river; the war-chariots, which destroy man and beast, had, in their course, crushed the bloody bodies and limbs.” All this their warlike pride should be but fuel for fire, and vanish in smoke, an emblem of pride, swelling, mounting like a column toward heaven, disappearing.

Not a brand will then be saved out of the burning; nothing half-consumed; but the fire will burn, until there is nothing left to consume, as, in Sodom and Gomorrah, the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furnace. And the sword of the vengeance of God shall devour the young lions (Genesis 19:28), his hope for the time to come, the flower of his youth; and I will cut off thy prey, what you have robbed, and so that you should rob no more, but that your spoil should utterly cease from the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall be no more heard, such as Rabshakeh, by which they insulted and terrified the nations and blasphemed God.

In the spiritual sense, Nineveh being an image of the world, the prophecy speaks of the inroad made upon it through the Gospel—its resistance, capture, desolation, destruction. First, He who rules with a rod of iron came and denounced woe to it because of offenses; then His mighty ones came in His Name. Their shield is red, the shield of faith, kindled and glowing with love. Their raiment too is red, because they wash it in the Blood of the Lamb, and conquer through the Blood of the Lamb, and many shed their own blood for a witness to them.

The day of His preparation is the whole period, until the end of the world, in which the Gospel is preached, of which the prophets and apostles speak as the day of salvation (Isaiah 49:8; 2 Corinthians 6:2); to the believing world a day of salvation, to the unbelieving, of preparation for judgment. All that is done—judgments, mercy, preaching, miracles, patience of the saints, martyrdom—all that is spoken, done, suffered, is part of the one preparation for the final judgment.

The chariots, flashing with light as they pass, are the chariots of salvation (Habakkuk 3:8), bearing the brightness of the doctrine of Christ and the glory of His truth throughout the world, enlightening while they wound; the spears are the word of God, slaying to make alive.

On the other hand, in resisting, the world clashes with itself. It would oppose the Gospel, yet does not know how; is maddened with rage, and gnashes its teeth, that it can prevail nothing. On the broad ways that lead to death, where Wisdom uttereth her voice and is not heard, it is hemmed in, and cannot find a straight path; its chariots dash one against another, and yet they breathe their ancient fury, and run to and fro like lightning, as the Lord says, I beheld Satan, as lightning, fall from heaven (Luke 10:18).

Then they will remember their mighty ones, all the might of this world which they ascribed to their gods, their manifold triumphs, by which in pagan times their empire was established; they will gather strength against strength, but it will be powerless and real weakness.

While they prepare for a long siege, without hand their gates give way; the kingdom falls, the world is taken captive by a blessed captivity, suddenly, unawares, as one says in the second century: “Men cry out that the state is beset, that the Christians are in their fields, in their forts, in their islands!” These mourn over their past sins, and beat their breasts, in token of their sorrow; yet sweeter will be the plaint of their sorrow than any past joy.

So they will mourn as doves, and their mourning is as melody and the voice of praise in the ear of the Most High. One part of the inhabitants of the world being thus blessedly taken, the rest have fled. So in all nearness of God’s judgments, those who are not brought nearer, flee further. They flee, and look not back, and none hears the Lord speaking, Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings (Jeremiah 3:22).

So then, not hearing His Voice, stand, stand, they flee away from His presence in mercy, into darkness forever. Such is the lot of the inhabitants of the world; and what is the world itself? The prophet answers what it has been.

A pool of water, into which all things—the riches and glory, and wisdom, and pleasures of this world—have flowed in on all sides, and which gave back nothing. All ended in itself. The water came from above, and became stagnant in the lowest part of the earth. “For all the wisdom of this world, apart from the sealed fountain of the Church, and of which it cannot be said, the streams thereof make glad the city of God nor are of those waters which, above the heavens, praise the Name of the Lord, however large they may seem, yet are little, and are enclosed in a narrow bound” (Luke 10:18).

These either are hallowed to God, like the spoils of Egypt, as when the eloquence of Cyprian was won through the fishermen, or the gold and silver are offered to Him, or they are left to be wasted and burned up. All which is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, all under the sun, remain here.

“If they are thine, take them with thee. When he dieth, he shall carry nothing away, his glory shall not descend after him (Psalms 49:17). True riches are not wealth, but virtues, which the conscience carries with it, that it may be rich forever.”

The seven-fold terrors (Nahum 2:10), singly, may have a good sense, that the stony heart will be melted, and the stiff knees, which before were not bent to God, will be bowed in the Name of Jesus.

Yet more fully are they the deepening horrors of the wicked in the Day of Judgment, when men’s hearts shall fail them for fear and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth (Luke 21:26), closing with the everlasting confusion of face, the shame and everlasting contempt, to which the wicked will rise.

As the vessel over the fire is not cleansed, but blackened, so through the judgments of God, by which the righteous are cleansed, the wicked gather but fresh defilement and hate. Lastly, the prophet asks, Where is the dwelling of those who had made the world a den of ravin, where the lion—even the devil who is a roaring lion, and all antichrists (1 John 2:18), who destroyed at will; where Satan made his dwelling in the hearts of the worldly, and tore in pieces for his whelps (that is, killed souls of men and gave them over to inferior evil spirits to be tormented), and filled his holes with prey (the pit of hell with the souls which he deceived)?

The question implies that they will not be. They which have seen him shall say, Where is he? (Job 20:7).

God Himself answers, that He Himself will come against it to judgment, and destroy all might arrayed against God; and Christ will smite the Wicked one with the rod of His Mouth (Isaiah 11:4), and the sharp two-edged sword out of His mouth shall smite all nations (Revelation 1:16; Revelation 19:15, 21), and the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever (Revelation 14:11); and it will no more oppress, nor any messenger of Satan go forth to harass the saints of God.