1Woe to the bloody city! It is all full of lies and robbery; never without victims! 2There is the constant crack of whips, the clatter of the rattling chariot wheels, and the prancing horses of bounding chariots. 3The charging horsemen raise their bright swords and glittering spears; and there are many bodies of the slain - a great number of carcasses - there is no end of their corpses; people stumble over them, 4All because Nineveh, the beautiful and faithless city, mistress of deadly charms, enticed the nations with her beauty. She taught them all her magic, enchanting people everywhere. 5“I am against you”, declares the LORD Almighty, “And I will lift your skirts over your face, and I will expose your nakedness to all the nations and kingdoms, to your shame. 6And I will throw abominable filth upon you, and make you a vile and contemptible spectacle. 7And all that see you shall shrink back from you, and say, ‘Nineveh is in ruins, and who will grieve for her’. Where will you find anyone to sympathize with or comfort you?” 8Are you better than populous No-amon (Thebes) that was situated among the rivers, surrounded by much water, whose defensive walls were the sea? 9Ethiopia (Cush) and Egypt were her strength, and it seemed to be unlimited; Put and Lubim (Libya) were her allies. 10Yet she was conquered and went into captivity; her young children also were dashed in pieces at every street corner; and they cast lots for her nobles; and all her great men were bound in chains. 11And you, too, Nineveh, shall also become drunk; you shall go into hiding, you shall also seek rescue from your enemy. 12All your strongholds shall be like fig trees with the first-ripe figs; if they are shaken, they shall fall into the mouth of those who desire to devour them. 13Look at your troops – they are weaklings; the gates of your land are wide open to your enemies; the fire has consumed the bars of your gates. 14Draw and store water for the siege, fortify your defenses! Work the clay, and tread the mortar, repair, and make strong the brickwork. 15There shall the fire devour you; the sword shall cut you down, it shall devour you like locusts. Multiply yourselves into many like the cankerworm; even if you multiply yourselves like the locusts, they will devour you. 16You have increased the number of your merchants above the stars of heaven; but like the cankerworms, they strip the land, then fly away. 17Your guards and officials are like the locusts, and your officers like the great grasshoppers, that settle in the walls on a cold day, but when the sun rises, they fly away, and disappear. 18Your shepherds are asleep, O king of Assyria; your nobles lie down to rest. Your people are scattered upon the mountains, with no one to lead them. 19There is no healing of your fatal wound. All that hear the report of you shall clap the hands over your fall; for who has not felt your endless cruelty? Back in 769 BC, God sent Jonah to preach to the people of Nineveh, and warn them of their impending doom as His punishment for their endless cruelty (3:19) and depravity. Instead of rejecting the LORD’s warning, as you might expect, the Ninevites humbled themselves and repented of their sin - from the king on his throne down to the least of them. The whole city fasted, put on sackcloth, and sat in ashes—(they even dressed their animals in sackcloth), as recorded in Jonah 3:5–9. It is not known how long this remarkable repentance and evidence of contrition lasted, but we do know that Nineveh’s destruction as prophesied here, was postponed for about 160 years from the time when God sent Jonah to warn them of its impending doom for the cruel depravity they were known for. Nineveh’s ultimate destruction, as predicted by Nahum and Zephaniah (Zeth.2:13-15), came to pass in 612 BC, when the Babylonians, Medes, and Scythians sacked the city. The “one that has come out of you, Nineveh” (1:11) is likely Sennacherib, who uttered so many blasphemous words against the true God, or perhaps his envoy, Rabsbakeh (2 Kings 18, 19). The Medes and her allies attacked and lay siege to Ninevah. The metal that flashed on the chariots (2:5) may well have been sharp instruments attached to the chariot wheels. (Cyrus is said to have earlier introduced the ‘scythe-chariot’.) A.R.Faussett credits Cyrus with its overthrow - “Babylon having been overthrown by the Persian Cyrus.” Historians tell us that the defensive walls around Nineva were 100 feet high, and wide enough for chariots to be driven 3 abreast on top of it. Apparently, these formidable walls frustrated assault efforts for the first 2 years of the siege; but in the 3rd year, as a result of 2 years of the Euphrates River being swollen and flooding part of the city, those flood waters weakened and breached the wall on the east for a distance of about 12,000 feet, which enabled the assault to succeed. That is apparently what verse 2:6 alludes to; and resulted in panic by its defenders, and the looting that ensued (2:7-10). The “lion” of verses 2:11-12 is Nahum’s metaphor for the kings of Assyria; lionesses were queens, concubines, or ladies of the court; whelps were the young blood of the royal family. Verse 12 speaks of how they treated their neighboring nations, as they violently took for themselves whatever they wanted. The “voices” of verse 13 likely refers to proud messengers such as Rabshakeh. All the destruction and slaughter described in 3:1-4 came to pass in 612 BC, when the Babylonians, Medes, and Persians sacked the city that all had believed to be impregnable.
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