This afternoon, my good wife asked me a simple question. “Where does it say God is a father to the fatherless and a husband to the widow?” As I was sitting at the computer, tethered to that fount of all knowledge, the InterWeb, I looked it up. “A father to the fatherless” comes from Psalm 68:5, but the phrase that follows is either a judge or defender of the widow depending on your translation. Looking up the Hebrew word in question, I see that judge, advocate, and defender are the ideas at hand, close to but not actually a husband. A couple verses in Deuteronomy speak of God the Father’s intent to protect widows and bring justice to those who would harm them. Where is the phrase “husband to the widow?” It doesn’t appear to be in the Bible, unless it came from an old translation which is no longer in use.<\/p>\n
More irritating than not finding a quotation you felt strongly about is finding a couple articles which claim to have read the verse. A couple writers said, “I came across a verse that said that God is a husband to the widow and a father to the fatherless.” No reference, of course, but how can people write so carelessly that they don’t double check or reference their biblical quotations?<\/p>\n
Or did I just not find the right verse? Any idea where this phrase “husband to the window” came from?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This afternoon, my good wife asked me a simple question. “Where does it say God is a father to the fatherless and a husband to the widow?” As I was sitting at the computer, tethered to that fount of all knowledge, the InterWeb, I looked it up. “A father to the fatherless” comes from Psalm … Continue reading When Is a Biblical Quotation Not a Quote from the Bible?<\/span>