2 Kingschapter 7
20 verses · Jeremiah, by tradition · 6th century BC · History
Key verse
Then a lord on whose hand the king leaned answered the man of God, and said, Behold, if the Lord would make windows in heaven, might this thing be? And he said, Behold, thou shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.
It stands in Fine flour for a shekel tomorrow: and a captain who scoffs, verses 1 to 2.
The chapter
Chapter summary
Elisha answers the famine with a price list for tomorrow: fine flour a shekel a measure, barley two measures a shekel, in the gate of Samaria. The captain on whose hand the king leans scoffs about windows in heaven, and is told he will see it and not eat of it. That night four lepers at the gate reason that they will die either way, walk into the Syrian camp at twilight, and find it empty. The Lord had made the host hear chariots. They eat and hide spoil, then stop themselves: 'this day is a day of good tidings, and we hold our peace.' Every word comes true, and the scoffing captain is trodden down in the gate.
Context
History · Jeremiah · 2 Kings overview
The world of this chapter
- Who
- Israelites who had watched a city gate become a marketplace of famine prices
- Where
- The gate of Samaria and the abandoned Aramean camp outside it
- When
- The siege of Samaria. c. 845 BC, on Thiele's chronology
Historical context
The four men with skin disease sit at the entrance of the gate because the Law required them to live outside the community, and in a siege that put them in the worst possible position, outside the wall with the enemy and cut off from whatever food was still inside. Their reasoning is stated plainly: staying means starving, going means maybe dying, so they walk toward the enemy camp at dusk.
The gate itself is the setting for both halves of the chapter. City gates were roofed structures with chambers where elders sat, business was done, and grain was measured and priced. The prophecy is given in market terms, a measure of fine flour for a shekel and two of barley for a shekel, which is the language of an ordinary trading day, and that is what makes it unbelievable to men who had just been quoting the price of a donkey's head.
The Arameans hear the sound of chariots and a great army and conclude that Israel has hired the Hittite and Egyptian kings. That was a realistic fear, since small kingdoms did hire outside powers and a night alarm in a camp was notoriously hard to control. They leave tents, horses and donkeys standing and run for the Jordan, and the road is littered with clothing and equipment thrown down in flight, a detail that reads as a rout.
The officer on whose hand the king leaned held a real court post, a personal aide close enough to the king to support his arm in public. His mocking remark about windows in heaven and his death in the crush of the crowd at the gate are told twice, at the start and the end, because the narrator wants the fulfilment matched to the word.
Significance
The four outcasts say the sentence that carries the chapter: this day is a day of good news, and we are keeping silent. Men with nothing, holding the only good news in the country, decide it has to be told.
For the first hearers the point beneath it was that God can lift a siege overnight and needs no army to do it. The city was saved by a sound, and the news was carried by the men it had pushed outside the wall.
Where the chapter sits
2 Kings 7 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
People1
Places1
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
Fine flour for a shekel tomorrow: and a captain who scoffsvv. 1-2
a measure of fine flour: Elisha's message sets tomorrow's grain prices to the shekel, spoken into a city that one chapter earlier paid silver for dove's dung and watched a mother boil her own son for food. The lord who leans on the king's hand answers with a scoff at the idea of a downpour of grain, and Elisha answers him with a sentence rather than an argument, thou shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof. The chapter repeats that same sentence word for word at verse nineteen, so the reader is told it twice before its execution is reported at verses seventeen through twenty. The pattern echoes the man of God who named Josiah three centuries before his birth at 1 Ki 13:2, a word spoken plainly and then kept to the letter, only here the gap between word and fulfillment is a single day.
2 Kings 7:1
“The division between the chapters is most awkward here. Elisha, in this verse, replies to the king’s challenge in 2Ki 6:33 - that his God, Yahweh, will give deliverance in the space of a day. On the morrow, by the same time in the day, the famine will have ceased, and food will be even cheaper than usual. A measure of fine flour - literally, “a seah of fine flour;” about a peck and a half. For a shekel - About 2 shillings 8 12 d. Two measures of burley - Or, “two seahs of barley;” about three pecks.”
2 more voices on this verseWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
2 Kings 7:1
“The consequence of that shall be great plenty. This would, in time, follow of course, but that corn should be thus cheap in so short a time was quite beyond what could be thought of. Though the king of Israel had just now threatened Elisha's life, God promises to save his life and the life of his people; for where sin abounded grace doth much more abound.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2 Kings 7:1
“Hear ye the word of the Lord--This prediction, though uttered first to the assembled elders, was intimated to the king's messengers, who reported it to Jehoram (2Ki 7:18).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
2 Kings 7:2
“Then a lord - שליש shalish. This word, as a name of office, occurs often, and seems to point out one of the highest offices in the state. So unlikely was this prediction to be fulfilled, that he thought God must pour out wheat and barley from heaven before it could have a literal accomplishment. But shalt not eat thereof - This was a mere prediction of his death, but not as a judgment for his unbelief; any person in his circumstances might have spoken as he did.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
2 Kings 7:2
“The murmuring Israelites saw Canaan, but could not enter in because of unbelief. Such (says bishop Patrick) will be the portion of those that believe not the promise of eternal life; they shall see it at a distance--Abraham afar off, but shall never taste of it; for they forfeit the benefit of the promise if they cannot find in their heart to take God's word.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Four lepers find an empty camp and stop hoarding
four leprous men at the entering in: Four men with leprosy sit where the law of Moses placed them, outside the gate and outside the camp, and hunger drives them to reason out loud. Their logic admits only three doors: stay and die of famine, enter the starving city and die the same death, or risk the Syrian camp where death is only a possibility instead of a certainty. It is not courage that moves them so much as arithmetic, and the text lets their calculation stand as reasoning any starving man could follow.
2 Kings 7:3
“The position of the lepers is in accordance with the Law of Moses (marginal references); and shows that the Law was still observed to some extent in the kingdom of Israel.”
2 Kings 7:4
“OUTSIDE the gates of Samaria, at the time mentioned in our text, you might have seen four miserable beings, gaunt and thin, with that sharpness of eye and visage which is always the effect of protracted hunger. They were lepers, suffering from a loathsome disease and emaciated by starvation. They held, as it were, a miniature council of war, and the result of their deliberations was that they said to one another, "Why do we stay here to die?”
Charles Spurgeon· written before 1892· The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 2894: “The Sinner's Only Alternative” (lightly modernized text, CCEL edition)Particular Baptist
there was no man there: The lepers reach the camp at the same hour they set out, the evening twilight, and find it empty of any watch to surrender to. The text names the cause directly: the Lord made the host of Syria hear a noise of chariots and horses, a great host they could not see, and their own guess turns it into hired armies of the Hittites and of Egypt. One chapter earlier Elisha's servant saw a mountain full of real horses and chariots of fire around Dothan at 6:17; here the enemy hears an army that was never assembled at all, and the same God stands behind both the seen host and the imagined one. They flee, leaving tents, horses, asses, and the camp exactly as it stood, saving nothing but their lives.
2 Kings 7:5
“The twilight - The evening twilight (see 2Ki 7:9). The uttermost part of the camp - The extreme boundary of the camp toward the city, not its furthest or most distant portion. Compare 2Ki 7:8.”
2 Kings 7:6
“It is a matter of no importance whether we say that the miracle by which God now performed deliverance for Samaria consisted in a mere illusion of the sense of hearing (compare 2Ki 6:19-20); or whether there was any objective reality in the sound (compare the marginal references). The king of Israel hath hired - The swords of mercenaries had been employed by the nations bordering on Palestine as early as the time of David 2Sa 10:6; 1Ch 19:6-7. Hence, the supposition of the Syrians was far from improbable.”
2 more voices on this verse
2 Kings 7:6
“For the Lord had made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, even the noise of a great host,....”
2 Kings 7:6
“The Lord had made the - Syrians to hear a noise - This threw them into confusion; they imagined that they were about to be attacked by powerful auxiliaries, which the king of Israel had hired against them.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 Kings 7:7
“Those that will not fear God he can make to fear at the shaking of a leaf. How the Syrians' flight was discovered by four leprous men. Samaria was delivered, and did not know it.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
did eat and drink: The lepers work tent to tent, eating, drinking, and hiding silver, gold and clothing before conscience catches up with them. Their own verdict names the fault precisely, this day is a day of good tidings, and we hold our peace, men with nothing left to lose sitting on news that could save a starving city. Spurgeon preached this verse by name as a debt owed once deliverance has been tasted, that a man who has found good news has no right to keep it to himself. The lepers correct themselves before the night is out and go to tell the king's household.
2 Kings 7:9
“You are not surprised to find that, when those four lepers outside the gate of Samaria had made the great discovery that the Syrian camp was deserted, they first satisfied their own hunger and thirst. And quite right, too. Who would do otherwise? It is true that they were bound to go and tell other hungry ones, but they could do that with all the louder voice and they were the more sure of the truth they had to tell when they had first refreshed themselves.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Kings 7:9
“The lepers began to think that if they kept this important matter secret during the whole night for their own private advantage, when the morning came they would be found out, accused, and punished (see margin).”
2 Kings 7:10-12
called unto the porter of the city: Word passes in three quick steps: the lepers call to the porter of the city, the porter calls the porters, and the king's house hears it from within. The king's first reaction is not faith but calculation, a trap set by starving Syrians hiding in the field to catch Israel outside the walls once hunger drives the people out. Matthew Henry reads the suspicion as the mark of a mind unstable in all its ways, expecting to receive nothing good from God even when the report is true. The same king who tore his robes and blamed Elisha for the famine one chapter earlier still cannot trust deliverance when it is standing at the gate.
2 Kings 7:10
“They called unto the porter ... and told them - The word “porter” is used like our “guard” and the meaning here is, not that the lepers called to any particular individual, but that they roused the body of men who were keeping guard at one of the gates.”
2 Kings 7:11
“And he called the porters,.... The porter of the city called to the porters of the king's palace: and they told it to the king's house within; to some of his domestic servants within the palace, and they reported it to the king.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Kings 7:11
“13 And one of his servants answered and said, Let some take, I pray thee, five of the horses that remain, which are left in the city, (behold, they are as all the multitude of Israel that are left in it: behold, I say, they are even as all the multitude of the Israelites that are consumed:) and let us send and see.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
The gate is trampled and the word comes true
2 Kings 7:12
“He knew no reason the Syrians had to fly, for it does not appear that he or any of this attendants heard the noise of the chariots which the Syrians were frightened at. Let not those who, like him, are unstable in all their ways, think to receive any thing from God; nay, a guilty conscience fears the worst and makes men suspicious.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
five of the horses that remain: One servant proposes a modest test, send five of the horses that are left, since they will die of the famine soon enough whether they go or stay. Only two chariot horses can be found fit to send, a detail that measures how far the siege has stripped the city's own strength. The riders follow the road toward Jordan and find it strewn the whole way with garments and vessels the Syrians threw off in their haste, proof the king could see for himself before a single soldier was put at risk.
2 Kings 7:15
“The Syrians had fled probably by the great road which led from Samaria to Damascus through Geba, En-gannim, Beth-shean, and Aphek. It crosses the Jordan at the Jisr Mejamia, about thirty-five miles northeast of Samaria.”
spoiled the tents of the Syrians: The city empties into the abandoned camp and takes what the four lepers had only sampled, and the market answers Elisha's word to the letter, a measure of fine flour for a shekel, two measures of barley for a shekel, exactly as promised at sundown the day before. The text names its own standard for truth, according to the word of the Lord, the same formula Kings uses whenever a spoken word and its outcome are set side by side for the reader to compare.
2 Kings 7:16
“God's promise may be safely relied on, for no word of his shall fall to the ground. The death of the unbelieving courtier, that questioned the truth of Elisha's word. Divine threatenings will as surely be accomplished as divine promises.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Thou shalt see it, but shalt not eat thereofvv. 17-20
on whose hand he leaned: The king sets the skeptical lord over the gate to keep order, and the same crowd whose hunger emptied the Syrian camp tramples him underfoot on its way to the spoil. Verses eighteen and nineteen repeat the prophecy and the lord's scoffing answer almost word for word from the chapter's opening, so the narrator lets the reader watch the sentence land a second time before reporting the death itself. He sees the plenty with his own eyes exactly as told, and eats none of it, exactly as told. Kings closes the account the way it opened it, as the man of God had said, a small word kept as carefully as any of the covenant promises the rest of the book is built on.
2 Kings 7:17
“And the people trode upon him - This officer being appointed by the king to have the command of the gate, the people rushing out to get spoil, and in to carry it to their houses, he was borne down by the multitude and trodden to death. This also was foreseen by the spirit of prophecy. The literal and exact fulfillment of such predictions must have acquired the prophet a great deal of credit in Israel.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 more voices on this verse
2 Kings 7:17
“When he was about to fill his belly God cast the fury of his wrath upon him ( Job xx. 23 ) and it came between the cup and the lip. Justly are those thus tantalized with the world's promises that think themselves tantalized with the promises of God.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2 Kings 7:17
“The news spread like lightning through the city, and was followed, as was natural, by a popular rush to the Syrian camp. To keep order at the gate, the king ordered his minister to keep guard; but the impetuosity of the famishing people could not be resisted. The lord was trodden to death, and Elisha's prophecy in all respects accomplished.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
2 Kings 7:18
“And it came to pass, as the man of God had spoken to the king, saying,.... As in 2Ki 7:1, and what he said to the king there, and to the lord, in 2Ki 7:2, are repeated in this and the next verse, that it might be observed how exactly the prophecies were fulfilled.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Kings 7:18
“When Israel said, Can God furnish a table? the Lord heard it and was wroth. Infinite wisdom will not be limited by our folly. God never promises the end without knowing where to provide the means.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2 Kings 7:19
“And that lord answered the man of God, and said,.... As in 2Ki 7:2. and he said; that is, Elisha, as in the same place.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Kings 7:19
“ONE WISE man may deliver a whole city; one good man may be the means of safety to a thousand others. The holy ones are “the salt of the earth,” the means of the preservation of the wicked. Without the godly as a conserve, the race would be utterly destroyed. In the city of Samaria there was one righteous man—Elisha, the servant of the Lord. Piety was altogether extinct in the court. The king was a sinner of the blackest dye, his iniquity was glaring and infamous.”
2 Kings 7:20
“And so it fell out, &c. - See how heinously God resents our distrust of his power, providence and promise! Whenever God promises the end, he knows where to provide the means.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
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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; Charles Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 1996, Public Testimony, a Debt to God and Man; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; 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.