2 Kings 6:18

6:18 As they approached him,¹ Elisha prayed to the Lord, “Strike these people² with blindness.”³ The Lord⁴ struck them with blindness as Elisha requested.⁵

2 Kings 10:18

Jehu Executes the Prophets and Priests of Baal

10:18 Jehu assembled all the people and said to them, “Ahab worshiped⁶ Baal a little; Jehu will worship⁷ him with great devotion.⁸

2 Kings 11:17

11:17 Jehoiada then drew up a covenant between the Lord and the king and people, stipulating that they should be loyal to the Lord.⁹

2 Kings 11:20

11:20 All the people of the land celebrated, for the city had rest now that they had killed Athaliah with the sword in the royal palace.

2 Kings 14:21

14:21 All the people of Judah took Azariah, who was sixteen years old, and made him king in his father Amaziah’s place.

2 Kings 16:9

16:9 The king of Assyria responded favorably to his request;¹⁰ he¹¹ attacked Damascus and captured it. He deported the people¹² to Kir and executed Rezin.

2 Kings 17:32

17:32 At the same time they worshiped¹³ the Lord. They appointed some of their own people to serve as priests in the shrines on the high places.¹⁴

2 Kings 19:12

19:12 Were the nations whom my ancestors destroyed – the nations of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden in Telassar – rescued by their gods?¹⁵

2 Kings 19:31

19:31 For a remnant will leave Jerusalem;

survivors will come out of Mount Zion.

The intense devotion of the sovereign Lord¹⁶ to his people¹⁷ will accomplish this.

2 Kings 21:14

21:14 I will abandon this last remaining tribe among my people¹⁸ and hand them over to their enemies; they will be plundered and robbed by all their enemies,¹⁹

2 Kings 21:24

21:24 The people of the land executed all those who had conspired against King Amon, and they²⁰ made his son Josiah king in his place.

2 Kings 23:21

23:21 The king ordered all the people, “Observe the Passover of the Lord your God, as prescribed in this scroll of the covenant.”

2 Kings 25:22

Gedaliah Appointed Governor

25:22 Now King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon appointed Gedaliah son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, as governor over the people whom he allowed to remain in the land of Judah.²¹

¹tn Heb “and they came down to him.”

²tn Or “this nation,” perhaps emphasizing the strength of the Syrian army.

³tn On the basis of the Akkadian etymology of the word, M. Cogan and H. Tadmor (II Kings [AB], 74) translate “blinding light.” HALOT 761 s.v. סַנְוֵרִים suggests the glosses “dazzling, deception.”

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

⁵tn Heb “according to the word of Elisha.”

⁶tn Or “served.

⁷tn Or “serve.”

⁸tn Heb “much” or “greatly.”

⁹tn Heb “and Jehoiada made a covenant between the Lord and [between] the king and [between] the people, to become a people for the Lord, and between the king and [between] the people.” The final words of the verse (“and between the king and [between] the people”) are probably accidentally repeated from earlier in the verse. They do not appear in the parallel account in 2 Chr 23:16. If retained, they probably point to an agreement governing how the king and people should relate to one another.

¹⁰tn Heb “listened to him.”

¹¹tn Heb “the king of Assyria.”

¹²tn Heb “it.”

¹³tn Heb “feared.”

¹⁴tn Heb “and they appointed for themselves from their whole people priests for the high places and they were serving for them in the house[s] of the high places.”

¹⁵tn Heb “Did the gods of the nations whom my fathers destroyed rescue them – Gozan and Haran, and Rezeph and the sons of Eden who are in Telassar?”

¹⁶tn Traditionally “the Lord of hosts.”

¹⁷tn Heb “the zeal of the Lord.” In this context the Lord’s “zeal” refers to his intense devotion to and love for his people which prompts him to protect and restore them. The Qere, along with many medieval Hebrew mss and the ancient versions, has “the zeal of the LORD of hosts” rather than “the zeal of the LORD” (Kethib). The translation follows the Qere here.

¹⁸tn Heb “the remnant of my inheritance.” In this context the Lord’s remnant is the tribe of Judah, which had been preserved when the Assyrians conquered and deported the northern tribes. See 17:18 and M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 269.

¹⁹tn Heb “they will become plunder and spoils of war for all their enemies.”

²⁰tn Heb “the people of the land.” The pronoun “they” has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons, to avoid the repetition of the phrase “the people of the land” from the beginning of the verse.

²¹tn Heb “And the people who were left in the land of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon left, he appointed over them Gedaliah son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan.”