The interpretation timeline

Exod 17:4

How this passage has been read — the sources, oldest to newest.

From the early Church Fathers to now.

Exod 17:4 · Douay-Rheims

“And Moses cried to the Lord, saying: What shall I do to this people? Yet a little more and they will stone me.”

Patristic before A.D. 750

420

A.D.

Jerome Patristic

c. A.D. 347–420

“When [Moses] was being stoned by the people, he made intercession for them. Even more so he wished to be blotted out of God's book sooner than that the flock committed to him should perish. He sought to imitate the Shepherd who would, he knew, carry on his shoulders even the wandering sheep.”

Source

Modern · 1953 →

The in-app commentary runs from the Fathers to the early-modern record, then stops — that's where the public-domain sources end, not where the reading does. For the modern reading, follow the sources directly.