Habakkuk 1:10

And they shall scoff at the kings,.... Or, "he shall" (u), Nebuchadnezzar king of the Chaldeans, and the army with him; who would make a jest of kings and their armies that should oppose them, as

And they shall scoff at the kings, and the princes shall be a scorn unto them: they shall deride every strong hold; for they shall heap dust, and take it. And they shall scoff at the kings - as unable to resist them.

They, both the king of Babylon and his soldiers, shall scoff, deride and contemn, at the kings, which either confederated with the Jews, or else opposed the designs of the Chaldeans; as the kings of Egypt, of Tyre, &c.; or the kings of the Jews, as Jehoiachin and Zedekiah. The princes, governors, counsellors, valiant commanders, and officers, shall be a scorn unto them, to the whole army of the Chaldeans. They shall heap dust, and take it; by mighty mounts cast up, or by filling up the trenches about your cities and fortresses, shall master them.

Habakkuk 1:10 And they shall scoff at the kings, and the princes shall be a scorn unto them: they shall deride every strong hold; for they shall heap dust, and take it.Ver. 10. And they shall scoff at the kings] Heb. He shall scoff, i.e. Nebuchadnezzar shall, and that not once only, but often; shall make a practice of it, as the Hebrew word signifieth. Hithpael notat assiduam illusionem. Thus Adonibezek dealt by the kings he took, the Philistines by Saul, 1 Samuel 31:8-10, Nebuchadnezzar by Zedekiah,; as also by the kings of Egypt, Tyre, Arabia, and others whom he had taken, and used them, haply, as Tamerlane did Bajazet, or those other captive kings whom he caused as horses to draw his chariot. How much better Evilmerodach, who (mindful of the instability of all human affairs) lifted up the head and spoke to the heart of his prisoner, Jehoiachin, King of Judah, Jeremiah 52:31; Cyrus, who honoured his captive Croesus, and made him of his council (neither was he less enriched by the good counsel Croesus gave him, than by all the wealth he had from him); our Edward III, who having the King of Scotland and the French king his prisoners here in England both together at one time, gave them stately entertainment, and made them princely pastime, by holding royal jousts in Smithfield for their delight! And the princes shall be a scorn unto them] Through the just judgment of God, "who scorneth the scorners," Proverbs 3:34, that is, saith Rabbi Levi, facit ut aliis sint ludibrio, he maketh others mock them in their misery who in prosperity scoffed at those that were better than they. "Now therefore be ye not mockers, lest your bands be made strong," &c., Isaiah 28:22. They shall deride every stronghold] As that which cannot long hold out against their assault. How should they, when God breaketh the bars and setteth open the gates to them? Amos 1:5; Amos 9:3 Proverbs 21:30. For they shall heap dust, and take it] i.e. By casting up mounts and ramparts, take it with as much ease as if they were in sport. The Turks have their Asapi, or common soldiers, of whom they make no great reckoning, but to blunt the swords of their enemies and to fill up ditches with their dead bodies, that they may the better come at the town or fort which they would take.

(10) Kings and princes are deposed or enthroned at the invader’s pleasure. Thus Nebuchadnezzar set Jehoiakim as a tributary sovereign on the throne of Jerusalem and three years later deposed his son and successor Jehciaohin and made Zedekiah king. For they shall heap dust, and take it.—This means that they shall besiege and carry all strongholds by means of the mounds of earth commonly used in sieges. These mounds were employed either to place the besieger on a level with the besieged, and so facilitate the operations of siege engines, or to form an inclined plane, up which the besieger might march his men, and so take the place by escalade. We find they were used by the Egyptians (Ezekiel 17:17) and the Assyrians (2 Kings 19:32), as well as by the Babylonians (Jeremiah 6:6, and passim). They are mentioned as employed by the Spartan king Archidamus in the celebrated siege of Platæa in B.C. 429 (Thucydides, lib. 2). In the present passage the term “dust” is used to indicate these mounds of earth, as expressing the contemptuous ease with which the invader effects his capture of strongholds.

Verse 10. They shall scoff at the kings] No power shall be able to stand before them. It will be only as pastime to them to take the strongest places. They will have no need to build formidable ramparts: by sweeping the dust together they shall make mounts sufficient to pass over the walls and take the city.

10. shall scoff at the kings] he scoffeth at kings. The Chaldean is referred to. All the verbs in the verse should be in the present: are a scorn, he derideth, he heapeth up. shall heap dust] he heapeth up. The phrase refers to the dykes or “mounts” which the besiegers cast up in order to be on a level with the walls of the besieged fortress and command them, 2 Samuel 20:15; Jeremiah 32:24. The ease and rapidity of the Chaldean operations is forcibly expressed. Nothing can withstand their impetuosity. Kings with their armies who might oppose them, and fortresses which might arrest their progress, they laugh at.

And they - literally, “he,” the word stands emphatically, he, alone against all the kings of the earth Shall scoff at the kings - and all their might taking them away or setting them up at his

9. Their purpose is to rob and to destroy. For violence — They are without humane feelings; their only object is to do violence.