Damascus is waxed feeble,.... Or, "is become remiss" g; her hands hang down, not being able through fear and fright to lift them up against the enemy; that is, the inhabitants of Damascus, as the Targum:
[and] turneth herself to flee; instead of going out to meet the enemy, the inhabitants of this city meditated a flight, and turned their backs upon him in order to flee from him, and escape falling into his hands:
and fear hath seized on [her]: or, "she seized on fear" h; instead of seizing on arms, and laying hold on them to defend herself with, she seized on that; or however that seized on her, and made her quite unfit to stand up in her own defence:
anguish and sorrows have taken her as a woman in travail;
Jeremiah 49:22; A phrase often used to express the sudden and inevitable destruction of a people, and their distress and inability to help themselves.
g רפתה "remissa erit", Junius Tremellius "remissa est", Cocceius, Piscator; "remissa facta est", Schmidt. h ורטט החזיקה "et apprehendit tremorem", Munster; "et horrorem apprehendit", Schmidt; "et horrorem febrilem prehendet", Junius Tremellius "apprehendet", Piscator.