Jeremiah 51:58 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

The broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly broken, &c. That the walls of Babylon were of a prodigious height and thickness, Herodotus tells, who says, they were 200 cubits high, and 50 cubits in breadth, lib. 1. cap. 178. “We are astonished,” says Bishop Lowth, in his note on Isaiah 13:19, “at the accounts which ancient historians of the best credit give, of the immense extent, height, and thickness of the walls of Nineveh and Babylon; nor are we less astonished, when we are assured by the concurrent testimony of modern travellers, that no remains, not the least traces, of these prodigious works, are to be found. Our wonder will, I think, be moderated in both respects, if we consider the fabric of these celebrated walls, and the nature of the materials of which they consisted. Buildings in the East have always been, and are to this day, made of earth or clay mixed, or beat up with straw, to make the parts cohere, and dried only in the sun. This is their method of making bricks. The walls of the city were built of the earth, digged out of the spot, and dried upon the place; by which means both the ditch and the wall were at once formed; the former furnishing materials for the latter. That the walls of Babylon were of this kind is well known; and Berosus expressly says, (apud Joseph. Antiq. Jeremiah 10:11,) that Nebuchadnezzar added three new walls, both to the old and new city, partly of brick and bitumen, and partly of brick alone. A wall of this sort must have a great thickness in proportion to its height, otherwise it cannot stand. The thickness of the walls of Babylon is said to have been one-fourth of their height; which seems to have been no more than was absolutely necessary.” Her high gates shall be burned, and the people shall labour in vain, &c. If the Chaldeans take never so much pains to quench the fire, it shall be to no purpose; and all their efforts to preserve their empire and city shall be as insignificant as if men wrought in the fire, which immediately destroys all the fruits of their labours. The words may be better translated, “And the people have laboured for a thing of naught, and the folks have wearied themselves for that which shall be fuel for the fire;” that is, the works which have been erected with such incredible labour and expense, shall be a prey to the flames.