3 Kings 17:21
And he stretched, and measured himself upon the child three times, and cried to the Lord, and said: O Lord my God, let the soul of this child, I beseech thee, return into his body.
Open 3 Kings 17:21 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Et expandit se, atque mensus est super puerum tribus vicibus, et clamavit ad Dominum, et ait : Domine Deus meus, revertatur, obsecro, anima pueri hujus in viscera ejus.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- καὶ ἐνεφύσησεν τῷ παιδαρίῳ τρίς, καὶ ἐπεκαλέσατο τὸν κύριον καὶ εἶπεν Κύριε ὁ θεός μου, ἐπιστραφήτω δὴ ἡ ψυχὴ τοῦ παιδαρίου τούτου εἰς αὐτόν.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וַיִּתְמֹדֵ֤ד עַל הַיֶּ֨לֶד֙ שָׁלֹ֣שׁ פְּעָמִ֔ים וַיִּקְרָ֥א אֶל יְהוָ֖ה וַיֹּאמַ֑ר יְהוָ֣ה אֱלֹהָ֔י תָּ֥שָׁב נָ֛א נֶֽפֶשׁ הַיֶּ֥לֶד הַזֶּ֖ה עַל קִרְבּֽוֹ
Haydock's commentary
Times, in honour of the blessed Trinity. (Menochius)
He puts himself in this posture, as if to co-operate with God in warming the child; as Eliseus did, (4 Kings iv. 34,) as well as St. Paul, (Acts xx. 10,) and St. Benedict. (St. Gregory, Dial. ii. 32.) This posture represented the condescension of Jesus Christ in assuming our nature, to give us life; and the Old Testament affords few more striking figures of this union. (Calmet) (St. Augustine, ser. 201. de Temp.; St. Bernard xvi. in Cant.) (Tirinus)
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 Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John, Chapter XV. 24, 25
2. But what is meant when, after saying, “If I had not done among them works,” He immediately added, “which none other man did”? Of a certainty, among all the works of Christ, none seem to be greater than the raising of the dead; and yet we know that the same was done by the prophets of olden time. For Elias did so; and Elisha also, both when alive in the flesh, and when he lay buried in his sepulchre. For when certain men, who were carrying a dead person, had fled thither for refuge from an onset of their enemies, and had laid him down therein, he instantly came again to life. …
St Gregory Nazianzen The Oration on Holy Baptism
XLIII. I should like to call the Father the greater, because from him flows both the Equality and the Being of the Equals (this will be granted on all hands), but I am afraid to use the word Origin, lest I should make Him the Origin of Inferiors, and thus insult Him by precedencies of honour. For the lowering of those Who are from Him is no glory to the Source. Moreover, I look with suspicion at your insatiate desire, for fear you should take hold of this word Greater, and divide the Nature, using the word Greater in all senses, whereas it does not apply to the Nature, but only to Origination. For in the Consubstantial Persons there is nothing greater or less in point of Substance. I would honour the Son as Son before the Spirit, but Baptism consecrating me through the Spirit does not allow of this. …
St Gregory Nazianzen On Pentecost
IV. And if we must also look at ancient history, I perceive that Enoch, the seventh among our ancestors, was honoured by translation. I perceive also that the twenty-first, Abraham, was given the glory of the Patriarchate, by the addition of a greater mystery. For the Hebdomad thrice repeated brings out this number. And one who is very bold might venture even to come to the New Adam, my God and Lord Jesus Christ, Who is counted the Seventy-seventh from the old Adam who fell under sin, in the backward genealogy according to Luke. And I think of the seven trumpets of Jesus, the son of Nave, and the same number of circuits and days and priests, by which the walls of Jericho were shaken down. …