(58) Her high gates shall be burned with fire.--These were part of the works on which Nebuchadnezzar prided himself as the restorer of the city. The inscription already quoted refers to these as well as to the walls: "Babylon is the refuge of the god Merodach. I have finished Imgur Bel, his great enclosure. In the threshold of the great gates I have adjusted folding-doors in brass." (Oppert, ut supra; Comp. also Records of the Past, v. pp. 125, 127).

The people shall labour in vain.--The words are all but verbally identical, in some MSS. absolutely so, with those of Habakkuk 2:13. In both the thought is that the stately edifices which had been raised with so much toil by the slave-labour of Nebuchadnezzar's subjects and captives should all be fruitless. The walls of Babylon are described by Herod. (1, 173), possibly with some exaggeration, as 50 cubits (= 75 feet) thick and 200 high.

Verse 58. - The broad walls of Babylon... and her high gates. See Herod., 1:179, 181, and the parallel accounts from other authors, cited by Duncker ('Hist. of Antiquity,' 3:373, etc.), who taxes Herodotus with exaggeration, but admits as probable that the walls were not less than forty feet broad. Utterly broken; rather, destroyed even to the ground (literally, made bare). The people; rather, peoples.

51:1-58 The particulars of this prophecy are dispersed and interwoven, and the same things left and returned to again. Babylon is abundant in treasures, yet neither her waters nor her wealth shall secure her. Destruction comes when they did not think of it. Wherever we are, in the greatest depths, at the greatest distances, we are to remember the Lord our God; and in the times of the greatest fears and hopes, it is most needful to remember the Lord. The feeling excited by Babylon's fall is the same with the New Testament Babylon, Re 18:9,19. The ruin of all who support idolatry, infidelity, and superstition, is needful for the revival of true godliness; and the threatening prophecies of Scripture yield comfort in this view. The great seat of antichristian tyranny, idolatry, and superstition, the persecutor of true Christians, is as certainly doomed to destruction as ancient Babylon. Then will vast multitudes mourn for sin, and seek the Lord. Then will the lost sheep of the house of Israel be brought back to the fold of the good Shepherd, and stray no more. And the exact fulfilment of these ancient prophecies encourages us to faith in all the promises and prophecies of the sacred Scriptures.Thus saith the Lord of hosts,.... Because what follows might seem incredible ever to be effected; it is introduced with this preface, expressed by him who is the God of truth, and the Lord God omnipotent:

the broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly broken; or rased up; the foundations of them, and the ground on which they stood made naked and bare, and open to public view; everyone of the walls, the inward and the outward, as Kimchi and Ben Melech interpret it. Curtius says (s) the wall of Babylon was thirty two feet broad, and that carriages might pass by each other without any danger. Herodotus (t) says it was fifty royal cubits broad, which were three fingers larger than the common measure; and both Strabo (u) and Diodorus Siculus (w) affirm, that two chariots drawn with four horses abreast might meet each other, and pass easily; and, according to Ctesias (x), the breadth of the wall was large enough for six chariots: or the words may be read, "the walls of broad Babylon" (y); for Babylon was very large in circumference; more like a country than a city, as Aristotle (z) says. Historians differ much about the compass of its wall; but all agree it was very large; the best account, which is that of Curtius (a), makes it to be three hundred and fifty eight furlongs (about forty five miles); with Ctesias it was three hundred and sixty; and with Clitarchus three hundred and sixty five, as they are both quoted by Diodorus Siculus (b); according to Strabo (c) it was three hundred and eighty five; and according to Dion Cassius (d) four hundred; by Philostratus (e) it is said to be four hundred and eighty; as also by Herodotus; and by Julian (f) the emperor almost five hundred. Pliny (g) reckons it sixty miles:

and her high gates shall be burnt with fire; there were a hundred of them, all of brass, with their posts and hinges, as Herodotus (h) affirms:

and the people shall labour in vain, and the folk in the fire, and they shall be weary; which some understand of the builders of the walls, gates, and city of Babylon, whose labour in the issue was in vain, since the end of them was to be broken and burned; but rather it designs the Chaldeans, who laboured in the fire to extinguish and save the city and its gates, but to no purpose.

(s) Hist. l. 5. c. 1.((t) L. 1. sive Clio, c. 178. (u) Geograph l. 16. p. 508. (w) Bibl. l. 2. p. 96. (x) Apud Diodor. ib. (y) "mari Babelis lati", Schmidt. (z) Politic. l. 3. c. 3.((a) Hist. l. 5. c. 1.((b) Ut supra. (Bibl. l. 2. p. 96.) (c) Ut supra. (Geograph l. 16. p. 508.) (d) Apud Marsham Canon. p. 590. (e) Vita Apollon. l. 1. e. 18. (f) Orat. 3. p. 236. (g) Nat. Hist. l. 6. c. 26. (h) L. 1. sive Clio, c. 179.