(14) I will kindle a fire in the forest thereof.--The "forest" thus referred to may be either literally the woods, then covering a larger surface than in later times, at Kirjath-jearim (Psalm 132:6; 1Samuel 7:2), or the wood of the lone wilderness of Ziph (1Samuel 23:15), or the valley of Rephaim (2Samuel 5:22), or, figuratively, the royal palace, which, from its cedar columns (1Kings 7:2; 1Kings 10:21), was known as "the house of the forest of Lebanon." (Comp. the comparison of the king's house to "Gilead and the head of Lebanon," in Jeremiah 22:6.) The desolation wrought by an invading army such as that of Nebuchadnezzar, cutting down the "choice fir-trees of Lebanon and the forest of Carmel" (2Kings 19:23), showed itself in this destruction of forests in its most conspicuous form, and explains the comparative scarcity of trees in modern Palestine. So Assur-nasirpal narrates, in the history of his conquests, how he had cut down the pine, box, cypress, and other trees of the forest (Records of the Past, iii. p. 74).

Verse 14. - In the forest thereof; i.e. in the forest of houses (comp. Jeremiah 22:6, 7).

21:11-14 The wickedness of the king and his family was the worse because of their relation to David. They were urged to act with justice, at once, lest the Lord's anger should be unquenchable. If God be for us, who can be against us? But if he be against us, who can do any thing for us?But I will punish you according to the fruit of your doings,

saith the Lord,.... The situation of their city, and the strength of its fortifications, however sufficient they might be thought to keep out an enemy from annoying them; yet it was impossible to hinder the Lord's coming among them, as he here threatens to do; and "visit" them, as the word signifies, in a way of wrath and justice, according to the demerit of their sins, expressed by "the fruit of their doings"; their punishment was the reward of their unrighteousness, the effect of their sinful practices; and, though this was dreadful and terrible, they could not but own it was just and equitable:

and I will kindle a fire in the forest thereof; not in the forest of Lebanon, but in the city of Jerusalem; whose houses stood as thick as trees in a forest, and which many of them, at least the most stately, might be built or ceiled with cedars from Mount Lebanon and its forest; though some understand this of the cities and towns about Jerusalem; and so the Targum renders it, "in its cities"; and the Syriac version, "its towns"; but these seem rather meant in the following clause:

and it shall devour all things round about it; the mountains and trees upon them, the cities and towns adjacent.