Nachum 3: Even Assyria Can Fall
This piece first appeared in Rabbi Natasha's commentary on the 929 Tanakh Project here . The character of Nachum was introduced to us in Chapter One with two opposing forces. First, there is the prophet’s name: Nachum, meaning ‘comfort’. Second, we are provided with Nachum’s birthplace: he is an ‘Elkoshi’, a man from Elkosh. Since no such place is known to have existed, some scholars have suggested that it is a play on words, meaning ‘God is harsh’. This apparent theological juxtaposition behind the character of the prophet might help us to understand the significance of the fate of Nineveh. By this final chapter of the book, we see that Nineveh is doomed for destruction. As modern readers, Nineveh might only be familiar to us through the Book of Jonah. However, to the ancient eye, this was a grand city of the Assyrian Empire. In the time of Nachum, Assyria had been the superpower of the Ancient Near East for what must have felt like forever. Unbeknownst to Nachum’s contemporar...
