Judges 9:15

15. Put your trust in my shadow The bramble has no shadow worthy of the name, and the language here is a biting irony upon those who had chosen a worthless man for a king. A thorn bush give shade and protection to the olive or the fig tree! As well might one expect to gather grapes of thorns or figs of thistles.

Let fire come out of the bramble Thorn-bushes are commonly used for fuel in the East. They easily catch fire and soon burn out, and yet they may kindle a fire that will burn and destroy the greatest of trees, even the noble cedars of Lebanon. So a weak and worthless ruler may provoke civil discords, or incur foreign wars, which in their fiery progress swallow up and devour the brave, the virtuous, and the noble. So it was in the case of Abimelech.