1 Kings 13:25

It is not to be imagined that one has been so annihilated by the teeth of a beast that his soul has then been snatched away to infernal punishment, since the same lion who killed his very body guarded it. Even the beast of burden on which the man had been riding was unhurt and with great courage stood in the presence of the wild beast at the destruction of his master. By this miraculous sign it is made clear that the man of God was corrected temporarily even at the point of death rather than that he was punished after death. On this subject the apostle Paul, when he had made mention of certain unpleasant infirmities and death experienced by many, said, "But if we judged ourselves, we should not thus be judged by the Lord. But when we are judged, we are being chastised by the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world."

We know that even saintly men have been given over in the flesh to Satan and to great afflictions for some very slight faults, since the divine mercy will not tolerate the very least spot or stain to be found in them on the day of judgment, and purges away in this world every spot of their filth, as the prophet, or rather God himself says, in order that he may commit them to eternity as gold or silver refined and needing no penal purification. "And," he says,"I will clean purge away your dross, and I will take away all your sin; and after this you will be called the city of the just, a faithful city." And again: "Just as silver and gold are tried in the furnace, so the Lord chooses hearts." 18 And again: "The fire tries gold and silver, but man is tried in the furnace of humiliation." And this also: "For the Lord chastens those whom he loves, and he disciplines every son whom he receives." We see a clear instance of this in the case of the prophet and man of God in the third book of Kings who was immediately destroyed by a lion for a single disobedience, in which he was implicated not of set purpose nor by the fault of his own will but by the enticement of another. As the Scripture says of him: "It is the man of God, who disobeyed the word of the Lord, and the Lord delivered him to the lion, and it killed him according to the word of the Lord, which he spoke." The punishment for his present offense and his careless error—together with the reward for his righteousness—for which the Lord gave over his prophet in this world to the destroyer appeared in the moderation and abstinence of the beast of prey, when that most savage creature did not dare even to taste the carcass that was given over to him.

Through the words "a lion killed him" [the Scripture] shows that [the lion] strangled and killed him according to God's command. And through the sentence "it did not eat him," it shows that [the animal] was not urged by hunger but acted in compliance with …

And, behold, men passed by,.... Travellers on the road; nor did the lion offer to seize on them, nor desert the carcass upon their approach: and saw the carcass cast in the way, and the lion standing by the carcass; as before described: and they came and told it in the city where the old prophet dwelt; which was Bethel, by which means he came to have knowledge of it.

His commission was to kill the prophet; hitherto he should go, but no further. Thus God showed that, though he was angry with him, his anger was turned away, and the punishment went no further than death.