NAHUM, na'hiim (Hebrew for °rich in God's comfort"), one of the 12 minor Hebrew prophets of the Old Testament, whose only ord is the book, attributed to 607-606 s.c., that bears his name, a reference in Nehemiah vii, 7, as °Rehm" being a copyist's error. Nahum is described as °The Ellcoshite," either the son of a man named Elkosh, or native of a village of that name in Galilee, the location of which is uncertain. Saint Jerome states that the village in Galilee which bore the name of Elkesi in the 4th century A.D. was the prophet's birthplace, and the Galilean village Capernaum, signifying the "village of Nahum," has also been vaguely speculated upon. The tomb of the prophet is pointed out at Alkush near Mosul — ancient Nineveh — and his life has been associated with the great city, the destruction of which he prophesied. His book entitled 'The Burden of Nineveh. The Book of the Vision of Nahum the Elkoshite,' should be compared with that of Jonah which illustrates the remission of God's judgments, while Nahum describes their execution, in a style full of animation, fancy and originality, and at the same time clear and rounded. His language throughout is classical and in the purest Hebrew, belonging to the ond half of Hezekiah's reign, or to the time im- mediatel following the defeat of Sennacherib Jerusalem. erusalem. Nineveh was at that time the capital of the great and flourishing Assyrian Empire. It was a city of vast extent and ulation; the centre of the principal commerce of the world. Its wealth, however, was not altogether derived from trade. It was a "bloody city," "full of lies and robbery," chap. iii, 1. It plundered the neighboring nations; and is compared by the prophet to a family of lions, which "fill their holes with prey, and their dens with ravin," chap. ii, 11, 12. At the same
time it was strongly fortified, its colossal walls, 100 feet high, with their 1,500 towers, bidding defiance to all enemies. Yet so totally was it destroyed that, in the 2d century after Christ, not a vestige remained of it; and its site was for centuries a matter of doubt and uncertainty. The book is surpassed by none in sublimity of description. It consists of a single poem which opens with a superb vision of God's coming to judge the nations, vs. 2-8. Then follows vs. 8-14, an address to the As syrians describing their confusion and over throw ; vs. 12-13 parenthetically consoling the Israelites with promises of future rest and re lief from oppression. Chapter ii depicts in vivid colors the siege and capture of Nineveh by its foes, the Medes and Chaldxans, and the consternation of the inhabitants. Chapter iii describes the utter ruin of the great city and the various contributing causes. The fall of No-Ammon, Thebes in Egypt in 668 Lc., about half a century before, under the judgment of God, is cited, vs. 8-10, to illustrate the pun ishment coming on the Assyrian Empire and the deliverance and restoration of Israel. With a wide view of the working of Providence, an avoidance of all moral or homiletic utterances, this powerful prophecy advances with majestic unity from its noble prcemium to its close. Consult Davidson, A. B., "Nahum, Habbakuk and Zephaniah" in 'Cambridge Bible' (1896) ; Driver, S. R., "Nahum" in 'Century Bible' (1906) ; Smith, G. A., 'The Book of the Twelve Prophets' (2 vols., 1876-77); Haller, "Nahum" in 'Die Religion in Geschichte and Gegenwart' (1913); also the numerous commentaries, not ably by Bickel!, Billerbeck and Jeremias, Gun kel, Marti, Norvack, Wellhausen, etc.