Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/5_600_p.lzh/5_649.TXT

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utterly be destroyed. yet should never recover its
former glory..
Vet. 12. The nations have heard o.f thy shame, &c.]
Their shatneful defeat and overthrow by the Chaldean
army; so, after the manner of prophecy, the thing is re-
and the victoryobtained;
lated asdone; the battlefought,
and the rumour and fame of it spread among the na-
tions, to the great mor.tification of this proud people:
and thy cry hath filled the land; the shrieks of the
wounded; the cry of the pursued and taken; the lamen-
tation of friends and relations for their dead; with one
thing or another of this kind the whole land of Egypt
was filled; yea, all the countries round about them,
in confederacy with them, were filled with distress for
the loss of their own; the calamity was large and
spreading, and the rumour of it: for the mighty man
hath stumbled against the mighty, and they are fallen
both together; either the mighty Egyptians against the
mighty Chaldeans; and though the latter were the
conquerors, yet lost abundance of men; so that there
were mighty ones fell on both sides: or rather, as
Jarchi, Kimchi, and Abarbinel, the mighty Egyptians
in their flight fell, and other mighty ones of them fol-
lowing, stumbled at them, and fell upon them, and so
both became a prey to the pursuers; or in their flight
the mighty Egyptians stumbled against their mighty
auxiliaries before mentioned, ver. 9. and so both came
into the hands of their enetnies. The Targum is, both
were slain.
Ver. 13. The word that the Lord spake to Jeremiah
the prophet, &c.] This is a new and distinct prophecy
from the former, though concerning Egypt as that; but
in this they differ; the former prophecy respects only
the overthrow of the Egyptian army at a certain place;
this latter the general destruction of the land; and
was fulfilled some years after the other; Jarchi says,
according to their chronicles g, in the 27th year of Ne-
huchadnezzar's reign: how Nebuchadrezzar king of Ba-
bylon should come; or, concerning the coming {} of Ne-
buchadrezzar king of Babylon, to smite the land of
Egypt; who was to come, and did come, out of his
country, into the land of Egypt, to smite the inhabit-
ants of it with the sword, take their cities, plunder
them of their substance, and make them tributary to
him.
Ver. 14. Declare ye in Egypt, &c.] The coming of
the king of Babylon, and his intention to invade the
land, and subdue it: and publish in Migdol, and publish
in Noph, and in Tahpanhes ; of these places see the
note on ch. xliv. 1. these were principal ones in the
land of Egypt, where the enemy should come, and
which he should lay waste; and therefore the above
things are to be published for their warning; and par-
ticularly these were places where the Jews that went
into Egypt contrary to the will of God resided; and
therctbre for their sakes also this publication must be
made, to let them see and know that they would not
be safe there, but would be involved in the general ca-
lamity of the nation: say ye, stand .fast, and prepare
thee; 0 Egypt, and the several cities mentioned, and
all others; prepare for war, and to meet the enemy,
resist and repe! him; present yourselves on the fron-
tiers of your country; put yourselves in proper places,
and keep your ground: for the sword shall devour round
about thee; the sword of the Chaldeans, into whose
hands fell Palestine, Judea, Syria, and other neigh-
boutlag countries; and therefore it was high time for
them to bestir themselves, and provide for their de-
fence and safety.
Vet. 15. Wh!/ are thy valiant men swept away ? &c.]
As with a mighty torrent, or a sweeping fain; so the
word is used in Pray. xxviii. 3. to which the Chaldeaa
army may be compared; which came with such irre-
sistible force as to drive the Egyptians from their posts,
so that they could not stand their ground. The Sep-
tuagint renders it, "why does Apis flee from thee?
"thy choice ox does not continue." Which was the
god of the Egyptians, they warshipped in the form of
an ox; this could not protect them, though thought
by them to be very mighty and powerful; so AElianus {}
says Apis with the Egyptians is believed to be a most
powerful deity; yet could not save them; but the
word signifies their nobles, their mighty men of war,
their generals and officers, at least their valiant soldiers;
who yet were not able to stand the tide of power that
came against them. The reason was, because the Lord
did drive them; by means of the Chaldeans; he dis-
pirited them.; he put them into a panic, and they fled
from their posts; there is no standing against the Lord.
Ver. 16. He made many to fall, &c.3 That is, the
Lord, by the hand of the Chaldeans, by whose sword
multitudes fell in battle: yea, one.fellupon another;
they fell in heaps, denoting the multitude of the slain;
or rather they fell in flight one upon another; one fell,
and then another upon him, as usually they do, when
men are frighted and flee precipitantly, as in ver. 12:
and they said, arise: not those that fell, which may
seem at first sight; but either the strangers in the land
of Egypt, as Kimchi, such as the Jews were; who, per-
ceiving the destruction that was coming on Egypt, ex-
hort one another to arise, and get out of it; or rather
the auxiliaries of the Egyptians, as the Ethiopians,
Lybians, and Lydians, ver. 9, who finding the enemy
too strong for them, and they themselves deserted or
unsupported by Pharaoh's army, advise one another to
quit his service, and provide for their own safety: and
let us go again to our own people, and to the land of our
nativity their own country, where they were born, and
their friends and relations lived; that so they might be
safe from the oppressing sword; the sword of the Chal-
deans. The Septuagint version is a very bad one, fol-
lowed by the Arabic, which renders it, from the Gre-
cian sword; and so is the Vulgate Latin version,from
the.face of the dove; to countenance which it is said,
that the Chaldeans and Assyrians had a dove in their
ensigns; see the note on ch. xxv. 38. and so a most
ancient Saxon translation in the library of Christ's
Church in Oxford, from the face of the sword of the
culver {k}, or dove; thfit is, from their sword, who display
their banners in the field with the ensign of a dove;

{g} Seder Olam Rabba, c. 26. p. 77.
{h} \^ruardkwbn awbl\^ de venturo Nebuchadretzare, Junius & Tremel-
lius; de adventu Nebuchadretsaris, Calvin, Munster, Piscator; de
veniendo, Vatablus, Montanus.
{i} De Animal. I. 11. c.10.
{k} Apud Gregory's Posthuma, p. 236.