Nahum Chapter 2 verse 8 Holy Bible
But Nineveh hath been from of old like a pool of water: yet they flee away. Stand, stand, `they cry'; but none looketh back.
read chapter 2 in ASV
And the queen is uncovered, she is taken away and her servant-girls are weeping like the sound of doves, hammering on their breasts.
read chapter 2 in BBE
Nineveh hath been like a pool of water, since the day she existed, yet they flee away. ... Stand! Stand! But none looketh back.
read chapter 2 in DARBY
But Nineveh is of old like a pool of water: yet they shall flee away. Stand, stand, shall they cry; but none shall look back.
read chapter 2 in KJV
read chapter 2 in WBT
But Nineveh has been from of old like a pool of water, yet they flee away. "Stop! Stop!" they cry, but no one looks back.
read chapter 2 in WEB
And Nineveh `is' as a pool of waters, From of old it `is' -- and they are fleeing! `Stand ye, stand;' and none is turning!
read chapter 2 in YLT
Pulpit Commentary
Pulpit CommentaryVerse 8. - The prophet compares the past and present condition of Nineveh. But Nineveh is of old like a pool of water; and (or, though) Nineveh hath been like a pool of water all her days. Others, altering the points in accordance with the Septuagint and Vulgate, translate, "But as for Nineveh, her waters are like a pool of water." This is what she has come to, for "her waters" represent herself. She is compared to a pool or reservoir (Nehemiah 2:15; Nehemiah 3:15) from the multitude of her inhabitants gathered from all parts of the world, and streaming unto her, both as tributary and for commercial purposes (comp. Jeremiah 51:13; Revelation 17:1, 15). Yet they shall flee away. In spite of their numbers, the multitudes represented by "the waters" fly before the enemy. In vain the captains cry, Stand, stand. They pay no attention. None shall look back. No one of the fugitives turns rounder gives a thought to anything but his own safety.
Ellicott's Commentary
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(8) We prefer to adopt the slight change of reading favoured by the LXX. (meymeyha for mimey hi, and to render, And Nineveh, like a pool of water are her waters, and they [her inhabitants] are fleeing away. The waters which formerly flowed in river-courses and dykes are now one vast expanse of inundation. A panic thereupon seizes the inhabitants. If the present text be maintained, the rendering of the Authorised Version will stand. We may then suppose the heterogeneous population of Nineveh to be compared to "countless drops, full, untroubled, with no ebb or flow, fenced in from the days that she hath been, yet even therefore stagnant and corrupted; not 'a fountain of living waters'" (Pusey). But this appears to us a farfetched comparison.The pregnant terseness of the last part of the verse will give the English reader a good idea of Nahum's style and the difficulties therewith connected.
