3 Kings 19:13
And when Elias heard it, he covered his face with his mantle, and coming forth stood in the entering in of the cave, and behold a voice unto him, saying: What dost thou here, Elias? And he answered:
Open 3 Kings 19:13 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Quod cum audisset Elias, operuit vultum suum pallio, et egressus stetit in ostio speluncæ. Et ecce vox ad eum dicens : Quid hic agis, Elia ? Et ille respondit :
- Septuagint (Swete)
- καὶ ἐγένετο ὡς ἤκουσεν Ἠλειού, καὶ ἐπεκάλυψεν τὸ πρόσωπον αὐτοῦ ἐν τῇ μηλωτῇ ἑαυτοῦ, καὶ ἐξῆλθεν καὶ ἔστη ὑπὸ σπὴλαιον· καὶ ἰδοὺ πρὸς αὐτὸν φωνὴ καὶ εἶπεν Τί σὺ ἐνταῦθα, Ἠλειού;
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וַיְהִ֣י כִּשְׁמֹ֣עַ אֵלִיָּ֗הוּ וַיָּ֤לֶט פָּנָיו֙ בְּאַדַּרְתּ֔וֹ וַיֵּצֵ֕א וַֽיַּעֲמֹ֖ד פֶּ֣תַח הַמְּעָרָ֑ה וְהִנֵּ֤ה אֵלָיו֙ ק֔וֹל וַיֹּ֕אמֶר מַה לְּךָ֥ פֹ֖ה אֵלִיָּֽהוּ
Haydock's commentary
Mantle, out of respect, like Moses, Exodus iii. 6. So the cherubim veil their faces with their wings, Isaias vi. 2. (Menochius)
Among the Orientals, to cover the face has the same import as when we pull of our hats. (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
Tertullian On Fasting, Chapter VI
On the other hand, he whose “heart” was habitually found “lifted up” rather than fattened up, who in forty days and as many nights maintained a fast above the power of human nature, while spiritual faith subministered strength (to his body), both saw with his eyes God’s glory, and heard with his ears God’s voice, and understood with his heart God’s law: while He taught him even then (by experience) that man liveth not upon bread alone, but upon every word of God; in that the People, though fatter than he, could not constantly contemplate even Moses himself, fed as he had been upon God, nor his leanness, sated as it had been with His glory! Deservedly, therefore, even while in the flesh, did the Lord show Himself to him, the colleague of His own fasts, no less than to Elijah. …
St Jerome The Letters of St. Jerome, To Ageruchia
Jacob in his flight from his brother left behind in his father’s house great riches and made his way with nothing into Mesopotamia. Moreover, to prove to us his powers of endurance, he took a stone for his pillow. Yet as he lay there he beheld a ladder set up on the earth reaching to heaven and behold the Lord stood above it, and the angels ascended and descended on it; the lesson being thus taught that the sinner must not despair of salvation nor the righteous man rest secure in his virtue. To pass over much of the story (for there is no time to explain all the points in the narrative) after twenty years he who before had passed over Jordan with his staff returned into his native land with three droves of cattle, rich in flocks and herds and richer still in children. …