For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth [are] the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion.
Ver. 6. For a nation is come up upon my land] A nation, sc. of vermin, by swarms, as Joel 2:9, called afterwards an army, Joel 2:11, and a people, Joel 2:2. See the like Proverbs 30:25,26. "Is come," that is, shortly shall come, "upon my land," this glorious and goodly land, as it is called, Daniel 11:16. Tarnovius makes this by a mimesis a to be the drunkard's lamentation. "A nation is come up," &c.
Strong and without number] Yea, therefore strong, because without number; insuperable, because innumerable. Feeble they are, and yet formidable; because set on by God Almighty, whose warriors they are, as the Roman spoilers are called, Matthew 22:7. And perhaps the Assyrians may here be hinted at. I doubt not but the literal sense is chiefly intended; neither can I concur with Oecolampadius, who holdeth it to be propheta indignum, unbeseeming the prophet to preach thus concerning worms and locusts: for concerning such poor creatures deal the prophets by the instinct of the Holy Ghost, in sundry other places, Proverbs 6:6 Amos 4:9; Amo 7:1 Nahum 3:15 .
Whose teeth are the teeth of a lion] That is, they devour all that is in their way; as there is no standing before a lion, no, not before a moth that hath commission to crush a man, Job 4:19 .
a Rhet. A figure of speech, whereby the supposed words or actions of another are imitated. ŒD