2 Kings 11:6

11:6 Another third of you will be stationed at the Foundation ¹  Gate. Still another third of you will be stationed at the gate behind the royal guard. ²  You will take turns guarding the palace. ³ 

2 Kings 7:20

7:20 This is exactly what happened to him. The people trampled him to death in the city gate.

2 Kings 9:31

9:31 When Jehu came through the gate, she said, “Is everything all right, Zimri, murderer of his master?” ⁴ 

2 Kings 7:1

7:1 Elisha replied, “Hear the word of the Lord! This is what the Lord says, ‘About this time tomorrow a seah ⁵  of finely milled flour will sell for a shekel and two seahs of barley for a shekel at the gate of Samaria.’”

2 Kings 7:18

7:18 The prophet told the king, “Two seahs of barley will sell for a shekel, and a seah of finely milled flour for a shekel; this will happen about this time tomorrow in the gate of Samaria.”

2 Kings 7:17

7:17 Now the king had placed the officer who was his right-hand man ⁶  at the city gate. When the people rushed out, they trampled him to death in the gate. ⁷  This fulfilled the prophet’s word which he had spoken when the king tried to arrest him. ⁸ 

2 Kings 14:13

14:13 King Jehoash of Israel captured King Amaziah of Judah, son of Jehoash son of Ahaziah, in Beth Shemesh. He ⁹  attacked ¹⁰  Jerusalem and broke down the wall of Jerusalem from the Gate of Ephraim to the Corner Gate – a distance of about six hundred feet. ¹¹ 

2 Kings 23:8

23:8 He brought all the priests from the cities of Judah and ruined ¹²  the high places where the priests had offered sacrifices, from Geba to Beer Sheba. ¹³  He tore down the high place of the goat idols ¹⁴  situated at the entrance of the gate of Joshua, the city official, on the left side of the city gate.

[11:6]  ¹ tn Heb “the gate of Sur” (followed by many English versions) but no such gate is mentioned elsewhere in the OT. The parallel account in 2 Chr 23:5 has “Foundation Gate.” סוּר (sur), “Sur,” may be a corruption of יְסוֹד (yÿsod) “foundation,” involving in part dalet-resh confusion.

[11:6]  ² tn Heb “the runners.”

[11:6]  ³ tn The meaning of מַסָּח (massakh) is not certain. The translation above, rather than understanding it as a genitive modifying “house,” takes it as an adverb describing how the groups will guard the palace. See HALOT 605 s.v. מַסָּח for the proposed meaning “alternating” (i.e., “in turns”).

[9:31]  ⁴ sn Jezebel associates Jehu with another assassin, Zimri, who approximately 44 years before had murdered King Elah, only to meet a violent death just a few days later (1 Kgs 16:9-20). On the surface Jezebel’s actions seem contradictory. On the one hand, she beautifies herself as if to seduce Jehu, but on the other hand, she insults and indirectly threatens him with this comparison to Zimri. Upon further reflection, however, her actions reveal a clear underlying motive. She wants to retain her power, not to mention her life. By beautifying herself, she appeals to Jehu’s sexual impulses; by threatening him, she reminds him that he is in the same precarious position as Zimri. But, if he makes Jezebel his queen, he can consolidate his power. In other words through her actions and words Jezebel is saying to Jehu, “You desire me, don’t you? And you need me!”

[7:1]  ⁷ sn A seah was a dry measure equivalent to about 7 quarts.

[7:17]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “the officer on whose hand he leans.”

[7:17]  ¹¹ tn Heb “and the people trampled him in the gate and he died.”

[7:17]  ¹² tn Heb “just as the man of God had spoken, [the word] which he spoke when the king came down to him.”

[14:13]  ¹³ tc The MT has the plural form of the verb, but the final vav (ו) is virtually dittographic. The word that immediately follows in the Hebrew text begins with a yod (י). The form should be emended to the singular, which is consistent in number with the verb (“he broke down”) that follows.

[14:13]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “came to.”

[14:13]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “four hundred cubits.” The standard cubit in the OT is assumed by most authorities to be about eighteen inches (45 cm) long.

[23:8]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “defiled; desecrated,” that is, “made ritually unclean and unusable.”

[23:8]  ¹⁷ sn These towns marked Judah’s northern and southern borders, respectively, at the time of Josiah.

[23:8]  ¹⁸ tc The Hebrew text reads “the high places of the gates,” which is problematic in that the rest of the verse speaks of a specific gate. The translation assumes an emendation to בָּמוֹת הַשְּׁעָרִים (bamot hashÿ’arim), “the high place of the goats” (that is, goat idols). Worship of such images is referred to in Lev 17:7 and 2 Chr 11:15. For a discussion of the textual issue, see M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 286-87.