1:11 The king 5 sent another captain and his fifty soldiers to retrieve Elijah. He went up and told him, 6 “Prophet, this is what the king says, ‘Come down at once!’” 7
2:4 Elijah said to him, “Elisha, stay here, for the Lord has sent me to Jericho.” 11 But he replied, “As certainly as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you.” So they went to Jericho. 2:5 Some members of the prophetic guild in Jericho approached Elisha and said, “Do you know that today the Lord is going to take your master from you?” He answered, “Yes, I know. Be quiet.”
2:6 Elijah said to him, “Stay here, for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan.” But he replied, “As certainly as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you.” So they traveled on together.
3:4 Now King Mesha of Moab was a sheep breeder. 12 He would send as tribute 13 to the king of Israel 100,000 male lambs and the wool of 100,000 rams.
4:38 Now Elisha went back to Gilgal, while there was famine in the land. Some of the prophets were visiting him 19 and he told his servant, “Put the big pot on the fire 20 and boil some stew for the prophets.” 21
9:17 Now the watchman was standing on the tower in Jezreel and saw Jehu’s troops approaching. 36 He said, “I see troops!” 37 Jehoram ordered, 38 “Send a rider out to meet them and have him ask, ‘Is everything all right?’” 39
13:1 In the twenty-third year of the reign of Judah’s King Joash son of Ahaziah, Jehu’s son Jehoahaz became king over Israel. He reigned in Samaria 52 for seventeen years.
13:10 In the thirty-seventh year of King Joash’s reign over Judah, Jehoahaz’s son Jehoash became king over Israel. He reigned in Samaria 53 for sixteen years.
13:14 Now Elisha had a terminal illness. 54 King Joash of Israel went down to visit him. 55 He wept before him and said, “My father, my father! The chariot 56 and horsemen of Israel!” 57
14:23 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Judah’s King Amaziah, son of Joash, Jeroboam son of Joash became king over Israel. He reigned for forty-one years in Samaria. 59
15:8 In the thirty-eighth year of King Azariah’s reign over Judah, Jeroboam’s son Zechariah became king over Israel. He reigned in Samaria 60 for six months.
15:17 In the thirty-ninth year of King Azariah’s reign over Judah, Menahem son of Gadi became king over Israel. He reigned for twelve years in Samaria. 61
15:27 In the fifty-second year of King Azariah’s reign over Judah, Pekah son of Remaliah became king over Israel. He reigned in Samaria 63 for twenty years.
16:10 When King Ahaz went to meet with King Tiglath-pileser of Assyria in Damascus, he saw the altar there. 67 King Ahaz sent to Uriah the priest a drawing of the altar and a blueprint for its design. 68
16:17 King Ahaz took off the frames of the movable stands, and removed the basins from them. He took “The Sea” 70 down from the bronze bulls that supported it 71 and put it on the pavement.
17:34 To this very day they observe their earlier practices. They do not worship 77 the Lord; they do not obey the rules, regulations, law, and commandments that the Lord gave 78 the descendants of Jacob, whom he renamed Israel.
21:16 Furthermore Manasseh killed so many innocent people, he stained Jerusalem with their blood from end to end, 93 in addition to encouraging Judah to sin by doing evil in the sight of the Lord. 94
21:17 The rest of the events of Manasseh’s reign and all his accomplishments, as well as the sinful acts he committed, are recorded in the scroll called the Annals of the Kings of Judah. 95
22:8 Hilkiah the high priest informed Shaphan the scribe, “I found the law scroll in the Lord’s temple.” Hilkiah gave the scroll to Shaphan and he read it.
24:20 What follows is a record of what happened to Jerusalem and Judah because of the Lord’s anger; he finally threw them out of his presence. 105 Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.
1 map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.
2 tn Heb “and he sent messengers and said to them.”
3 tn That is, “seek an oracle from.”
4 sn Apparently Baal Zebub refers to a local manifestation of the god Baal at the Philistine city of Ekron. The name appears to mean “Lord of the Flies,” but it may be a deliberate scribal corruption of Baal Zebul, “Baal, the Prince,” a title known from the Ugaritic texts. For further discussion and bibliography, see HALOT 261 s.v. זְבוּב בַּעַל and M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 25.
5 tn Heb “he”; the referent (the king) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
6 tc The MT reads, “he answered and said to him.” The verb “he answered” (וַיַּעַן, vayya’an) is probably a corruption of “he went up” (וַיַּעַל, vayya’al). See v. 9.
7 sn In this second panel of the three-paneled narrative, the king and his captain are more arrogant than before. The captain uses a more official sounding introduction (“this is what the king says”) and the king adds “at once” to the command.
8 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.
9 tn Heb “the sons of the prophets.”
10 tn Heb “from your head.” The same expression occurs in v. 5.
11 map For location see Map5-B2; Map6-E1; Map7-E1; Map8-E3; Map10-A2; Map11-A1.
12 tn For a discussion of the meaning of term (נֹקֵד, noqed), see M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 43.
13 tn The vav + perfect here indicates customary action contemporary with the situation described in the preceding main clause. See IBHS 533-34 §32.2.3e.
14 tn Heb “to her son.”
15 tn Heb “man of God” (also in vv. 16, 22, 25, 27 [twice]).
16 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
17 tn Heb “and he returned and went into the house, once here and once there.”
18 tn Heb “and he went up.”
19 tn Heb “the sons of the prophets were sitting before him.”
20 tn The words “the fire” are added for clarification.
21 tn Heb “sons of the prophets.”
22 tn Heb “How can I set this before a hundred men?”
23 tn The verb forms are infinitives absolute (Heb “eating and leaving over”) and have to be translated in light of the context.
24 tn Heb “and now when this letter comes to you, look, I have sent to you Naaman my servant.”
25 tn Heb “peace.”
26 tn Heb “Look now, here, two servants came to me from the Ephraimite hill country, from the sons of the prophets.”
27 tn 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 75 pounds of silver (cf. NCV, NLT, CEV).
28 tn Heb “man of God” (also in v. 9).
29 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
30 map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.
31 tn The Hebrew text also has “look” here.
32 tn Heb “came down to him.”
33 tn Heb “Look, this is a disaster from the
34 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Hazael) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
35 tn Heb “his”; the referent (Ben Hadad) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
36 tn Heb “the quantity [of the men] of Jehu, when he approached.” Elsewhere שִׁפְעַה (shif’ah), “quantity,” is used of a quantity of camels (Isa 60:6) or horses (Ezek 26:10) and of an abundance of water (Job 22:11; 38:34).
37 tn The term שִׁפְעַת (shifat) appears to be a construct form of the noun, but no genitive follows.
38 tn Heb “said.”
39 tn Heb “Get a rider and send [him] to meet him and let him ask, ‘Is there peace?’”
40 tn Heb “and Jehu filled his hand with the bow and he struck Jehoram between his shoulders.”
41 tn Heb “went out from.”
42 tn The words “when she hit the ground” are added for stylistic reasons.
43 tn Heb “and he trampled her.”
44 tn Heb “Know then that there has not fallen from the word of the
45 tn Heb “The man who escapes from the men whom I am bringing into your hands, [it will be] his life in place of his life.”
46 tn Heb “But Jehu was not careful to walk in the law of the
47 tn Heb “He did not turn aside from the sins of Jeroboam which he caused Israel to commit.”
48 tn Heb “all the land of Gilead, the Gadites, and the Reubenites, and the Manassehites, from Aroer which is near the Arnon Valley, and Gilead, and Bashan.”
49 tn Heb “and be with the king in his going out and in his coming in.”
50 tn Heb “struck him down and he died.”
51 tn Heb “they buried him.”
52 map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.
53 map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.
54 tn Heb “Now Elisha was ill with the illness by which he would die.”
55 tn Heb “went down to him.”
56 tn Though the noun is singular here, it may be collective, in which case it could be translated “chariots.”
57 sn By comparing Elisha to a one-man army, the king emphasizes the power of the prophetic word. See the note at 2:12.
58 tn Heb “from the hand of.”
59 map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.
60 map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.
61 map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.
62 tn Heb “and he struck him down in Samaria in the fortress of the house of the king, Argob and Arieh, and with him fifty men from the sons of the Gileadites, and they killed him.”
sn The precise identity of Argob and Arieh, as well as their relationship to the king, are uncertain. The usual assumption is that they were officials assassinated along with Pekahiah, or that they were two of the more prominent Gileadites involved in the revolt. For discussion see M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 173.
63 map For location see Map2-B1; Map4-D3; Map5-E2; Map6-A4; Map7-C1.
64 map For location see Map1-D2; Map2-D3; Map3-A2; Map4-C1.
65 tn Heb “them.”
66 tn Heb “and struck him down and killed him.”
67 tn Heb “in Damascus.”
68 tn Heb “the likeness of the altar and its pattern for all its work.”
69 tn The word “new” is added in the translation for clarification.
70 sn See the note at 1 Kgs 7:23.
71 tn Heb “that [were] under it.”
72 tn Heb “and they made Jeroboam son of Nebat king.”
73 tc The consonantal text (Kethib) assumes the verb is נָדָא (nada’), an alternate form of נָדָה (nadah), “push away.” The marginal reading (Qere) assumes the verb נָדָח (nadakh), “drive away.”
74 tn Heb “a great sin.”
75 tc The second plural subject may refer to the leaders of the Assyrian army. However, some prefer to read “whom I deported,” changing the verb to a first person singular form with a third masculine plural pronominal suffix. This reading has some support from Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic witnesses.
76 tc Heb “and let them go and let them live there, and let him teach them the requirements of the God of the land.” The two plural verbs seem inconsistent with the preceding and following contexts, where only one priest is sent back to Samaria. The singular has the support of Greek, Syriac, and Latin witnesses.
77 tn Heb “fear.”
78 tn Heb “commanded.”
79 tn The Hebrew text has simply “Israel” as the object of the verb.
80 tn Heb “At that time Hezekiah stripped the doors of the
81 tn Heb “I will put in him a spirit.” The precise sense of רוּחַ (ruakh), “spirit,” is uncertain in this context. It may refer to a spiritual being who will take control of his mind (see 1 Kgs 22:19), or it could refer to a disposition of concern and fear. In either case the
82 tn Heb “hear.”
83 tn Heb “cause him to fall,” that is, “kill him.”
84 tn Heb “will not be given.”
85 sn The assassination probably took place in 681
86 sn No such Mesopotamian god is presently known. Perhaps the name is a corruption of Nusku.
87 tc Although “his sons” is absent in the Kethib, it is supported by the Qere, along with many medieval Hebrew
88 sn Extra-biblical sources also mention the assassination of Sennacherib, though they refer to only one assassin. See M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 239-40.
89 tn The Hebrew הָלַךְ (halakh, a perfect), “it has moved ahead,” should be emended to הֲיֵלֵךְ (hayelekh, an imperfect with interrogative he [ה] prefixed), “shall it move ahead.”
90 tn Heb “good.”
91 tn Heb “and he said.” Many English versions translate, “for he thought.” The verb אָמַר (’amar), “say,” is sometimes used of what one thinks (that is, says to oneself). Cf. NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT.
92 tn Heb “Is it not [true] there will be peace and stability in my days?” The rhetorical question expects the answer, “Yes, there will be peace and stability.”
93 tn Heb “and also Manasseh shed very much innocent blood, until he filled Jerusalem from mouth to mouth.”
94 tn Heb “apart from his sin which he caused Judah to commit, by doing what is evil in the eyes of the
95 tn Heb “As for the rest of the events of Manasseh, and all which he did, and his sin which he committed, are they not written on the scroll of the events of the days of the kings of Judah?”
96 tn Heb “man of God.”
97 tn The Hebrew text has simply “because.” The translation attempts to reflect more clearly the logical connection between the king’s order and the narrator’s observation. Another option is to interpret כִּי (ki) as asseverative and translate, “indeed.”
98 tn Heb “because there had not been observed [one] like this Passover from the days of the judges who judged Israel and all the days of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah.”
99 tn Heb “went up to.” The idiom עַל…עָלָה (’alah …’al) can sometimes mean “go up against,” but here it refers to Necho’s attempt to aid the Assyrians in their struggle with the Babylonians.
100 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Necho) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
101 map For location see Map1-D4; Map2-C1; Map4-C2; Map5-F2; Map7-B1.
102 tc The consonantal text (Kethib) has “when [he was] ruling in Jerusalem,” but the marginal reading (Qere), which has support from Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic, and Latin witnesses, has “[preventing him] from ruling in Jerusalem.”
103 tn Or “fine.”
104 tn 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 7,500 pounds of silver and 75 pounds of gold (cf. NCV, NLT); CEV “almost four tons of silver and about seventy-five pounds of gold.”
105 tn Heb “Surely [or, ‘for’] because of the anger of the