Nahum 1:10
in Nahum 1For they will be entangled as with thorns and consumed like the drink of a drunkard—like stubble that is fully dry.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
For entangled like thorns, and drunken as with their drink, they are consumed utterly as dry stubble.
KJV
For while they be folden together as thorns, and while they are drunken as drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry.
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This verse in Nahum 1
Commentary
8 notes on this verse(Verse 10.) Because just as thorns embrace each other, so their feast will be consumed by those who drink together, like straw full of dryness. Septuagint: Because they will be reduced to thorns down to their foundations, and will be eaten like a rolling wheel surrounded, and like straw full of dryness.
This site's exposition
What do ye imagine against the Lord
on Nahum 1:9-11
The question is put directly to Nineveh's own plotters, and the answer follows in the same breath, he will make an utter end, no second affliction needed. Folded together as thorns and drunken as drunkards pictures a tangled, stupefied mass consumed as fast as dry stubble catches fire, an image of how quickly the apparent strength collapses. The one come out of thee, a wicked counsellor against the Lord, is read by much of the bench as Sennacherib or the Rabshakeh who mocked the Lord's power before the walls of Jerusalem in Hezekiah's day, though the verse names no one and the reading is held as a reading.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening3 voices
(3.) They shall be devoured as stubble fully dry, which is irresistibly and irrecoverably consumed by the flame. The judgments of God are as devouring fire to those that make themselves as stubble to them. It is again threatened concerning this great army (
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — unbalanced-parens
For while they be folden together as thorns,....
Let each take his portion from it; let sinners read it and tremble; let saints read it and triumph. The wrath of God is here revealed from heaven against him enemies, his favour and mercy are here assured to his faithful loyal subjects, and his almighty power in both, making his wrath very terrible and his favour very desirable.
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
The Hebrew is "soaked," or "drunken as with their own wine." Their drunken revelries are perhaps alluded to, during which the foe (according to DIODORUS SICULUS [2]) broke into their city, and Sardanapalus burned his palace; though the main and ultimate destruction of Nineveh referred to by Nahum was long subsequent to that under Sardanapalus.
While they be folden together - However united their counsels may be, they shall be as drunken men - perplexed and unsteady in all their resolutions; and before God’s judgments they shall be as dry thorns before a devouring fire.
1 more voice on this verse
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
For while they be leiden together as thorns - that is, as confused, intertwined, sharp, piercing, hard to be touched, rending and tearing whosoever would interfere with its tangled ways, and seemingly compact together and strong; “and while they are drunken as their drink” , not “drinkers” only but literally, “drunken,” swallowed up, as it were, by their drink which they had swallowed, mastered, overcome, powerless, “they shall be derogated as stubble fully dry” , rapidly, in an instant, with an empty crackling sound, unresisting, as having nothing in them which can resist. Historically, the great defeat of the Assyrians, before the capture of Nineveh, took place while its king, flushed with success, was giving himself to listlessness; and having distributed to his soldiers victims, and abundance of wine, and other necessaries for banqueting, the whole army was negligent and drunken.” In like way Babylon was taken amid the feasting of Belshazzar Dan. 5:1-30; Benhadad was smitten, while “drinking himself drunk in the pavilions, he and the kings, the thirty and two kings that helped him” 1Ki 20:16. And so it may well be meant here too, that Sennacherib’s army, secure of their prey, were sunk in revelry, already swallowed up by wine, before they were swallowed up by the pestilence, on the night when the Angel of the Lord went out to smite them, and, from the sleep of revelry, they slept the sleep from which they shall not awake until the Judgment Day. God chooses the last moment of the triumph of the wicked, when he is flushed by his success, the last of the helplessness of the righteous, when his hope can be in the Lord alone, to exchange their lots. “The righteous is delivered out of trouble, and the wicked comes in his stead” Pro 11:8. […]
How the passage was read
What the Jewish commentators add
For, while the thorns are entangled —I.e., their destruction will come upon them suddenly, and they will not descend from their honor gradually, but while the thorns and the briers are [yet] entangled; i.e., strongly rooted.
This section is reception history: how the passage was read and kept in the Jewish tradition. Where a reading parts from an essential of the Christian faith, the section says so at that point.
Texts and citation data: Sefaria; each excerpt follows its version’s licence. 4 further sources are cited on this chapter that carry no English text this site may quote or only restate the verse.
The words behind it
10 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| כִּ֚י | ki | for | H3588 → | 4482 times |
| עַד־ | ʾad- | to | H5704 → | |
| סִירִ֣ים | sirim | thorns | H5518 → | |
| סְבֻכִ֔ים | sevukhim | interwoven | H5440 → | |
| וּכְסָבְאָ֖ם | ukhesaveam | and like drink their | H5435 → | |
| סְבוּאִ֑ים | sevuim | drunkards | H5433 → | |
| אֻ֨כְּל֔וּ | ʾukelu | they will be consumed | H398 → | 810 times |
| כְּקַ֥שׁ | kekash | like stubble | H7179 → | |
| יָבֵ֖שׁ | yavesh | dry | H3002 → | |
| מָלֵֽא׃ | male' | full | H4392 → |
כִּ֚יfor
kiH3588 →4482 times
עַד־to
ʾad-H5704 →
סִירִ֣יםthorns
sirimH5518 →
סְבֻכִ֔יםinterwoven
sevukhimH5440 →
וּכְסָבְאָ֖םand like drink their
ukhesaveamH5435 →
סְבוּאִ֑יםdrunkards
sevuimH5433 →
אֻ֨כְּל֔וּthey will be consumed
ʾukeluH398 →810 times
כְּקַ֥שׁlike stubble
kekashH7179 →
יָבֵ֖שׁdry
yaveshH3002 →
מָלֵֽא׃full
male'H4392 →
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Malachi 4:1“For behold, the day is coming, burning like a furnace, when all the arrogant and every evildoer will be stubble; the day is coming when I will set them ablaze,” says the LORD of…
it leads to
- Isaiah 47:14
Surely they are like stubble; the fire will burn them up. They cannot deliver themselves from the power of the flame. There will be no coals to warm them or fire to sit beside.
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- 2 Thessalonians 1:8
in blazing fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
- 2 Peter 3:7
And by that same word, the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
- Malachi 3:2
But who can endure the day of His coming? And who can stand when He appears? For He will be like a refiner’s fire, like a launderer’s soap.
- Isaiah 5:24
Therefore, as a tongue of fire consumes the straw, and as dry grass shrivels in the flame, so their roots will decay and their blossoms will blow away like dust; for they have rejected…
- Isaiah 47:14
Through
Micah 7:4The best of them is like a brier; the most upright is sharper than a hedge of thorns. The day for your watchmen has come, the day of your visitation. Now is the time…
it leads to
- Isaiah 22:5
For the Lord GOD of Hosts has set a day of tumult and trampling and confusion in the Valley of Vision—of breaking down the walls and crying to the mountains.
- Ezekiel 2:6
But you, son of man, do not be afraid of them or their words. Do not be afraid, though briers and thorns surround you, and you dwell among scorpions. Do not be afraid of…
- Isaiah 10:3
What will you do on the day of reckoning when devastation comes from afar? To whom will you flee for help? Where will you leave your wealth?
- Isaiah 22:5
Where this verse is studied
About Nahum
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Carl Friedrich Keil, The Twelve Minor Prophets; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Commentary on Nahum; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.