Psalms 104:17
He sent a man before them: Joseph, who was sold for a slave.
Open Psalms 104:17 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Misit ante eos virum : in servum venumdatus est, Joseph.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- ἀπέστειλεν ἔμπροσθεν αὐτῶν ἄνθρωπον, εἰς δοῦλον ἐπράθη Ἰωσήφ.
- Hebrew (WLC) shown from Psalms 105:17
- שָׁלַ֣ח לִפְנֵיהֶ֣ם אִ֑ישׁ לְ֝עֶ֗בֶד נִמְכַּ֥ר יוֹסֵֽף
Haydock's commentary
He sent. Drawing good from the malice of Joseph's brethren, (Haydock) in which he had no hand. (Berthier)
Who could have thought that this event would have tended to Joseph's exaltation, and to the safety of his father's house?
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 Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Psalm CV
11. “But He had sent a man before them” ( ver. 17 ). What man? “Even Joseph.” How did He send him? “Joseph was sold to be a bond-servant.” When this happened, it was the sin of his brethren, and, nevertheless, God sent Joseph into Egypt. We should therefore meditate on this important and necessary subject, how God useth well the evil works of men, as they on the other hand use ill the good works of God.
St John Cassian The Conferences of John Cassian. Part II. Containing Conferences XI-XVII, Chapter XI. Whether the grace of God precedes or follows our good will
And so these are somehow mixed up and indiscriminately confused, so that among many persons, which depends on the other is involved in great questionings, i.e., does God have compassion upon us because we have shown the beginning of a good will, or does the beginning of a good will follow because God has had compassion upon us? For many believing each of these and asserting them more widely than is right are entangled in all kinds of opposite errors. …