Nahum 2:1-7

1 A destroyer has risen in front of your face; guard the ramparts, keep watch on the road, brace yourselves, marshall all your strength.

2 For ADONAI is restoring the pride of Ya'akov, along with the pride of Isra'el; because plunderers have plundered them and ravaged their vines.

3 The shields of [Ninveh's] warriors are [dyed] red; the soldiers are wearing scarlet. The steel of the chariots flashes like fire as they prepare for battle. The cypress [spears] are poisoned.

4 The chariots rush madly about in the streets, jostling each other in the open places; their appearance is like torches, they run here and there like lightning.

5 [The king of Ninveh] assigns his officers; they stumble as they march; they hurry to its wall and set up shields to protect the battering ram.

6 The gates of the rivers are opened, and the palace melts away.

7 Its mistress is stripped and carried away; her handmaids moan, they sound like doves, as they beat their breasts.

Nahum 2:1-7 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO NAHUM 2

This chapter gives an account of the destruction of the city of Nineveh; describes the instruments of it as very terrible and powerful, and not to be resisted, Na 2:1-4. The manner of taking it, the flight of its inhabitants, and the spoil of its riches and treasures, Na 2:5-10 and the king and the princes thereof, compared to a lion, and a lion's whelp, are insulted as being without a den or dwelling place, because of their cruelty and ravening, for which the Lord was against them, and threatened them with utter ruin, which he brought upon them, Na 2:11-13.