1 Kings 20:42

WEB

He said to him, "Thus says the Lord, 'Because you have let go out of your hand the man whom I had devoted to destruction, therefore your life shall go for his life, and your people for his people.'"

KJV

And he said unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Because thou hast let go out of thy hand a man whom I appointed to utter destruction, therefore thy life shall go for his life, and thy people for his people.

Commentary

And he said unto him, thus saith the Lord,.... He spake not his own sense, and in his own words, but in the name of the Lord, for which he had authority, that it might have the greater weight with Ahab: because thou hast let go out of thy hand a man whom I appointed to utter destruction; meaning Benhadad; or "the man of my anathema or curse" (w); cursed of God for his blasphemy of him, and devoted by him to ruin on that account; or "of my net" (x), being by his providence brought into a net or noose at Aphek, out of which he could not have escaped, had not Ahab let him go: therefore thy life shall go for his life; as it shortly did, and that by the hand of a Syrian soldier, Kg1 22:34 , and thy people for his people; which was fulfilled by Hazael king of Syria, the sins of Israel rendering them deserving of the calamities they endured by his means, see Kg2 8:12 . (w) "vir anathematis mei", Montanus, Piscator. (x) "Vir retis mei"; so some in Vatablus.