Matthew Henry on Judges 13:15-23
We have here an account,
I. Of what further passed between Manoah and the angel at this interview. It was in kindness to him that while the angel was with him it was concealed from him that he was an angel; for, had he known it, it would have been such a terror to him that he durst not have conversed with him as he did (Jdg 13:16): He knew not that he was an angel. So Christ was in the world, and the world knew him not. Verily thou art a God that hidest thyself. We could not bear the sight of the divine glory unveiled. God having determined to speak to us by men like ourselves, prophets and ministers, even when he spoke by his angels, or by his Son, they appeared in the likeness of men, and…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Judges 13:17
Manoah said unto the angel . . ., What is thy name?--Manoah's request elicited the most unequivocal proofs of the divinity of his supernatural visitor--in his name "secret" (in the Margin, "wonderful"), and in the miraculous flame that betokened the acceptance of the sacrifice.
John Gill on Judges 13:19
So Manoah took a kid with a meat offering,.... The kid which he proposed to make an entertainment with, for the man of God, he took him to be, he fetched and brought for a burnt offering, at the hint which the angel had given him, and joined to it a meat offering, as was usual whenever burnt offerings were made; see Numbers 15:3,
and offered it upon a rock unto the Lord; for though Manoah was not a priest, nor was this a proper place for sacrifice; high places were now forbidden, and only at the tabernacle in Shiloh were offerings to be brought; yet all this was dispensed with, and Manoah was justified in what he did by the warrant of the angel, Judges 13:16. The rock was probably near the…
Read the whole note in the consoleKeil & Delitzsch on Judges 13:19-20
Manoah then took the kid and the minchah, i.e., according to Num 15:4., the meat-offering belonging to the burnt-offering, and offered it upon the rock, which is called an altar in Jdg 13:20, because the angel of the Lord, who is of one nature with God, had sanctified it as an altar through the miraculous acceptance of the sacrifice. לעשׁות מפלא, "and wonderfully (miraculously) did he act" (הפליא followed by the infinitive with ל as in Ch2 26:15). These words form a circumstantial clause, which is not to be attached, however, to the subject of the principal clause, but to ליהוה: "Manoah offered the sacrifice to the Lord, whereupon He acted to do wonderfully, i.e., He performed a wonder or mi…
