Genesis 19:13

Gen 19:13 For we will destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxen great before the face of the LORD; and the LORD hath sent us to destroy it.

Ver. 13. For we will destroy this place.] Even the good angels are God’s executioners. And the first execution they did in the world, that we read of, was upon these filthy Sodomites. So will it be, likely, at the last day. And St Peter seems to say as much. {2Pe 2:9} The Lord reserves the unjust to the day of judgment, to be punished, "but chiefly them that walk after the flesh, in the lust of uncleanness." Mark that chiefly.

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.

Gen 19:13. We will destroy this place — The holy angels are ministers of God’s wrath for the destruction of sinners, as well as of his mercy for the preservation and deliverance of his people.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

This proveth that the Angels are ministers, as well to execute God’s wrath, as to declare his favor.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

13. The Lord has sent us to destroy it. This place teaches us, that the angels are the ministers of God’s wrath, as well as of his grace. Nor does it form any objection to this statement, that elsewhere the latter service is peculiarly ascribed to holy angels: as when the Apostle says, they were appointed for the salvation of those whom God had adopted as sons. (Hebrews 1:14.) And the Scripture, in various places, testifies, that the guardianship of the pious is committed to them, (Psalm 91:11;) while, on the other hand, it declares that God executes his judgments by reprobate angels. (Psalm 78:49.) For it must be maintained, that God causes his elect angels to preside over those judgments which he executes by means of the reprobate. For it would be absurd to attribute to devils, the honor of presiding over the judgments of God, since they do not yield him voluntary obedience; but rather, while raging contumaciously against him, are yet reluctantly compelled to become his executioners. Let us therefore know, that it is not foreign to the office of elect angels, to descend armed for the purpose of executing Divine vengeance and of inflicting punishment. As the angel of the Lord destroyed, in one night, the army of Sennacherib which besieged Jerusalem, (2 Kings 19:35;) so also the angel of the Lord appeared to David with his drawn sword, when the pestilence was raging against the people. (2 Samuel 24:16.) But, as I have before said, the angels repeat what they had previously said to Abraham, concerning the cry of Sodomy that they may the more urgently impel Lot, by a detestation of the place, to take his flight, and may induce him by the fear of the wrath of God, to seek for safety.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

13. we will destroy] See Gen_19:24.

the cry of them] i.e. the cry against the people of Sodom; see note on Gen_18:20.

the Lord hath sent us] Defining the position of the men in this and the previous chapter, as distinct from, and messengers of, Jehovah.

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.

For we will destroy this place,.... Or "we are destroying it" (p), are about to do it, and will quickly and immediately do it:

because the cry of them is waxen great before the face of the Lord; the cry of the sins of the inhabitants of it, which were many, and openly, and daringly committed, and reached to heaven, and called for immediate vengeance and punishment:

and the Lord hath sent us to destroy it; by which they discovered themselves to be angels, and what their business was, to destroy Sodom; and which confutes the notion of the Jews, that they were sent on different errands; whereas it is clear from hence, these two were sent to do one and the same thing; See Gill on Gen 18:2.

(p) "disperdentes nos", Montanus; "nos perdituri mox sumus", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; so Drusius, Schmidt.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

13. We will destroy this place — Now they announce themselves as ministers of wrath to Sodom.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

We will destroy this place - The holy angels are ministers of God's wrath for the destruction of sinners, as well as of his mercy for the preservation and deliverance of his people.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

כי משחיתים.... כי גדלה צעקתם, the outcry to G’d by the victims of the cruelties of the Sodomites has become too great. In this construction the pronoun ending has been appended to the subject as well as to the predicate, just as in Isaiah 56,7 ושמחתים בבית תפלתי it has been appended to the predicate or in Isaiah 38,1 שמעתי את תפלתך where it has been appended to the subject.

לשחתה, to destroy the town, seeing the town is part of the larger region described as המקום previously.

Radak on the Tanakh — English translations: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “Eliyahu Munk, HaChut Hameshulash” (CC BY 4.0); “Rabbi Mike Feuer, Jerusalem Anthology” (CC BY 4.0); and “R. David Kimhi on the first book of Psalms, Translated by R.G. Finch, London, 1919” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.