God’s Word for You

Nahum 2:11-12 Lions without prey or dens

by Pastor Timothy Smith on Saturday, May 16, 2026

11 Where now is the lions’ den,
and the food for the young lions,
where the lion and lioness have gone?
There were the cubs, with nothing to fear.
12 The lion killed enough for his cubs
and strangled the prey for his mate,
filling his caves with prey and his dens with torn flesh.

Assyrian artwork was filled with images of lions. Sculptures, mosaics, paintings, carvings—there were lions everywhere. The kings of Assyria liked to picture themselves as lions, at least in their ferocity. This was true of many nations. “A lion has come out of his den; a destroyer of nations has set out” (Jeremiah 4:7). “I will suddenly chase Edom like a lion springing out of the thickets of the Jordan” (Jeremiah 49:19).

So Nahum takes that idea and turns it back on the city, its king, and the whole nation. Aren’t you a lions’ den? Weren’t the nations of the world your prey? All of the different kinds of lions, the big father-lions, the lionesses, the young lions, the cubs, all were there in Nineveh. Everyone in the city was ferocious and terrible like a lion. The lion and lioness could leave the cub alone and unguarded in the den when they went out to find prey, but even their cub was tough enough to take care of himself, surely? The prophet hints with this that the city would be undefended when the marauders came, or that the defenses would be less than adequate.

The terrifying details of how lions actually hunt are paraded for us in verse 12. Prey, the torn or strangled flesh of killed animals, is brought back for the feast. This is not far from the terrifying way the Assyrians carried out their warfare and brought back helpless prisoners.

I don’t think that the “bestiality and degenerate practices” of Nineveh are being described as one commentator suggests (Calvin), but simply that the Assyrians were ruthless in warfare. This passage is about their downfall: lions without prey or dens.

When Nahum asks about the prey, the food for the cubs, he is taunting the rulers of Nineveh. They used to have more than enough, plenty for everyone. Where is all that plunder that was in the city? Surely if you don’t Have enough in your fields, there is gold enough to buy more grain? Surely if you can’t catch enough fish in the river, is there any silver left in your pockets to buy meat for your people? But the fields are stripped, the money is all gone. There’s no bait for the hook. The coffers are “emptier than empty.” There’s no food to feed the cubs, and no money to buy it with.

In this chapter, Nahum has sounded something like Amos, who said, “The whole land will rise like the Nile; it will be stirred up and then sink like the river of Egypt” (Amos 8:8), and again, “I will turn your religious feasts into mourning and all your singing into weeping. I will make all of you wear sackcloth and shave your heads. I will make that time like mourning for an only son and the end of it like a bitter day” (Amos 8:10). These things are typical of the defeat of God’s enemies. But Amos also proclaimed this terrible judgment from the Lord: “The days are coming when I will send a famine through the land—not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the LORD. Men will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the LORD, but they will not find it” (Amos 8:11-12). In the same way, nothing that could have nourished the “lions” of Assyria will be left anymore. They will be deprived of food, shelter, clothing, wealth of any kind, protection, and even of the one thing that they had when Jonah had come: the Word of God. Without the Gospel, there is no knowledge of God and no hope for salvation at all. For what does his Apostle say? “He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power” (2 Thessalonians 1:8-9).

For this reason we have so much to thank God about! We can include those blessings that we have that were stripped from Nineveh (food, shelter, protection, wealth, and so on) but especially for the true Gospel. For as Luther teaches us to confess: “The Holy Spirit has called me by the gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith. In the same way he calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth, and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. In this Christian church he daily and fully forgives all sins to me and all believers. On the Last Day he will raise me and all the dead and give eternal life to me and all believers in Christ. This is most certainly true.”

In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith

 

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