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Judgment on Israel’s Enemies

Gather together, gather,

O shameless nation,

before you are driven away

like the drifting chaff,

before there comes upon you

the fierce anger of the L ord,

before there comes upon you

the day of the L ord’s wrath.

Seek the L ord, all you humble of the land,

who do his commands;

seek righteousness, seek humility;

perhaps you may be hidden

on the day of the L ord’s wrath.

For Gaza shall be deserted,

and Ashkelon shall become a desolation;

Ashdod’s people shall be driven out at noon,

and Ekron shall be uprooted.

Ah, inhabitants of the seacoast,

you nation of the Cherethites!

The word of the L ord is against you,

O Canaan, land of the Philistines;

and I will destroy you until no inhabitant is left.

And you, O seacoast, shall be pastures,

meadows for shepherds

and folds for flocks.

The seacoast shall become the possession

of the remnant of the house of Judah,

on which they shall pasture,

and in the houses of Ashkelon

they shall lie down at evening.

For the L ord their God will be mindful of them

and restore their fortunes.

I have heard the taunts of Moab

and the revilings of the Ammonites,

how they have taunted my people

and made boasts against their territory.

Therefore, as I live, says the L ord of hosts,

the God of Israel,

Moab shall become like Sodom

and the Ammonites like Gomorrah,

a land possessed by nettles and salt pits,

and a waste forever.

The remnant of my people shall plunder them,

and the survivors of my nation shall possess them.

This shall be their lot in return for their pride,

because they scoffed and boasted

against the people of the L ord of hosts.

The L ord will be terrible against them;

he will shrivel all the gods of the earth,

and to him shall bow down,

each in its place,

all the coasts and islands of the nations.

You also, O Ethiopians,

shall be killed by my sword.

And he will stretch out his hand against the north,

and destroy Assyria;

and he will make Nineveh a desolation,

a dry waste like the desert.

Herds shall lie down in it,

every wild animal;

the desert owl and the screech owl

shall lodge on its capitals;

the owl shall hoot at the window,

the raven croak on the threshold;

for its cedar work will be laid bare.

Is this the exultant city

that lived secure,

that said to itself,

“I am, and there is no one else”?

What a desolation it has become,

a lair for wild animals!

Everyone who passes by it

hisses and shakes the fist.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

The Prophet describes here the state of the city and the desolation of the country. He says, that the habitations of flocks would be in the midst of the city Nineveh. The city, we know, was populous; but while men were so many, there was no place for flocks, especially in the middle of a city so celebrated. Hence no common change is here described by the Prophet, when he says, that flocks would lie down in the middle of Nineveh; and he adds, all wild beasts. For beasts, which seek seclusion and shun the sight of men, are wont to come forth, when they find a country desolate and deserted; and they range then at large, as it is the case after a slaughter in war; and when any region is emptied of its inhabitants, the wolves, the lions, and other wild beasts, roam here and there at full liberty. So the Prophet says, that wild beasts would come from other parts and remote places, and find a place where Nineveh once stood. ¹⁰⁴¹⁰⁴ It is literally, “every wild beast of the nation,”—[נוי],—“of the land,” in the Septuagint. What is meant is, every wild beast that belonged to that country.—Ed. He adds that the bitterns, or the storks or the cuckoos, and similar wild birds would be there. ¹⁰⁵¹⁰⁵ Both Newcome and Henderson render the two words, “the pelican and the porcupine.” The former says that [קאת], “pelican,” comes from [קאה], to vomit, because it casts up fish or water from its membranaceous bag; and [קפד], “porcupine,” according to Bochart, is from the verb, which means to cut off as by a bite, or rather, he says, from its Syriac meaning, to dread, for it is a solitary animal. See Newcome. But Parkhurst contends that it is the hedgehog, and both the Septuagint and Vulgate render it so.
What Calvin translates “in postibus ejus,” [בכפתויה], is rendered by Newcome, “in the carved lintels thereof,” by Henderson, “in her capitals,” and by Parkhurst, “in her door-porches,” i.e. when thrown down.—Ed. As to their various kinds, I make no laborious research; for it is enough to know the Prophet’s design: besides, the Jews themselves, who boldly affirm that either the bittern or the stork is meant, yet adduce nothing that is certain. What, in short, this description means, is—that the place, which before a vast multitude of men inhabited, would become so forsaken, that wild beasts and nocturnal birds would be its only inhabitants.

But we must bear in mind what I have stated, that all these things were set before the Jews, that they might patiently bear their miseries, understanding that God would become their defender. For this is the only support that remains for us under very grievous evils, as Paul reminds us in the first chapter of the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians; for he says, that the time will come when the Lord shall give to us relief and refreshment, and that he will visit our adversaries with punishment 2 Thessalonians 1:6.

The Prophet mentions especially Nineveh, that the Jews might know that there is nothing so great and splendid in the world which God does not esteem of less consequence than the salvation of his Church, as it is said in Isaiah, I will give Egypt as thy ransom. So God threatens the wealthiest city, that he might show how much he loved his chosen people. And the Jews could not have attributed this to their own worthiness; but the cause of so great a love depended on their gratuitous adoption. It afterwards follows—

¹⁰⁴ It is literally, “every wild beast of the nation,”—[נוי],—“of the land,” in the Septuagint. What is meant is, every wild beast that belonged to that country.—Ed.

¹⁰⁵ Both Newcome and Henderson render the two words, “the pelican and the porcupine.” The former says that [קאת], “pelican,” comes from [קאה], to vomit, because it casts up fish or water from its membranaceous bag; and [קפד], “porcupine,” according to Bochart, is from the verb, which means to cut off as by a bite, or rather, he says, from its Syriac meaning, to dread, for it is a solitary animal. See Newcome. But Parkhurst contends that it is the hedgehog, and both the Septuagint and Vulgate render it so. What Calvin translates “in postibus ejus,” [בכפתויה], is rendered by Newcome, “in the carved lintels thereof,” by Henderson, “in her capitals,” and by Parkhurst, “in her door-porches,” i.e. when thrown down.—Ed.