Nahum 3:9 - Exposition

Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength. Urdamaneh, or Rudammon, in whose time this capture of No-Amon took place, was son and successor of Tirhalrah, who is called expressly King of Ethiopia ( 2 Kings 19:9 ; Isaiah 37:9 ). Egypt. The Egyptians proper, combined with the Ethiopians, formed the kingdom of Egypt under the twenty-fifth, the Ethiopian, dynasty. And it was infinite. The power of Egypt was boundless, its forces in numerable (see 2 Chronicles 12:3 ). Pusey notes a remark of Cato (in Steph. Byzant. ap. Boch; 4.27) that the Egyptians connected with Thebes amounted to seven millions. In Isaiah 18-20. Ethiopia and Egypt are represented as combined against Assyria, and conquered by it (Wordsworth). Septuagint, οὐκ ἔστῃ τέρας τῆς φυγῆς , "There was no limit of the flight." This is thought by Jerome to be connected with the previous verses, and to refer to Nineveh. Put and Lubim were thy helpers. No-Amon is here suddenly addressed. Put, or Punt, designates either a part of Arabia or that part of the coast of Egypt opposite to it. Luhim are the Lybians, dwelling on the west of the Canopic mouth of the Nile. Thus the enumeration of the forces of Thebes is regularly arranged, beginning with the south, Ethiopia, then through Egypt proper to the north, and then to the provinces on the east and west (Knabenbauer). The Vulgate translates the two terms, Africa et Libya. The LXX . combines them in one, λίβυες . These peoples are named together elsewhere: e.g. Jeremiah 46:9 ; Ezekiel 27:10 ; Ezekiel 30:5 ; Ezekiel 38:5 .