2 Kings 1:13

1:13 The king¹ sent a third captain and his fifty soldiers. This third captain went up and fell² on his knees before Elijah. He begged for mercy, “Prophet, please have respect for my life and for the lives of these fifty servants of yours.

2 Kings 1:16

1:16 Elijah³ said to the king,⁴ “This is what the Lord says, ‘You sent messengers to seek an oracle from Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron. You must think there is no God in Israel from whom you can seek an oracle!⁵ Therefore you will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die.’”⁶

2 Kings 2:16

2:16 They said to him, “Look, there are fifty capable men with your servants. Let them go and look for your master, for the wind sent from the Lord⁷ may have carried him away and dropped him on one of the hills or in one of the valleys.” But Elisha⁸ replied, “Don’t send them out.”

2 Kings 3:7

3:7 He sent⁹ this message to King Jehoshaphat of Judah: “The king of Moab has rebelled against me. Will you fight with me against Moab?” Jehoshaphat¹⁰ replied, “I will join you in the campaign; my army and horses are at your disposal.”¹¹

2 Kings 6:32

6:32 Now Elisha was sitting in his house with the community leaders.¹² The king¹³ sent a messenger on ahead, but before he arrived,¹⁴ Elisha¹⁵ said to the leaders,¹⁶ “Do you realize this assassin intends to cut off my head?”¹⁷ Look, when the messenger arrives, shut the door and lean against it. His master will certainly be right behind him.”¹⁸

2 Kings 8:9

8:9 So Hazael went to visit Elisha.¹⁹ He took along a gift,²⁰ as well as²¹ forty camel loads of all the fine things of Damascus. When he arrived, he stood before him and said, “Your son,²² King Ben Hadad of Syria, has sent me to you with this question,²³ ‘Will I recover from this sickness?’”

2 Kings 12:18

12:18 King Jehoash of Judah collected all the sacred items that his ancestors Jehoshaphat, Jehoram, and Ahaziah, kings of Judah, had consecrated, as well as his own sacred items and all the gold that could be found in the treasuries of the Lord’s temple and the royal palace. He sent it all²⁴ to King Hazael of Syria, who then withdrew²⁵ from Jerusalem.

2 Kings 17:13

17:13 The Lord solemnly warned Israel and Judah through all his prophets and all the seers, “Turn back from your evil ways; obey my commandments and rules that are recorded in the law. I ordered your ancestors to keep this law and sent my servants the prophets to remind you of its demands.”²⁶

2 Kings 17:26

17:26 The king of Assyria was told,²⁷ “The nations whom you deported and settled in the cities of Samaria do not know the requirements of the God of the land, so he has sent lions among them. They are killing the people²⁸ because they do not know the requirements of the God of the land.”

2 Kings 18:14

18:14 King Hezekiah of Judah sent this message to the king of Assyria, who was at Lachish, “I have violated our treaty.²⁹ If you leave, I will do whatever you demand.”³⁰ So the king of Assyria demanded that King Hezekiah of Judah pay three hundred talents³¹ of silver and thirty talents of gold.

2 Kings 18:17

18:17 The king of Assyria sent his commanding general, the chief eunuch, and the chief adviser³² from Lachish to King Hezekiah in Jerusalem,³³ along with a large army. They went up and arrived at Jerusalem. They went³⁴ and stood at the conduit of the upper pool which is located on the road to the field where they wash and dry cloth.³⁵

2 Kings 19:4

19:4 Perhaps the Lord your God will hear all these things the chief adviser has spoken on behalf of his master, the king of Assyria, who sent him to taunt the living God.³⁶ When the Lord your God hears, perhaps he will punish him for the things he has said.³⁷ So pray for this remnant that remains.’”³⁸

¹tn Heb “he”; the referent (the king) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

²tn Heb “went up and approached and kneeled.”

³tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elijah) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

⁴tn Heb “him”; the referent (the king) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

⁵tn Heb “Because you sent messengers to inquire of Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron, is there no God in Israel to inquire of his word?”

⁶sn For the third time in this chapter we read the Lord’s sarcastic question to king and the accompanying announcement of judgment. The repetition emphasizes one of the chapter’s main themes. Israel’s leaders should seek guidance from their own God, not a pagan deity, for Israel’s sovereign God is the one who controls life and death.

⁷tn Or “the spirit of the Lord.”

⁸tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

⁹tn Heb “went and sent.”

¹⁰tn Heb “he”; the referent (Jehoshaphat) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹¹tn Heb “I will go up – like me, like you; like my people, like your people; like my horses; like your horses.”

¹²tn Heb “and the elders were sitting with him.”

¹³tn Heb “he”; the referent (the king) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁴tn Heb “sent a man from before him, before the messenger came to him.”

¹⁵tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁶tn Heb “elders.”

¹⁷tn Heb “Do you see that this son of an assassin has sent to remove my head?”

¹⁸tn Heb “Is not the sound of his master’s footsteps behind him?”

¹⁹tn Heb “him”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

²⁰tn The Hebrew text also has “in his hand.”

²¹tn Heb “and.” It is possible that the conjunction is here explanatory, equivalent to English “that is.” In this case the forty camel loads constitute the “gift” and one should translate, “He took along a gift, consisting of forty camel loads of all the fine things of Damascus.”

²²sn The words “your son” emphasize the king’s respect for the prophet.

²³tn Heb “saying.”

²⁴tn The object (“it all”) is supplied in the translation for clarification.

²⁵tn Heb “went up.”

²⁶tn Heb “obey my commandments and rules according to all the law which I commanded your fathers and which I sent to you by the hand of my servants the prophets.”

²⁷tn Heb “and they said to the king of Assyria, saying.” The plural subject of the verb is indefinite.

²⁸tn Heb “Look they are killing them.”

²⁹tn Or “I have done wrong.”

³⁰tn Heb “Return from upon me; what you place upon me, I will carry.”

³¹tn The Hebrew term כִּכָּר (kikkar, “circle”) refers generally to something that is round. When used of metals it can refer to a disk-shaped weight made of the metal or to a standard unit of weight, generally regarded as a talent. Since the accepted weight for a talent of metal is about 75 pounds, this would have amounted to about 22,500 pounds of silver and 2,250 pounds of gold.

³²sn For a discussion of these titles see M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 229-30.

³³map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

³⁴tn Heb “and they went up and came.”

³⁵tn Heb “the field of the washer.”

³⁶tn Heb “all the words of the chief adviser whom his master, the king of Assyria, sent to taunt the living God.”

³⁷tn Heb “and rebuke the words which the Lord your God hears.”

³⁸tn Heb “and lift up a prayer on behalf of the remnant that is found.”