Zephaniah 2:12

12 But and ye, Ethiopians, shall be slain by my sword. (And ye Ethiopians shall also be killed by my sword.)

Zephaniah 2:12 Meaning and Commentary

Zephaniah 2:12

Ye Ethiopians also
Or, "as for ye Ethiopians also" {h}; not the Ethiopians in Africa beyond Egypt, at a distance from the land of Israel, and the countries before mentioned; but the inhabitants of Arabia Chusea, or Ethiopia, which lay near to Moab and Ammon; these should not escape, but suffer with their neighbours, who sometimes distressed the people of the Jews, and made war with them, being nigh them; see ( 2 Chronicles 14:9 ) ( 21:16 ) : ye [shall be] slain by my sword;
or, "the slain of my sword are they" ^F9; R. Japhet thinks here is a defect of the note of similitude "as", which should be supplied thus, "ye" are, or shall be, "the slain of my sword", as they; as the Moabites and Ammonites; that is, these Ethiopians should be slain as well as they by the sword of Nebuchadnezzar; which is called the sword of God, because he was an instrument in the hand of God for punishing the nations of the earth. This was fulfilled very probably when Egypt was subdued by Nebuchadnezzar, with whom Ethiopia was confederate, as well as near unto it, ( Jeremiah 46:1 Jeremiah 46:2 ) . The destruction of these by the Assyrians is predicted, ( Isaiah 20:4 ) .

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FOOTNOTES:

F8 (Myvwk Mta Mg) "etiam ad vos Aethiopes quod attinet", Piscator.
F9 (hmh ybrx yllx) "interfecti gladio meo ipsi", Montanus.

Zephaniah 2:12 In-Context

10 Soothly this thing shall come to them for their pride, for they blasphemed, and were magnified [up]on, (or lorded themselves over,) the people of the Lord of hosts.

11 The Lord shall be horrible on them, and he shall make feeble all gods of earth; and men of their place shall worship him, all the isles of heathen men. (And so the Lord shall be terrible to them, or shall terrify them, and he shall make feeble, or shall bring down unto nothing, all the gods of the earth; and the people in the places there, shall worship him, yea, on all the islands of the heathen.)

12 But and ye, Ethiopians, shall be slain by my sword. (And ye Ethiopians shall also be killed by my sword.)

13 And he shall stretch forth his hand on the north, and shall lose Assur; and he shall put the fair city Nineveh into wilderness, and into without way, and as desert. (And he shall stretch out his hand over the north, and shall destroy Assyria; and he shall make the beautiful city of Nineveh into a wilderness, and without a way, and like a desert.)

14 And flocks, and all the beasts of folks, shall lie, (or shall rest,) in the middle thereof; and onocrotalus, and urchin shall dwell in [the] thresholds thereof; voice of the singing in the window, and a crow in the lintel, for I shall make thine the strength thereof. (And flocks, and all the beasts of the nations, or of every kind, shall lie down, or shall rest, in its midst; and owls, and bitterns shall live on its thresholds; the sound of the singing, or of the chirping, at the windows, and of the crows cawing on the lintels, for I shall make all its structures thine.)