2 Kings 25:17

25:17 Each of the pillars was about twenty-seven feet high. The bronze top of one pillar was about four and a half feet high and had bronze latticework and pomegranate shaped ornaments all around it. The second pillar with its latticework was like it.

2 Kings 25:2

25:2 The city remained under siege until King Zedekiah’s eleventh year.

2 Kings 3:16

3:16 and he said, “This is what the Lord says, ‘Make many cisterns in this valley,’

2 Kings 4:13

4:13 Elisha said to Gehazi, “Tell her, ‘Look, you have treated us with such great respect. 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.”

Jeremiah 52:22-23

52:22 The bronze top of one pillar was about seven and one-half feet high and had bronze latticework and pomegranate-shaped ornaments all around it. The second pillar with its pomegranate-shaped ornaments was like it. 52:23 There were ninety-six pomegranate-shaped ornaments on the sides; in all there were one hundred pomegranate-shaped ornaments over the latticework that went around it.


tn Heb “eighteen cubits.” The standard cubit in the OT is assumed by most authorities to be about eighteen inches (45 cm) long.

tn Heb “three cubits.” The parallel passage in Jer 52:22 has “five.”

tn Heb “making this valley cisterns, cisterns.” The Hebrew noun גֵּב (gev) means “cistern” in Jer 14:3 (cf. Jer 39:10). The repetition of the noun is for emphasis. See GKC 396 §123.e. The verb (“making”) is an infinitive absolute, which has to be interpreted in light of the context. The translation above takes it in an imperatival sense. The command need not be understood as literal, but as hyperbolic. Telling them to build cisterns is a dramatic way of leading into the announcement that he would miraculously provide water in the desert. Some prefer to translate the infinitive as an imperfect with the Lord as the understood subject, “I will turn this valley [into] many pools.”

tn Heb “he said to him.”

tn 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.

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

tn Heb “five cubits.” A “cubit” was a unit of measure, approximately equivalent to a foot and a half.