The children struggled, in a violent and extraordinary manner, which was likely to cause both pain and fear in her. The sense may be either,
1. If it be thus with me, that there be two children contending and fighting within me, likely to destroy one the other, and both threatening my death, why did I desire and pray for this as a great mercy? Or, why is it thus with me? Why hath God dealt thus with me, to continue my life till it be a burden to me, and to give me conception which is so painful and hazardous? Or rather,
2. If God hath granted me my desire in the conception of a child, what means this disturbance and conflict within me, which threatens me with loss of the mercy before I enjoy it? For she seems not so much to murmur at it, as to wonder and to inquire about it, as it here follows. She went to inquire of the Lord; either immediately, by ardent prayers to God that he would reveal his mind to her herein; or mediately, by her father Abraham, who lived fifteen years after this time, Genesis 25:7, or by some other godly patriarch yet surviving, by whom God used to manifest his will and counsels to others, when he thought fit.