2 Kings 11:15
Writing in the letter: Set ye Urias in the front of the battle, where the fight is strongest: and leave ye him, that he may be wounded and die.
Open 2 Kings 11:15 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- scribens in epistola : Ponite Uriam ex adverso belli, ubi fortissimum est prælium : et derelinquite eum, ut percussus intereat.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- καὶ ἔγραψεν ἐν βιβλίῳ λέγων Εἰσάγαγε τὸν Οὐρείαν ἐξ ἐναντίας τοῦ πολέμου τοῦ κραταιοῦ, καὶ ἀποστραφήσεσθε ἀπὸ ὄπισθεν αὐτοῦ, καὶ πληγήσεται καὶ ἀποθανεῖται.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וַיִּכְתֹּ֥ב בַּסֵּ֖פֶר לֵאמֹ֑ר הָב֣וּ אֶת אֽוּרִיָּ֗ה אֶל מוּל֙ פְּנֵ֤י הַמִּלְחָמָה֙ הַֽחֲזָקָ֔ה וְשַׁבְתֶּ֥ם מֵאַחֲרָ֖יו וְנִכָּ֥ה וָמֵֽת
Haydock's commentary
Die. We no longer behold the genius of that David who would not hurt his persecutor. What a change does a shameful passion introduce in the whole conduct of a man! and how does one false step conduct from one abyss to another! Proprium humani ingenii est odisse quem læseris. (Tacitus)
David could no longer bear the sight of a man whom he had injured so grievously. (Calmet)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Augustine Reply to Faustus the Manichæan, Faustus states his objections to the morality of the law and the prophets, and Augustin seeks by the application of the type and the allegory to explain away the moral difficulties of the Old Testament
5. Again, we are not responsible for what is said of Abraham, that in his irrational craving to have children, and not believing God, who promised that his wife Sara should have a son, he defiled himself with a mistress, with the knowledge of his wife, which only made it worse; or that, in sacrilegious profanation of his marriage, he on different occasions, from avarice and greed, sold his wife Sara for the gratification of the kings Abimelech and Pharas, telling them that she was his sister, because she was very fair. …
St Augustine Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Psalm LI
2. For there is written over it the title thereof, “A Psalm of David himself, when there came to him Nathan the prophet, when he went in unto Bersabee.” Bersabee was a woman, wife of another. With grief indeed we speak, and with trembling; but yet God would not have to be hushed what He hath willed to be written. I will say then not what I will, but what I am obliged; I will say not as one exhorting to imitation, but as one instructing you to fear. Captivated with this woman’s beauty, the wife of another, the king and prophet David, from whose seed according to the flesh the Lord was to come, committed adultery with her. This thing in this Psalm is not read, but in the title thereof it appeareth; but in the book of Kings it is more fully read. Both Scriptures are canonical, to both without any doubt by Christians credit must be given. The sin was committed, and was written down. …
St Augustine Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Psalm LI
9. “Against Thee alone have I sinned, and before Thee an evil thing have I done” ( ver. 4 ). What is this? For before men was not another’s wife debauched and husband slain? Did not all men know what David had done? What is, “Against Thee alone have I sinned, and before Thee an evil thing have I done.” Because Thou alone art without sin. He is a just punisher that hath nothing in Him to be punished; He is a just reprover that hath nothing in Him to be reproved. “That thou mayest be justified in Thy sayings, and conquer when Thou art judged.” To whom he speaketh, brethren, to whom he speaketh, is difficult to understand. To God surely he speaketh, and it is evident that God the Father is not judged. What is, “And conquer when Thou art judged”? He seeth the future Judge to be judged, one just by sinners to be judged, and therein conquering, because in Him was nothing to be judged. …