Jeremiah 51:30

The mighty men of Babylon have forborn to fight, they have remained in their holds: their might hath failed; they became as women: they have burned her dwellingplaces; her bars are broken. THE MIGHTY MEN OF BABYLON HAVE FORBORNE TO FIGHT - for the city was not taken by force of arms, but by stratagem, according to the counsel given to Cyrus by two eunuchs of Belshazzar, who deserted. THEY HAVE REMAINED IN THEIR HOLDS - not daring to go forth to fight; many, with Nabonnidus, withdrew to the fortified city Borsippa....

The Prophet shows here, as by the finger, the manner of the destruction of Babylon, such as it is described by heathen authors. He then says, that the _valiant _men _of Babylon, _even those who had been chosen to defend the city, _ceased to fight _For the city was taken rather by craft than by open force; for after a long siege, Cyrus was laughed to scorn by the Babylonians; then they securely held a feast. In the meantime two eunuchs of Belshazzar passed over to Cyrus; for; as Xenophon relates, the tyrant had slain the son of one, and by way of disgrace castrated the other. Hence, then, it was that they revolted from him; and Cyrus was instructed by them how he could take the city. The fords were dried-up, when Belshazzar suspected no such thing, and in the night he heard that the city was taken. Daniel gives a clearer description; for he says that there was held a stated feast, and tha...

1-58 The particulars of this prophecy are dispersed and interwoven, and the same things left and returned to again. Babylon is abundant in treasures, yet neither her waters nor her wealth shall secure her. Destruction comes when they did not think of it. Wherever we are, in the greatest depths, at the greatest distances, we are to remember the Lord our God; and in the times of the greatest fears and hopes, it is most needful to remember the Lord. The feeling excited by Babylon's fall is the same with the New Testament Babylon, Revelation 18:9; Revelation 18:19. The ruin of all who support idolatry, infidelity, and superstition, is needful for the revival of true godliness; and the threatening prophecies of Scripture yield comfort in this view. The great seat of antichristian tyranny, idolatry, and su...

Verse Jeremiah 51:30. _THE MIGHTY MEN - HAVE FORBORNE TO FIGHT_] They were panic-struck when they found the Medes and Persians within their walls, and at once saw that resistance was useless....

HAVE FORBORN TO FIGHT - Or, have ceased to fight: in despair when they saw that the conflict was hopeless. HOLDS - The word properly means an acropolis, and so any inaccessible place of refuge. THEY HAVE BURNED - i. e., the enemy have burned. BARS - i. e., fortifications (compare Amos 1:5)....

EXPOSITION JEREMIAH 51:1 AGAINST THEM THAT DWELL IN THE MIDST OF THEM THAT RISE UP AGAINST ME. The Hebrew has _lēb-kāmai_, which is _Kasdim_, or _Chaldea, _written in the cypher called Athbash (see on Jeremiah 25:26); just as _Sheshach_ in Jeremiah 51:41 is equivalent to Babel. The question arises whether the prophet himself is responsible for this covert way of writing, or a scribe in later times (so Ewald). In favour of the former view it may be urged that Babylon and Chaldea receive symbolic names (though not in Athbash) in the connected chapter ...

THE MIGHTY MEN OF BABYLON HAVE FORBORNE TO FIGHT,.... Or, "ceased from fighting" h for it seems, upon Cyrus's first coming, the king of Babylon and his army gave him battle; but being overthrown, they retired to the city i, and dared never fight more: THEY HAVE REMAINED IN [THEIR] HOLDS; in the towers and fortresses of Babylon, never daring to sally out of the city, or appear in the field of battle any more; even though Cyrus sent the king of Babylon a personal challenge, to end the quarrel by a single combat k: THEIR MIGHT HATH FAILED; their courage sunk and was gone; they had no heart to face their enemy: THEY BECAME AS WOMEN; as weak as they, as the Targum; timorous and fearful, having no courage left in them, and behaved more like women than men: THEY HAVE BURNT HER DWELLING PLACES; that is, the enemy burnt their houses, when they entered into the city, to inject terror into them...

CHAPTER S 50-51 BABYLON These two final Chapter s contain a great prophecy concerning Babylon, her overthrow and doom. The fifty-first chapter closes with the statement “thus far are the words of Jeremiah.” There is a direct statement that Jeremiah wrote all these words. We find it at the close of Jeremiah 51:59. “Jeremiah wrote in a book all the evil that should come upon Babylon, even all these words that are written against Babylon.” It would be a brazen infidelity which says Jeremiah did not write all these words. Yet the almost universally accepted view of the critics is that these Chapter s cannot be the work of Jeremiah. The German infidel, Professor Eichhorn, the man who coined the phrase “higher criticism,” started this denial; Kuenen, Budde and others have followed in his steps. Others have modified this radical view and concede the possibility that Jeremiah may have b

JEREMIAH 50:1 TO JEREMIAH 51:58. BABYLON. This long and monotonous prophecy, which is without order or logical development of ideas, is largely a compilation from the prophetic writings of Jeremiah and others (_cf., e.g.,_ Jeremiah 50:41 ff., Jeremiah 51:15). It presupposes the destruction of Jerusalem, apparently as a remote rather than a recent event. Its idea of Babylon is that of a cruel tyrant to be punished by Yahweh, not that of a Divinely commissioned agent of Yahweh's wrath against Israel, as Jeremiah teaches. We are not at liberty to make it contemporaneous with such exilic writings as Isaiah 13, 40-55, because

THE MIGHTY MEN. Hebrew pi. of _gibbor._ App-14....