As one of them was felling a log, the ax head dropped into the water. He shouted, “Oh no, my master! It was borrowed!”

But the prophet sent this message to the king of Israel, “Make sure you don’t pass through this place because Syria is invading there.”

So the king of Israel sent a message to the place the prophet had pointed out, warning it to be on its guard. This happened on several occasions.

As they approached him, Elisha prayed to the Lord, “Strike these people with blindness.” The Lord struck them with blindness as Elisha requested.

He replied, “Do not strike them down! You did not capture them with your sword or bow, so what gives you the right to strike them down? Give them some food and water, so they can eat and drink and then go back to their master.”

So he threw a big banquet for them and they ate and drank. Then he sent them back to their master. After that no Syrian raiding parties again invaded the land of Israel.

Now four men with a skin disease were sitting at the entrance of the city gate. They said to one another, “Why are we just sitting here waiting to die?

So they started toward the Syrian camp at dusk. When they reached the edge of the Syrian camp, there was no one there.

So they got up and fled at dusk, leaving behind their tents, horses, and donkeys. They left the camp as it was and ran for their lives.

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.”

Now the king was talking to Gehazi, the prophet’s servant, and said, “Tell me all the great things which Elisha has done.”

He left Elisha and went to his master. Ben Hadad asked him, “What did Elisha tell you?” Hazael replied, “He told me you would surely recover.”

When he arrived, the officers of the army were sitting there. So he said, “I have a message for you, O officer.” Jehu asked, “For which one of us?” He replied, “For you, O officer.”

But they said, “You’re lying! Tell us what he said.” So he told them what he had said. He also related how he had said, “This is what the Lord says, ‘I have designated you as king over Israel.’”

Each of them quickly took off his cloak and they spread them out at Jehu’s feet on the steps. The trumpet was blown and they shouted, “Jehu is king!”

He looked up at the window and said, “Who is on my side? Who?” Two or three eunuchs looked down at him.

Ahab had seventy sons living in Samaria. So Jehu wrote letters and sent them to Samaria to the leading officials of Jezreel and to the guardians of Ahab’s dynasty. This is what the letters said,

He said, “Capture them alive!” So they captured them alive and then executed all forty-two of them in the cistern at Beth Eked. He left no survivors.

He went to Samaria and exterminated all the members of Ahab’s family who were still alive in Samaria, just as the Lord had announced to Elijah.

The two units who are off duty on the Sabbath will guard the Lord’s temple and protect the king.