Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Nahum 1:10
For while [they be] folded together [as] thorns, and while they are drunken [as] drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry.
10. Nah 1:10 can hardly have been handed down in its original state. It may be rendered much as R.V.: for though (they be like) thorns tangled together and drenched as with their drink, they shall be consumed as stubble fully dry. The Ninevites are compared to a tangled thorn hedge soaked with moisture and thus inaccessible to fire, yet the fire of Jehovah shall consume them as suddenly and completely as if they were the driest stubble. For the sense of though, even to prep. ‘ ad cf. Num 8:4; 1Sa 2:5; Hag 2:19; Job 25:5, and for the sense as with cf. Isa 1:25 &c. Of course the words might mean wet or wetted like their drink. It has been usually supposed that in the words “their drink” the prophet refers to the excess and debauchery of the Assyrian court. But a witticism of this sort is altogether improbable. The text is no doubt corrupt. For “drenched as with their drink” Sept. gives “like tangled yew,” or some such plant. The general sense of the text may be conjectured to have been, that though the Ninevites from their strong defences were as unassailable and able to inflict injury as a tangled thorn hedge, they would become the prey of the fire. See a similar comparison to a thorn hedge, Mic 7:4; and on the comparison of enemies or the wicked to thorns, 2Sa 23:6-7; Eze 2:6.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
For while they be leiden together as thorns – that is, as confused, intertwined, sharp, piercing, hard to be touched, rending and tearing whosoever would interfere with its tangled ways, and seemingly compact together and strong; and while they are drunken as their drink , not drinkers only but literally, drunken, swallowed up, as it were, by their drink which they had swallowed, mastered, overcome, powerless, they shall be derogated as stubble fully dry , rapidly, in an instant, with an empty crackling sound, unresisting, as having nothing in them which can resist. Historically, the great defeat of the Assyrians, before the capture of Nineveh, took place while its king, flushed with success, was giving himself to listlessness; and having distributed to his soldiers victims, and abundance of wine, and other necessaries for banqueting, the whole army was negligent and drunken.
In like way Babylon was taken amid the feasting of Belshazzar Dan. 5:1-30; Benhadad was smitten, while drinking himself drunk in the pavilions, he and the kings, the thirty and two kings that helped him 1Ki 20:16. And so it may well be meant here too, that Sennacheribs army, secure of their prey, were sunk in revelry, already swallowed up by wine, before they were swallowed up by the pestilence, on the night when the Angel of the Lord went out to smite them, and, from the sleep of revelry, they slept the sleep from which they shall not awake until the Judgment Day. God chooses the last moment of the triumph of the wicked, when he is flushed by his success, the last of the helplessness of the righteous, when his hope can be in the Lord alone, to exchange their lots. The righteous is delivered out of trouble, and the wicked comes in his stead Pro 11:8. Spiritually , the false fullness of the rich of this world, is real leanness; the greenness of such grass (for all flesh is grass) is real dryness. Marvelous words, fully dry. For what is dryness but emptiness? They are perfected, but in dryness, and so perfectly prepared to be burned up. The thorns had, as far as in them lay, choked the good seed, and hated the Seed-corn, and now are found, like stubble, void of all seed, fitted only to be burned with fire. For those who feast themselves without fear is reserved the blackness of darkness forever Jud 1:12-13.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 10. While they be folden together] However united their counsels may be, they shall be as drunken men-perplexed and unsteady in all their resolutions; and before God’s judgments they shall be as dry thorns before a devouring fire.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
This gives us account how this desolation shall be effected.
While they be folded together as thorns; they should be like thorns easily burnt, and like thorns folden together, which burn together, and help to destroy each other, or are all together cast into the fire.
While they are drunken as drunkards; as men drunken, and unable to help themselves, are easily destroyed, so shall the Assyrians be; or, drunk with pleasures and pride, they shall be surprised, and ruined, and easily overthrown.
They shall be devoured as stubble fully dry: this fully expresseth the speedy, irresistible, and total destruction that the anger of God will bring upon them; as the fire burns up all the dried stubble, so shall the wrath of God destroy the enemies of Israel and of Israels God.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
10. while they are folden togetheras thornsliterally, “to the same degree as thorns“(compare 1Ch 4:27, Margin).As thorns, so folded together and entangled that they cannot beloosed asunder without trouble, are thrown by the husbandmen all in amass into the fire, so the Assyrians shall all be given together todestruction. Compare 2Sa 23:6;2Sa 23:7, where also “thorns”are the image of the wicked. As this image represents the speedinessof their destruction in a mass, so that of “drunkards,”their rushing as it were of their own accord into it; fordrunkards fall down without any one pushing them [KIMCHI].CALVIN explains, Althoughye be dangerous to touch as thorns (that is, full of rage andviolence), yet the Lord can easily consume you. But “although”will hardly apply to the next clause. English Version andKIMCHI, therefore, are tobe preferred. The comparison to drunkards is appropriate. Fordrunkards, though exulting and bold, are weak and easily thrown downby even a finger touching them. So the insolent self-confidence ofthe Assyrians shall precipitate their overthrow by God. The Hebrewis “soaked,” or “drunken as with their ownwine.” Their drunken revelries are perhaps alluded to,during which the foe (according to DIODORUSSICULUS [2]) broke intotheir city, and Sardanapalus burned his palace; though themain and ultimate destruction of Nineveh referred to by Nahum waslong subsequent to that under Sardanapalus.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
For while [they be] folden together [as] thorns,…. Like them, useless and unprofitable, harmful and pernicious, fit only for burning, and, being bundled together, are prepared for it; and which is not only expressive of the bad qualities of the Ninevites, and of the danger they were in, and what they deserved; but of the certainty of their ruin, no more being able to save themselves from it, than a bundle of thorns from the devouring fire:
and while they are drunken [as] drunkards; dead drunk, no more able to help themselves than a drunken man that is fallen; or who were as easily thrown down as a drunken man is with the least touch; though there is no need to have recourse to a figurative sense, since the Ninevites were actually drunk when they were attacked by their enemy, as the historian relates i; that the king of Assyria being elated with his fortune, and thinking himself secure, feasted his army, and gave them large quantities of wine; and while the whole army were indulging themselves, the enemy, having notice of their negligence and drunkenness by deserters, fell upon them unawares in the night, when disordered and unprepared, and made a great slaughter among them, and forced the rest into the city, and in a little time took it:
they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry; as easily, and as inevitably and irrecoverably.
i Diodor. Sicul. l. 2. p. 112.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
He goes on with this same subject, — that Gods when he pleases to exercise his power, can, with no difficulty, consume his enemies: for the similitude, which is here added, means this, — that nothing is safe from God’s vengeance; for by perplexed thorns he understands things difficult to be handled. When thorns are entangled, we dare not, with the ends of our fingers, to touch their extreme parts; for wherever we put our hands, thorns meet and prick us. As then pricking from entangled thorns make us afraid, so none of us dare to come nigh them. Hence the Prophet says, they who are as entangled thorns; that is “However thorny ye may be, however full of poison, full of fury, full of wickedness, full of frauds, full of cruelty, ye may be, still the Lord can with one fire consume you, and consume you without any difficulty.” They were then as entangled thorns.
And then, as drunken by their own drinking. If we read so, the meaning is, — God or God’s wrath will come upon you as on drunker men; who, though they exult in their own intemperance, are yet enervated, and are not fit for fighting, for they have weakened their strength by extreme drinking. There seems indeed to be much vigor in a drunken man, for he swaggers immoderately and foams out much rage; but yet he may be cast down by a finger; and even a child can easily overcome a drunken person. It is therefore an apt similitude, — that God would manage the Assyrians as the drunken are wont to be managed; for the more audacity there is in drunken men, the easier they are brought under; for as they perceive no danger, and are, as it were, stupefied, so they run headlong with greater impetuosity. “In like manners” he says, “extreme satiety will be the cause of your ruin, when I shall attack you. Ye are indeed very violent; but all this your fury is altogether drunkenness: Come, he says, to you shall the vengeance of God as to those drunken with their own drinking (217)
Some render the last words, “To the drunken according to their drinking;” and this sense also is admissible; but as the Prophet’s meaning is still the same, I do not contend about words. Others indeed give to the Prophet’s words a different sense: but I doubt not but that he derides here that haughtiness by which the Assyrians were swollen, and compares it to drunkenness; as though he said, “Ye are indeed more than enough inflated and hence all tremble at your strength; but this your excess rather debilitates and weakens your powers. When God then shall undertake to destroy you as drunken men, your insolence will avail you nothing; but, on the contrary, it will be the cause of your ruin as ye offer yourselves of your own accord; and the Lord will easily cast you down, as when one, by pushing a drunken man, immediately throws him on the ground.”
And these comparisons ought to be carefully observed by us: for when there seems to be no probability of our enemies being destroyed, God can with one spark easily consume them. How so? for as fire consumes thorns entangled together, which no man dares to touch, so God can with one spark destroy all the wicked, however united together they may be. And the other comparison affords us also no small consolation; for when our enemies are insolent, and throw out high swelling words, and seem to frighten and to shake the whole world with their threatening, their excess is like drunkenness; there is no strength within; they are frantic but not strong, as is the case with all drunken men.
And he says, They shall be devoured as stubble of full dryness מלא, mela, means not only to be full, but also to be perfect or complete. Others render the words, “As stubble full of dryness,” but the sense is the same. He therefore intimates, that there would be nothing to prevent God from consuming the enemies of his Church; for he would make dry their whole vigor, so that they would differ nothing from stubble, and that very dry, which is in such a state, that it will easily take fire. It follows —
(217) Newcome, on the sole authority of the Syriac and the Targum, changes “thorns” into “princes,” and thus wholly destroys the propriety of the simile of dry stubble at the end of the verse. Henderson says justly, that this change is on no account to be adopted.
Though like thorns, entwined, And as with their drinking drunken, They shall be consumed as stubble fully dry.
The particle עד, before “thorns,” is to be here taken as in 1Ch 4:27, as designating likeness. — Ed.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(10) For while.Better, For they shall be even as bundles of thorn fagots, and even while steeped in their drink they shall be burnt up like stubble fully dry. Dry thorn cuttings were commonly used as fuel. (See Psa. 58:9; Psa. 118:12; Ecc. 7:6.) The verse compares the victims of Jehovahs wrath, first, to a compact bundle of thorn fagots; secondly, to a material equally combustible, the dry straw and stubble of the threshing-floor. With regard to the words while steeped in their drink, it may be remarked that in the final siege of Nineveh a great defeat of its forces was effected by a surprise while the king and his captains were sunk in revelry (Diod. Sic. ii. 26). Benhadad, king of Syria, and Belshazzar, king of Babylon, were overcome under similar circumstances (1Ki. 1:16; Dan. 5:1-30). Feasting and revelry may have gone on in Sennacheribs camp at the moment when the sudden visitation of the angel of the Lord was impending; but on this point we have no information. The introduction of this detail adds to the metaphor a certain grim humour. Soaked in wine though the enemy be, he shall surely burn like driest fuel in the day of Jehovahs fiery wrath. The opening clause of the verse is beset with difficulties, both grammatical and lexical. Kleinert renders For in thorns they shall be entangled, &c.; Ewald and Hitzig, For even though they be compact as a wickerwork of thorns, &c.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Nah 1:10. For while they be folden, &c. For they who sit round their cups, and are drunken as drunkards, shall be, &c. Houbigant. Diodorus relates, that while all the Assyrian army were feasting for their former victories, those about Arbaces, being informed by some deserters of the negligence and drunkenness in the camp of the enemies, assaulted them unexpectedly by night; and, falling orderly upon them disordered, and prepared on them unprepared, became masters of the camp, slew many of the soldiers, and drove the rest into the city. See Newton’s Prophesies, vol. 1:
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Nah 1:10 For while [they be] folden together [as] thorns, and while they are drunken [as] drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry.
Ver. 10. For while they be folden together as thorns ] And so can hardly be handled without hurt, God will burn them together in the same place, 2Sa 23:7 , as a man puts thorns folden, and that cannot easily be sundered, all together into the fire, where they make a sudden blaze and are extinct. So will God deal with the Ninevites, notwithstanding their carnal combinations and confederacies.
And while they are drunken as drunkards
As stubble fully dry
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
folden = entangled.
thorns. The emblem of hostile armies (Isa 10:17; Isa 27:4).
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
while they be: 2Sa 23:6, 2Sa 23:7, Mic 7:4, 1Th 5:2, 1Th 5:3
drunken: Nah 3:11, 1Sa 25:36, 2Sa 13:28, Jer 51:39, Jer 51:57
they shall: Psa 68:2, Isa 9:18, Isa 10:17-19, Isa 27:4, Mal 4:1
Reciprocal: Exo 5:12 – stubble Exo 15:7 – consumed 1Ki 16:9 – drinking Job 21:18 – as stubble Psa 10:6 – not Psa 83:14 – the flame Psa 118:12 – quenched Pro 23:29 – Who hath woe Ecc 7:4 – the heart Isa 5:14 – he that rejoiceth Isa 5:24 – devoureth Isa 21:4 – the night Isa 47:8 – I shall not Isa 47:14 – they shall Eze 21:10 – should Dan 5:1 – made Hos 2:11 – cause Amo 6:7 – and the Amo 8:10 – I will turn Oba 1:18 – for stubble Hab 2:5 – he transgresseth Hab 2:7 – they Luk 6:25 – mourn Luk 12:20 – God
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Nah 1:10. Folden is from CABAK and is defined in the lexicon by “to entwine.” Drunken and drunkards are from COBE, which means “carousal.” The thought in both clauses is that of being in a conspiracy. But though the Assyrians form such an opposition against the people ol Israel, they will be devoured as stubble fully dry, which means that the resistance will be no more effective than dry stubble would be against a fire.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
1:10 For while [they be] folden together [as] {l} thorns, and while they are drunken [as] drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry.
(l) Though the Assyrians think themselves like thorns that prick on all sides, yet the Lord will set fire on them, and as drunken men are not able to stand against any force, so they will not be able to resist him at all.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Tangled (Heb. sebukim) thorns are tough to penetrate, but they are no match for fire. Likewise the Ninevites, as confused as they would be when their city was under attack, would be no match for the consuming fire of Yahweh’s wrath (cf. Nah 1:6). Many of the Ninevites were confused because they were drunk (Heb. sebu’im). Yahweh would destroy them as easily and quickly as fire burned up the dead stalks left in fields after harvest.