2 Kings 3:13

3:13 Elisha said to the king of Israel, “Why are you here?¹ Go to your father’s prophets or your mother’s prophets!” The king of Israel replied to him, “No, for the Lord is the one who summoned these three kings so that he can hand them over to Moab.”

2 Kings 4:42

Elisha Miraculously Feeds a Hundred People

4:42 Now a man from Baal Shalisha brought some food for the prophet² – twenty loaves of bread made from the firstfruits of the barley harvest, as well as fresh ears of grain.³ Elisha⁴ said, “Set it before the people so they may eat.”

2 Kings 6:25

6:25 Samaria’s food supply ran out.⁵ They laid siege to it so long that⁶ a donkey’s head was selling for eighty shekels of silver⁷ and a quarter of a kab⁸ of dove’s droppings⁹ for five shekels of silver.¹⁰

2 Kings 7:2

7:2 An officer who was the king’s right-hand man¹¹ responded to the prophet,¹² “Look, even if the Lord made it rain by opening holes in the sky, could this happen so soon?”¹³ Elisha¹⁴ said, “Look, you will see it happen with your own eyes, but you will not eat any of the food!”¹⁵

2 Kings 7:4

7:4 If we go into the city, we’ll die of starvation,¹⁶ and if we stay here we’ll die! So come on, let’s defect¹⁷ to the Syrian camp! If they spare us,¹⁸ we’ll live; if they kill us – well, we were going to die anyway.”¹⁹

2 Kings 7:9-10

7:9 Then they said to one another, “It’s not right what we’re doing! This is a day to celebrate, but we haven’t told anyone.²⁰ If we wait until dawn,²¹ we’ll be punished.²² So come on, let’s go and inform the royal palace.” 7:10 So they went and called out to the gatekeepers²³ of the city. They told them, “We entered the Syrian camp and there was no one there. We didn’t even hear a man’s voice.²⁴ But the horses and donkeys are still tied up, and the tents remain up.”²⁵

2 Kings 7:12-13

7:12 The king got up in the night and said to his advisers,²⁶ “I will tell you what the Syrians have done to us. They know we are starving, so they left the camp and hid in the field, thinking, ‘When they come out of the city, we will capture them alive and enter the city.’” 7:13 One of his advisers replied, “Pick some men and have them take five of the horses that are left in the city. (Even if they are killed, their fate will be no different than that of all the Israelite people – we’re all going to die!)²⁷ Let’s send them out so we can know for sure what’s going on.”²⁸

2 Kings 7:19

7:19 But the officer replied to the prophet, “Look, even if the Lord made it rain by opening holes in the sky, could this happen so soon?”²⁹ Elisha³⁰ said, “Look, you will see it happen with your own eyes, but you will not eat any of the food!”³¹

2 Kings 8:9

8:9 So Hazael went to visit Elisha.³² He took along a gift,³³ as well as³⁴ forty camel loads of all the fine things of Damascus. When he arrived, he stood before him and said, “Your son,³⁵ King Ben Hadad of Syria, has sent me to you with this question,³⁶ ‘Will I recover from this sickness?’”

2 Kings 9:6

9:6 So Jehu³⁷ got up and went inside. Then the prophet³⁸ poured the olive oil on his head and said to him, “This is what the Lord God of Israel says, ‘I have designated you as king over the Lord’s people Israel.

2 Kings 9:12

9:12 But they said, “You’re lying! Tell us what he said.” So he told them what he had said. He also related how he had said,³⁹ “This is what the Lord says, ‘I have designated you as king over Israel.’”

2 Kings 9:26

9:26 ‘“Know for sure that I saw the shed blood of Naboth and his sons yesterday,” says the Lord, “and that I will give you what you deserve right here in this plot of land,”⁴⁰ says the Lord.’ So now pick him up and throw him into this plot of land, just as the Lord said.”⁴¹

2 Kings 10:25

10:25 When he finished offering the burnt sacrifice, Jehu ordered the royal guard⁴² and officers, “Come in and strike them down! Don’t let any escape!” So the royal guard and officers struck them down with the sword and left their bodies lying there.⁴³ Then they entered the inner sanctuary of the temple of Baal.⁴⁴

2 Kings 12:7

12:7 So King Jehoash summoned Jehoiada the priest along with the other priests, and said to them, “Why have you not repaired the damage to the temple? Now, take no more silver from your treasurers unless you intend to use it to repair the damage.”⁴⁵

2 Kings 13:21

13:21 One day some men⁴⁶ were burying a man when they spotted⁴⁷ a raiding party. So they threw the dead man⁴⁸ into Elisha’s tomb. When the body⁴⁹ touched Elisha’s bones, the dead man⁵⁰ came to life and stood on his feet.

2 Kings 17:15

17:15 They rejected his rules, the covenant he had made with their ancestors, and the laws he had commanded them to obey.⁵¹ They paid allegiance to⁵² worthless idols, and so became worthless to the Lord.⁵³ They copied the practices of the surrounding nations in blatant disregard of the Lord’s command.⁵⁴

2 Kings 17:26

17:26 The king of Assyria was told,⁵⁵ “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 people⁵⁶ 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.⁵⁷ If you leave, I will do whatever you demand.”⁵⁸ So the king of Assyria demanded that King Hezekiah of Judah pay three hundred talents⁵⁹ of silver and thirty talents of gold.

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.⁶⁰ When the Lord your God hears, perhaps he will punish him for the things he has said.⁶¹ So pray for this remnant that remains.’”⁶²

2 Kings 19:32

19:32 So this is what the Lord says about the king of Assyria:

“He will not enter this city,

nor will he shoot an arrow here.⁶³

He will not attack it with his shield-carrying warriors,⁶⁴

nor will he build siege works against it.

2 Kings 22:14

22:14 So Hilkiah the priest, Ahikam, Acbor, Shaphan, and Asaiah went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shullam son of Tikvah, the son of Harhas, the supervisor of the wardrobe.⁶⁵ (She lived in Jerusalem in the Mishneh⁶⁶ district.) They stated their business,⁶⁷

2 Kings 25:1

25:1 So King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came against Jerusalem with his whole army and set up camp outside⁶⁸ it. They built siege ramps all around it. He arrived on the tenth day of the tenth month in the ninth year of Zedekiah’s reign.⁶⁹

2 Kings 25:23-24

25:23 All of the officers of the Judahite army⁷⁰ and their troops heard that the king of Babylon had appointed Gedaliah to govern. So they came to Gedaliah at Mizpah. The officers who came were Ishmael son of Nethaniah, Johanan son of Kareah, Seraiah son of Tanhumeth the Netophathite, and Jaazaniah son of the Maacathite. 25:24 Gedaliah took an oath so as to give them and their troops some assurance of safety.⁷¹ He said, “You don’t need to be afraid to submit to the Babylonian officials. Settle down in the land and submit to the king of Babylon. Then things will go well for you.”

¹tn Or “What do we have in common?” The text reads literally, “What to me and to you?”

²tn Heb “man of God.”

³tn On the meaning of the word צִקְלוֹן (tsiqlon), “ear of grain,” see HALOT 148 s.v. בָּצֵק and M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 59.

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

⁵tn Heb “and there was a great famine in Samaria.”

⁶tn Heb “and look, [they] were besieging it until.”

⁷tn Heb “eighty, silver.” The unit of measurement is omitted.

⁸sn A kab was a unit of dry measure, equivalent to approximately one quart.

⁹tn The consonantal text (Kethib) reads, “dove dung” (חֲרֵייוֹנִים, khareyonim), while the marginal reading (Qere) has “discharge” (דִּבְיוֹנִים, divyonim). Based on evidence from Akkadian, M. Cogan and H. Tadmor (II Kings [AB], 79) suggest that “dove’s dung” was a popular name for the inedible husks of seeds.

¹⁰tn Heb “five, silver.” The unit of measurement is omitted.

¹¹tn Heb “the officer on whose hand the king leans.”

¹²tn Heb “man of God.”

¹³tn Heb “the Lord was making holes in the sky, could this thing be?” Opening holes in the sky would allow the waters stored up there to pour to the earth and assure a good crop. But, the officer argues, even if this were to happen, it would take a long time to grow and harvest the crop.

¹⁴tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁵tn Heb “you will not eat from there.”

¹⁶tn Heb “If we say, ‘We will enter the city,’ the famine is in the city and we will die there.”

¹⁷tn Heb “fall.”

¹⁸tn Heb “keep us alive.”

¹⁹tn Heb “we will die.” The paraphrastic translation attempts to bring out the logical force of their reasoning.

²⁰tn Heb “this day is a day of good news and we are keeping silent.”

²¹tn Heb “the light of the morning.”

²²tn Heb “punishment will find us.”

²³tn The MT has a singular form (“gatekeeper”), but the context suggests a plural. The pronoun that follows (“them”) is plural and a plural noun appears in v. 11. The Syriac Peshitta and the Targum have the plural here.

²⁴tn Heb “and, look, there was no man or voice of a man there.”

²⁵tn Heb “but the horses are tied up and the donkeys are tied up and the tents are as they were.”

²⁶tn Heb “servants” (also in v. 13).

²⁷tn Heb “Let them take five of the remaining horses that remain in it. Look, they are like all the people of Israel that remain in it. Look, they are like all the people of Israel that have come to an end.” The MT is dittographic here; the words “that remain in it. Look they are like all the people of Israel” have been accidentally repeated. The original text read, “Let them take five of the remaining horses that remain in it. Look, they are like all the people of Israel that have come to an end.”

²⁸tn Heb “and let us send so we might see.”

²⁹tn Heb “the Lord was making holes in the sky, could this thing be?” See the note at 7:2.

³⁰tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

³¹tn Heb “you will not eat from there.”

tn In the Hebrew text vv. 18-19a are one lengthy sentence, “When the man of God spoke to the king…, the officer replied to the man of God, ‘Look…so soon?’” The translation divides this sentence up for stylistic reasons.

³²tn Heb “him”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

³³tn The Hebrew text also has “in his hand.”

³⁴tn 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.”

³⁵sn The words “your son” emphasize the king’s respect for the prophet.

³⁶tn Heb “saying.”

³⁷tn Heb “he”; the referent (Jehu) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

³⁸tn Heb “he”; the referent (the prophet) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

³⁹tn Heb “So he said, ‘Like this and like this he said to me, saying.’” The words “like this and like this” are probably not a direct quote of Jehu’s words to his colleagues. Rather this is the narrator’s way of avoiding repetition and indicating that Jehu repeated, or at least summarized, what the prophet had said to him.

⁴⁰tn Heb “and I will repay you in this plot of land.”

⁴¹tn Heb “according to the word of the Lord.”

⁴²tn Heb “runners.”

⁴³tn Heb “and they threw.” No object appears. According to M. Cogan and H. Tadmor (II Kings [AB], 116), this is an idiom for leaving a corpse unburied.

⁴⁴tn Heb “and they came to the city of the house of Baal.” It seems unlikely that a literal city is meant. Some emend עִיר (’ir), “city,” to דְּבִיר (dÿvir) “holy place,” or suggest that עִיר is due to dittography of the immediately preceding עַד (’ad) “to.” Perhaps עִיר is here a technical term meaning “fortress” or, more likely, “inner room.”

⁴⁵tn Heb “Now, do not take silver from your treasurers, because for the damages to the temple you must give it.”

⁴⁶tn Heb “and it so happened [that] they.”

⁴⁷tn Heb “and look, they saw.”

⁴⁸tn Heb “the man”; the adjective “dead” has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

⁴⁹tn Heb “the man.”

⁵⁰tn Heb “he”; the referent (the dead man) has been specified in the translation for clarity. Otherwise the reader might think it was Elisha rather than the unnamed dead man who came back to life.

⁵¹tn Or “and his warnings he had given them.”

⁵²tn Heb “They went [or, ‘followed’] after.” This idiom probably does not mean much if translated literally. It is found most often in Deuteronomy or in literature related to the covenant. It refers in the first instance to loyalty to God and to His covenant or His commandments (1 Kgs 14:8; 2 Chr 34:31) with the metaphor of a path or way underlying it (Deut 11:28; 28:14). To “follow other gods” was to abandon this way and this loyalty (to “abandon” or “forget” God, Judg 2:12; Hos 2:13) and to follow the customs or religious traditions of the pagan nations (2 Kgs 17:15). The classic text on “following” God or another god is 1 Kgs 18:18, 21 where Elijah taunts the people with “halting between two opinions” whether the Lord was the true God or Baal was. The idiom is often found followed by “to serve and to worship” or “they served and worshiped” such and such a god or entity (Jer 8:2; 11:10; 13:10; 16:11; 25:6; 35:15).

⁵³tn Heb “they followed after the worthless thing/things and became worthless.” The words “to the Lord” are not in the Hebrew text but are implicit from the context. There is an obvious wordplay on the verb “became worthless” and the noun “worthless thing”, which is probably to be understood collectively and to refer to idols as it does in Jer 8:19; 10:8; 14:22; Jonah 2:8.

⁵⁴tn Heb “and [they walked] after the nations which were around them, concerning which the Lord commanded them not to do like them.”

⁵⁵tn Heb “and they said to the king of Assyria, saying.” The plural subject of the verb is indefinite.

⁵⁶tn Heb “Look they are killing them.”

⁵⁷tn Or “I have done wrong.”

⁵⁸tn Heb “Return from upon me; what you place upon me, I will carry.”

⁵⁹tn 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.

⁶⁰tn Heb “all the words of the chief adviser whom his master, the king of Assyria, sent to taunt the living God.”

⁶¹tn Heb “and rebuke the words which the Lord your God hears.”

⁶²tn Heb “and lift up a prayer on behalf of the remnant that is found.”

⁶³tn Heb “there.”

⁶⁴tn Heb “[with] a shield.” By metonymy the “shield” stands for the soldier who carries it.

⁶⁵tn Heb “the keeper of the clothes.”

⁶⁶tn Or “second.” For a discussion of the possible location of this district, see M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 283.

⁶⁷tn Heb “and they spoke to her.”

⁶⁸tn Or “against.”

⁶⁹sn This would have been Jan 15, 588 b.c. The reckoning is based on the calendar that begins the year in the spring (Nisan = March/April).

⁷⁰tn Heb “of the army.” The word “Judahite” has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

⁷¹tn The words “so as to give them…some assurance of safety” are supplied in the translation for clarification.