2 Kingschapter 13
25 verses · Jeremiah, by tradition · 6th century BC · History
Key verse
And it came to pass, as they were burying a man, that, behold, they spied a band of men; and they cast the man into the sepulchre of Elisha: and when the man was let down, and touched the bones of Elisha, he revived, and stood up on his feet.
It stands in A dead man revives at the touch of Elisha's bones, verses 20 to 25.
The chapter
Chapter summary
Jehoahaz's Israel is ground down until Hazael leaves him only fifty horsemen, ten chariots, and ten thousand footmen, made like the dust in threshing. Yet when he entreats Jehovah a savior is given, for the sake of the covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Then Elisha's deathbed and the last enacted prophecy of his life. Jehoash weeps over him with Elisha's own words for Elijah, and is told to shoot eastward through the opened window: 'The arrow of Jehovah's victory.' Told next to smite the ground, he strikes three times and stops, and the man of God is angry. Now he will beat Syria only thrice. Even Elisha's bones raise a corpse thrown hastily into his grave.
Context
History · Jeremiah · 2 Kings overview
The world of this chapter
The low point of the northern kingdom under Aramean pressure · Jehoahaz 814 to 798 BC, Jehoash of Israel 798 to 782 BC on Thiele's reckoning · Samaria, reduced to a token army, and Elisha's deathbed · Israelites whose national defence had been ground down to almost nothing
Historical context
The chapter belongs to two kings of Jehu's house, Jehoahaz and his son Jehoash, and to Elisha in the last days of a ministry that had run since Elijah was taken. The years are 814 to 782 BC on Thiele's reckoning.
The place is Samaria and the territory Hazael had taken, with the closing scene at the prophet's own sickbed. The occasion is a kingdom under Aramean pressure for a whole reign.
A first hearer measured the collapse in equipment. Fifty horsemen, ten chariots and ten thousand foot soldiers was what remained, where Ahab had put two thousand chariots into the field at Qarqar about sixty years earlier. The text says Hazael had made them like the dust at threshing.
The deliverer God sends is unnamed in the chapter, and the historical candidate is Adad-nirari III of Assyria, whose campaigns against Damascus around 796 BC broke Aramean power in the region. His own inscription found at Tell al-Rimah names Joash of Samaria among the kings who paid him tribute, so the relief came through a great power pursuing its own interests. The commentators read the same verse of the man named at the end of the chapter, which is set out in the chapter's study row.
The Asherah pole still standing in Samaria through all of this is noted in passing. It was a wooden cult object representing a Canaanite goddess, and its survival through a national catastrophe says how settled the mixed worship had become.
A first hearer read the deathbed scene as a prophetic sign act. The king's hands go on the bow with the prophet's hands over them. The arrow is shot east, which is the direction of the lost Transjordan territory, and the number of blows on the ground is the number of victories. The burial at the end works the same way, since rock-cut family tombs were reopened to add later bodies. Moabite raiders came at the turn of the year, when the roads dried and the grain stood.
Significance
The first hearers heard something surprising in a chapter about ruin. The LORD was gracious to them and had compassion on them because of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and would not destroy them yet.
They also heard the sharpest lesson in the book about half-hearted asking. The king had a promise in his hands and struck three times, and the limit on the victory was set by the man holding the arrows.
Where the chapter sits
2 Kings 13 falls in Elijah's ascension; Elisha's ministry (chapters 1–13). Elijah taken up by whirlwind; double portion; widow's oil; the Shunammite's son raised; Naaman healed; siege of Samaria broken; Elisha dies and his bones raise a man.
After it: Northern kingdom's fall, chapters 14–17.
The whole shape of 2 Kings→The structure of this chapter
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
A. Jehoahaz left fifty horsemen: and a savior sent anyway
1. (vv. 1-3)
Jehoahaz the son of Jehu: Jehu's own dynasty had been promised four generations on the throne for striking down Ahab's house, and his son Jehoahaz opens that promise by walking the same road Jeroboam laid down. The narrator names the sin before he names the punishment: the anger of the LORD delivers Israel into Hazael's hand for the whole reign, the same king whose rise Elijah was told to anoint at Horeb. A dynasty raised up in judgment on one house still answers for its own choices.
2 Kings 13:1
“In this chapter the history of the kingdom of Israel is traced through the two reigns of Jehoahaz and Jehoash. In 2 Kings 14 the history of Judah is resumed. In the three and twentieth year - Rather, the “one and twentieth year.” See 2Ki 13:10.”
2 Kings 13:2
“And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord,.... Committed idolatry: and followed the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which made Israel to sin; worshipping the golden calves: he departed not therefrom; from the worship of them.”
2 Kings 13:3
“All their days - literally, “all the days.” Not “all the days” of the two Syrian kings, for Ben-hadad lost to Joash all the cities which he had gained from Jehoahaz 2Ki 13:25; but either “all the days of Jehoahaz” 2Ki 13:22, or “all the days of Hazael” - both while he led his own armies, and while they were led by his son.”
2. (vv. 4-6)
Jehoahaz besought the Lord: Under Hazael's oppression Jehoahaz prays, and the LORD hears him and gives Israel a saviour, though the text withholds the man's name here and Gill and the bench identify him only later at verse 25 as Jehoahaz's own son Joash, the deliverance arriving after the father who prayed for it is dead. The parenthesis that closes the unit is the chapter's own commentary on the prayer: the sins of the house of Jeroboam remain, and the grove Ahab set up still stands in Samaria. Mercy answers the cry without waiting for the reform that never comes.
2 Kings 13:4
“In the extremity of his distress, Jehoahaz besought the Lord, and was heard, not on his own account (Ps 66:18; 15:8), but that of the ancient covenant with the patriarchs (2Ki 13:23).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
2 Kings 13:5
“And the Lord gave Israel a saviour,.... Not an angel sent by him, nor a captain raised up among them, nor the prophet Elisha, who predicted their deliverance, nor Jehoahaz himself, but his son Joash, 2Ki 13:25. so that they went out from under the hand of the Syrians; were not in subjection to them, nor harassed by them, nor in fear of them: and the children of Israel dwelt in their tents, as before time; in peace and safety.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Kings 13:5
“The Lord gave Israel a saviour - Not immediately on the repentance of Jehoahaz but after his death (see 2Ki 13:25). They went out from under the hand of the Syrians - i. e. they ceased to be oppressed by the Syrians; they shook off their yoke, and became once more perfectly independent. Tents - See 1Ki 8:66 note.”
2 Kings 13:6
“Nevertheless, they departed not from the sins of the house of Jeroboam, who made Israel to sin, but walked therein,.... Continued to worship the calves still, which was an instance of great ingratitude; the Syriac and Arabic versions read, "he departed not"; Jehoahaz the king: and there remained the grove in Samaria; which Ahab made there, 1Ki 16:33, neither Jehu nor his son had it cut down, though Baal was destroyed.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Kings 13:6
“The grove also in Samaria - Asherah, or Astarte, remained in Samaria, and there was she worshipped, with all her abominable rites.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
3. (v. 7)
but fifty horsemen, and ten chariots: Hazael's oppression is measured in a single ruined army: fifty horsemen, ten chariots and ten thousand footmen left of a kingdom's fighting strength, made like the dust by threshing. Barnes reads the threshing figure as more than metaphor, the literal use of the threshing instrument on captives that 2 Sam 12:31 also records. A northern kingdom that traded the LORD for a calf now has almost nothing left to defend either.
2 Kings 13:7
“The meaning is that “he, the king of Syria” (2Ki 13:4 Hazael) limited the standing army of Jehoahaz. Like the dust by threshing - An expression not only employed metaphorically, and importing defeat, conquest, and grinding oppression Jer 51:33; Mic 4:12, but implying also the literal use of threshing-instruments in the execution of prisoners of war (marginal reference, and compare 2Sa 12:31).”
4. (vv. 8-9)
the rest of the acts of Jehoahaz: The regnal formula closes Jehoahaz's reign the way it closes every northern king's, a reference to a chronicle no longer extant and a burial notice, and the text spends no more ink on a king who prayed once and reformed nothing. Joash his son succeeds him, the deliverer promised at verse 5 not yet named but already on the throne. The pattern holds across the whole book: mercy is granted, and the throne passes on unchanged.
2 Kings 13:8
“Now the rest of the acts of Jehoahaz, and all that he did, and his might,.... Which he exerted against the Syrians, being a man of courage, though not successful, because the Lord was not with him, but against him: are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? where their acts, and the events of their reigns, were recorded.”
2 Kings 13:9
“And Jehoahaz slept with his fathers,.... Died, as they did: and they buried him in Samaria; where Omri, and all the kings of Israel, that descended from him, were buried: and Joash his son reigned in his stead; of whom a short account is given in the following verses.”
B. Jehoash of Israel and the sins that would not dievv. 10-13
Jehoash the son of Jehoahaz: Joash inherits his father's sin along with his father's throne, the same formula, the same calves, the same refusal to depart from Jeroboam's way that has now run four reigns. Verse 13 names Jeroboam the second sitting on his throne before the narrative has told a word of Jehoash's own acts, the book's habit of naming the next king before finishing the last one's story. This Joash is the deliverer the parenthesis of verse 5 promised, arriving under a name the chapter has not yet spent on him.
2 Kings 13:10
“In the thirty and seventh year - Joash, the son of Jehoahaz, was associated with his father in the government two years before his death. It is this association that is spoken of here. He succeeded him two years after, a little before the death of Elisha. Joash reigned sixteen years, which include the years he governed conjointly with his father. - Calmet.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 Kings 13:11
“And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord,.... As his father did, and his character is described in the same words, see 2Ki 13:2.”
2 Kings 13:12
“Wherewith he fought against Amaziah - This war with Amaziah may be seen in ample detail 2 Chron. 25; it ended in the total defeat of Amaziah, who was taken prisoner by Joash, and afterwards slain in a conspiracy at Lachish. Joash took Jerusalem, broke down four hundred cubits of the wall, and took all the royal treasures, and the treasures of the house of God. See 2Ch 25:20-27.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
C. Shoot the arrow of Jehovah's deliverance: then smite the ground
1. (v. 14)
O my father, my father: Elisha's own last sickness draws from the king of Israel the very cry Elisha himself gave for Elijah at 2:12, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof, the prophet's ministry named in a soldier's vocabulary of national defense. Clarke and Henry read the king's tears as real, however compromised his reign, an honor paid to sixty years of a man who had outlived the drought, the double portion, and every king of his lifetime. A calf worshipper still knows where Israel's true strength has stood.
2 Kings 13:14
“Now Elisha was fallen sick - This is supposed to have taken place in the tenth year of Joash; and if so, Elisha must have prophesied about sixty-five years. O my father, my father - “What shall I do now thou art dying? thou art the only defense of Israel.” He accosts him with the same words which himself spoke to Elijah when he was translated; see 2Ki 2:12 (note), and the note there.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 more voices on this verse
2 Kings 13:14
“Elisha was aware that therefore he was loth to part with him because he looked upon him as the great bulwark of the kingdom against that common enemy, and depended much upon his blessings and prayers in his designs against them.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2 Kings 13:14
“The particular application of them to Elisha, who, by his counsels and prayer, had obtained many glorious victories for Israel, shows that the king possessed some measure of faith and trust, which, though weak, was accepted, and called forth the prophet's dying benediction.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
2. (vv. 15-19)
Take bow and arrows: The prophet's hands over the king's hands on the bow mark the arrow as the LORD's own act worked through a human hand, and the shot east through the open window is named outright, the arrow of the Lord's deliverance against Syria. Smiting the ground was the same kind of act, and Joash stops at three strokes where the man of God expected five or six, a king asked to keep asking and settling instead for a token obedience. Elisha's anger names the cost precisely: thou shouldest have smitten five or six times, then hadst thou smitten Syria till thou hadst consumed it, whereas now thou shalt smite Syria but thrice, the measure of the asking returned as the measure of the victory.
2 Kings 13:15
“His laying his hands upon the king's hands was to represent the power imparted to the bow shot as coming from the Lord through the medium of the prophet. His shooting the first arrow eastward--to that part of his kingdom which the Syrians had taken and which was east of Samaria--was a declaration of war against them for the invasion.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
2 Kings 13:16
“And he said unto the king of Israel, put thine hand upon the bow, and he put his hand upon it,.... His left hand: and Elisha put his hands upon the king's hands; on both his hands, which were put, the one on the bow, the other on the arrow (m); hereby signifying, that though the king would draw the bow in battle, the Lord, whom the prophet represented, would give the success; and that it would be by his help, and through his blessing on his arms, that he would obtain victory over his enemies. (m) See Virgil. Aeneid.”
2 Kings 13:17
Eastward - Syria of Damascus lay partly east, but still more north, of the holy land. The arrow was to be shot, eastward, not so much against Syria itself as against the scene of the recent Syrian successes, Gilead 2Ki 10:33, which was also to be the scene of Joash’s victories over them. Aphek is almost due east from Shunem, where it is not unlikely that Elisha now was. The arrow ... - literally, “An arrow of deliverance from the Lord, and an arrow of deliverance against Syria; and thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek, even to consuming.”
2 Kings 13:18
“Smite upon the ground - As he was ordered to take his arrows, the smiting on the ground must mean shooting arrows into it. He smote thrice, and stayed - The prophet knew that this shooting was emblematical: probably the king was not aware of what depended on the frequency of the action; and perhaps it was of the Lord that he smote only thrice, as he had determined to give Israel those three victories only over the Syrians.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 Kings 13:19
“The unfaithfulness of man limits the goodness of God. Though Joash did the prophet’s bidding, it was without any zeal or fervour; and probably without any earnest belief in the efficacy of what he was doing. Compare Mar 6:5-6. God had been willing to give the Israelites complete victory over Syria 2Ki 13:17; but Joash by his non-acceptance of the divine promise in its fulness had checked the outflow of mercy; and the result was that the original promise could not be fulfilled.”
D. A dead man revives at the touch of Elisha's bones
1. (vv. 20-21)
the bands of the Moabites: Elisha dies and is buried, and Wesley reads the Moabite raid that follows at the coming in of the year as judgment moving in where a faithful prophet's protection has been removed. A corpse thrown hastily into Elisha's own sepulchre touches the prophet's bones and stands up alive, the last of his miracles worked without a word from his mouth. The bench reads it as the seal on a lifetime of the LORD's power resting on him, power the grave itself could not hold back.
2 Kings 13:20
“Moabites invaded - The mentioning this immediately on the death of Elisha intimates, that the removal of God's faithful prophets, is a presage of judgments approaching.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
2 Kings 13:21
“They cast the man - Rather, “they thrust the man.” The graves of the Jews were not pits dug in the ground, like ours, but caves or cells excavated in the side of a rock, the mouth of the cave being ordinarily shut by a heavy stone. Stood up on his feet - Coffins were not used by the Jews. The body was simply wrapped or swathed in grave-clothes (compare Luk 7:15; Joh 11:44). This miracle of Elisha’s after his death is more surprising than any of those which he performed during his lifetime.”
2 more voices on this verse
2 Kings 13:21
“After this, another law is published. It says, "Whatever soul touches anything unclean, or the carcass of unclean beasts, and conceals it and is defiled, or if he touches the uncleanness of [a person] or anything unclean by which he is defiled," and so forth. These, to be sure, are observed by the Jews indecently and uselessly enough. And why should one who, for example, touches a dead animal or the body of a dead person be held to be impure? What if it is the body of a prophet?”
Origen of Alexandria· written before 253· HOMILIES ON LEVITICUS 3.3.1patristic
2 Kings 13:21
“And it may, perhaps, have a reference to Christ, by whose death and burial the grave is made to all believers a safe and happy passage to life. It likewise intimated that though Elisha was dead, yet, in virtue of the promises made by him, Israel's interests, though they seemed quite sunk and lost, should revive and flourish again.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2. (vv. 22-23)
oppressed Israel all the days: The narrator states the oppression once more before turning to the reason it did not become extermination, and the reason is named without qualification: the LORD was gracious unto them, and had compassion on them, and had respect unto them, because of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Where thread one holds Judah's throne on David's covenant, the same chapter holds the northern people themselves on the patriarchal covenant older than either kingdom, and would not destroy them, neither cast he them from his presence as yet leaves the door open rather than shut. Barnes reads as yet against 2 Ki 17:18-20's later casting out, a mercy with a horizon rather than a permanent reprieve.
2 Kings 13:22
“But Hazael king of Syria oppressed Israel all the days of Jehoahaz. That he reigned alone, at least, before he took his son Joash to reign with him.”
2 Kings 13:23
“And the Lord was gracious to them,.... To Israel, notwithstanding their apostasy from him, and the idolatry of the calves they were guilty of: and had compassion on them; being in oppression and distress: and had respect unto them; looked upon them with an eye of pity and mercy: because of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; made so long ago he still remembered: and would not destroy them, neither cast he them from his presence as yet; or suffered them to be carried captive into another land, as he afterwards did in the times of Hoshea.”
2 more voices on this verse
2 Kings 13:23
“The writer regards the captivity of Israel as God’s “casting them out of His sight” (see 2Ki 17:18, 2Ki 17:20); and notes that this extreme punishment, though deserved, was by God’s mercy not allowed to fall on them as yet.”
2 Kings 13:23
“It was of the Lord's mercies that they were not consumed, because he would not destroy them as yet. He foresaw they would destroy themselves at last, but as yet he would reprieve them, and give them space to repent. The slowness of God's processes against sinners must be construed to the honour of his mercy, not the impeachment of his justice.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
3. (vv. 24-25)
So Hazael king of Syria died: Hazael's death and his son's succession clear the ground for the deliverance promised back at verse 5 to take its full shape: Jehoash recovers the cities his father lost, and does it in exactly three victories, no more. Gill and Henry both draw the line straight back to the bow: thrice Joash beat the Syrians, just as often as he had struck the ground with the arrows, and there the course of his victories stopped. A half obedience buys a partial deliverance, and the chapter lets the arithmetic stand without softening it.
2 Kings 13:24
“So Hazael the king of Syria died, and Benhadad his son reigned in his stead. This was Benhadad the third; the first of this name was of the Damascene kings; but though the kingdom was now in another family, yet this name, being respectable with the Syrians, was retained in it.”
2 Kings 13:25
“This was a great kindness to the cities themselves, which were hereby brought from under the yoke of oppression, and to the whole kingdom, which was much strengthened by the reduction of those cities. Thrice Joash beat the Syrians, just as often as he had struck the ground with the arrows, and then a full stop was put to the course of his victories.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 more voice on this verse
2 Kings 13:25
“The cities which ... - Probably cities west of the Jordan, since the tract east of that river was conquered, mainly if not wholly, in the reign of Jehu 2Ki 10:33.”
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Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes on the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament; Keil, The Books of the Kings and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.