Ezekiel 30:6-9 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

They also that uphold Egypt shall fall By this seems to be meant the governors of the several provinces, those who are called the stay of the tribes thereof, Isaiah 19:13; that is, of the several Nomi, or districts of Egypt. From the tower of Syene shall they fall This should rather be rendered, from Migdol to Syene. See note on Ezekiel 29:10. When I have set a fire in Egypt When I shall have kindled up the flame of war in Egypt. God's judgments are often compared to fire: see the margin. And when all her helpers shall be destroyed All her allies and auxiliaries. In that day shall messengers, &c. Houbigant translates this verse, In that day shall swift messengers go forth from me, who shall terrify the secure Ethiopian; and he shall have great fears concerning the day of Egypt, because it shall be nigh. He observes, that as the messengers are said to be “sent to Cush, or Ethiopia, if the Arabians be meant, they were not to be gone by ships: if the Ethiopians, properly so called, to the south of Egypt, it was not proper for messengers to be sent to them in ships, because the navigation was against the stream, and could not be so quick as it ought upon an approaching calamity.” Bishop Newcome, however, adopts our translation of the first clause, observing, that to send messengers up the Nile in ships was, if not so swift, yet a more secure way of communicating intelligence in a time of general commotion, than to send them by land. The Egyptians and Ethiopians being confederates, the ill news of the conquest of Egypt could not but greatly affect the Ethiopians.