THE COMPANY OF the prophets said to Elisha, “Look, the place where we meet with you is too small for us. 2Let us go to the Jordan, where each of us can get a pole; and let us build a place there for us to live.”
And he said, “Go.”
3Then one of them said, “Won’t you please come with your servants?”
“I will,” Elisha replied. 4And he went with them.
They went to the Jordan and began to cut down trees. 5As one of them was cutting down a tree, the iron axhead fell into the water. “Oh, my lord,” he cried out, “it was borrowed!”
6The man of God asked, “Where did it fall?” When he showed him the place, Elisha cut a stick and threw it there, and made the iron float. 7“Lift it out,” he said. Then the man reached out his hand and took it.
8Now the king of Aram was at war with Israel. After conferring with his officers, he said, “I will set up my camp in such and such a place.”
9The man of God sent word to the king of Israel: “Beware of passing that place, because the Arameans are going down there.” 10So the king of Israel checked on the place indicated by the man of God. Time and again Elisha warned the king, so that he was on his guard in such places.
11This enraged the king of Aram. He summoned his officers and demanded of them, “Will you not tell me which of us is on the side of the king of Israel?”
12“None of us, my lord the king,” said one of his officers, “but Elisha, the prophet who is in Israel, tells the king of Israel the very words you speak in your bedroom.”
13“Go, find out where he is,” the king ordered, “so I can send men and capture him.” The report came back: “He is in Dothan.” 14Then he sent horses and chariots and a strong force there. They went by night and surrounded the city.
15When the servant of the man of God got up and went out early the next morning, an army with horses and chariots had surrounded the city. “Oh, my lord, what shall we do?” the servant asked.
16“Don’t be afraid,” the prophet answered. “Those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”
17And Elisha prayed, “O LORD, open his eyes so he may see.” Then the LORD opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.
18As the enemy came down toward him, Elisha prayed to the LORD, “Strike these people with blindness.” So he struck them with blindness, as Elisha had asked.
19Elisha told them, “This is not the road and this is not the city. Follow me, and I will lead you to the man you are looking for.” And he led them to Samaria.
20After they entered the city, Elisha said, “LORD, open the eyes of these men so they can see.” Then the LORD opened their eyes and they looked, and there they were, inside Samaria.
21When the king of Israel saw them, he asked Elisha, “Shall I kill them, my father? Shall I kill them?”
22“Do not kill them,” he answered. “Would you kill men you have captured with your own sword or bow? Set food and water before them so that they may eat and drink and then go back to their master.” 23So he prepared a great feast for them, and after they had finished eating and drinking, he sent them away, and they returned to their master. So the bands from Aram stopped raiding Israel’s territory.
24Some time later, Ben-Hadad king of Aram mobilized his entire army and marched up and laid siege to Samaria. 25There was a great famine in the city; the siege lasted so long that a donkey’s head sold for eighty shekels of silver, and a quarter of a cab of seed pods for five shekels.
26As the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried to him, “Help me, my lord the king!”
27The king replied, “If the LORD does not help you, where can I get help for you? From the threshing floor? From the winepress?” 28Then he asked her, “What’s the matter?”
She answered, “This woman said to me, ‘Give up your son so we may eat him today, and tomorrow we’ll eat my son.’ 29So we cooked my son and ate him. The next day I said to her, ‘Give up your son so we may eat him,’ but she had hidden him.”
30When the king heard the woman’s words, he tore his robes. As he went along the wall, the people looked, and there, underneath, he had sackcloth on his body. 31He said, “May God deal with me, be it ever so severely, if the head of Elisha son of Shaphat remains on his shoulders today!”
32Now Elisha was sitting in his house, and the elders were sitting with him. The king sent a messenger ahead, but before he arrived, Elisha said to the elders, “Don’t you see how this murderer is sending someone to cut off my head? Look, when the messenger comes, shut the door and hold it shut against him. Is not the sound of his master’s footsteps behind him?”
33While he was still talking to them, the messenger came down to him. And the king said, “This disaster is from the LORD. Why should I wait for the LORD any longer?”
7:1Elisha said, “Hear the word of the LORD. This is what the LORD says: About this time tomorrow, a seah of flour will sell for a shekel and two seahs of barley for a shekel at the gate of Samaria.”
2The officer on whose arm the king was leaning said to the man of God, “Look, even if the LORD should open the floodgates of the heavens, could this happen?”
“You will see it with your own eyes,” answered Elisha, “but you will not eat any of it!”
3Now there were four men with leprosy at the entrance of the city gate. They said to each other, “Why stay here until we die? 4If we say, ‘We’ll go into the city’—the famine is there, and we will die. And if we stay here, we will die. So let’s go over to the camp of the Arameans and surrender. If they spare us, we live; if they kill us, then we die.”
5At dusk they got up and went to the camp of the Arameans. When they reached the edge of the camp, not a man was there, 6for the Lord had caused the Arameans to hear the sound of chariots and horses and a great army, so that they said to one another, “Look, the king of Israel has hired the Hittite and Egyptian kings to attack us!” 7So they got up and fled in the dusk and abandoned their tents and their horses and donkeys. They left the camp as it was and ran for their lives.
8The men who had leprosy reached the edge of the camp and entered one of the tents. They ate and drank, and carried away silver, gold and clothes, and went off and hid them. They returned and entered another tent and took some things from it and hid them also.
9Then they said to each other, “We’re not doing right. This is a day of good news and we are keeping it to ourselves. If we wait until daylight, punishment will overtake us. Let’s go at once and report this to the royal palace.”
10So they went and called out to the city gatekeepers and told them, “We went into the Aramean camp and not a man was there—not a sound of anyone—only tethered horses and donkeys, and the tents left just as they were.” 11The gatekeepers shouted the news, and it was reported within the palace.
12The king got up in the night and said to his officers, “I will tell you what the Arameans have done to us. They know we are starving; so they have left the camp to hide in the countryside, thinking, ‘They will surely come out, and then we will take them alive and get into the city.’”
13One of his officers answered, “Have some men take five of the horses that are left in the city. Their plight will be like that of all the Israelites left here—yes, they will only be like all these Israelites who are doomed. So let us send them to find out what happened.”
14So they selected two chariots with their horses, and the king sent them after the Aramean army. He commanded the drivers, “Go and find out what has happened.” 15They followed them as far as the Jordan, and they found the whole road strewn with the clothing and equipment the Arameans had thrown away in their headlong flight. So the messengers returned and reported to the king. 16Then the people went out and plundered the camp of the Arameans. So a seah of flour sold for a shekel, and two seahs of barley sold for a shekel, as the LORD had said.
17Now the king had put the officer on whose arm he leaned in charge of the gate, and the people trampled him in the gateway, and he died, just as the man of God had foretold when the king came down to his house. 18It happened as the man of God had said to the king: “About this time tomorrow, a seah of flour will sell for a shekel and two seahs of barley for a shekel at the gate of Samaria.”
19The officer had said to the man of God, “Look, even if the LORD should open the floodgates of the heavens, could this happen?” The man of God had replied, “You will see it with your own eyes, but you will not eat any of it!” 20And that is exactly what happened to him, for the people trampled him in the gateway, and he died.
8:1Now Elisha had said to the woman whose son he had restored to life, “Go away with your family and stay for a while wherever you can, because the LORD has decreed a famine in the land that will last seven years.” 2The woman proceeded to do as the man of God said. She and her family went away and stayed in the land of the Philistines seven years.
3At the end of the seven years she came back from the land of the Philistines and went to the king to beg for her house and land. 4The king was talking to Gehazi, the servant of the man of God, and had said, “Tell me about all the great things Elisha has done.” 5Just as Gehazi was telling the king how Elisha had restored the dead to life, the woman whose son Elisha had brought back to life came to beg the king for her house and land.
Gehazi said, “This is the woman, my lord the king, and this is her son whom Elisha restored to life.” 6The king asked the woman about it, and she told him.
Then he assigned an official to her case and said to him, “Give back everything that belonged to her, including all the income from her land from the day she left the country until now.”
7Elisha went to Damascus, and Ben-Hadad king of Aram was ill. When the king was told, “The man of God has come all the way up here,” 8he said to Hazael, “Take a gift with you and go to meet the man of God. Consult the LORD through him; ask him, ‘Will I recover from this illness?’”
9Hazael went to meet Elisha, taking with him as a gift forty camel-loads of all the finest wares of Damascus. He went in and stood before him, and said, “Your son Ben-Hadad king of Aram has sent me to ask, ‘Will I recover from this illness?’”
10Elisha answered, “Go and say to him, ‘You will certainly recover’; but the LORD has revealed to me that he will in fact die.” 11He stared at him with a fixed gaze until Hazael felt ashamed. Then the man of God began to weep.
12“Why is my lord weeping?” asked Hazael.
“Because I know the harm you will do to the Israelites,” he answered. “You will set fire to their fortified places, kill their young men with the sword, dash their little children to the ground, and rip open their pregnant women.”
13Hazael said, “How could your servant, a mere dog, accomplish such a feat?”
“The LORD has shown me that you will become king of Aram,” answered Elisha.
14Then Hazael left Elisha and returned to his master. When Ben-Hadad asked, “What did Elisha say to you?” Hazael replied, “He told me that you would certainly recover.” 15But the next day he took a thick cloth, soaked it in water and spread it over the king’s face, so that he died. Then Hazael succeeded him as king.
Original Meaning
ELISHA THE MAN of God continues his mission of confronting the religion of Baal, but in a less direct manner than Elijah. Elisha makes it his work to support the sons of the prophets, to meet needs as he encounters them, and to assist the king of Israel (usually unnamed) in the hostilities that confront him. The story of Naaman is followed by a series of encounters at a variety of geographical locations that take place during the time of Aramean incursions.
These stories do not follow any chronology of events; the account of Elisha delivering Israel from the Aramean raids (6:8–23) is followed immediately by a story of Samaria under a severe siege (6:24–7:20). These accounts are joined by a literary phrase linking independent narratives (6:24).1 They do not provide a political history but are examples of the sovereign work of God through his prophet during times of apostasy and conflict.
Mercy at the Jordan (6:1–7)
THE ACCOUNT OF the building project for the sons of the prophets at the Jordan is given in sketchy details. Nothing is said about the time of the project, the circumstances that create the need, or the reason for moving to the Jordan. The story is abruptly introduced with the notice that the meeting place is too cramped.2 It may have been inadequate from the beginning, the prophetic group may have grown, or the time may have come to build an improved building.
There must have been some advantage in moving to the Jordan, since that is not an ideal location for finding timbers. Elisha as the leader of the group is asked to join in the project and is thus present when the axhead was lost. This iron instrument no doubt was a valuable instrument and was “borrowed” (v. 5; lit., it was “begged or prayed for”), making the loss so much more distressing. The story’s focus is entirely on the miracle of recovering the axhead from the Jordan; the only connection for its being placed here in the Elisha collection of stories is that it relates another miracle of Elisha at the Jordan (cf. the Naaman story).
Military Secrets at Dothan (6:8–23)
THE FIRST EPISODE of this story presents Elisha as a spy in the Aramean camp, warning the Israelites where the enemy is planning to attack (6:8–10). The episode is artistically arranged to link the actions of the Aramean king, the man of God, and the king of Israel.3 The Aramean king plans an attack against Israel (cf. NEB),4 but Elisha sends a warning to the king of Israel about the place of attack (v. 9).5 The king then sends a warning to his commander (v. 10), so the Arameans are stymied repeatedly, and no attack actually takes place.
In the second episode (6:11–14), a frustrated Aramean king rages against his own advisors, accusing one of them of being a spy for Israel. It is not clear whether he really believes his ranks have been infiltrated or is venting his frustration in seeking someone to blame. Apparently the king has his own spies in the Israelite camp, because one of his assistants is able to inform him that the prophet Elisha can hear what is said in the walls of his bedroom. The king further learns that the prophet is residing at Dothan, a city north of Samaria on the road leading into the Jezreel Valley.6 The king is determined to capture Elisha, either to avenge the sabotage of his army or to enlist him as an intelligence informant in his own forces. In order to ensure the success of his efforts, he dispatches a heavy force deep into the Israelite territory. The force enters under the cover of darkness and surrounds the city.
The third episode contrasts the army of the Arameans with the army of God (6:15–17). The Arameans have surrounded the city with horses and chariots, but to the vision of the trusting eye, the hill on which the city stands is filled with horses and chariots of fire. The sense requires that the divine contingent is serving as a protective cordon around the city of Dothan.7 The mighty army of the Arameans surrounding the city (v. 15) is no match for one man of God surrounded by the chariots of Yahweh’s army (v. 17).
The Aramean army is not struck down by the swords of soldiers but by a blinding light (sanwērîm). This is not ordinary blindness (ʿiwwārôn), but a bright light that causes a temporary distortion of vision.8 In this fourth episode the Aramean army is taken captive by Elisha and led to the capital (6:18–20). The original command of the Aramean king is to go and find Elisha (v. 13); once they get to the city they are unable to find him, but instead are led to the city where they will find him. Elisha then prays a prayer virtually identical to the one that enabled his servant to see the heavenly armies (v. 20; cf. v. 17). The eyes of the soldiers are opened and they see their man, but they also see that they are now surrounded by the enemy army.
In the final episode the king of Israel believes he has an opportunity to inflict a debilitating defeat on the Aramean army (6:21–23). Matters, however, are not in his control; he has not been responsible for taking the soldiers captive and requires permission from the prophet, respectfully and unusually addressed as “father” (v. 21). The prophet instead follows the wisdom of a proverb: “If your enemy hungers, give him food to eat; if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head, and the LORD will reward you” (Prov. 25:21–22). These soldiers are not to be slain or taken captive as the spoils of war and made slaves; instead, they are treated lavishly with food and drink and sent on their way. The result is a halt of the border wars.
Famine in Samaria (6:24–7:20)
THIS STORY BEGINS with a siege by Ben-Hadad against the city of Samaria. The mention of Ben-Hadad does not assist in locating this story historically. Ahab fought against Ben-Hadad (cf. 1 Kings 20; 22), an Aramean king otherwise historically unknown by that name. Ben-Hadad was probably a dynastic name for Aramean kings.
The usual assumption of historians is that the Ben-Hadad in this Elisha story is Ben-Hadad son of Hazael (cf. 13:3). This is consistent with the assumptions of historians that Aramean conquests such as this siege of Samaria take place during the Jehu dynasty when Israel is weak.9 Since the Israelite king is not named, the siege is not remembered for its political significance.
One of the tactics of siege warfare was to create famine so the citizens within a fortified city would be forced to surrender. Montgomery refers to Plutarch (Artaxerxes 24.3), who says that the Kadisians divided up the draft animals so that a donkey’s head was worth almost sixty drachmas, and to Pliny the Elder (Historia naturalis 8.82), who says that during a siege by Hannibal a mouse rose in the market to 200 denarii.10 A “cab” (6:25) was a dry measure equal to one sixth of a seah (7:1); thirty seahs made an omer, equal to about 100 liters. A seah was just over three liters, and a cab about half a liter.11 Linguistic comparisons show that the Masoretic text’s “dove’s dung” (ḥireyyônîm) was slang for an edible “seed pod” as a carob.12 It is possible that “donkey’s head” is a similar type of idiom. Siege warfare reduces populations to extremes, which can include cannibalism.
The pathos of the story surfaces in the appeal of the woman who cries out to the king for help (6:26–31). Her complaint is not that she had been reduced to eating the corpse of her own child for food, but the injustice she feels when her neighbor refuses to honor the agreement they have to equally share their grisly fare. Her complaint to the king is legal; it is an appeal for justice in the deception of her neighbor. The revulsion of the story is her apparent lack of feeling for the death of her own child and that of her neighbor; the normal compassion of motherhood is subordinated to the desperation to survive.
The king betrays his own feelings of futility when the woman appeals for help. He initially assumes she is asking for food, and his helplessness is seen in the retort that only God can provide help in such circumstances (6:27), for the royal storehouses have been exhausted. When he learns of the real concern of the woman, he can only tear his clothes in grief. The rip reveals his own despair, as it exposes the coarse cloth of lament he is wearing underneath his regular tunic.
Contrary to the previous story, where Elisha is in total control, the prophet is now threatened with death by his own king. Just as Elijah was held responsible for causing the drought in the days of Ahab (1 Kings 18:17), so Elisha is held responsible for the siege that has caused such famine. After all, Elisha preached divine judgment against the descendants of Ahab (e.g., 2 Kings 3:13), and the encounter with Naaman and his treatment of the Aramean army in Samaria demonstrate his good standing with the Arameans. Elisha is a logical target for the frustrations of an impotent king.
The threat the king makes against Elisha is irrational, but it is not idle. He dispatches a messenger to ambush the prophet while he is conferring with the leaders of the city (6:32–33); it is not only the members of the prophetic band who listen to Elisha. Elisha is fully aware of the king’s intentions and instructs the elders to block the door and hold the executioner until the king arrives. He knows the king is right behind and that he has relented from his rash order.
The apocopated style of the Hebrew narrative makes it seem as if the king arrives ahead of the executioner, because he arrives while Elisha is still issuing instructions to the elders (RSV; cf. NLT).13 This may be paraphrased by saying the messenger arrives; then the king as the subject for the speech is supplied (NIV). Josephus provides a similar reconstruction, saying that the king hastened after the messenger to prevent the killing (Ant. 9.69–70). The narrative moves quickly, showing the control of the prophet and the despair of the king. This disaster is part of God’s sovereign purpose; the king can do nothing, not even pray.
Elisha responds to the king with a word from Yahweh pertaining to the next day; it sounds like the cry of a vendor in the marketplace of Samaria (7:1). The open plaza at the city gate serves as a main marketplace. The prices announced indicate a break in the famine, and though they may still be many times the normal prices, it will be taken as a great blessing to the starving residents of Samaria.14 The officer who is the immediate assistant to the king finds this announcement unbelievable (7:2). The prophet assures the officer that he will see this reversal of fortune but not enjoy the benefits. The warning is not given in the usual formula of a judgment oracle. It serves to reinforce the truth of the change of circumstances as well as the helplessness and skepticism of the political leaders responsible for the well-being of the citizens of Samaria.
The fulfillment of Yahweh’s word begins with four lepers outside the gate of the city. According to ritual law, a leper was quarantined outside the settlement (Lev. 13:11, 46; Num. 12:14–16). Caught in a death trap, the four decide to desert to the enemy camp (7:3–4). When they arrive there, they find the enemy has fled in terror, having heard the noise of a mighty army. Risky mercenary alliances were adopted as a last resort—Isaiah disparagingly refers to the disastrous alliance of Israel with Assyria against the Arameans as being shaved with a “hired razor” (Isa. 7:20). During the days of Israel the territory of Syria was controlled by Aramean city-states. Reference to “kings of Egypt” may have been a rhetorical plural, including the Hittites, or the primus inter pares (first among equals) status of the pharaoh among other rulers in Egypt.15 The Aramean soldiers have fled for their lives (7:7).
The divine message comes full circle as the lepers report back. As with Naaman, the good news is almost stifled (cf. 5:11); the king, acting with prudent skepticism, suspects an enemy ploy to dupe his soldiers, draw them out of the city, capture them alive, and take the city. As in the Naaman story, subordinates point out the only real danger—missing an opportunity to for relief from the famine. His army has been defeated (7:13); nothing is lost in taking a few of the remaining horses and confirming the report. The Jordan is some distance through hostile territory, whether it was crossed at the Jabbok or the Yarmuk, adding panic to the fleeing force.
Food prices become exactly as the prophet earlier announced (7:16). The death of the officer takes place when he is appointed to be in charge of the gate and is trampled by the stampeding people. The final verses bring closure to the story by repeating the prophetic word (7:18–20), which determines the course of events. Yahweh gave the Arameans victory, using them as an instrument of punishment for Israel. The panic of the Aramean army is a performance of the divine will, bringing temporary mercy to a people under judgment.
Land Claims at Shunem (8:1–6)
THIS STORY ABOUT the appeal of the woman of Shunem to the justice of the king is a natural sequel to the story of the desperate woman calling out to the king for justice in the famine at Samaria (6:26). There is no link between the famines; the former was temporary caused by a siege, whereas this one lasts seven years. Elisha continues to assist his patroness from Shumen, this time warning her to leave because of a famine that is about to devastate the land of Israel (8:1). The woman takes refuge in the land of the Philistines (v. 2), somewhere in the southwest coastal plain where rainfall is adequate to support a good agricultural life.16 When the woman returns, she finds her properties have been taken over. Though Elisha is no longer present, his influence comes to her assistance in getting a hearing with the king.
The legal details for loss of land tenure are not given. The woman of Shumen may have become a widow, since her husband was already old when Elisha first met her (4:14); this is not stated, nor should his death have affected her right to the land. The land may have become crown property in her absence or may have been land leased by the crown on condition certain services were rendered.17 The text indicates that the problem is one of confiscation; in her absence the properties have been taken over, possibly by another family member or neighbor. Earlier the woman lived securely among her people without need (4:13), but her situation has drastically changed. The property is legally hers, possibly through inheritance, but she has no access to it.
The activities of Elisha are of interest to many during his lifetime, including the king. Gehazi has regained access to the king’s court after being struck with leprosy. The king desires an interview with Gehazi because he wishes to know more about Elisha. The arrival of the woman of Shunem to lodge her complaint, accompanied by her son, provides an immediate opportunity to verify the event of his being raised back to life. The king is moved by her story and appoints an officer to be in charge of restoring her property. This king acts much more nobly than his predecessor Ahab, who had no hesitation in confiscating the property of Naboth. The reputation of Elisha and his legacy influence the king to act immediately; the woman of Shunem receives back her properties with all the attendant revenues due to her.
Regime Change at Damascus (8:7–15)
ELISHA IS IN Damascus on the occasion of King Ben-Hadad’s being ill. The fame of the prophet is well known in Damascus, so it is only natural that the king should inquire about the outcome of his illness. The king sends Hazael, one of his trusted deputies, with a substantial remuneration to receive a word from the prophet. Though this is the gift of a king, forty camel loads must be read as hyperbole (v. 9); more descriptive is the gift the wife of Jeroboam brought to Ahijah the prophet (1 Kings 14:3).
The encounter is not what Hazael expects; Elisha commissions him with the message that the king will live, though in fact the king will die (2 Kings 8:10).18 The message is mixed; the king will not die of his illness (the subject of his inquiry), but he will die at the hands of an assassin.19 The news so shocks Hazael that his gaze remains transfixed until he feels embarrassed (v. 11); it is broken only by the weeping of the man of God.20
God has already declared that Hazael will be the instrument of punishment to Israel (1 Kings 19:15–17); Hazael will be anointed through Elisha and will bring destruction on Israel. As the incredulous Hazael stares at the prophet, the impact of Elijah’s words overcome Elisha’s composure. Here stands the man who will crush innocent citizens of Israel. The prophet knows that Hazael will become king of Aram (2 Kings 7:13) and that war against Israel will be the inevitable outcome.
Events transpired as the prophet says (8:14–15); Hazael reports to his master that he will live, but the next day Hazael takes a water soaked mesh and suffocates his lord (cf. Josephus, Ant. 9.92).21 Hazael is well known in history as the usurper who took over the Aramean throne in Damascus. Zakkur, king of Hamath, in the inscription that celebrates the defense of his capital Hazrak (the biblical Hadrak of Zech. 9:1), names Hazael as the father of Ben-Hadad, the king of Damascus who led a coalition against him.22 Shalmaneser III, in his eighteenth year (841 B.C.) defeats Hazael in his expansions into Assyria and lays siege to Damascus.23 The “feats” that Hazael will accomplish (8:13) are described from an Aramean point of view. The crushing of children and slashing of pregnant women might be victory to a conquering king, but they are not great feats to the most vulnerable victims of war.
GOD AT WORK in human affairs. Naaman, who has been leading raids into Israel, ends up finding healing in the rivers of the Jordan. The role of the Jordan is the link to another story about the sons of the prophets attempting to expand their meeting quarters at the Jordan (6:1–7). At Dothan, Elisha frustrates the Aramean sorties into Israel with divine information as to their location (6:8–23). War with Ben-Hadad brings severe famine during a siege against Samaria (6:24–33); Elisha comes to the aid of the victimized citizens of Samaria (7:1–20). War and famine bring about the exile of the woman of Shunem to the land of the Philistines (8:1–6). Through the testimony of Gehazi, apparently because Elisha is no longer alive, the woman is able to have her property restored. Elisha has sufficiently cordial relations with the royal house of the Arameans that he is able to visit the palace in Damascus and appoint Hazael as the new king (8:7–15). Elisha as the man of God has a role in both alleviating suffering and effecting the sovereign judgment of God.
This collection of stories about Elisha shows that God’s will may done on earth even during times of apostasy, political conflict, suffering, and despair. God is at work in human kingdoms; an Aramean army is not only thwarted in its militant border raids but is brought to submission and cessation of hostilities; a prophet of Israel becomes the messenger of political change in a foreign nation. Amidst the horror and anguish of war the mercy of God can be found; a small group of faithful at the Jordan River are assisted in constructing new quarters; starving citizens of the capital city gain relief; a woman whose property has been confiscated receives justice.
The miracle of the floating axhead is a simple act of mercy; no prophetic word is fulfilled, no judgment stated, no promise given, no indictment on the decision to build new facilities. The miracle does not emphasize spectacular powers. Elisha must ask to ascertain the location of the iron. A new handle is cut to bring the iron to the surface. The sense of the word cut (qṣb) seems to be fitting to the right size and shape (cf. 1 Kings 6:25; 7:37). A new handle is required, because the miracle signals a kind of new beginning (cf. 2 Kings 2:20). The story shows how Elisha acts promptly and decisively to meet a need, as in the case of the bitter water (2:19–22) or the inedible food (4:38–41). The action itself is similar to the other occasions where Elisha comes to the aid of the prophetic band (cf. 2:21; 4:41). Elisha is shown to be a compassionate leader, but able to provide only through divine assistance in ordinary things.
Nothing is said about the occasion of the Aramean invasions (6:8). The absence of the names of the kings or the political circumstances has an important effect on the impact of the narrative. Elisha is not seen to be on either side of the conflict; he first protects the Israelite army from ambush and then prevents a massacre of the Arameans. The focus of the whole story is on vision, particularly the ability to see beyond usual perception. Elisha is able to know what the Aramean king is planning and can warn the Israelite king accordingly (6:9–10); he is able to show his servant the armies of Yahweh around Dothan, which the Aramean armies cannot see (vv. 16–17). Elisha prays again, and a blinding light overcomes the Aramean armies, so they can be led right into the capital city (vv. 18–19). Elijah prays again, and the normal vision of the Aramean soldiers is restored and they realize they are in Samaria. The story is not about military victory or political developments. It is a story about the difference between sight and vision, about being controlled by the temporal or by the transcendent. Political powers are subordinated to the sovereignty of God; Elisha completely outmaneuvers both military establishments and brings an end to the hostilities.
Covenant consequences. In keeping with Deuteronomistic theology, these stories show that there is no escape from the conditions of the covenant. The apostasy of Israel brings the judgment of war but not the absence of the divine warrior. In the Aramean raids, God is the informant frustrating the schemes of the Aramean king repeatedly, to the point where he becomes completely enraged (6:11). In the siege of Samaria, the army is put to flight because of the plight of starving citizens. In neither case does this result in the actual defeat of the enemy army. The divine warrior is at work in acts of mercy to the victims of war, but the judgment of war is a consequence from which there is no escape. The curses of the covenant are clearly stated and well known.
Even the most gentle and sensitive man among you will have no compassion on his own brother or the wife he loves or his surviving children, and he will not give to one of them any of the flesh of his children that he is eating. It will be all he has left because of the suffering your enemy will inflict on you during the siege of all your cities. The most gentle and sensitive woman among you—so sensitive and gentle that she would not venture to touch the ground with the sole of her foot—will begrudge the husband she loves and her own son or daughter the afterbirth from her womb and the children she bears. For she intends to eat them secretly during the siege and in the distress that your enemy will inflict on you in your cities. (Deut. 28:54–57)
This gruesome description of the curse of the covenant is not a vengeful punishment of an insulted God. This description is the inescapable reality of war and the dreadful consequences of the anarchy that war perpetuates. Failure to honor the divine order of the covenant leaves the people at the mercy of the nations. They suffer in the ways of all other nations. The vassal treaties of Esarhaddon not only mention eating the flesh of one’s children but also adults eating one another and mothers barring their doors to their daughters.24 The curses of Deuteronomy, exemplified in these stories of Elisha, describe a society outside of the order that God has designed. This is not what God has chosen for his people; the house of Omri chose the ways of the nations for themselves.
Disobedience to the covenant and the experience of the covenant curse does not imply God has abdicated his people or his promises. The divine warrior is still present, as is evident in these stories. At the same time the role of the divine warrior is not the way it was experienced in the days when God acted as the Redeemer of his people to make them a peculiar people. In the ideal, God acting as warrior took place in three stages: preparations for the war, the battle, and the sequel to victory.25
Preparation required knowing God’s will and being spiritually ready; in the conquest of Jericho the people were required to consecrate themselves for the day of battle (Josh. 3:5) and to renew the covenant commitment through circumcision of the new generation (5:2–8). This obviously was not usual military strategy; the battle itself was won by the power of God. Jericho, a mighty fortified city, was conquered when the Israelites marched around it in ceremony, led by the ark, accompanied with the blowing of horns; the walls came down with a shout (6:20). Since the battle belonged to Yahweh, praise followed victory (e.g., Ps. 144:9–10). The spoils of war belonged to Yahweh; in the case of Jericho, it was everything in the city (Josh. 6:17–19). None of the classic signs of the divine warrior are present in these battles with the Arameans. At the same time God is at work through the prophet Elisha.
The power of the prophetic word. These stories about Elisha and the Arameans are more about the power of the prophetic word than about God as the victor in war. However the power of the prophetic word requires the presence of God as the warrior. Gone is the expectation that Yahweh will provide the incomprehensible ingredient of success. DeVries describes this as a more sophisticated situation, where Israel’s faith has grown more supernaturalistic, ascribing victory to mysterious forces of twilight, without human effort.26 The real difference is the apostasy of the nation; the prophet announces the day of relief, not as a reward of faithfulness but as the transcendent negation of complete despair. The problem is the faithlessness of Israel, as expressed by the king and his captain, rather than the absence of God from history.
The power of the divine warrior is released in the words of the prophet. When the servant of Elisha awakes to find Dothan surrounded by the Aramean army, he is paralyzed with fear (6:15). The response of Elisha is that one with Yahweh is more than a mighty military (v. 16). Rofé thinks that the phrase “Elisha prayed” begins a parenthetical explanation, much like that of later rabbinic technique, in which the figurative is explained by the literal.27 Elisha has simply stated that God is more powerful than the Arameans, but the explanation shows visually how the forces of God around Elisha are more numerous than the Aramean army (v. 17). Rofé thinks that the explanation ends with the resumptive phrase when Elisha prays again (v. 18a), after the army descends. This would specify that the army that came down to Elisha is not the enemy Arameans (NIV), but the divine army. The power of God protects Elisha and strikes the Arameans with a blinding light so the prophet is saved and the army led away.
In the siege of Samaria, the apostate king views Elisha as a prophet with unlimited power from God. The woman’s cry for justice against the greed of her neighbor over the corpse of a child so shocks the king that he calls for Elisha’s head. The rights of the case are so contorted that justice is not even conceivable. Believing it is impossible for God to allow such heinous acts to occur, acts so contrary to human nature, he can only expect that the man of God should have prevented such calamity. Elisha again remains unperturbed at the ranting of the king. He simply requires his servants to block the executioner at the door until the king arrives (6:32). When the king arrives, Elisha calmly announces that there will be sufficient food the next day.
Such a promise is incomprehensible to the king’s captain. However, the armies of Yahweh again rout the Arameans (7:6–7), just as the prophet said, abandoning sufficient provisions so that the famine is broken. The work of the divine warrior, through the word of the prophet, is evident both in the provision of food and the trampling of the skeptical captain.
The path of wisdom. The path of wisdom is to follow consistently the right choice of values. In actual life situations this may not be possible. The story of Solomon and the two prostitutes quarreling over the life of a child (1 Kings 3:16–27) is often compared with the account of two women quarreling over the life of a child for food (2 Kings 6:24–31). Conditions of severe famine created by war bring about conditions in which normal values of motherhood are subordinated to the need for survival. Injustice is created by a refusal to give up the life of a child. War creates an ambiguity about wisdom and justice, folly and wickedness.28
In the instance of the two prostitutes, maternal instincts become the means by which Solomon determines the true mother of the living child. However in that story it is also true that one of the women has subordinated those instincts and is willing to sacrifice the life of a child; Solomon, apparently, would have been willing to allow that to take place. In the second story the conflict is over a sense of justice, which is present even in the revolting conditions of war, and the protection of the life of a child, a maternal love, which prevails even in the face of famine. Faced with such a dilemma and the inhumanity of the woman pleading for justice, the wicked king simply admits his impotence and tears his garments, revealing the fact that he is wearing the clothing of a penitent. Only God has the power to bring deliverance in such a situation (6:27). No amount of wisdom can prevail in such a circumstance.
The story of Solomon’s receiving divine wisdom is meant to teach us that God honors the right choice of values so that our choices can work out for good. The story of the two women during the Syrian siege is not intended to compromise the significance of the gift of wisdom Solomon received.29 War is truly a dread in which no amount of wisdom can bring about justice, but this does not undermine the possibility of a good and just king, of goodness and justice in society derived from the benefit of wisdom in learning to live together. This wisdom is a divine gift in that it is revealed to us through instruction that comes from God and is made available to us through his presence in particular circumstances. Wisdom is to trust God in situations beyond the ability of human intelligence to judge or human power to change. God honors choices made in submission to the truths of wisdom.
Contemporary Significance
TOOLS OF OUR WARFARE. The Israelites experience the activity of the divine warrior in many different ways, depending on their situation, but the presence and activity of God is at work through his prophets. The rule of God is demonstrated through Elisha the man of God rather than the king. Protecting the poor, bringing life and justice, leading armies, and acting as a covenant champion are all part of the ideal royal profile.
The apostle Paul reminds the Ephesians that the situation is no different for them (Eph. 6:10–13). They need to be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might; they must put on the whole armor of God so that they can take their stand against the wiles of the devil. They are not struggling with an enemy of flesh and blood, but against rulers, authorities, and mighty forces of this dark world, against spiritual wickedness in the heavenly places. Behind the evil forces at work in the world are transworldly forces that put Paul into prison. Equipped with the spiritual armor of God it is possible for Christians in this world to stand against such forces. This spiritual armor is nothing other than faith in the truth of the gospel (6:14–17); above all it is prayer to the divine warrior (v. 18), and steadfast prayer at all times for all the saints.
In the essentials of spiritual warfare, the present world is no different from the tortured topsy-turvy world of Elisha. Christians in many different places are ravaged by the turbulence of war, just as the faithful in the days of Elisha. Where actual physical warfare is not present, Christians struggle against ideologies and social forces designed to undermine the rule of God in this world, the way of life God has ordained through his Word for those created to represent him as his image. Everywhere the faithful are called to be like Elisha and his followers; they must resist evil and show mercy, as they are able. As with Elisha, their weapon is prayer, and their assurance is that the divine warrior will act on their behalf even as he did in the distressing days of Omride apostasy.
The community in oppressive times. The account of the floating axhead (2 Kings 6:1–7) is an example of the function of community in oppressive times. Of immediate significance is the fact of community and its importance. The faithful are not only in need of each other, but they are in need of adequate facilities so they can meet with the prophet and with each other. Henton Davies observes that the community represents freedom for the followers of Elisha; freedom works through restraint, through consideration of the needs of the group.30
Freedom is not uninhibited liberty to follow an individual course of action; such individuals are not free but forced to work within the orbit of their own narrow personality and opinions. Freedom comes with the enablement of the community, the mutual support of others in the faith. Such freedom has a price. The leader of such a community might be regarded as “a very irascible and bald-headed old gentleman who didn’t mind delivering children to bears, let alone theological students to their proper place.”31 The result of sharing might be that a valuable item is lost, buried beneath the water. The point of the floating axhead was not simply to show that Elisha is a wonder worker, for Elisha displays many of his own limits in the situation. A new handle is prepared and cast where the iron has fallen, signifying a new beginning for one who has failed and the power for the community to continue.
The brutality of human government. The brutality of governments toward their own people is ever present. In that cruelty it is frequent that famine is used as a murder weapon. As stated recently by Edgar Chen and David Marcus, famine endures only because the international community and governments continue to perceive it as an act of nature and not a human rights disaster.32 They quote Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen to say that “famine is, after all, so easy to prevent that it is amazing that it is allowed to occur at all.” Histories prove that people often starve because it is politically advantageous.
Stalin engineered an apocalyptic famine in the 1930s to exterminate millions of politically suspect Ukrainians. Mao pursued the “Great Leap Forward” with deliberate disregard for the misery it wrought, starving at least 20 million Chinese to death. Dubbing his strategy “emptying the sea to catch the fish,” Mengistu Haile Mariam targeted the infamous 1984–85 famine in Ethiopia against civil insurgents.33
The world continues to perpetuate such atrocities. At the time of writing, Mugabe in Zimbabwe has followed the same policy, bringing the one-time breadbasket of Africa to the precipice of famine. Ironically, Mengistu fled to Zimbabwe to escape indictment for genocide in Ethiopia.
The ancient practice of siege warfare creating temporary famine within a city is a modest crime by modern standards. Whatever the size of the monstrosity of famine, it does not change the horror for the individual victims or the helplessness of individuals who might seek to intervene. In the siege of Samaria, even the king is presented as sympathetic, utterly powerless, and revolted by the plea of his own citizen over the refusal of an agreement to share a corpse. In such desperate situations, the determination of right and wrong can be confused and uncertain.
The king appears as a somewhat ambiguous figure in the famine of Samaria. In the larger theology of the Deuteronomistic History, the Omride kings were responsible when the wars of judgment came against Israel. In this story the king appears genuinely remorseful as he surveys the wall, wearing sackcloth under his clothes (6:30). When a woman calls out to him for justice because a cannibalistic agreement has been denied, he is genuinely appalled. The reader identifies with his feeling of outrage; how can there be a concern for the injustice of not sharing such grizzly fare, when the real outrage is the war that has driven these poor victims to such extremes? The king responds by demanding the life of Elisha, since he is seen as responsible for this situation in his pronouncements of judgments against Israel. Before the executioner can carry out the task, the king has come to some sense; there is no use blaming the messenger for the bad news. The question is rather how Yahweh can act in this manner (17:33).
This might lead to the conclusion that this story is told to challenge the justice of God.34 Though this is a legitimate question, the context presents other concerns. Israel as a nation has come to be as other nations. War is a part of the human condition; war is created entirely by humans, they must accept responsibility for its atrocities. God and the prophet are directly involved only to the extent that this particular war is a judgment against Israel. War creates a perversion of values so that good and evil in particular circumstances become entirely blurred.
It is important that the plight of individuals in circumstances such as these not be lost and that judgment not be passed against them. Hens-Piazza appropriately provides an example of this danger:
A graphic photo of a dying four-year-old Tutsi child lying in the remains of a deserted refugee camp in Burundi, his grieving mother slumped over him, accompanied the headline “Burundi Steps Up Expulsions of Rwandans.” The article reviewed the history of the controversy and offered an update of the battle between leaders and the warring factions of the two ethnic groups. The responses of other nations and the UN’s gestures were also sketched. Nowhere did the report refer to the mother and child or describe what happened to them. In fact, the impact of the report served to distract and nullify any feeling that might be evoked in the reader response to the photo.35
Powerful governing bodies, stymied by forces outside their control, become the total focus of attention. The miserable victims of these forces of evil are only used as decoys to call attention to what is regarded as the real story, the story about political power and the apparent means to address the problem.
Divine intervention. The story about the two cannibal mothers in the siege of Samaria does call attention to divine intervention for suffering individuals. Only God can intervene in such calamity, as the king himself acknowledges in his despair. Divine deliverance is one of the topoi of this story.36 The “windows of heaven” (7:2) are mentioned in the account of the Flood to restrain or release water (Gen. 7:11; 8:2); the other occurrence is found when the prophet Malachi uses the term to describe divine abundance for those who tithe (Mal. 3:10). The windows of heaven become a metaphor for divine prosperity.
A similar motif is found in the Chronicle of Joshua the Stylite while describing the siege of Amid during the Seleucid era.37 The report details cannibalism but describes a plentiful state of “blessings sent down abundantly from heaven upon all men … and the rain was falling and the fruits of the earth were growing in their seasons.” A repetition of the prophet’s words and those of the captain close the account at Samaria (2 Kings 7:18–19), emphasizing the divine response to human cynicism.
Christians in acts of mercy. Rather than a challenge to the justice of Yahweh, these stories of Elisha are an example of his mercy in outrageous times. Yahweh alone provides relief during the cruelties of the Aramean wars. The intervention of the king for the Shunammite after she lost her land is not coincidence but a divine provision as the king is consulting Gehazi about the death-defying feats of Elisha (8:1–6). Humans are treacherous even to their own masters, as Hazael against Ben-Hadad, perhaps even to their own astonishment (8:11). What they consider to be great things in their own conquests are often great judgment and affliction on innocent victims (v. 13). In all of this the faithful are called to show mercy as they can and to know that the sovereignty of God will prevail over the great powers of the world.
As in the days of Elijah, Christians continue to be known for their acts of humanity in the most horrible of human situations. This was the substance of a convocation address by journalist Brian Stewart.38 What surprised him in over forty years of journalism was the force of Christianity in the drive to serve and help others, a force present from the beginning of Christianity that mysteriously never seems to weaken or grow weary. From the “ringside” seat of a reporter he has found there is no movement closer to the raw truth of war, famines, or crisis and the vast human predicament than organized Christianity in action. There is no alliance more determined and dogged in action than church workers mobilized for common good. They are involved in a vast front stretching from the most impoverished reaches of the developing world to the hectic struggle to preserve caring values in towns and cities of North America. As a journalist he has never reached these front lines without finding Christians already in the thick of it, mobilizing congregations that care, being a faithful witness to truth, the primary light in the darkness, and often the only light.
Stewart came to this admiring view slowly and reluctantly. At the start of his career he had abandoned religion, regarding the church as a tiresome irrelevance. What ultimately persuaded him otherwise was the reality of Christianity’s mission, physically and in spirit, before his very eyes. He was moved by quiet individual moments of character, a courage that seemed anchored to some deep core within Christianity.
Stewart recalled a stairwell in Gdansk, Poland. The first unbelievable crack in the mighty Communist empire, which had so often proclaimed triumph over religion, occurred in Poland in the early 1980s, when the Solidarity Movement, supported by the Roman Catholic Church, rose to challenge tyranny, under the leadership of a most unlikely little shipyard electrician Lech Walensa, who later won the Nobel Peace Prize and become president of Poland. When Stewart met him, Walensa had been jailed and was isolated, and his life was so threatened he seemed to be a “dead man walking.” Reporters assumed security forces were arranging one of those convenient “accidents” that so frequently happen in the climate of oppression.
A few reporters met him alone on this stairwell as he slipped out to mass. One of them asked if he was frightened. He stopped and looked surprised at the thought. Then he answered in a voice of steel: “No, I am afraid of no one, nothing, only God.” With that he walked out into the night; in that dingy stairwell was the purest courage and conscience backed by Christian faith that no force of empire or terror could ever extinguish. Years later in Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Romania, Stewart watched the mighty empire crumble away before civil rights movements that often began in equally dingy little church halls and basements—early gatherings the world knew nothing about and would not have taken seriously if it had.
There have been other movements. Bishop Tutu in Soweto in South Africa in the Apartheid era counseled Christians of all races how to mobilize against injustice without losing their humanity. Martin Luther King Jr. began his movement against segregation in some Birmingham church halls. Stewart testifies to many such efforts: saving children in Mozambique from life on garbage dumps, schools for ex-field hands in the fovea-slums of Brazil, the quiet comforting of runaways and addicts in a thousand asphalt city jungles, and small groups of Christians visiting the lonely and mentally fragile in low-income boarding house flats.
Stewart recalls one particular incident in the murderous civil war in El Salvador in the early 1980s, a war of almost casual massacres, when reporters came to quake before the term “Right Wing Death Squads.” These death squads would kill anyone from landless peasants to Archbishop Romero in his own cathedral. The policy of journalists was to be in the capital before dark, as it was suicide to be on the roads at night. One afternoon they misjudged the time when interviewing a small group of landless refugees to the north. As the night began to thicken, jungle sounds seemed to grow heavy with menace. As they were packing, a delegation of refugee elders begged them to spend the night because the death squads were active and the presence of journalists might prevent the abduction of all the men or a massacre.
That day Stewart cursed the day he became a foreign correspondent. They too were targets; they rationalized—a satellite feed was waiting, jobs were on the line, what good would it do if they too were killed. As they debated, an old station wagon raced into the camp in a cloud of dust. Out stepped three Christian aid workers waving a Red Cross flag. They insisted the journalists return; it was critical they get the word out. All over that awful war there were small groups of Christians trying to stave off the killings. The journalists left, in great relief. The protection that night by the good Samaritans worked. What if the station wagon had not come?
Stewart is perhaps best known for his famous picture of “the face of famine” in Ethiopia. He was in a Catholic refugee camp when an infant girl brought by her parents was given up for dead. Her grave had already been dug. The infant was given what treatment was available and miraculously lived. In time her father came and took her back home. Years later Stewart was able to successfully find the young woman, now herself a mother, to complete the story of how relief saves lives. It was 1984 when Stewart, along with Michael Buerk of BBC fame, first carried the story of the Great Ethiopian Famine on television. The world responded to their story, but they were not the first. They went because, for months, church aid groups on the ground had seen famine coming and urged the world to take notice.
When they did get in, against considerable Ethiopian resistance, these groups showed them where to go. Once when flying to a disaster story their twin engine plane had to make an emergency landing at a deserted landing strip in the dense jungle in central Africa. They stepped into the middle of nowhere, only to be greeted by a cheerful Dutch Reformed minister offering tea. A veteran cameraman named Mike Sweeny later sighed in exasperation, “Do you think you could ever get us to a story, somewhere, anywhere where those Christians aren’t there first!!” It never happened.
Stewart summarized his experience with the following words:
I’m often asked if I lost belief in God covering events like Ethiopia, then called “the worst Hell on Earth.” Actually, like others before me, it was precisely in such hells that I rediscovered religion. I saw so many countless acts of human love and charity, total respect for the most forsaken, for ALL life. I was confronted by the miracle of our Humanity. And I felt again the “Good Infection” of Christian volunteers … and heard again those words tolling “Even Here … Even Here.”39
The Christian witness, of which Stewart speaks, is no less significant than the great works of Elisha during the terrible days of the Syrian wars. The human disasters and pain are not any different in the contemporary world, nor is the power of God through his people in bringing mercy to desperate situations.