Zephaniah 2:14

all the beasts of the nations Sept. all the beasts of the earth, as the phrase usually runs (Genesis 1:24; Psalms 79:2), or beasts of the field. The phrase seems to stand in apposition to flocks, the idea of which it expands. The word "flocks" seems nowhere to be used of wild creatures, but always of those tended by the shepherd. The term "beasts" is generally used of wild creatures, but in Isaiah 46:1 it is used of tame animals, and elsewhere of creatures in general. The term nation(here sing.) is used of locusts (Joel 1:6), just as "people" is used of the ants and conies (Proverbs 30:25-26), and many assume that it is so used here, rendering, all kinds of animals in crowds(Keil, R.V. marg.). The construction is against such a sense, and there seems no reason for departing from the ordinary meaning of nation. Nineveh shall be a common pasture for every tribe of people. On the other hand, Wellhausen appears to take "beasts" in a figurative sense, rendering a motley medley of people, the reference being to the tribes who own the flocks. But though "beasts" be sometimes used figuratively of peoples, when the idea is to be expressed that they shall attack and devour another people (Isaiah 56:9), in a passage like the present such a sense is entirely unnatural.

cormorant and the bittern R.V. pelican and porcupine. The first word is usually supposed to denote the pelican (Deuteronomy 14:17; Isaiah 34:11; Psalms 102:6). Sept. renders the second "hedgehog"; by others it is supposed to mean the bittern (Tristram). For upper lintels, marg. more literally: chapiters (so R.V.), that is, the carved tops of the pillars now flung to the ground, or of those still standing amidst the ruins.

Their voice shall sing lit. a voice that singeth = hark! they sing!The idea of "singing" is strange; Sept. takes the word in a more general sense of the cry of birds or wild creatures.

desolationshall be in the thresholds Instead of "desolation," Sept. (with difference of one letter) reads ravens, a reading which many follow. Cf. Isaiah 34:11.

uncover the cedar work The text is probably in disorder. The term "uncover" is that rendered raseto the foundation, Psalms 137:7 (see on Habakkuk 3:13). The supposed form rendered "cedar work" does not occur elsewhere. The slightest possible change in pointing would give hercedar, which might mean, her cedar work. The word, however, might possibly be some form of the verb to make lean(Zephaniah 2:11), either 1 pers. impf., I will makeher voidand raseher, or with Aramaic spelling (as Isaiah 63:3), 3 pers. perf., they shall make(lit. have made) her voidand raseher, which is equivalent to the passiveshe shall be made void, &c. But all this is little satisfactory.