He increaseth the nations, and destroyeth them: he enlargeth the nations, and straiteneth them [again].
Ver. 23. He increaseth the nations, and destroyeth them] It is all one with God whether against a single man or a whole nation, Job 34:29, when he once taketh them to do. "The wicked shall be turned into hell," and (that they may not hope to escape because a multitude) "all the nations that forget God," Psalms 9:17. Soon after the flood the Babel builders were scattered; Sodom and her sisters were not only consumed with fire from heaven, Genesis 19:23,29, but thrown forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire, Judges 1:7. Some nations were ejected, and others substituted, Deuteronomy 2:10; Deuteronomy 2:12; Deuteronomy 2:20. Some utterly wasted and rooted out, such as the Edomites, Ammonites, Moabites, &c., that live by fame only; others not so much as by fame, their very names being blotted out from under heaven. "The cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land is utterly desolate," Isaiah 6:11. Now all this is the Lord's own doing, and should be marvellous in our eyes. He plants, and plucks up; he builds, and breaks down, Jeremiah 31:28 .
He enlargeth the nations, and straiteneth them again] Or, that he may straiten them again: so in the former clause, that he may destroy them. This if he may justly do to whole nations, why should it seem so strange that he suffereth particular persons, though wicked, to prosper for a season; and though righteous, for a while to suffer hardship?