Editing Nahum

{{short description|Minor prophet in the Bible}}
{{About|Nahum, a biblical prophet}}
[[Image:Nahum-prophet.jpg|thumb|200px|[[Russian Orthodox]] [[icon]] of the Prophet Nahum, 18th century ([[Iconostasis]] of [[Transfiguration of Jesus|Transfiguration]] Church, [[Kizhi]] Monastery, [[Karelia]], Russia).]]

'''Nahum''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|n|eɪ|.|əm}} or {{IPAc-en|ˈ|n|eɪ|h|əm}}; {{langx|he|נַחוּם}} ''Naḥūm'') was a [[minor prophet]] whose prophecy is recorded in the ''Tanakh'', also called the [[Hebrew Bible]] and the Old Testament. His [[Book of Nahum|book]] comes in chronological order between [[Book of Micah|Micah]] and [[Habakkuk]] in the [[Bible]].<ref>
[https://www.ucalgary.ca/~eslinger/genrels/ChronolBiblicalProphets.html "The Chronology of Biblical Prophets"], Adapted from Hauer, C.E. & Young, W. A., ''An Introduction to the Bible: A Journey into Three Worlds'', p.123, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1994</ref> He wrote about the end of the [[Assyrian Empire]], and its capital city, [[Nineveh]], in a vivid poetic style.<ref>[http://www.ibs.org/niv/studybible/nahum.php Introduction to Nahum] at the [http://www.ibs.org/ International Bible Society] website</ref>

==Life==
Little is known about Nahum's personal history. His name means "comfort",<ref>[[Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc.]], [https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Nahum%201%3A1-2&version=NABRE#fen-NABRE-27005a Footnote a at Nahum 1:1 in the New American Bible Revised Edition], accessed on 14 September 2024</ref> and is derived from  the same [[root (linguistics)|root]] as the Hebrew verb meaning "to comfort".<ref>Cook, G., [https://www.tyndalebulletin.org/article/29407.pdf Nahum's Prophetic Name], ''[[Tyndale Bulletin]]'', 67.1 (2016) 37-40, accessed on 14 September 2024</ref> He came from the town of Alqosh ([[Book of Nahum|Nahum]] 1:1), which scholars have attempted to identify with several cities, including the modern [[Alqosh]] in northern [[Iraq]] and [[Capernaum]] of northern [[Galilee]].<ref>[http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10670a.htm Nahum] at [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/index.html ''The Catholic Encyclopedia'']</ref> He was a very nationalistic Hebrew, however, and lived amongst the Elkoshites in peace. Nahum, called "the Elkoshite", is the seventh in order of the minor prophets. According to [[Jerome]], Nahum's Elkosh was a little town in [[Galilee]].<ref>https://biblehub.com/commentaries/nahum/1-1.htm</ref> This identification could explain how the famous New Testament city of [[Capernaum]] got its name.<ref>https://faith.nd.edu/capernaum/</ref> 

Scholars with a preference for [[Hebrew]] manuscripts place Nahum's prophecy after the Assyrian king [[Ashurbanipal]]'s [[Sack of Thebes]] in 663 B.C. This view is the current majority opinion because the city of Thebes is referred to in the past tense in the [[Masoretic Text]] of Nahum 3:8-10. However, both the [[Septuagint]] and [[Vulgate]] refer to the city in the present tense, and the former opinion held by scholars was that Nahum lived about a century earlier, before both the [[Assyrian captivity|captivity of the ten lost tribes]] and the Sack of Thebes.<ref>https://biblehub.com/sep/nahum/3.htm</ref><ref>https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Nahum%203&version=VULGATE</ref> The first-century Jewish historian [[Flavius Josephus]]<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/L326JosephusJewishAntiquitiesVIII1213|title=Vol. VI: Jewish Antiquities, Books IX–XI|last=Josephus|first=Flavius|publisher=William Heinemann|year=1958|series=Loeb Classical Library|volume=326|location=London|pages=[https://archive.org/details/L326JosephusJewishAntiquitiesVIII1213/page/n140 125]–129, XI.xi.2–3|translator-last=Marcus|translator-first=William}}</ref> places Nahum's life during the reign of [[Jotham]]. This view was also held by the Catholic scholar [[Thomas Worthington (Douai)|Thomas Worthington]] in his notes for the original [[Douay-Rheims Bible]], writing: "Nahum prophesied about 50 years after [[Jonah]] ... 135 before the destruction of Niniveh."<ref>https://philologic.northwestern.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?c.9:1:39.bie</ref> In this view, rather than Ashurbanipal, Nahum's prophecy would have been directed at [[Tiglath-Pileser III]], who revitalized the Neo-Assyrian Empire into a world power again and conquered most of the Levant, defeating and subjugating previously influential kingdoms, including [[Aram-Damascus]]. Tiglath-Pileser was contemporary with the reign of Jotham.

==Works==
[[File:Nahum.jpg|thumb|130px|Nahum (watercolor circa 1888 by [[James Tissot]])]]
{{Main|Book of Nahum}}
Nahum's writings could be taken as prophecy or as history. One account suggests that his writings are a prophecy written in about 615 BCE, just before the downfall of Assyria, while another account suggests that he wrote this passage as liturgy just after its downfall in 612 BCE.<ref>Heaton, E. W., ''A Short Introduction To The Old Testament Prophets'', p. 35, Oneworld Publications, P.O. Box 830, 21 Broadway, Rockport, NA 01966, {{ISBN|1-85168-114-0}}</ref><ref name = "abp">{{cite web|url=http://www.aboutbibleprophecy.com/p52.htm|title=Nahum|website=Aboutbibleprophecy.com}}</ref>

The book was introduced in Reformation theologian [[John Calvin|Calvin]]'s Commentary<ref>{{cite web | title=Commentaries on Twelve Minor Prophets | url=http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/calcom28.titlepage.html | access-date=2012-08-22 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171014183248/http://www.ccel.org/ccel/calvin/calcom28.titlepage.html | archive-date=2017-10-14 | url-status=dead }}</ref> as a complete and finished poem:

{{Blockquote|No one of the minor Prophets seems to equal the sublimity, the vehemence and the boldness of Nahum: besides, his Prophecy is a complete and finished poem; his exordium is magnificent, and indeed majestic; the preparation for the destruction of Nineveh, and the description of its ruin, and its greatness, are expressed in most vivid colors, and possess admirable perspicuity and fulness.|Rev. John Owen, translator|Calvin's Commentary on Jonah, Micah, Nahum}}

There are indications that an acrostic underlies the present text. Thus 1:2 begins with the first letter of the alphabet (א), verse 3b (‘in whirlwind’) with the second letter (ב), verse 4 with the third (ג), and so on until from ten to sixteen of the twenty two letters have appeared. In places the scheme breaks down: in the process of transmission, what was once an alphabetic poem has now been seriously corrupted, rearranged, and supplemented.<ref name="Taylor, C. L 1956 p. 954">Taylor, C. L.-I. (1956). The Interpreters' Bible (first ed., Vol. VI Lamentations through Malachi, p. 954). (S. T. George Arthur Buttrick, Ed.) Nashville: Abingdon Press.</ref>

Nahum, taking words from [[Moses]] himself, has shown in a general way what sort of "Being God is". Calvin argued that Nahum painted God by which his nature must be seen, and "it is from that most memorable vision, when God appeared to Moses after the breaking of the tablets."<ref>[http://onetenthblog.wordpress.com/readings/780-2/ Calvin; Commentary on Jonah, Micah, Nahum] {{webarchive|url=https://archive.today/20121130075010/http://onetenthblog.wordpress.com/readings/780-2/ |date=2012-11-30 }}</ref>

{{Blockquote|Although all three chapters fall below the standards set by the developed Judaeo-Christian tradition concerning the nature of God and man’s relation with his brother man… it is one of the world’s classic rebukes of militarism…. All tyrants are doomed. They make enemies of those whom they attack and oppress; they become corrupt, dissolute, drunken, effeminate; they are lulled into false security… | Charles L. Taylor, Jr.<ref name="Taylor, C. L 1956 p. 954">Taylor, C. L.-I. (1956). The Interpreters' Bible (first ed., Vol. VI Lamentations through Malachi, p. 954). (S. T. George Arthur Buttrick, Ed.) Nashville: Abingdon Press.</ref>}}

==Tomb==
{{Infobox ancient site
| name           = Tomb of Nahum
| native_name    = נַחוּם‬
| native_name_lang = 
| alternate_name = 
| image          = File:ProphetNahum.JPG
| image_size     =
| alt            =
| caption        = Tomb of Nahum
| map            =
| map_type       = Iraq
| map_alt        =
| map_size       =
| map_caption    =
| altitude_m     = <!-- Enter a number for altitude in meters (m) -->
| altitude_ref   =
| relief         =
| coordinates    = {{coord|36|44|18.87|N|43|05|45|E|region:PL-MA_type:landmark|display=inline,title}}
| map_dot_label  =
| location       = Town of [[Alqosh]], Northern [[Iraq]], 50km north of [[Mosul]]
| region         =
| type           = Shrine to the biblical prophet Nahum
| part_of        =
| length         = 
| width          = 
| area           =
| volume         =
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| height         = 
| builder        =
| material       =
| built          =
| abandoned      =
| epochs         = 
| cultures       = [[Jewish|Assyrian, Jewish]]
| dependency_of  =
| occupants      =
| event          =
| discovered     = 
| excavations    = None
| archaeologists =
| condition      = Partial Collapse, Stabilized in 2018 
| ownership      =
| management     = 
| public_access  = yes
| other_designation =
|website= <!-- [http://www.archinternational.org/projects/standwithnineveh/] -->
| architectural_styles = 
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| notes          =
}}
The tomb of Nahum is supposedly inside the synagogue at [[Alqosh]], although there are other places outside [[Iraq]] which also lay claim to being the original "Elkosh" from which Nahum hailed. Alqosh was emptied of its Jewish population in 1948 when they were expelled after Israel was recognized as a Jewish nation, and the synagogue that houses the tomb is now in a poor structural state, to the extent that the tomb itself is in danger of destruction. The tomb underwent basic repairs in 1796. When all Jews were forced to flee Alqosh in 1948, the iron keys to the tomb were handed to an Assyrian man, Sami Jajouhana.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://philosproject.org/isis-tomb-nahum-assyria-assyrians/ |title=Jewish Shrine Defies ISIS on War's Edge |access-date=2018-03-27 |archive-date=2018-03-27 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180327212408/https://philosproject.org/isis-tomb-nahum-assyria-assyrians/}}</ref> Few Jews visit the historic site, yet Jajouhana continues to keep the promise he made with his Jewish friends, and looks after the tomb.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://chaldean.org/Home/tabid/36/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/491/An-AlQosh-Man-Struggles-to-Keep-a-Promise-to-an-Old-Friend.aspx|title=An Alqosh Man Struggles to Keep a Promise to an Old Friend |publisher=chaldean.org}}</ref>

As of early 2017, the tomb was in significant disrepair and was threatened by the rise of ISIS in Iraq.<ref>{{cite news|last1=Schwartzstein|first1=Peter|title=Surrounded by Conflict, an Ancient Synagogue Crumbles in Iraq|url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/02/150219-iraq-tomb-biblical-prophet-collapse/?google_editors_picks=true|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150220063105/http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/02/150219-iraq-tomb-biblical-prophet-collapse/?google_editors_picks=true|url-status=dead|archive-date=February 20, 2015|access-date=20 February 2015|work=National Geographic|date=19 February 2015}}</ref> A team of engineers conducted a survey of the tomb and determined that the tomb was in danger of imminent collapse and might not survive another winter.<ref name=":0">{{Cite news|url=http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Progress-made-on-saving-Prophet-Nahums-tomb-in-Iraq-543500|title=Progress made on saving Prophet Nahum's tomb in Iraq|work=The Jerusalem Post {{!}} JPost.com|access-date=2018-04-23}}</ref> A team led by the U.S.-based non-profit [http://www.archinternational.org/ Alliance for the Restoration of Cultural Heritage] ("ARCH") raised the funds necessary to stabilize the site.<ref name=":0" /> After raising the necessary funds, ARCH partnered with the Prague-based [https://www.gemaart.com/en/salvation-of-the-prophet-nahum-shrine-iraq/ GEMA ART International s.r.o.], experts in historic preservation and reconstruction to do the immediate stabilization work.<ref name=":0" /> Following coordination with local partners, the initial stabilization work was completed in January 2018.<ref name=":1">{{Cite news|url=https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2018/03/nahums-tomb-in-iraq-restoration-begins.html|title=Hebrew prophet's tomb in Iraq saved from collapse|last=Neurink|first=Judit|date=2018-03-21|work=Al-Monitor|access-date=2018-04-23|language=en-us}}</ref> The stabilization work is expected to prevent further deterioration of the structure for between two and three years.<ref name=":1" /> With the tomb and its surrounding structure stabilized, ARCH is planning on raising the funding necessary to fully restore the site.<ref name=":1" /> On 26 April 2019, the United States government announced that it would contribute $500,000 to restore the tomb.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.timesofisrael.com/us-to-donate-500k-to-restore-tomb-of-biblical-prophet-nahum-in-iraq/|title=US to donate $500K to restore tomb of biblical prophet Nahum in Iraq|last=staff|first=T. O. I.|website=www.timesofisrael.com|language=en-US|access-date=2019-04-26}}</ref>

Two other possible burial sites mentioned in historical accounts are Elkesi, near [[Rameh]] in the [[Galilee]] and Elcesei in the [[West Bank]].<ref>[http://www.tombofnahum.com/index.htm Renovation - Al Qush Synagogue and the Tomb of Nahum] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120211085524/http://www.tombofnahum.com/index.htm |date=2012-02-11 }}.</ref>

==Liturgical commemoration==
The prophet Nahum is [[venerated]] as a [[saint]] in [[Eastern Christianity]]. On the [[Eastern Orthodox liturgical calendar]], his [[feast day]] is [[December 1 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)|December 1]]<ref>Great [[Synaxarium|Synaxaristes]]: {{in lang|el}} ''[http://www.synaxarion.gr/gr/sid/1324/sxsaintinfo.aspx Ὁ Προφήτης Ναούμ] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171204075018/http://www.synaxarion.gr/gr/sid/1324/sxsaintinfo.aspx |date=2017-12-04 }}.'' 1 Δεκεμβρίου. ΜΕΓΑΣ ΣΥΝΑΞΑΡΙΣΤΗΣ.</ref><ref>[http://ocafs.oca.org/FeastSaintsViewer.asp?SID=4&ID=1&FSID=103452 Prophet Nahum]. OCA - Feasts and Saints.</ref><ref name=ROMAN>[http://www.breviary.net/martyrology/mart12/mart1201.htm December 1] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120520213536/http://www.breviary.net/martyrology/mart12/mart1201.htm |date=2012-05-20 }}. The Roman Martyrology</ref> (for those churches which follow the traditional [[Julian Calendar]], December 1 currently falls on December 14 of the modern [[Gregorian Calendar]]). He is commemorated with the other minor [[prophet]]s in the [[Calendar of Saints (Armenian Apostolic Church)|calendar of saints]] of the [[Armenian Apostolic Church]] on July 31.

==References==
{{Reflist|2}}

==External links==
{{commons category}}
* {{wikisource author-inline|Nahum}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110824060609/http://www.tombofnahum.com/ Renovation - Al Qush Synagogue and the Tomb of Nahum]
* [http://ocafs.oca.org/FeastSaintsViewer.asp?SID=4&ID=1&FSID=103452 Prophet Nahum] Orthodox [[icon]] and [[synaxarion]]
* [http://www.babylonjews.com/prophet-pictures/the-prophet-nahum/ Unique Pictures Of Nahum Tomb By Kobi Arami]

{{Prophets of the Tanakh}}
{{Book of Nahum}}
{{Catholic saints}}
{{Extra-Quranic Prophets of Islam}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:7th-century BC people]]
[[Category:Christian saints from the Old Testament]]
[[Category:Book of Nahum]]
[[Category:Assyrian Jews]]
[[Category:Mesopotamian Hebrews]]