2 Kings 4:39

4:39 Someone went out to the field to gather some herbs and found a wild vine.¹ He picked some of its fruit,² enough to fill up the fold of his robe. He came back, cut it up, and threw the slices³ into the stew pot, not knowing they were harmful.⁴

2 Kings 6:22

6:22 He replied, “Do not strike them down! You did not capture them with your sword or bow, so what gives you the right to strike them down?⁵ Give them some food and water, so they can eat and drink and then go back to their master.”

2 Kings 7:8

7:8 When the men with a skin disease reached the edge of the camp, they entered a tent and had a meal.⁶ They also took some silver, gold, and clothes and went and hid it all.⁷ Then they went back and entered another tent. They looted it⁸ and went and hid what they had taken.

2 Kings 8:1

Elisha Again Helps the Shunammite Woman

8:1 Now Elisha advised the woman whose son he had brought back to life, “You and your family should go and live somewhere else for a while,⁹ for the Lord has decreed that a famine will overtake the land for seven years.”

2 Kings 8:6

8:6 The king asked the woman about it, and she gave him the details.¹⁰ The king assigned a eunuch to take care of her request and ordered him,¹¹ “Give her back everything she owns, as well as the amount of crops her field produced from the day she left the land until now.”

2 Kings 14:9

14:9 King Jehoash of Israel sent this message back to King Amaziah of Judah, “A thornbush in Lebanon sent this message to a cedar in Lebanon, ‘Give your daughter to my son as a wife.’ Then a wild animal¹² of Lebanon came by and trampled down the thorn.¹³

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.”¹⁴

2 Kings 20:5

20:5 “Go back and tell Hezekiah, the leader of my people: ‘This is what the Lord God of your ancestor David says: “I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears. Look, I will heal you. The day after tomorrow¹⁵ you will go up to the Lord’s temple.

¹tn Heb “a vine of the field.”

²tn Heb “[some] of the gourds of the field.”

³tn Heb “he came and cut [them up].”

⁴tc The Hebrew text reads, “for they did not know” (יָדָעוּ, yada’u) but some emend the final shureq (וּ, indicating a third plural subject) to holem vav (וֹ, a third masculine singular pronominal suffix on a third singular verb) and read “for he did not know it.” Perhaps it is best to omit the final vav as dittographic (note the vav at the beginning of the next verb form) and read simply, “for he did not know.” See M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 59.

⁵tn Heb “Are [they] ones you captured with your sword or your bow (that) you can strike (them) down?”

⁶tn Heb “they ate and drank.”

⁷tn Heb “and they hid [it].”

⁸tn Heb “and they took from there.”

⁹tn Heb “Get up and go, you and your house, and live temporarily where you can live temporarily.”

¹⁰tn Heb “and the king asked the woman and she told him.”

¹¹tn Heb “and he assigned to her an official, saying.”

¹²tn Heb “the animal of the field.”

¹³sn Judah is the thorn in the allegory. Amaziah’s success has deceived him into thinking he is on the same level as the major powers in the area (symbolized by the cedar). In reality he is not capable of withstanding an attack by a real military power such as Israel (symbolized by the wild animal).

¹⁴tn 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.”

¹⁵tn Heb “on the third day.”