John Gill's Exposition on 1 Kings 17:12

A historical reference excerpt for this verse. Read it alongside the biblical text and other available sources.

Exposition of the Old and New Testament
John Gill (1697–1771) · 18th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.

And she said, as the Lord thy God liveth, etc.] Which shows her to be a good woman, swearing by the living God, and him only, and that she took Elijah to be a good man, and a prophet of the Lord: I have not a cake; greater or less, not a morsel of bread in the house: but a handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse; these separate and unmixed, and not made into a cake, and dressed as she intended to do with them: and, behold, I am gathering two sticks; or a few, which would be sufficient to bake such a quantity as her meal and oil would make; she speaks by the figure “meiosis”, which expresses less than what is meant, as Ben Melech observes: that I may go in and dress it for me, and my son, that we may eat it, and die; having nothing more left, and no expectation of any elsewhere, and the famine strong in the land; so that she could look for nothing but death after this was eaten.

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