SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/16/2016
7:58 PM
My Worship Time Focus: Introduction
to Nahum
In today’s SD I want to quote from a number of
people who have written different introductions to the book of Nahum. We will begin with Matthew Henry.
“The name of this prophet signifies a comforter; for it was a
charge given to all the prophets, Comfort you, comfort you, my people: and even
this prophet, though wholly taken up in foretelling the destruction of Nineveh, which speaks terror to the
Assyrians, is, even in that, comforter to the ten tribes of Israel, who,
it is probable, were now lately carried captives into Assyria. It is very uncertain at what time he lived
and prophesied, but it is most probable that he lied in the time of Hezekiah,
and prophesied against Nineveh, after the captivity of Israel by the king of
Assyria, which was in the ninth year of Hezekiah, and before Sennacherib’s
invading Judah, which was in the fourteenth year of Hezekiah, for to that
attempt, and the defeat of it, it is supposed, the first chapter has reference;
and it is probable that it was delivered a little before it, for the
encouragement of God’s people in that day of treading down and perplexity. It
is the conjecture of the learned Huetius that the two other chapters of this
book were delivered by Nahum some years after, perhaps in the reign of
Manasseh, and in that reign the Jewish chronologies generally place him,
somewhat nearer to the time when Nineveh was conquered, and the Assyrian
monarchy reduced, by Cyaxares and Nebuchadnezzar, some time before the first
captivity of Judah. It is probable that Nahum did by word of mouth prophesy
many things concerning Israel and Judah, as it is certain that Jonah did (#2Ki
14:25), though we have nothing of either of them in writing, but what related
to Nineveh, of which though a great and ancient city, yet probably we should
never have heard in sacred writ if the Israel of God had not had some concern
in it.”
I want to also quote a section of John MacArthur’s
introduction to Nahum under the title of “Historical and Theological Themes.” “Nahum
forms a sequel to the book of Jonah, who prophesied over a century
earlier. Johan recounts the remission of
God’s promise judgment toward Nineveh, while Nahum depicts the later execution
of God’s judgment. Nineveh was proud of
her invulnerable city, with her walls reaching 100 feet high and with a moat
150 feet wide and 60 feet deep but Nahum established the fact that the
sovereign God (1:2-5) would bring vengeance upon those who violated His law
(1:8, 14; 3:5-7). The same God had a
retributive judgment against evil which is also redemptive, bestowing His
loving kindness upon the faithful (cf. 1:7, 12, 13, 15; 2:2). The prophecy brought comfort to Judah and all
who feared the cruel Assyrians. Nahum
said Nineveh would end ‘with an overflowing flood’ (1:8); and it happened when
the Tigris River overflowed to destroy enough of the walls to bet the
Babylonians through. Nahum also
predicted that the city would be hidden (3:11).
After its destruction in 612
BC, the site was not rediscovered until 1842 AD.”
We may look at more introductive material in our
next SD. 1/16/2016 8:22 PM
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