27 He said, "If Yahweh doesn't help you, from where could I help you? From of the threshing floor, or from the winepress?"
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
If the Lord do not help - The translation in the text is decidedly better than the marginal rendering. Some prefer to render - "Nay let Jehovah help thee. Whence, shall I help thee?"
Out of the barnfloor - The king means that both were empty - that he had no longer any food in store; and therefore could not help the woman. Compare Hosea 9:2.
If the Lord do not help thee - Some read this as an imprecation, May God save thee not! how can I save thee?
And he said, If the LORD do not help thee, whence shall I help thee? out of the (o) barnfloor, or out of the winepress?
(o) Meaning, any kind of food as corn and wine.
And he said, if the Lord do not help thee, whence shall I help thee?.... Mistaking her meaning, as if she prayed him to relieve her hunger; the margin of our Bible is, "let not the Lord save thee"; and so some understand it as a wish that she might perish; and so Josephus (o), that being wroth, he cursed her in the name of God:
out of the barn floor, or out of the winepress? when neither of them afforded anything; no corn was to be had from the one, nor wine from the other, no, not for his own use, and therefore how could he help her out of either?
(o) Ut supra. (Antiqu. l. 9. c. 4. sect. 4.)
Whence shall I help thee - Dost thou ask of me corn or wine, which I want for myself? If God does not, I cannot help thee. Creatures are helpless things without God. Every creature is all that, and only that which God makes it to be.
*More commentary available at chapter level.