Translation & Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ The Redeemer Church of Manhattan, KS, 9 March 2025
Omitting greyed-out text should bring presentation time down around 45 minutes.
Nahum has already introduced us to God’s judgment against the Assyrian city-state of Nineveh, and we’ve already had occasion in the past weeks to meditate on the patterns of God’s judgment revealed to us in the Bible. This passage gives us even more occasion for that! Verses 5-7 call us to consider the way God judges through loss of protection, shame, and alienation, and there will be more in verses 10-11: loss of identity, barbarity, depersonalization, restriction, madness, shunning, and becoming a refugee.
Read
passage, starting at Nahum 3:5:
“Look at me; I am
against you,” declares Yahweh, Commander of armies, “and I will
strip your skirts over your face, and I will show nations your
nakedness, and kingdoms your shame, and I will throw
abominable-idols on top of you, and I will make a fool of you, then
I will set you up as a sight [to see], and it will be that everyone
who sees you will withdraw from you and will say, “Nineveh has
been devestated; who will be sympathetic toward her?” Where ever
would I seek comforters for you from? Are you better than No-Amon –
the one settled along the rivers, water all around her, the rampart
of which was the sea, her defensive-wall being the water? Ethiopia
was her strength, and so was Egypt, and that without limit. Sudan
and Libya were in your alliance. Even she become an exile; she went
into captivity. Even her nursing-babies were dashed to pieces at the
head of all the streets. And over her honored men they handled dice,
and all her great men were bound with chains. Even you yourself will
become intoxicated; you will be disregarded, Even you yourself will
seek refuge from the enemies.
For the second time since Nahum 2:13, God says, “I am against you...”
Remember the reasons listed at the beginning of chapter 3 as to why God is against Nineveh:
They are guilty of much bloodshed of innocent life, they are completely full of lies, they have stolen and pillaged from other people, as well as enslaved and oppressed others.
All these things are bad enough in themselves, but they all stem from the worse problem of setting themselves at enmity against God, as chapter 1 describes. They are God’s “adversaries” (v.2), who do not “seek refuge in Him” (v.7), but “plot evil against the LORD” (v.11), and worship “idols and images” (v.14).
That’s why God is “against” them.
Already up to this point, God has revealed through Nahum several temporal judgments which God is planning to execute upon the unrepentantly-sinful city-state of Nineveh. The most recent of these planned judgments was mentioned in verses 2-3 of chapter 3: the judgment of being massacred by a foreign army.
To this is added another temporal judgement in verses 5-11, that of exposure and loss of protection. The metaphor Nahum uses is that of publicly stripping a woman of her clothes. The woman here is the city of Nineveh, and the clothes represent the ways that cities protect their citizens.
Now, in our contemporary, secularized rape-culture, women are celebrated as brave when they expose their bodies in public, but in Biblical culture, ever since God provided animal skins to cover the nakedness of Adam and Eve when they sinned, it is a shameful thing to have nakedness even partially uncovered in public.
It’s not that we should be ashamed of our bodies, for God said that He created us “very good” (Gen. 1:27-31, 2:25), and we need to believe Him on that! The problem is that we lost our glory when we sinned – we lost our original righteousness, and that makes us vulnerable to sin and exposes us to shame and liability to God’s judgment, so what we need is to be covered with the righteousness of Christ (Rom. 3:22, 2 Cor. 5:21) to remove that vulnerability and liability, and, whether or not we realize that clothing is a symbol of the Gospel, God ordained clothing to symbolize that.
But we’re talking about the stripping of Nineveh now. What kinds of covering might a city have? Its army, its outer defensive wall, its alliances with other nations to help defend it, its network of supply-chains which keep a stable flow of food and goods coming into the city, its leadership that can make plans to overcome problems and keep the city resilient, and its loaded treasuries which can smooth out any crisis with an infusion of cash. These are some of the protective measures a city or state provides for its citizens, and these are all good things that can be a benefit to any community, but God says that, in His punishment of Nineveh, He will strip all those protections away and leave the city in a very embarrasing and vulnerable position, so much so that all the other cities in the world will consider Nineveh “despicable.”
This judgment of stripping away the protective covering of a nation and exposing it to shame among other nations is one of God’s temporal judgments frequently spoken of throughout the prophets:
Not only is it threatened against Assyria here (and earlier in Nahum 2:7)1,
it is also threatened against Babylon (in Isaiah 47 and Jeremiah 13 and 50)2,
against Tyre (in Ezekiel 26:3),
against Egypt (in Isaiah 20)3,
against Israel (in Micah 1 and Ezekiel 23)4,
and even against Judah (in Lamentations 1 and Habakkuk 2)5.
And the words in the Greek translation of Nahum 3:5 for the “nakedness” and “shame” that God exposes in judgment show up in the New Testament too, describing God’s judgments, as well as the way of salvation:
Romans 1:22-26 “Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man-- and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things. Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this reason God gave them up to vile [ἀτιμίας] passions…” (NKJV) This is a judgment of God: “God gave them up to what is dishonorable.”
Philipppians 3:18-19 “...many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame [αἰσχύνῃ]-- who set their mind on earthly things.” (NKJV, cf. 2 Cor. 4:2)
So, what is the way of salvation from this judgment? Jesus explained to the church in Laodicea that didn’t realize how “wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked” is was in Revelation 3:17-18 “...I counsel you to buy from Me... white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness6 may not be revealed...” (NKJV) Jesus is the one we must go to, to be saved from this judgment of exposure and loss of protection.
In v.6, Nahum prophesies another temporal judgment upon Nineveh, and that is the judgment of “shame” and “despising” from other people.Three phrases describe this.
The last phrase is that God will “set” Nineveh up to be a “spectacle/gazingstock” – literally, a “sight” over which people gawk. That has literally come true. Nineveh ceased to be a functioning city after its overthrow in 612 BC, but, thousands of years later, its ruins are a tourist destination – people come to “stare” at it!
The second phrase describing God’s judgement of “shame” in v.6 is, “I will make you vile/treat you with contempt/make a fool of you.”
The root meaning of this Hebrew verb has to do with being “hollow” or “lightweight” – not something to be taken seriously.
We encountered that verb once already in Nahum 1:14, where God says that the king of Nineveh is “foolish/despised/not to be taken seriously.” Here God Himself pledges to be the one who makes Nineveh thus.
As I have perused archaeology magazines and museum showcases on Nineveh, I have noted phrases from the curators themselves which fulfill this prophecy:
The British Museum’s I Ashurbanipal exibition from 2019 was subtitled, “The greatest king you’ve never heard of.” Wild Frontiers’ blog about that exhibition calls the king of Nineveh a “PR...master” and “immodest.”7 Not particularly flattering descriptions!
The Fall 2003 issue of Bible & Spade magazine entitled one of its articles, “Nahum, Nineveh, and Those Nasty Assyrians,” pointing out the ironic reversals in which some of the very things that the Assyrians, in their records, boasted of doing to their rivals, ended up being done to them by their own enemies, heaping all the more shame on their memory.8
The first phrase in verse 6 (also detailing God’s judgment of shame upon Nineveh) is, I think, particularly a jibe at Nineveh’s false gods. The Hebrew word shiqqutzim, translated “filth/abominations” appears 47 other times in the Bible, and almost every time it occurs, a word for an idol or a false god appears alongside it. Nevertheless, most of the commentaries I read thought it was describing God throwing “mud/excrement/rotting food” at Nineveh. I think this is God littering the ground of Nineveh with the useless shapes of its own idols. This is the one True God getting the last laugh against all the petty demonic rivals that stole worship from Him in Nineveh!
This judgment of shame is something God instituted, not only against Assyria and its idols, but also against
Judah (Mal. 2:9) and Babylon (Isa. 14:16, Jer. 51:37) and their idols,
and, in the New Testament, we see it again: the humiliation of the demonic powers and principalities of this world by the Son of God: “And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it [the cross].” (Colossians 2:13-15, NKJV)
And we see the ultimate future triumph of Jesus, the Lamb of God, where “...there shall by no means enter [heaven] anything that defiles, or causes an abomination or a lie, but only those who are written in the Lamb's Book of Life.” (Rev. 21:27, NKJV, cf. Luke 16:15)
So, once again, the way out of this judgment it to go to Jesus and worship Him instead of the things of this world.
Verse 7 continues to play out the natural consequence of shame, and that is: people distancing themselves from the one who is being shamed.
The first half of v.7 describes people’s natural reaction to someone else on the receiving end of judgment: I don’t want to be anywhere near that person, because I don’t want any of that to rub off on me!
I have noticed in my house, whenever my wife or I single out one of our children for discipline, all the rest of the kids suddenly make themselves very scarce!
They’re like the merchants in Revelation 18:10 “standing at a distance for fear of her torment, saying, `Alas, alas, that great city Babylon, that mighty city! For in one hour your judgment has come!” (NKJV)
In the second half of v.7, the questions are posed, “Who will grieve?” and “Whence can comforters be sought?”
The problem, as v. 19 states, is that there is no one against whom Nineveh hasn’t done evil, so whoever wants to arrange a memorial service is going to have a really hard time finding anyone sorry to see Nineveh go. Any funeral parlor he checks into is going to say, “Sorry, we don’t provide services for Assyrians.” You couldn’t even pay anybody to pretend to mourn for Nineveh!
This discipline of alienation is one of God’s temporal judgments intended to drive home to us that friends have become an idol to us and that what we need most is to be right with God.
God has also used alienation as a form of discipline to bring maturity to those He loves. In the Psalms, David wrote about his experience using the same verbs Nahum used:
Psalm 31:11 “As a result of all my adversaries I was a stigma even more to my neighbors, and to those with whom I was intimately acquainted I was a terrorist. Upon seeing me in the outdoors they shrank/fled from me.” (NAW)
Psalm 69:20 “Reproach has broken my heart, And I am full of heaviness; I looked for someone to take pity, but there was none; And for comforters, but I found none.” (NKJV)
In the prophets, God describes using the same process to refine the Jews through the Babylonian exile. For instance, Jeremiah9 wrote:
Lamentations 1:21 “They have heard that I sigh, But no one comforts me. All my enemies have heard of my trouble; They are glad that You have done it...” (NKJV)
Jeremiah 15:5 “For who will have pity on you, O Jerusalem? Or who will bemoan you? Or who will turn aside to ask how you are doing? ... 31:18-20 I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself: `You have chastised me, and I was chastised, Like an untrained bull; Restore me, and I will return, For You are the LORD my God. Surely, after my turning, I repented; And after I was instructed, I struck myself on the thigh; I was ashamed, yes, even humiliated, Because I bore the reproach of my youth.' Is Ephraim My dear son? Is he a pleasant child? For though I spoke against him, I earnestly remember him still; Therefore My heart yearns for him; I will surely have mercy on him, says the LORD.” (NKJV)
Once again, what is the way out of this judgment of alienation? It is to return to the “Lord” Jesus and receive His “mercy.”
But this outcome was not-to-be, in the case of Nineveh. Instead, Nineveh would be destroyed, much as she had destroyed other cities and nations. One such city was No-Amon, in Egypt, which the Assyrians conquered during Nahum’s lifetime. God says in ...
No-Amon was an ancient Egyptian city located on the Nile River in the highlands of the country.
No-Amon means “city of [the God] Amon” in Egyptian. The Greeks called it Thebes10, and Egyptians now call it Luxor11.
Nahum uses the words “water,” “sea,” and “river” to describe a key aspect of the city’s defensive strategy. (Some contemporary English versions also add the proper-name of the river, the “Nile.”)
The ancient Hebrews called any large body of water a “sea” – so most scholars think that Nahum’s words for “sea,” “water,” and “river” all refer to the Nile (and perhaps the canals built around it)12, and that the ancient fortress actually sat on an island in the middle of the water. Any army that tried to attack that city would have to cross the river or canals and fight from the water, leaving them at a significant disadvantage.
By the way, there is another significant body of water, the Red Sea, about 50 miles to the East of No-Amon, so any attack from countries to the East would be significantly slowed down by having to cross that sea. So, water indeed was part of its defense.
Let me quote from the Fall 2003 issue of the archaeology magazine, Bible & Spade, which contains an article on the historical event behind this verse: “Esarhaddon [the king of Assyria while Manasseh was king of Judah] had taken Egypt on his second invasion in 671 BC. When he died, the Egyptians revolted and [Esarhaddon’s successor,] Ashurbanipal went to Egypt to put down this revolt. He cleared the Delta of the Cushites (Ethiopians) in 667/666 BC, and the Cushite ruler [Pharoah], Taharqa, fled to [the city of] No-Amon... On his second campaign in 663 BC, Ashurbanipal went to No-Amon and defeated the city and razed it [to the ground]. There were Judeans in the Assyrian army that saw this event. When they heard or read the words of Nahum they would have been encouraged. The Assyrians were able to defeat a strong and impregnable Thebes, and God would now fulfill His Word and Nineveh would fall. Ashurbanipal commissioned a relief depicting the fall of No-Amon. It is labeled “an Egyptian fortress” in the British Museum.”13
The point is that if God could bring judgment against the fortress of No-Amon in Egypt through the Assyrian army, then God was perfectly capable of bringing the same judgment of destruction upon Nineveh through some other army.14
God used the same logic with the Israelites in Amos 6:2-8 “Go over to Calneh and see; And from there go to Hamath the great; Then go down to Gath of the Philistines. Are you better than these kingdoms? ...The LORD God of hosts says: ‘I abhor the pride of Jacob, And hate his palaces; Therefore I will deliver up the city And all that is in it.’” (NKJV)
And Jesus used the same logic against the Jews of his day in Matthew 11:23-24 “And you, Capernaum, you won't be lifted up to heaven will you? You will be brought down as low as Hell, because if the miracles which occurred in you had occurred in Sodom, it would have remained until today. Moreover, I'm telling y'all, that for the land of Sodom it will be more tolerable in the day of judgment than for you!”
Paul also used similar logic against the Christians of his day in Romans 11:19-22 “You will say then, ‘Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in.’ Well said. Because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either. Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off.” (NKJV)
If God “cut off” the Jews for “not believing” in Jesus, He can do it to you too. But notice who is saved in Romans 11: those who humbly “stand by faith” in God and “continue in His goodness.”
This raises the question of whether the Assyrian conquest of No-Amon is past or future to Nahum. This would help us get a much more precise date for Nahum.
The argument for Nahum writing after the fall of No-Amon in 663BC is strong because the argument that, “if No-Ammon can fall, then Nineveh can fall,” works best if No-Ammon has already fallen. Nahum also wrote of the fall of No-Amon in the Hebrew past tense.
This argument isn’t airtight, however, because Nahum could be using the common technique of prophetic perfects to speak of the fall of No-Ammon as a future event just as he prophecied of the future fall of Nineveh15, in which case his prophecy of the fall of No-Ammon before the fall of Nineveh would be a kind of “easter egg” that only people in the future would understand, but when it did happen, it would underscore the sovereign foreknowledge of God all the more.
The argument for Nahum writing before the fall of No-Amon in 663BC is supported by the way Nahum uses the Hebrew future tense in chapter 1 to speak of the end of Sennacherib’s siege against Jerusalem and of Sennacherib’s ignominious death. If Nahum were writing after the 663BC downfall of No-Amon, it would seem odd for him to still be encouraging Jews to trust God to deliver them from Assyria with assurances that Sennacherib would be assassinated, two decades after the threat of Sennacherib had passed.
The more I think about it, the more I wonder if Nahum’s chapters might have been written at different times in his life: perhaps chapters 1 and 2 as a young man under king Hezekiah, then chapter 3 decades later under king Josiah.
In that case, God’s deliverance of Jerusalem from Sennacherib could have been future to him when he wrote chapter 1, and then the Assyrian overthrow of Thebes could have been past to him when he wrote chapter 3.
This could also explain why there is so much repeated material between chapters 2 and 3 – perhaps it had been a long time since he had written chapter 2 and he felt the need as an old man to review some of it in his last writing.
That is just a hypothesis. What’s important is that there are plausible explanations for the difficulty in figuring out when Nahum was written, so we don’t have to conclude that it was a fraud-prophecy.
Verse 9 focuses on the military alliances that No-Amon had, but
No-Ammon, located in middle Egypt, could get the help and support of
the army of Cush (a.k.a. Ethiopia) to the South,
the army of Egypt to the North,
and the armies of Put (now called Sudan) and Libya to the West.
(Remember, they had the Red Sea to protect them on the East.)
They had an alliance with every neighboring nation. They must have thought “Surely no one can possibly challenge us. Our combined strength makes us safe!” But they were wrong. God had-it-out for them, so, despite all that united strength, they were decimated by the Assyrians under King Ashurbanipal.
It’s a lesson every nation should learn. While it is good to have wise relationships with your neighbors, it is not your human allies who keep you secure; it is God who protects you and keeps you safe.
Psalm 127:1-7 “...From whence comes my help? My help comes from the LORD, Who made heaven and earth. He will not allow your foot to be moved; He who keeps you will not slumber... The LORD is your keeper... The LORD shall preserve you from all evil; He shall preserve your soul.” (NKJV)
Proverbs 16:7 “When a man's ways please the LORD, He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him.” (NKJV)
Israel had to learn it the hard way, much like No-Amon. Their kings throughout history tried to secure their political protection from men instead of from God by building alliances with Egypt, Ammon, Syria, Assyria, and others, instead of obeying God and asking God to keep them safe. And time and again, those neighbor nations betrayed them so that they regretted the alliances they had made and wished they had obeyed God instead.
Early in Judah’s history, the prophet Hanani rebuked King Asa for giving the silver and gold from the temple in Jerusalem to the king of Syria in order to get the king of Syria to start a war with the northern kingdom of Israel and so end the border skirmishes between Israel and Judah. The prophet reminded King Asa in 2 Chronicles 16:8-9 of how God had delivered his predecessor, King Rehoboam, from Shishak’s multinational invasion of Judah. Hanani said, “Were the Ethiopians and the Lubim not a huge army with very many chariots and horsemen? Yet, because you relied on the LORD, He delivered them into your hand. For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him. In this [robbing God’s temple to pay foreigners to help instead of asking God for help] you have done foolishly; therefore from now on you shall have wars.” (NKJV, cf. 2 Chr. 12:3)
Isaiah delivered that message often to the later kings of Israel and Judah. In chapter 20, he warned the Jews that it was pointless to make an alliance with Egypt because the Assyrians were just going to conquer Egypt. And because they were trusting in human strength instead of God, Isaiah 20:5 says, “Then they shall be dismayed and ashamed of Cush of their hope and of Egypt their ornament.” (NAW)
And this message did not go out to the Jews alone, Ezekiel preached it to the cities of Lebanon (Tyre, Arvad) in chapters 27-28 and to Russia (Gog) in chapter 38, and Jeremiah preached it to Egypt in chapter 46. Don’t put your trust in your military alliances; put your trust in God and He will save you!
If you don’t, you will experience the horrors of God’s judgment at a very personal level, like the citizens of No-Amon did.
The Hebrew word translated “yet” in v.10 indicates that nobody expected No-Amon to be beat, and yet even they fell under God’s judgment.
It was Assyria’s policy to remove the residents, after conquering a city, and to resettle those residents somewhere else, so that they would lose their former identity and join the melting pot of Assyrian culture.
That’s what they did to Samaria (2 Ki. 17:6 & 24); it’s what they threatened to do to Jerusalem (Isa. 36:17), and it’s apparently what Essarhaddon did to the residents of No-Amon when he conquered it.
The land, the city, and the people in which they so prided themselves would be taken away from them in judgment. Isaiah 19:4 “I will give over the Egyptians into the hand of a hard master, and a fierce king will rule over them, declares Yahweh GOD Commander of armies.”
The barbaric murder of “nursing infants” publicly in the streets may also have been standard policy for the Assyrians, because they did it to Samaria when they conquered the northern kingdom of Israel too16, according to Hosea 13:16 “Samaria is held guilty, For she has rebelled against her God. They shall fall by the sword, Their infants shall be dashed in pieces, And their women with child ripped open.” (NKJV)
Perhaps they figured that babies and pregnant women would slow the captives down too much as they walked the long distance to their resettlement.
Later on, God also declared that this same atrocity would be part of His judgment upon Babylon (Isaiah 13:16-18).
Perhaps all the pregnant women these days hiring doctors to abort their unborn babies might be God’s contemporary way of judging nations along the same lines.
The “casting of lots” (or, in modern terms, “rolling of dice”), indicates that this once-great people would be reduced to mere things – chattel – objects of no personal interest except their market value, to be killed or used upon the mere roll of a die. No heed was given anymore to whether this person deserved respect; all dignity was stripped from them, even as their clothes were stripped off (Isa. 20:4).
In order to keep the strong men among the captives from escaping or fighting back while they were driven away into exile, the Assyrians “bound” them with “chains” (or iron “shackles”) on their hands17 to restrict their movement. [Note in Assyrian bas-relief of this event, captives marching out of the city handcuffed and little children escaping with their parents.]
This turning of persons into things as judgment from God might find a parallel in the New Testament where, in Romans 1:28, God “gave [men] over to a debased mind” when they “would not retain God in their knowledge,” thus they became, in their blaspheming “...like unreasoning, natural animals, born for domestication and consumption... they will be consumed by their corruption” according to 2 Peter 2:12 (NAW, cf. Jude 1:10).
Now, this is no excuse to actually treat other human beings with such barbarity and cruelty and injustice, but when it happens, we can recognize it as judgment from God against those in rebellion against Him. (cf. Joel 3:1-8, Obadiah 1:9-11, Isaiah 45:14)
The same Hebrew word translated into English as “yet” at the beginning of v.10, indicating a surprising downfall, appears again at the beginning of v.11, introducing yet another surprising outcome.
It’s unfortunate that most English versions don’t translate the same Hebrew word with the same English word at the beginning of both verses 10 and 11, but the Hebrew wording draws a parallel.
In v. 10 the unexpected fall of No-Amon is described in third person “she,” but in a dramatic conclusion, v.11 changes the pronouns to second-person “you.” In other words, God is saying that God will take “you” down (Nineveh), just as unexpectedly as Nineveh had taken “her” (No-Amon) down.
Three phrases in v.11 describe Assyria becoming down-and-out: Nineveh will become “drunk,” it will be “hidden,” and it will experience “refugee” status.
This Hebrew word for “drunk”
is used elsewhere in the Bible to describe inebriation from drinking too much alcohol,
and Nahum 1:10 does imply that the Assyrians drank too much alcohol,
and drunkenness does destroy a person’s reason and wealth (Prov. 23:29-35),
But I would like to point out that half of the times that this verb is used in the Bible it is a figurative expression for a deranged condition experienced, not from alcohol, but from God’s wrath. This is especially found in the prophetic books, for instance:
Isaiah 29:9-10 “...they have gotten drunk, but not through wine, they have tottered, but not through liquor. For Yahweh has poured out upon y’all a spirit of sleep… 63:6 “...I intoxicated them in my fury, and I brought their vigor down to the earth.” (NAW18)
Jeremiah 25:15-27 “...Take this wine cup of fury from My hand, and cause all the nations, to whom I send you, to drink it. And they will drink and stagger and go mad because of the sword that I will send among them…. Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: ‘Drink, be drunk, and vomit! Fall and rise no more, because of the sword which I will send among you.’” (NKJV, cf. 48:25-26, 51:7, 39, 57)
When the Lord’s cup comes around to the wicked (Hab. 2:16 and Psa. 75:8), it is to put them out of their right mind, whether that is “giving them over to a reprobate mind,” as it says in Romans 1, or whether it is to overwhelm them with so much grief and trauma from His judgments that they can’t think straight, as I think may be the case here in Nahum 3.
The 2nd aspect of a down-and-out status coming to Nineveh in God’s judgment in v.11 is that they will be “hidden.”
The NIV & ESV translate it “you will go into hiding,” but the Niphal spelling of this Hebrew verb is properly interpreted passively by the KJV and NASB (“be concealed/ignored/disregarded”)19.
This verb is not the standard Hebrew word for “hide,” rather, it is used to indicate purposeful avoidance or accidental ignorance, so as not to see, hear, or be near another person. For instance:
Isaiah 1:15 “When you spread out your hands [in prayer], I will hide my eyes from them…”
Isaiah 58:7 “... split your bread for the hungry, and bring home the poor vagabonds, and when you see a naked man, cover him, and not hide yourself from your flesh…” (NAW)
Lamentations 3:56 “...Do not hide Your ear From my sighing, from my cry for help.” (NKJV)20
I think that God is promising that folks will turn their heads and ignore the Ninevite refugees, rather than allow themselves to see and hear the ragged and hungry Ninevites begging for food and shelter21.
Instead of being the most powerful player among the nations, Assyria will become the sort of entity that people don’t pay attention to anymore,
either because they are so unimpressive that nobody notices them,
or because their problems are so hideous and embarrassing that nobody wants to deal with them.
This is God’s judgment upon the proud who set themselves against God.
The third judgment of God upon Nineveh in v.11 that will give it down-and-out status is that they will become displaced persons, “searching for a safe” place to live.
Logically, this implies that Nineveh will no longer be a “strong refuge” for them; Nineveh will be destroyed, leaving its people vulnerable to enemies.
After being the terror of the earth, they will be reduced to begging for a safe place to stay.
This is what it comes down to: Either get right with God and live in the safety of His care eternally, or live in rebellion against God and exist in fear, searching for safety.
Revelation 6:15-17 describes a similar scenario at the end of time when the world in rebellion against God tried to “...hide22 themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?’”
The only alternative is to do what the Psalmist did and make God your “strong refuge:” Psalm 43:1-5 “Adjudicate for me, God, and argue my case, please, against an ungodly nation. Deliver me from... deceit and injustice! For it is You who are my God, my stronghold/refuge! [this is the same word in the Greek translation of Nahum 3:11] ... Send Your light and Your truth; it is they that will guide me and bring me to the mountain of Your holiness and to Your chambers... Develop hope towards God, because I shall praise Him again... [for] salvations…” (NAW)
Due to its rebellion against God, God said to Nineveh, “I am against you,” but we who are in Christ hear another word from God in Romans 8:31-39 “...If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? ... I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:31-39, NKJV)
DouayB (Vulgate) |
LXXC |
BrentonD (Vaticanus) |
KJVE |
NAW |
Masoretic HebrewF |
5 Behold I [comeG] against thee, saith the Lord of hosts: and I will discover thy shame to thy face, and will shew thy nakedness to the nations, and thy shame to kingdoms. |
5 ἰδοῦ ἐγὼ ἐπὶ σέ, λέγει κύριος [ὁ θεὸς] ὁ παντοκράτωρ, καὶ ἀποκαλύψω τὰ ὀπίσω σου ἐπὶ τὸ πρόσωπόν σου καὶ δείξωH ἔθνεσιν τὴν αἰσχύνην σου καὶ βασιλείαις τὴν ἀτιμίαν σου |
5
Behold, I am
against thee, saith the Lord [God]
Almighty, and I will uncover
thy skirts |
5 Behold, I am against thee, saith the LORD of hosts; and I will discover thy skirts upon thy face, and I will shew the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame. |
5 “Look at me; I am against you,” declares Yahweh, Commander of armies, “and I will strip your skirts over your face, and I will show nations your nakedness, and kingdoms your shame, |
(ה) Iהִנְנִי אֵלַיִךְ נְאֻם יְהוָה צְבָאוֹת וְגִלֵּיתִי שׁוּלַיִךְ עַל פָּנָיִךְ וְהַרְאֵיתִי גוֹיִם מַעְרֵךְ וּמַמְלָכוֹת קְלוֹנֵךְ. |
6
And I will cast
abominations
upon thee, and will disgrace
thee, and will |
6
καὶ ἐπιρρίψω ἐπὶ σὲ βδελυγμ |
6
And I will cast
abominable filthX
upon thee |
6 And I will cast abominable filthX upon thee, and make thee vile, and will set thee as a gazingstock. |
6 and I will throw abominable-idols on top of you, and I will make a fool of you, then I will set you up as a sight [to see], |
(ו) וְהִשְׁלַכְתִּי עָלַיִךְ שִׁקֻּצִיםK וְנִבַּלְתִּיךְL וְשַׂמְתִּיךְ כְּרֹאִי. |
7 And it shall come to pass that every one that shall see thee, shall flee from thee, and shall say: Ninive is laid waste: who shall bemoan thee? whence shall I seek a comforter for thee? |
7
καὶ ἔσται πᾶς ὁ ὁρῶν σε
ἀποπηδήσεταιM
ἀπὸ σοῦ καὶ ἐρεῖ ΔειλαίαN
Νινευη· τίς στενάξει
αὐτήν; πόθεν ζητήσω
παράκλησιν |
7
And it shall be
that every one that sees thee shall go
|
7 And it shall come to pass, that all they that look upon thee shall flee from thee, and say, Nineveh is laid waste: who will bemoan her? whence shall I seek comforters for thee? |
7 and it will be that everyone who sees you will withdraw from you and will say, “Nineveh has been devestated; who will be sympathetic toward her?” Where ever would I seek comforters for you from? |
(ז) וְהָיָה כָל רֹאַיִךְ יִדּוֹד מִמֵּךְ וְאָמַר שָׁדְּדָה נִינְוֵה מִי יָנוּדQ לָהּR מֵאַיִןS אֲבַקֵּשׁ מְנַחֲמִים לָךְ. |
8 Art thou better than the populous Alexandria, that dwelleth among the rivers? waters are round about it: the sea is its riches: the waters are its wall[s]. |
8
[ἑτοίμασαι μερίδα,
ἅρμοσαι χορδήν,]
|
8
[Prepare
thee a portion,
tune the chord,]
|
8
Art thou better
than populous
No X,
that |
8 Are you better than No-Amon – the one settled along the rivers, water all around her, the rampart of which was the sea, her defensive-wall being /the water\? |
(ח) הֲתֵיטְבִי מִנֹּא אָמוֹן הַיֹּשְׁבָה בַּיְאֹרִים מַיִם סָבִיב לָהּ אֲשֶׁר חֵילW יָםX מִיָּםY חוֹמָתָהּ. |
9 Ethiopia and Egypt were the strength thereof, and there is no end: Africa and the Libyans were thy helper[s]. |
9
[καὶZ]
Αἰθιοπία ἡ ἰσχὺς αὐτῆς
καὶ Αἴγυπτος, καὶ οὐκ ἔστιν
πέρας [τῆς]
φυ |
9
[And]
Ethiopia is her strength, and Egypt; and there was no limit
of [the]
|
9 Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite; Put and Lubim were X thy helper[s]. |
9 Ethiopia was her strength, and so was Egypt, and that without limit. Sudan and Libya were in your alliance. |
(ט) כּוּשׁ עָצְמָהAB וּמִצְרַיִם וְאֵין קֵצֶה פּוּטAC וְלוּבִים הָיוּ בְּעֶזְרָתֵךְAD. |
10
Yet
she also was X
removed
and |
10 καὶAE αὐτὴ εἰς AF μετοικεσίαν πορεύσεται αἰχμάλωτος, καὶ τὰ νήπια αὐτῆς ἐδαφιοῦσιν ἐπ᾿ ἀρχὰς πασῶν τῶν ὁδῶν [αὐτῆςAG], καὶ ἐπὶ [πάντα] τὰ ἔνδοξα αὐτῆς βαλοῦσιν κλήρους, καὶ πάντες οἱ μεγιστᾶνες αὐτῆς δεθήσονται χειροπέδαις. |
10 Yet she shall go as a prisoner into captivity, and they shall X dashX her infants [against the ground] at the top of all [her] ways: and they shall cast lots upon [all] her glorious [possessions], and all her nobles shall be bound in chains. |
10 Yet was she X carried away, she went into captivity: her young children also were dashed in pieces at the top of all the streets: and they cast lots for her honourable men, and all her great men were bound in chains. |
10 Even she become an exile; she went into captivity. Even her nursing-babies were dashed to pieces at the head of all the streets. And over her honored men they handled dice, and all her great men were bound with chains. |
(י) גַּם הִיא לַגֹּלָה הָלְכָה בַשֶּׁבִי גַּם עֹלָלֶיהָAH יְרֻטְּשׁוּAI בְּרֹאשׁ כָּל חוּצוֹת וְעַל נִכְבַּדֶּיהָ יַדּוּ גוֹרָל וְכָל גְּדוֹלֶיהָ רֻתְּקוּAJ בַזִּקִּים. |
11
There-fore
thou also
shalt be |
11
καὶ
σὺAK
μεθυσθήσῃ
καὶ ἔσῃ ὑπερεωραμένη,
καὶAL
σὺ ζητήσεις σεαυτῇ
στάσινAM
ἐξ ἐχθρ |
11 And thou shalt be drunken, and shalt be overlooked; and thou shalt seek for thyself strength because of [thine] enem[ies]. |
11 Thou also shalt be drunken: thou shalt be hid, thou also shalt seek strength because of the enemy. |
11 Even you yourself will become intoxicated; you will be disregarded, Even you yourself will seek refuge from the enemies. |
(יא) גַּם אַתְּ תִּשְׁכְּרִיAN תְּהִי נַעֲלָמָה AO גַּם אַתְּ תְּבַקְשִׁי מָעוֹז מֵאוֹיֵבAP. |
1cf. 3 Maccabees 6:5 “When Sennacheri[b], the grievous king of the Assyrians, glorying in his countless hosts, had subdued the whole land with his spear, and was lifting himself against thine holy city, with boastings grievous to be endured, thou, O Lord, didst demolish him and didst shew forth thy might to many nations.” (Brenton)
2Jeremiah 50:31 "Behold, I am against you, [Babylon,] O most haughty one!" says the Lord GOD of hosts; "For your day has come, The time that I will punish you. 13:22 And if you say in your heart, "Why have these things come upon me?" For the greatness of your iniquity Your skirts have been uncovered, Your heels made bare… 26 Therefore I will uncover [חָשַׂפְתִּי] your skirts over your face, That your shame may appear.” (NKJV)
3Isaiah 20:4 “...the king of Assyria shall lead away the Egyptian captives and the Cushite exiles, children and elders, naked and barefoot, and their buttocks will be bare [חֲשׂוּפַי], the nakedness of Egypt.” (NAW)
4Micah 1:6 “Therefore I will make Samaria into a pile in the field – into a place for planting a vineyard, and I will have her building-stones poured out into the ravine, and her foundations laid bare.” (NAW) Ezekiel 23:9-10 "Therefore I have delivered her [Israel] Into the hand of her lovers, Into the hand of the Assyrians, For whom she lusted. They uncovered her nakedness, Took away her sons and daughters, And slew her with the sword; She became a byword among women, For they had executed judgment on her.” (NKJV)
5Lamentations 1:8 “Jerusalem has sinned gravely, Therefore she has become vile. All who honored her despise her Because they have seen her nakedness; Yes, she sighs and turns away.” (NKJV, cf. Ezekiel 16:37 & 23:17-18 ) Habakkuk 2:16 “You are filled with shame instead of glory. You also drink! And be exposed as uncircumcised [הערל]! The cup of the LORD'S right hand will be turned against you, And utter shame will be on your glory.” (NKJV)
6γυμνότητός, a synonym for the word αἰσχύνην in the LXX of Nahum 3:5.
7https://www.wildfrontierstravel.com/en_GB/blog/i-ashurbanipal accessed 6 Mar 2025.
8https://store.biblearchaeology.org/collections/bible-and-spade-magazine/products/abr-com-016
9Cf. Isaiah 1:7-8 “Your country is wasted; your cities burned with fire. In front of you foreigners consume your ground; it is desolate, as overthrown by foreigners. And the daughter of Zion is left like a booth in a vineyard, like a lodge in a cucumber patch… 51:19 “...Who will sympathize for her? The violence and the breakup and the famine and the sword – How shall I comfort her?” (NAW)
10Their attempt at pronouncing the Egyptian phrase “the seat.” They also called it the “city of 100 gates” and Diospolis (“city of god”). See Pusey’s commentary on Nahum for an extended description of the ancient city.
11Some early church fathers and Midieval Jewish commentators thought it was Alexandria, and Calvin seems to have followed them. All commentators after Calvin seem to be agreed on Thebes.
12It is possible, however, that the “defensive-rampart” on the “sea” that Nahum mentions might refer to a separate set of citadels located about 500 miles downriver in the lowlands of Egypt next to the Mediterranean Ocean. As we’ll see, those cities down on the delta had to be conquered before the Assyrians could make it up to the capitol city of No-Amon. One reason those delta cities were so easy for Assyria to conquer is that the Nubians had previously conducted a campaign against lower Egypt and weakened the defenses of that part of the country. I did not find a single commentator who suggested this possibility, however.
13https://biblearchaeology.org/research/divided-kingdom/2744-nahum-nineveh-and-those-nasty-assyrians
14Perhaps it should be noted that, although the Assyrian conquest of this city was a huge setback from which it never did fully recover, it did not result in the absolute erasure of the city. It got rebuilt in time, and God revisited judgment on it later on, as Jeremiah 46:25 and Ezekiel 30:14 attest.
15It is also possible that the event could be one of Sargon’s raids against Egypt between 705-722 BC, before Sennacherib’s attempted siege of Jerusalem around 700, a position held by C.F. Keil.
16Cf. Hos. 14:1ff (where it was done by Assyria), 2 Ki. 8:12 (where it was done by Syria), Amos 1:13 (where it was done by Ammon), and Psalm 137:9 (where it is implied that it was done by Edom).
17“pinioned or handcuffed (so the word properly signifies)” ~Matthew Henry
18cf. Deut. 32:42 (“make arrows drunk with blood”), Cant. 5:1b (sexual excitement), Isa. 49:25 (“intoxicated with their own blood”). The Greek word in the LXX for “drunk” appears 4x in the New Testament, 3x to indicate alcoholic drunkenness, and 1x figuratively (Rev. 17:2).
19The passive meaning is supported by all the ancient versions.
20See also: Psalm 10:1, 55:2, Prov. 28:27, Ezek. 22:26. The LXX word is found in the GNT only in Acts 17:30 (“God overlooked/winked at these times of ignorance”).
21Calvin, Pusey, and Keil, however interpreted this hiddenness in terms of disappearance “as though it had never been” (cf. Obadiah 1:16). Cf. Michael Barrett’s 2021 commentary: “The word for ‘hiding’ also has the sense of being unconscious or deranged and may fit the idea of drunkenness a bit better.”
22In both of the places where “hide” appears in this passage from Revelation 6, it is the standard Greek word for “hide” κρυπτω, whereas the LXX word used to translate “hid” in Nahum 3:11 was ὑπερεωραμένη (“overlook”).
AMy
original chart includes the following copyrighted English versions:
NASB, NIV, ESV, Bauscher’s version of the Peshitta, and Cathcart’s
version of the Targums, but I remove these columns from my public,
non-copyrighted edition of this chart so as not to infringe on their
copyrights. NAW is my translation. When a translation adds words not
in the Hebrew text, but does not indicate it has done so by the use
of italics or greyed-out text, I put the added words in [square
brackets]. When one version chooses a wording which is different
from all the other translations, I underline it. When a
version chooses a translation which, in my opinion, either departs
too far from the root meaning of the Hebrew word or departs too far
from the grammar form of the original text, I use strikeout.
And when a version omits a word which is in the original text, I
insert an X. I also place an X at the end of a word if the original
word is plural but the English translation is singular. I
occasionally use colors to help the reader see correlations between
the various editions and versions when there are more than two
different translations of a given word. The only known Dead Sea
Scrolls containing Nahum 3 are 4Q82 (containing parts of verses 1-3
& 17 and dated between 30-1 BC), The Nahal Hever Greek
scroll (containing parts of vs. 1-3 & 6-16 and dated around
25BC), and the Wadi Muraba’at Scroll (containing parts of verses
1-19 and dated around 135 AD). Where the DSS is legible and in
agreement with the MT, the MT is colored purple.
Where the DSS supports the LXX/Vulgate/Peshitta with omissions or
text not in the MT, I have highlighted
with yellow the LXX
and its translation into English, and where I have accepted that
into my NAW translation, I have marked it with {pointed brackets}.
BDouay Old Testament first published by the English College at Douay, A.D. 1609, Revised and Diligently Compared with the Latin Vulgate by Bishop Richard Challoner, Published in 1582, 1609, 1752. As published on E-Sword.
C“Septuagint” Greek Old Testament, edited by Alfred Rahlfs. Published in 1935. As published on E-Sword.
DEnglish translation of the Septuagint by Sir Lancelot Charles Lee Brenton, 1851, “based upon the text of the Vaticanus” but not identical to the Vaticanus. As published electronically by E-Sword.
E1769 King James Version of the Holy Bible; public domain. As published electronically by E-Sword.
FFrom
the Wiki Hebrew Bible
https://he.wikisource.org/wiki/%D7%9E%D7%99%D7%9B%D7%94_%D7%90/%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%A8%D7%95%D7%AA.
DSS text comes from https://downloads.thewaytoyahuweh.com
GThis word “come” is not in the original Latin text; it was added by Douay for the English translation.
H“show… kingdom… peoples” occurs in the LXX of Esther 1:4 & 11 (when the Babylonian King “showed off” his “kingdom” and also wanted to show off his queen before the “nations”) and in the GNT in Matthew 4:8 (when the Devil “showed” Jesus all the “kingdoms” of the world).
IThe first half of this verse is a reiteration of 2:13.
JNahal Hever reads with an active form (θησω) instead of the LXX’s deponent form, but the meaning is the same.
KAll 48 instances of this word are associated with idols and the worship of false gods, so I question the prevailing opinion among commentators that this is speaking of physical “filth.”
LThe only other times this verb appears in the Piel stem is Deut. 32:15 (“lightly esteemed the Rock”), Jer. 14:21 (“don’t make a fool of the seat of Your glory”), and Mic. 7:6 (“son makes a fool of father”).
MSymmachus rendered with αναχωρησει (“clear out”), an equally fair translation of the MT.
NΝ. Η. reads differently. The legible portion of this word is -πωρηκε- . A search for that string in the LXX yields only one word, τεταλαιπωρηκεν (“afflicted/miserable/wretched” Jer. 4:20; Joel 1:10; Zech. 11:3), which turns out to be a close synonym to the LXX, further evidence that they are independent translations. Symmachus rendered διεσκεδασται, possibly closer to the MT Hebrew meaning “it has been destroyed.”
OAnother instance of a homophone variant in the LXX. If the translator were visually reading the original, he would have translated correctly, but since he was hearing someone else read it, and the Hebrew לה (“to her”) sounds the same as לך (“to you”), a variant was introduced.
PAlthough the Greek word in the LXX can mean “dismount,” it also can mean “get off” or “leap away” from, and the latter would have been a better English translation.
QMost instances of this verb have to do with back-and-forth movement, but the meaning of “mourning/sympathizing” shows up here and in Isa. 51:19, Jer. 15:5, 22:10, 31:18, & 48:17, Psalm 69:20, and Job 2:11, & 42:11.
RCuriously, this pronoun in the Aramaic versions is second person (“you”) whereas it is 3rd person (“her”) in the MT, Latin and Greek.
SThe final nun appears to be a lengthened form of the interrogative אי (“where”). Perhaps since it borrows the spelling of the negative particle (אין) it emphasizes the negation of the prospect that it is anywhere. This lengthened form of אי is also found in Gen. 29:4, 42:7, Num. 11:13, Josh. 2:4, 9:8, Jdg. 17:9, 19:17, 2 Ki. 5:25, 6:27, 20:14, Job 1:7, 28:12,20, Psa. 121:1, Isa. 39:3, and Jon. 1:8.
TThe first phrase in the LXX appears to be an alternate translation of the first phrase in Hebrew. Nahal Hever omits that repetition, reading like the MT and other versions except with a negative: μη αγαθυεις ‘υπ- “You are not better than…” (Aquilla’s version concurs, and Symmachus translated with the synonym βελτιων=better than, and Theodotian with the synonym καλη). The name that follows is illegible in N.H., so, unfortunately, it can’t be compared to the LXX, but Aq, Sym. and Theod. all interpreted the Hebrew minno ammon as “than Ammon.”
UN.H. has the synonym ‘ισχυς (“strength”), which is a closer translation of the MT than the LXX.
VN.H. omits “and,” thus reading more like MT, but the meaning is not significantly different either way.
WThis word is only here and 2 Sam. 20:15, 1 Ki. 21:23, Ps. 48:14, 122:7, Isa. 26:1, and Lam. 2:8. I have translated it “rampart,” “bulwark,” and “defensive wall.”
XThis word “sea” is missing in W.M., but it’s in the other DSS (N.H.) as it is in the MT and all the ancient versions. The LXX and Peshitta, however, add an “and” here. The MT just has a disjunctive accent here, not a conjunction-word, but the practical upshot is much the same.
YNIV, ESV, NET, & NLT follow the Vulgate, LXX, and Peshitta which reasonably translate the unpointed text as “water,” but with the Masoretic pointing it becomes “from the sea,” which is the reading of Geneva, KJV & NASB. Targums go both ways.
ZAlthough obscured, N.H. does not appear to have this extra και, and the MT and other versions match without it.
AABrenton appears to have added this explanatory phrase for the word “flight” – it is not in the LXX or Vaticanus.
ABThe unpointed text could be either a feminine form of “strength/force,” or it could be a 3fs possessive pronoun “her strength.” Masoretic pointing from the 900’s AD chose the former, followed by one of the Targums and the NASB, NET, & NLT, but the consensus of the Vulgate, LXX, Peshitta, Geneva, KJV, NIV, ESV, and another Targum is the latter, which would call for a dot in the middle of the last letter. (The song “Dagesh In The He” that I composed and recorded with Nathan Clark George explains it all.)
ACN.H., Aq., Sym. and Theod. spell as the place name Put (φουδ/τ), followed by MT and all the other versions. (The Vulgate paraphrased “Africa” rather than transliterating “Put,” and the LXX editor noticed that the Hebrew word sounded a lot like the Greek word for “fugitive” and just went with it. Put would correspond roughly to modern-day Sudan.)
ADGeneva, NASB, NIV, NET, ESV, and NLT decided to follow the LXX & Syriac (“her” – which would have sounded the same but would have been spelled with a different letter in Hebrew) instead of the DSS, MT, Targums, Vulgate, and KJV (“your”). This “your” in Hebrew is spelled feminine and singular, so its meaning in English would be a cross between “her” and “your.”
AEThis and the next και are translated καιγε in N.H. No significant difference in meaning.
AFN.H. employed the απ- prefix instead of the μετα- prefix to the next main verb, but it is a synonymous meaning.
AGN.H. does not have space between legible words to include this word. MT also does not include this pronoun, although it doesn’t change the meaning.
AHFrom a root that means “suck milk.” The only other instances of this word are in Ps. 137:9 (where it speaks of dashing Edom’s infants against stones in retribution), Jer. 6:11 & 9:20 (Judgment coming on Jerusalem, even its children), and Lam. 1:5, 2:19, 4:4, Joel 2:16, and Mic. 2:9 (with less-relevant indicatives about children).
AIVulgate and Syriac (followed by all English versions to my knowledge) translated this as past tense, even though it is in imperfect tense in Hebrew (the LXX and Targums rendered it as future tense). The LXX reasonably translated the unpointed text actively, but all other versions follow the Hophal passive pointing in the MT. It is a rare word, only occurring here and 2 Ki. 8:12, Isa. 13:16-18, and Hos. 10:14 & 14:1 – all in connection with killing nursing children.
AJThe only other instance of this word is in Ecclesiastes 12:6 – what happens to the “silver cord” at death. This rare word (רֻתְּקוּ) could have been chosen to parallel יְרֻטְּשׁוּ (“dash in pieces”) from earlier in the verse.
AKNahal Hever reads γε instead of the LXX συ. Και γε might be a slightly better-nuanced translation of the the Hebrew gam, but the Hebrew does have an emphatic pronoun “you” here which is in the LXX, but not in Nahal Hever. However, since the verb has the second person embedded in it, the meaning is not really any different.
ALNahal Hever is partially illegible, but the letter ε is visible before συ here, presumably translating the Hebrew gam as και γε, like it did at the beginning of the verse also, yet another indication that Nahal Hever was a separate translation into Greek from the LXX.
AMBy the time of the Greek N. T., this word had a different meaning, that of insurrection/disputation, but there is an interesting judgment-day parallel in Rev. 6:17 which uses the same Greek root in the phrase “who is able to stand?”
ANCf. Hab. 2:16.
AOThe Niphal spelling is properly interpreted reflexively by the Geneva (“hide thyself”) or passively (“be concealed/ignored/disregarded”) by Vulgate, LXX, Peshitta, Targums, KJV, and NASB, but the Niphal stem is ignored and translated actively (“hiding”) by NIV & ESV. There are other words in Hebrew with a more primary meaning of “cover/hide,” but this one is used throughout the HOT to indicate accidental ignorance or a purposeful averting of the eyes or ears so as not to see or hear another person. BHS suggested that switching the second and third letters of this word could generate the Targum’s word “destroyed.”
APPeshitta, Symmachus, and Brenton add “your,” but it is not in the LXX (not even Vaticanus) or Vulgate. However, what is in the Peshitta, LXX, and Vulgate is a plural ending. Since no DSS have survived with this word intact, those ancient versions are much closer to the time of the original than the existing Hebrew text itself. The fact that Symmachus also saw a suffix on the ending of the Hebrew word also raises doubt as to the MT spelling. But whether it is “your enemy,” “enemy” or “enemies,” the general meaning comes out the same.