1 Kings 14:11

Him that dieth of Jeroboam in the city shall the dogs eat; and him that dieth in the field shall the fowls of the air eat: for the LORD hath spoken it.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(11) Him that dieth.—The same judgment is repeated in 1Kings 16:4; 1Kings 21:24. (Comp. also Jeremiah 36:30.) The “dogs” are the half-wild’ dogs, the scavengers of every Eastern city; the “fowls of the air” the vultures and other birds of prey. In ancient times the natural horror of insult to the remains of the dead was often intensified by the idea, that in some way the denial of the rites of burial would inflict suffering or privation on the departed soul. Whether such ideas may have lingered in the minds of the Israelites we have no means of knowing. But certainly their whole system of law and ritual was calculated to give due honour to the body in life, as consecrated to God; and this would naturally tend to teach them that the body was a part of the true man, and therefore to deepen the repugnance, with which all reverent feeling regards outrage on the dead.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

14:7-20 Whether we keep an account of God's mercies to us or not, he does; and he will set them in order before us, if we are ungrateful, to our greater confusion. Ahijah foretells the speedy death of the child then sick, in mercy to him. He only in the house of Jeroboam had affection for the true worship of God, and disliked the worship of the calves. To show the power and sovereignty of his grace, God saves some out of the worst families, in whom there is some good thing towards the Lord God of Israel. The righteous are removed from the evil to come in this world, to the good to come in a better world. It is often a bad sign for a family, when the best in it are buried out of it. Yet their death never can be a loss to themselves. It was a present affliction to the family and kingdom, by which both ought to have been instructed. God also tells the judgments which should come upon the people of Israel, for conforming to the worship Jeroboam established. After they left the house of David, the government never continued long in one family, but one undermined and destroyed another. Families and kingdoms are ruined by sin. If great men do wickedly, they draw many others, both into the guilt and punishment. The condemnation of those will be severest, who must answer, not only for their own sins, but for sins others have been drawn into, and kept in, by them.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The dogs are the chief scavengers of Oriental cities (compare Psalm 59:6, Psalm 59:14). And the vulture is the chief scavenger in the country districts, assisted sometimes by kites and crows (see Job 39:27-30, where the vulture, not the eagle, is intended). Vultures are very abundant in Palestine.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

10, 11. I will bring evil upon the house of Jeroboam—Strong expressions are here used to indicate the utter extirpation of his house;

him that is shut up and left in Israel—means those who were concealed with the greatest privacy, as the heirs of royalty often are where polygamy prevails; the other phrase, from the loose garments of the East having led to a different practice from what prevails in the West, cannot refer to men; it must signify either a very young boy, or rather, perhaps, a dog, so entire would be the destruction of Jeroboam's house that none, not even a dog, belonging to it should escape. This peculiar phrase occurs only in regard to the threatened extermination of a family (1Sa 25:22-34). See the manner of extermination (1Ki 16:4; 21:24).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

So both sorts shall die unburied.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Him that dieth of Jeroboam in the city shall the dogs eat, and him that dieth in the fields shall the fowls of the air eat,.... The meaning is, that they should have no burial:

for the Lord hath spoken it; and therefore shall be fulfilled, for what he hath said he will do, Numbers 23:19.

Geneva Study Bible

Him that dieth of Jeroboam in the city shall the dogs eat; and him that dieth in the field shall the fowls of the air eat: {i} for the LORD hath spoken it.

(i) They will lack the honour of burial in token of God's curse.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

11. shall the dogs eat] It was this circumstance which rendered it so horrible to the Oriental mind to be cast out unburied. The dogs of an Eastern city were many and devoured all they found.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 11. - Him that dieth of Jeroboam [Heb. to Jeroboam, i.e., belonging to, of the house cf. "Of Jeroboam," conveys the idea of his seed. It is possible that his wife shared in the general doom], in the city shall the dogs eat; and him that dieth in the field shall the fowls of the air [Heb. heavens, as in Genesis 1:26; Genesis 2:19; Genesis 7:23, etc.] eat [This was a terrible threat to a Jew - that the dead body should fall a prey to dogs and wild beasts. Cf. Psalm 79:2; Jeremiah 7:33; Jeremiah 16:4; Jeremiah 34:20; Ezekiel 29:5, etc. For him it had a factitious horror, because of the threatening of Deuteronomy 28:26; cf. Revelation 19:17, 18. It was, therefore, the climax of disgrace and misfortune; the greatest dishonour that could be offered to the dust and to the memory. Hence the threat of David (1 Samuel 17:46; cf. ver. 44); hence the devotion of Rizpah (2 Samuel 21:10), and the complaint of the Psalmist (Psalm 79:2). Cf. Homer, Iliad 1:4, 5.

"Whose limbs, unburied on the naked shore,
Devouring dogs and hungry vultures tore." Dogs, it is well known, are the scavengers of Eastern cities. They exist there in great numbers, and in a semi-savage state, and the carcases of animals and carrion of all sorts are left for them to consume, which they do most effectually, roaming the streets all night (Psalm 59:6, 14) in search of garbage. Vultures and other birds of prey perform a similar office in the open country (Job 39:29, 30; Matthew 24:28)]: for the Lord hath spoken it. 1 Kings 14:11

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The saying was as follows: "Therefore, because thou hast exalted thyself from the people, and I have made thee prince over my people Israel (cf., 1 Kings 11:31), ... but thou hast not been as my servant David, who kept my commandments...(cf., 1 Kings 11:34), and hast done worse than all who were before thee (judices nimirum et duces Israelis - Cler.), and hast gone and hast made thyself other gods (contrary to the express command in Exodus 20:2-3), ... and hast cast me behind thy back: therefore I bring misfortune upon the house of Jeroboam," etc. The expression, to cast God behind the back, which only occurs here and in Ezekiel 23:35, denotes the most scornful contempt of God, the strict opposite of "keeping God before the eyes and in the heart." בּקיר משׁתּין, every male person; see at 1 Samuel 25:22. A synonymous expression is ועזוּב עצוּר, the fettered (i.e., probably the married) and the free (or single); see at Deuteronomy 32:36. "In Israel," i.e., in the kingdom of the ten tribes. The threat is strengthened by the clause in 1 Kings 14:10, "and I will sweep out after the house of Jeroboam, as one sweepeth out dung, even to the end," which expresses shameful and utter extermination; and this threat is still further strengthened in 1 Kings 14:11 by the threat added from Deuteronomy 28:26, that of those cut off not one is to come to the grave, but their bodies are to be devoured by the dogs and birds of prey, - the worst disgrace that could befall the dead. Instead of wild beasts (Deuteronomy 28:26) the dogs are mentioned here, because in the East they wander out in the streets without owners, and are so wild and ravenous that they even devour corpses (vid., Harmar, Beobachtungen, i. p. 198). לירבעם with ל of relationship, equivalent to of those related to Jeroboam. It is the same in 1 Kings 14:13.