2 Kings 1:10

1:10 Elijah replied to the captain, 1  “If I am indeed a prophet, may fire come down from the sky and consume you and your fifty soldiers!” Fire then came down 2  from the sky and consumed him and his fifty soldiers.

2 Kings 1:12

1:12 Elijah replied to them, 3  “If I am indeed a prophet, may fire come down from the sky and consume you and your fifty soldiers!” Fire from God 4  came down from the sky and consumed him and his fifty soldiers.

2 Kings 1:15

1:15 The Lord’s angelic messenger said to Elijah, “Go down with him. Don’t be afraid of him.” So he got up and went down 5  with him to the king.

2 Kings 9:33

9:33 He said, “Throw her down!” So they threw her down, and when she hit the ground, 6  her blood splattered against the wall and the horses, and Jehu drove his chariot over her. 7 

1 tn Heb “answered and said to the officer of fifty.”

2 tn Wordplay contributes to the irony here. The king tells Elijah to “come down” (Hebrew יָרַד, yarad), but Elijah calls fire down (יָרַד) on the arrogant king’s officer.

3 tc Two medieval Hebrew mss, the LXX, and the Syriac Peshitta have the singular “to him.”

4 tn Or “intense fire.” The divine name may be used idiomatically to emphasize the intensity of the fire. Whether one translates אֱלֹהִים (’elohim) here as a proper name or idiomatically, this addition to the narrative (the name is omitted in the first panel, v. 10b) emphasizes the severity of the judgment and is appropriate given the more intense command delivered by the king to the prophet in this panel.

5 sn In this third panel the verb “come down” (יָרַד, yarad) occurs again, this time describing Elijah’s descent from the hill at the Lord’s command. The moral of the story seems clear: Those who act as if they have authority over God and his servants just may pay for their arrogance with their lives; those who, like the third commander, humble themselves and show the proper respect for God’s authority and for his servants will be spared and find God quite cooperative.

6 tn The words “when she hit the ground” are added for stylistic reasons.

7 tn Heb “and he trampled her.”