Your merchants have multiplied until they outnumber the stars. But like a swarm of locusts, they strip the land and fly away.
Parallel translations
- WEB You have increased your merchants more than the stars of the skies. The grasshopper strips, and flees away.
- KJV Thou hast multiplied thy merchants above the stars of heaven: the cankerworm spoileth, and fleeth away.
- BSB You have multiplied your merchants more than the stars of the sky. The young locust strips the land and flies away.
- NKJV You have multiplied your merchants more than the stars of heaven. The locust plunders and flies away.
- NASB You have made your traders more numerous than the stars of heaven— The creeping locust sheds its skin and flies away.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Nineveh multiplied its merchants beyond the stars, but like locusts they strip the land and fly away. Its commercial wealth offers no lasting security.
Overview
Assyria's vast trade network had enriched the city and seemed innumerable as the stars. Yet, like locusts, these merchants only plunder and then vanish when trouble comes. The image warns that wealth gathered by exploitation provides no faithful defense in the day of judgment.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 4
- Gen 22:17that I will bless you greatly, and I will multiply your offspring greatly like the stars of the heavens, and like the sand which is on the seashore. Your offspring will possess the gate of his enemies.
- Jer 33:22As the army of the sky can’t be counted, neither the sand of the sea measured; so I will multiply the offspring of David my servant, and the Levites who minister to me.’”
- Neh 9:23You also multiplied their children as the stars of the sky, and brought them into the land concerning which you said to their fathers, that they should go in to possess it.
- Gen 15:5Yahweh brought him outside, and said, “Look now toward the sky, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” He said to Abram, “So will your offspring be.”
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The certain judgment on Nineveh and the comfort that 'the LORD is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble' point to Christ, who is both the refuge of his people and the judge of their enemies.
How Nahum 3:16 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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