They shall be burnt with hunger, and devoured with burning heat, and with bitter destruction: I will also send the teeth of beasts upon them, with the poison of serpents of the dust. They shall be burnt with hunger - Their land shall be cursed, and famine shall prevail. This is one of the arrows.
Burning heat - No showers to cool the atmosphere; or rather boils, blains, and pestilential fevers; this was a second.
Bitter destruction - The plague; this was a third.
Teeth of beasts - with the poison of serpents - The beast of the field should multiply upon and destroy them; this was a fourth: and poisonous serpents, infesting all their steps, and whose mortal bite should produce the utmost anguish, were to be a fifth arrow. Added to all these, the sword of their enemies - terror among themselves, Deuteronomy 32:25, and captivity were to complete their ruin, and thus the arrows of God were to be spent upon them. There is a beautiful saying in the Toozuki Teemour, which will serve to illustrate this point, while it exhibits one of the finest metaphors that occurs in any writer, the sacred writers excepted.
"It was once demanded of the fourth Khaleefeh, (Aaly), on whom be the mercy of the Creator, 'If the canopy of heaven were a Bow; and if the earth were the cord thereof; and if calamities were Arrows; if mankind were the mark for those arrows; and if Almighty God, the tremendous and the glorious, were the unerring Archer; to whom could the sons of Adam flee for protection?' The Khaleefeh answered, saying, 'The sons of Adam must flee unto the Lord.'"