Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite; Put and Lubim were thy helpers.
The verse describes Thebes in Egypt, whose strength was counted as infinite because Ethiopia and Egypt supplied it, while Put and Lubim stood as its helpers and allies. That Thebes had been captured by Asurbanipal king of Assyria, whose cruelty included tearing off the lips and hands of kings and making a prince wear his own king's decapitated head. Such cruelty reveals Assyria as the brutal type of heathen abominations acting in the name of its god Asur. Nahum 3 is God's prediction of the utter ruin and fall of Nineveh and Assyria.
The prediction was given at the very height of Assyria's glory just after it had humbled Egypt its great rival. It was fulfilled when Assyria was overcome by the combined, united and superior power of its former dependencies. The conquering powers were Media, Egypt, and Babylonia, and the fall of Nineveh ended Assyrian rule and allowed Babylon under Nabopolassar to rise from vassalage to ascendancy. The verse thus displays God's moral government of the world, proving that kingdoms built on fraud, force, and cruelty must fall before God's kingdom reared on truth and righteousness.
The verse describes Thebes in Egypt, whose strength was counted as infinite because Ethiopia and Egypt supplied it, while Put and Lubim stood as its helpers and allies. That Thebes had been captured by Asurbanipal king of Assyria, whose cruelty included tearing off the lips and hands of kings and making a prince wear his own king's decapitated head. Such cruelty reveals Assyria as the brutal type of heathen abominations acting in the name of its god Asur. Nahum 3 is God's prediction of the utter ruin and fall of Nineveh and Assyria.
The prediction was given at the very height of Assyria's glory just after it had humbled Egypt its great rival. It was fulfilled when Assyria was overcome by the combined, united and superior power of its former dependencies. The conquering powers were Media, Egypt, and Babylonia, and the fall of Nineveh ended Assyrian rule and allowed Babylon under Nabopolassar to rise from vassalage to ascendancy. The verse thus displays God's moral government of the world, proving that kingdoms built on fraud, force, and cruelty must fall before God's kingdom reared on truth and righteousness.