2 Kings 3:19

3:19 You will defeat every fortified city and every important ¹  city. You must chop down ²  every productive ³  tree, stop up all the springs, and cover all the cultivated land with stones.” ⁴ 

2 Kings 3:25

3:25 They tore down the cities and each man threw a stone into every cultivated field until they were covered. ⁵  They stopped up every spring and chopped down every productive tree.

Only Kir Hareseth was left intact, ⁶  but the slingers surrounded it and attacked it.

2 Kings 8:9

8:9 So Hazael went to visit Elisha. ⁷  He took along a gift, ⁸  as well as ⁹  forty camel loads of all the fine things of Damascus. When he arrived, he stood before him and said, “Your son, ¹⁰  King Ben Hadad of Syria, has sent me to you with this question, ¹¹  ‘Will I recover from this sickness?’”

¹ tn Heb “choice” or “select.”

² tn Elisha places the object first and uses an imperfect verb form. The stylistic shift may signal that he is now instructing them what to do, rather than merely predicting what would happen.

³ tn Heb “good.”

⁴ tn Heb “and ruin every good portion with stones.”

⁵ tn Heb “and [on] every good portion they were throwing each man his stone and they filled it.” The vav + perfect (“and they filled”) here indicates customary action contemporary with the situation described in the preceding main clause (where a customary imperfect is used, “they were throwing”). See the note at 3:4.

⁶ tn Heb “until he had allowed its stones to remain in Kir Hareseth.”

⁹ tn Heb “him”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹⁰ tn The Hebrew text also has “in his hand.”

¹¹ tn 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.”

¹² sn The words “your son” emphasize the king’s respect for the prophet.

¹³ tn Heb “saying.”