Zephaniah 2:4 - Exposition.

There is reason enough why Judah should tremble when the nations around her, such as the powerful and turbulent Philistines, fall before the invading host. Four of the five cities of the Philistines are mentioned, as denoting the whole territory, which again is the representative of the heathen world more definitely particularized later on. Thus the four quarters of the world are virtually specified: the Philistines representing the west,, the Moabites and Ammonites ( Zephaniah 2:8-10 ) the east, the Cushites ( Zephaniah 2:11 , Zephaniah 2:12 ) the south, and the Assyrians ( Zephaniah 2:13-15 ) the north. Gaza (see note on Amos 1:6 ) shall be forsaken; depopulated and desolate. There is a paronomasia in the Hebrew: Azzah will be azubhah. Some of the other localities are treated in the same manner (comp. Micah 1:10-15 , and notes there). Ashkelon a desolation (see note on Amos 1:8 ). They shall drive out Ashdod. The inhabitants shall be expelled. (For Ashdod, see note on Amos, loc. cit. ) At the noon day. The hottest part of the day, the most unlikely time for a hostile attack, hence the expression is equivalent to "unexpectedly and suddenly" (comp. Jeremiah 15:8 ). Ekron shall be rooted up. In the Hebrew paronomasia, Ekron ("the Deep-rooted") shall be teaker . (For Ekron, see note on Amos, loc. cit ; where the fulfilment of prophecy concerning that town is noted.) Gaza (see note on Amos 1:7 ), after being depopulated and again re-peopled by Alexander the Great, fell into the hands of Ptolemy, and was destroyed by Antiochus, B.C. 198. Often rebuilt, it was as often razed to the ground; and the present representative of the ancient town, Ghuzzeh, stands upon a hill composed of the accumulated ruins of successive cities. Of the condition of Ashkelon, Dr. Thomson writes, "There are no buildings of the ancient city now standing, but broken columns are mixed up with the soil .... Let us climb to the top of these tall fragments at the southeast angle of the wall, and we shell have the whole scene of desolation before us, stretching terrace after terrace, quite down to the sea on the northwest .... No site in this country has so deeply impressed my mind with sadness. They have stretched out upon Ashkelon the line of confusion and the stones of emptiness. Thorns have come up in her palaces, and brambles in the fortresses thereof, and it is a habitation of dragons and a court for owls ( Isaiah 34:11-13 )". "It was for ages," says Dr. Porter, "a great and strong city. Under the Philistines, the Hebrews, the Greeks, the Romans, the Saracens, the Crusaders, it was a place of note. The shattered walls that still surround the site were built by Richard Coeur de Lion. When I first clambered to the top of a broken bastion, a scene of desolation burst suddenly upon my view for which I was not prepared, though I had seen Baal-bec and Palmyra, Heliopolis and Memphis. The whole site was before me, and not a fragment of a house standing. One small section was covered with little gardens; but over the rest of the site lay smooth rounded hillocks of drifting sand. The sand is fast advancing — so fast, that probably ere the close of the century the site of Ascalon will have been blotted out forever". As for Ekron, hod . Akir, travellers note that it is now a little village, consisting of about fifty mud houses, without a remnant of antiquity except two large walls; its very ruins have vanished. The omission of Gath, a town at this time of small importance (see note on Amos 1:6 ), is probably owing to a feeling of the symbolism of numbers, four denoting completion, or the whole, like "the four winds, the four ends of the earth," etc.