For, behold, the LORD commands, and he will smite the great house with breaches, and the little house with clefts.
For, behold, the LORD commands, and he will smite the great house with breaches, and the little house with clefts.
For, behold, Jehovah commandeth, and the great house shall be smitten with breaches, and the little house with clefts.
For see, at the order of the Lord the great house will be full of cracks and the little house will be broken.
For behold, the LORD commandeth, and he will smite the great house with breaches, and the little house with clefts.
"For, behold, Yahweh commands, and the great house will be smashed to pieces, and the little house into bits.
For, behold, the LORD commandeth, and the great house shall be smitten with breaches, and the little house with clefts.
He will smote the great house with breaches - The great and small shall equally suffer; no distinction shall be made; rich and poor shall fall together; death has received his commission, and he will spare none. Horace has a sentiment precisely like this, Carm. Lib. i., Od. iv., 5:13.
Pallida mors aequo pulsat pede pauperum
Tabernas, Regumque Turres.
With equal pace impartial fate
Knocks at the palace as the cottage gate.
But this may refer particularly to the houses of the poor in Eastern countries; their mud walls being frequently full of clefts; the earth of which they are built seldom adhering together because of its sandiness.
The Lord commandeth and He will smite - Jerome: "If He commandeth, how doth He smite? If He smiteth, how doth He command? In that thing which He "commands" and enjoins His ministers, He Himself is seen to "smite." In Egypt the Lord declares that He killed the first-born, who, we read, were slain by "the destroyer" Exodus 12:23. The "breaches" denote probably the larger, "the cleft" the smaller ruin. The greater pile was the more greatly destroyed.
6:11 For behold - It seems to be the continued speech of him who took care of the dead, ver. 10 , God hath sent out war, famine, and pestilence. The great house - The palaces of great men shall have great breaches made in them, and the cottages of poor men shall, by lesser strokes, be ruined.