The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt
As Sinai of old did, when the Lord descended on it, ( Exodus 19:18
) ( Judges
5:5 ) . Mountains figuratively signify kings and princes; and
hills large countries, as Jarchi and Abarbinel observe, and the
inhabitants of them; particularly the kingdoms and nations
belonging to the Assyrian empire, which would tremble and quake,
and their hearts melt with fear, when they should hear of the
destruction of Nineveh their chief city; and of the devastation
made by the enemy there and in other parts, under the direction
of the Lord of hosts; his power and providence succeeding him:
and the earth is burnt at his presence;
either when he withholds rain from it, and so it be comes parched
and burnt up with the heat of the sun; or when he rains fire and
brimstone on it, as he did on Sodom and Gomorrah; or consumes any
part of it with thunder and lightning, as he sometimes does; nay,
if he but touch the mountains, they smoke; see ( Psalms
104:32 ) ; yea, the world, and all that dwell
therein;
as in the last day, at the general conflagration, when the world,
and all the wicked inhabitants of it, will be burnt up; see (
2 Peter
3:10 ) .
Nahum 1:5
