And the waters shall fail from the sea
Which Kimchi understands figuratively of the destruction of the
Egyptians by the king of Assyria, compared to the drying up of
the waters of the Nile; and others think that the failure of
their trade by sea is meant, which brought great revenues into
the kingdom: but, by what follows, it seems best to take the
words in a literal sense, of the waters of the river Nile, which
being dried up, as in the next clause, could not empty themselves
into the sea, as they used, and therefore very properly may be
said to fail from it; nay, the Nile itself may be called a sea,
it being so large a confluence of water: and the river
shall be wasted and dried up;
that is, the river Nile, which was not only very useful for their
trade and navigation, but the fruitfulness of the country
depended upon it; for the want of rain, in the land of Egypt, was
supplied by the overflow of this river, at certain times, which
brought and left such a slime upon the earth, as made it
exceeding fertile; now the drying up of this river was either
occasioned by some great drought, which God in judgment sent; or
by the practices of some of their princes with this river, by
which it was greatly impaired, and its usefulness diminished.