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 Lord¹ may have carried him away and dropped him on one of the hills or in one of the valleys.” But Elisha² replied, “Don’t send them out.”

2 Kings 3:7

3:7 He sent³ this message to King Jehoshaphat of Judah: “The king of Moab has rebelled against me. Will you fight with me against Moab?” Jehoshaphat⁴ replied, “I will join you in the campaign; my army and horses are at your disposal.”⁵

2 Kings 3:11

3:11 Jehoshaphat asked, “Is there no prophet of the Lord here that we might seek the Lord’s direction?”⁶ One of the servants of the king of Israel answered, “Elisha son of Shapat is here; he used to be Elijah’s servant.”⁷

2 Kings 3:26

3:26 When the king of Moab realized he was losing the battle,⁸ he and 700 swordsmen tried to break through and attack⁹ the king of Edom, but they failed.

2 Kings 4:13

4:13 Elisha said to Gehazi,¹⁰ “Tell her, ‘Look, you have treated us with such great respect.¹¹ What can I do for you? Can I put in a good word for you with the king or the commander of the army?’” She replied, “I’m quite secure.”¹²

2 Kings 8:8

8:8 So the king told Hazael, “Take a gift¹³ and go visit the prophet. Request from him an oracle from the Lord. Ask him,¹⁴ ‘Will I recover from this sickness?’”

2 Kings 8:13

8:13 Hazael said, “How could your servant, who is as insignificant as a dog, accomplish this great military victory?”¹⁵ Elisha answered, “The Lord has revealed to me that you will be the king of Syria.”¹⁶

2 Kings 9:15

9:15 But King Joram had returned to Jezreel to recover from the wounds he received from the Syrians¹⁷ when he fought against King Hazael of Syria.¹⁸ Jehu told his supporters,¹⁹ “If you really want me to be king,²⁰ then don’t let anyone escape from the city to go and warn Jezreel.”

2 Kings 11:4

11:4 In the seventh year Jehoiada summoned²¹ the officers of the units of hundreds of the Carians²² and the royal bodyguard.²³ He met with them²⁴ in the Lord’s temple. He made an agreement²⁵ with them and made them swear an oath of allegiance in the Lord’s temple. Then he showed them the king’s son.

2 Kings 13:14

Elisha Makes One Final Prophecy

13:14 Now Elisha had a terminal illness.²⁶ King Joash of Israel went down to visit him.²⁷ He wept before him and said, “My father, my father! The chariot²⁸ and horsemen of Israel!”²⁹

2 Kings 15:25

15:25 His officer Pekah son of Remaliah conspired against him. He and fifty Gileadites assassinated Pekahiah, as well as Argob and Arieh, in Samaria in the fortress of the royal palace.³⁰ Pekah then took his place as king.

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.³¹ They paid allegiance to³² worthless idols, and so became worthless to the Lord.³³ They copied the practices of the surrounding nations in blatant disregard of the Lord’s command.³⁴

2 Kings 18:31

18:31 Don’t listen to Hezekiah!’ For this is what the king of Assyria says, ‘Send me a token of your submission and surrender to me.³⁵ Then each of you may eat from his own vine and fig tree and drink water from his own cistern,

2 Kings 23:2

23:2 The king went up to the Lord’s temple, accompanied by all the people of Judah, all the residents of Jerusalem, the priests, and the prophets. All the people were there, from the youngest to the oldest. He read aloud³⁶ all the words of the scroll of the covenant that had been discovered in the Lord’s temple.

¹tn Or “the spirit of the Lord.”

²tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

³tn Heb “went and sent.”

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

⁵tn Heb “I will go up – like me, like you; like my people, like your people; like my horses; like your horses.”

⁵tn Heb “that we might inquire of the Lord through him?”

⁶tn Heb “who poured water on the hands of Elijah.” This refers to one of the typical tasks of a servant.

⁷tn Heb “and the king of Moab saw that the battle was too strong for him.”

⁸tn Heb “he took with him seven hundred men, who drew the sword, to break through against.”

⁹tn Heb “he said to him.”

¹⁰tn Heb “you have turned trembling to us with all this trembling.” The exaggerated language is probably idiomatic. The point seems to be that she has taken great pains or gone out of her way to be kind to them. Her concern was a sign of her respect for the prophetic office.

¹¹tn Heb “Among my people I am living.” This answer suggests that she has security within the context of her family.

¹¹tn The Hebrew text also has “in your hand.”

¹²tn Heb “Inquire of the Lord through him, saying.”

¹³tn Heb “Indeed, what is your servant, a dog, that he could do this great thing?” With his reference to a dog, Hazael is not denying that he is a “dog” and protesting that he would never commit such a dastardly “dog-like” deed. Rather, as Elisha’s response indicates, Hazael is suggesting that he, like a dog, is too insignificant to ever be in a position to lead such conquests.

¹⁴tn Heb “The Lord has shown me you [as] king over Syria.”

¹⁵tn Heb “which the Syrians inflicted [on] him.”

¹⁶sn See 2 Kgs 8:28-29a.

¹⁷tn The words “his supporters” are added for clarification.

¹⁸tn Heb “If this is your desire.” נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh) refers here to the seat of the emotions and will. For other examples of this use of the word, see BDB 660-61 s.v.

¹⁷tn Heb “Jehoiada sent and took.”

¹⁸sn The Carians were apparently a bodyguard, probably comprised of foreigners. See HALOT 497 s.v. כָּרִי and M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 126.

¹⁹tn Heb “the runners.”

²⁰tn Heb “he brought them to himself.”

²¹tn Or “covenant.”

¹⁹tn Heb “Now Elisha was ill with the illness by which he would die.”

²⁰tn Heb “went down to him.”

²¹tn Though the noun is singular here, it may be collective, in which case it could be translated “chariots.”

²²sn By comparing Elisha to a one-man army, the king emphasizes the power of the prophetic word. See the note at 2:12.

²¹tn 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.”

²³tn Or “and his warnings he had given them.”

²⁴tn 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).

²⁵tn 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.

²⁶tn Heb “and [they walked] after the nations which were around them, concerning which the Lord commanded them not to do like them.”

²⁵tn Heb “make with me a blessing and come out to me.”

²⁷tn Heb “read in their ears.”