A Triumphal Ode (Ch. 1). 

            Scholars have found an acrostic poem here, but the first eleven letters of the alphabet can be discovered only by textual manipulation, and the second eleven only by major alter­ations (There are 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet. For details see HDB, article Nahum.). There are two diametrically opposite errors con­nected with the Hebrew text that we must avoid. On the one hand we must not assume that it has been handed down to us in a flawless condition. Equally we must not assume that it is full of major errors. All recent textual study, including the evidence of the older copy of Isaiah among the Dead Sea scrolls, has supported a middle position, and there has been a strong reaction from the lavish textual reconstruction of an earlier generation (See especially B. J. Roberts: The Old Testament Text and Versions.).

            Though there are considerable textual difficulties in the first chapter, to suppose that an acrostic poem should have been so mutilated seems impossible, unless we say of the writer with Pfeiffer, “It is clear that he did not copy the alphabetic psalm from a manuscript but wrote it down as best he could from memory. He had not only forgotten the second part of this poem, but being unconscious of the alphabetic arrange­ment of the lines, he paraphrased certain lines…” (Introduction to the Old Testament, p. 595.). Faced with this, common sense is likely to decide that the few in­dications of an acrostic are purely accidental.

            The ode begins with a description of the attributes of Jehovah (vers. 2, 3a) and of His power in nature (vers. 3b-6), both of which justify the confidence that He will at last carry out the punishment of Assyria first pronounced by Jonah (Jonah 3:4) and affirmed clearly by Isaiah (Isa. 10: 12, 16-19, etc.). Then comes the promise (vers. 7-15) that Jehovah will make an end of the enemies of His people. There are textual corruptions in vers. 10 and 12; the verbs in ver. 11 should be in the past, for the verse probably refers to Sennacherib; in ver. 12 the R.V. mg. should be followed. To get the sense we should omit 1:13, 15; 2:2, for while we do not doubt that they are by Nahum, in their present setting, addressed as they are to Judah, they interrupt the address to Assyria. This is particularly true of 2:2.