He answered them, “Which of you, if your son or an ox fell into a well, wouldn’t immediately pull him out on a Sabbath day?”
Parallel Translations
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He answered them, “Which of you, if your son or an ox fell into a well, wouldn’t immediately pull him out on a Sabbath day?”
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and answered the sayinge whiche of you shall have an asse or an oxe fallen into a pitt and will not strayght waye pull him out on the Saboth daye?
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And answered them, saying, Which of you shall haue an asse, or an oxe fallen into a pit, and wil not straightway pull him out on the Sabbath day?
Cross-references (3)
Passages linked to Luke 14:5 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Luke 13:15 Therefore the Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each one of you free his ox or his donkey from the stall on the Sabbath, and lead him away to water?
- Exodus 23:4-5 “If you meet your enemy’s ox or his donkey going astray, you shall surely bring it back to him again. If you see the donkey of him who hates you fallen down under his burden, don’t leave him. You shall surely help him with it.
- Matthew 12:11-12 He said to them, “What man is there among you, who has one sheep, and if this one falls into a pit on the Sabbath day, won’t he grab on to it, and lift it out? Of how much more value then is a man than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath day.”
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (11 sources)
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 5 And answered them, saying, Which of you shall…
5 And answered them, saying, Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the sabbath day?
Ver. 5. Pull him out on the sabbath day] The Jew of Tewkesbury, that would not be pulled out of the outhouse whereinto he fell on their sabbath day, perished deservedly.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain And answered them, saying,.... Murmuring secretly at what he…
And answered them, saying,.... Murmuring secretly at what he had done:
which of you shall have an ass, or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the sabbath day? being just ready to be drowned there; and therefore it must be much more right and necessary to cure a man, a reasonable creature, just drowning with a dropsy, as this man was. The Syriac and Persic versions, instead of "an ass", read "a son", very wrongly: a like kind of reasoning is used by Christ, in See Gill on Mat 12:11, Luk 13:15.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 5. An ass or an ox] See Clarke…
Verse 5. An ass or an ox] See Clarke on Lu 13:15.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Luk 14:5-6. And answered them — Accordingly, while the…
Luk 14:5-6. And answered them — Accordingly, while the Pharisees were considering with themselves how to turn the miracle against him, he disconcerted them by proving the lawfulness of what he had done from their own practice. Which of you shall have an ass, &c., fallen into a pit on the sabbath day — Will you, for fear of breaking the sabbath, let it pass before ye attempt to draw the beast out? and not rather make all the haste you can to save its life, though it should cost you a great deal of work? But the labour of this cure was barely that Jesus laid his hand on the man. His argument, therefore, was what the grossest stupidity could not overlook, nor the most virulent malice contradict. Our Lord had used the same reasoning before, almost in the same words, when vindicating the cure of the man whose hand was withered, Mat 12:14; and at another time had urged an argument in effect the same, with regard to the cure of the crooked woman, Luk 13:15. Which may serve, among a variety of other instances, to vindicate several repetitions which must be supposed, if we desire to assert the exact and circumstantial truth of the sacred historians. And they could not answer him again — What he said was so consonant to common sense, and common practice, that they had not a word to reply. They were much ashamed, therefore, and vexed at their disappointment, having gathered themselves together, and invited him in with a design to insnare him.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain See the notes at Mat 12:11.
See the notes at Mat 12:11.
Which of you ... - In this way Jesus refuted the notion of the Pharisees. If it was lawful to save an ox on the Sabbath, it was also to save the life of a man. To this the Jews had nothing to answer.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain By this example Christ convicts his adversaries, as guilty…
By this example Christ convicts his adversaries, as guilty of sordid avarice, since, in delivering beasts from the danger of perishing on the sabbath-day, they consult only their own advantage, whilst he was only employed in an act of charity towards his neighbour; an action they seemed so warmly to condemn. (Ven. Bede)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 5. Fallen into a pit—Our Lord used the instance…
5. Fallen into a pit—Our Lord used the instance of unloosing the beast in defending his loosing the bonds of a daughter of Abraham. He uses this instance of relieving the beast from the well in this case of the man saved from the watery disease.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 5. an ass or an ox] The unquestionable reading…
5. an ass or an ox] The unquestionable reading if we are to follow the MSS. is ‘a son or an ox.’ The strangeness of the collocation (which however may be taken to imply ‘a son—nay even an ox’) has led to the conjectural emendation of huios into ois ‘a sheep’ (whence the reading probaton ‘a sheep’ in D) or onos ‘an ass’ which was suggested by Deu_22:4. When however it is a question between two readings it is an almost invariable rule that the more difficult is to be preferred as the more likely to have been tampered with. Further (i) Scripture never has “ass and ox” but always “ox and ass and (ii) “son” is a probable allusion to Exo_23:12, “thine ox and thine ass and the son of thine handmaid shall rest on the sabbath,” and (iii) the collocation ‘son and ox’ is actually found in some Rabbinic parallels. If it be said that ‘a son falling into a well’ is an unusual incident, the answer seems to be that it may be an allusion to the man’s disease (dropsy=the watery disease); also that pits and wells are so common and often so unprotected in Palestine that the incident must have been less rare than it is among us.
straightway pull him out] although the Sabbath labour thus involved would be considerable. And why would they do this? because they had been taught, and in their better mind distinctly felt, that mercy was above the ceremonial law (Deu_22:4). An instance which had happened not many years before shews how completely they were blinding and stultifying their own better instincts in their Sabbath quibblings against our Lord. When Hillel—then a poor porter—had been found half-frozen under masses of snow in the window of the lecture-room of Shemaiah and Abtalion where he had hidden himself to profit by their wisdom because he had been unable to earn the small fee for entrance, they had rubbed and resuscitated him though it was the Sabbath day, and had said that he was one for whose sake it was well worth while to break the Sabbath.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (5) Which of you shall have an ass or…
(5) Which of you shall have an ass or an ox . . .—The line of thought is all but identical with that of Luk_13:15. Here, as there, the outward features of Jewish life are the same as they had been in Exo_20:17, and Isa_1:3. The “ox and the ass” are the beasts which common men use and value. The horse belongs to conquerors and kings. This is said with reference to the received text. Many of the best MSS., however, read, “Which of you shall have a son, or an ox . . .?” and, on the whole, this reading seems likely to be the true one. The familiar combination of the ox and the ass would naturally lead a transcriber to substitute ῠνος (ass) for ὑιός (son). There would be nothing to tempt any one to a change in the opposite direction.
Fallen into a pit.—Literally, into a well, as in Joh_4:6-11, but the word was applied also, as in Rev_9:1-2, to “wells without water”—i.e., as here, to “pits.”
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And will not straightway pull him out.—The words appeal to the common action and natural impulse of men, but the casuistry of the Pharisees had, as a matter of fact, given a different answer. Food might be let down to the ox or ass, but no effort to pull him out was to be made till the Sabbath rest was over.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain And answered them, saying, Which of you shall have…
And answered them, saying, Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the sabbath day? Most of the older authorities here, instead of" an ass or an ox," read "a son or an ox." The difference here in the reading without doubt arises from the perplexity which was felt in very early days over the strangeness of the collocation of "a son and an ox." This is the reading, however, which, according to all the acknowledged principles of criticism, we must consider the true one. The meaning is clear. "If thy son, or even, to take a very different comparison, thy ox, were to fall into a pit, wouldn"t you," etc.? How the sophistries of the scribes and the perplexing traditions of the Jerusalem rabbis on their sabbath restrictions must have been torn asunder by the act of mercy and power performed, and the words of Divine wisdom spoken by the Physician-Teacher of Galilee! The noble instincts even of the jealous Pharisees must have been for a moment stirred. Even they, at times, rose above the dreary, lightless teaching with which the rabbinical schools had so marred the old Divine Law. Dr. Farrar quotes a traditional instance of this. "When Hillel afterwards the great rabbi and head of the famous school which bore his name a poor porter, had been found half-frozen under masses of snow in the window of the lecture room of Shemaiah and Abtation, where he had hidden himself, to profit by their wisdom, because he had been unable to earn the small fee for entrance, they had rubbed and resuscitated him, though it was the sabbath day, and had said that he was one for whose sake it was well worth while to break the sabbath."
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 14:5 Jesus pointed out the Pharisees’ hypocrisy. See also…
14:5 Jesus pointed out the Pharisees’ hypocrisy. See also study note on 13:15-16.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.