I have cut off the nations: their towers are desolate; I made their streets waste, that none passeth by: their cities are destroyed, so that there is no man, that there is none inhabitant.
Ver. 6. I have cut off the nations] And hanged them up in gibbets, as it were, before your eyes, for your admonition, ut ruina maiorum sit cautela minorum, that their destruction might be your instruction; that, seeing your neighbour's house on fire, you might look to your own; that, observing others to suffer shipwreck, you might see to your tackling. This is the use God expects we should make of his judgments upon others, Luke 13:3; Luke 13:5; Luke 17:26; Luk 17:29 Matthew 12:13; Matthew 12:41,42 1 Corinthians 10:1,2, and surely he deserveth to be made an example that will not take example by others.
Their towers are desolate] Or, their corners, sc. of their munitions, whereon towers were set. Or, their extremities, q.d. I have overturned them from one end to another. Drusius and Ribera interpreteth it of their princes. See Trapp on " Zep 1:6 "
I made their streets waste, &c.] See Zephaniah 2:5,6; Zephaniah 2:14,15. To the end, that when my judgments were thus on the earth, the inhabitants of the world (but especially of the Church) might learn righteousness, Isaiah 26:9; that the righteous, seeing the vengeance, might wash his feet in the blood of the wicked, Psalms 59:10, taking warning by his harms. Observe here, by the way, what great account God makes of his people, since for their instance and instruction he thus wasteth the wicked; like as the Persian kings, when their sons had committed a fault, made their servants to be beaten before them.