This word of Jehovah was to be proclaimed in Egypt, and especially in the frontier cities, which would have to bear the first brunt of invasion:—
"Declare in Egypt, proclaim in Migdol, proclaim in Noph and Tahpanhes:
Say ye, Take thy stand and be ready, for the sword hath devoured round about thee.
Why hath Apis[203] fled and thy calf not stood? Because Jehovah overthrew it."
Memphis was devoted to the worship of Apis, incarnate in the sacred bull; but now Apis must succumb to the mightier divinity of Jehovah, and his sacred city become a prey to the invaders.
"He maketh many to stumble; they fall one against another.
Then they say, Arise, and let us return to our own people and to our native land, before the oppressing sword."
We must remember that the Egyptian armies were largely composed of foreign mercenaries. In the hour of disaster and defeat these hirelings would desert their employers and go home.
"Give unto Pharaoh king of Egypt the name[204] Crash; he hath let the appointed time pass by."
The form of this enigmatic sentence is probably due to a play upon Egyptian names and titles. When the allusions are forgotten, such paronomasia naturally results in hopeless obscurity. The "appointed time" has been explained as the period during which Jehovah gave Pharaoh the opportunity of repentance, or as that within which he might have submitted to Nebuchadnezzar on favourable terms.
"As I live, is the utterance of the King, whose name is Jehovah Sabaoth,
One shall come like Tabor among the mountains and like Carmel by the sea."
It was not necessary to name this terrible invader; it could be no other than Nebuchadnezzar.