And he went and found his carcass cast in the way, and the donkey and the lion standing by the carcass: the lion had not eaten the carcass, nor torn the donkey.
All Commentaries on 1 Kings 13:28 Go To 1 Kings 13
John Cassian
AD 435
Moreover, we know that even holy men have been given over bodily to Satan or to great sufferings on account of some slight sins. For the divine clemency does not permit the least blemish or stain to be found in them on the day of judgment. According to the words of the prophet, which are in fact God’s, he purges away all the dross of their uncleanness in the present so that he may bring them to eternity like fire-tried gold or silver, in need of no penal cleansing. “And I will,” he says, “utterly purge away your dross, and I will remove all your alloy. And after this you shall be called the city of the righteous, the faithful city.” And again: “Just as silver and gold are tried in a furnace, so the Lord chooses hearts.” And again: “Fire tries gold and silver, but a man is tried in the furnace of humiliation.” And this also: “The Lord chastises the one whom he loves, and he scourges every son whom he receives.” In the Third Book of Kings we see this clearly exemplified in the case of that prophet and man of God who was immediately destroyed by a lion because of a single sin of disobedience that he contracted not even out of the workings or the viciousness of his own will but through another’s deceptive behavior. Scripture says of him, “That is the man of God who was disobedient to the word of the Lord, and the Lord delivered him over to a lion, and it destroyed him, according to the word of the Lord which he spoke.” When this happened, the very sparingness and abstinence of the predator (for the voracious beast did not dare to eat anything at all of the corpse that had fallen to him) appeared as not only the punishment for his present offense and heedless error but also as the deserts of his righteousness, on account of which the Lord delivered over his prophet for a time to the tormenter.
