Bible Strands
Genesis 19:17
As soon as the men had brought them out, one of them said, “Run for your lives! Do not look back, and do not stop anywhere on the plain! Flee to the mountains, or you will be swept away!”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — One of the angels who extracted Lot's family commands him and his relatives to flee immediately. He issues this directive the moment they stand outside Sodom, just before the city's destruction begins.
The words — The imperative הִמָּלֵט (hi.malèt) literally means "escape" or "deliver yourself," directed at נַפְשֶׁךָ (nafshekha), "your life." This pairing links physical flight with the preservation of survival.
The thread — The command to flee to the mountains echoes in Matthew 24:16, while the prohibition against looking back anticipates Luke 9:62 and Philippians 3:13. These passages reuse the motif of urgent, unhesitating departure from judgment.
Why it lands — The text demands immediate obedience without hesitation or attachment to the past. It requires the reader to prioritize survival and forward motion over lingering or bargaining.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And it came to pass, when they had brought them forth abroad, that he said, Escape for thy life; look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed.
Cross-references
- Matthew 24:16 then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.
- Luke 9:62 Then Jesus declared, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and then looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
- Philippians 3:13 Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,
- Genesis 19:26 But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.
- Genesis 19:22 Hurry! Run there quickly, for I cannot do anything until you reach it.” That is why the town was called Zoar.
- Matthew 3:7 But when John saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his place of baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?
- Luke 17:31 On that day, let no one on the housetop come down to retrieve his possessions. Likewise, let no one in the field return for anything he has left behind.
- Jeremiah 48:6 ‘Flee! Run for your lives! Become like a juniper in the desert.’
- Genesis 13:10 And Lot looked out and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan, all the way to Zoar, was well watered like the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt. (This was before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.)
- 1 Kings 19:3 And Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant there,