1 Kings 3:27

Give her the living child Not referring to the woman who had last spoken as the sequence of the clauses might lead us to expect. The king no doubt pointed to the mother who was desirous at all cost to keep the child alive.

The late Dr Bernard had a most ingenious explanation of the construction of this passage. The king, he said, was pondering the words of the two women. At last he broke forth in the language of the mother who had said -Give her the living child and in no wise slay it." And to that sentence, taken as representative of the person who had spoken it, he adds his own decision, -She is the mother thereof."