Syria Besieges Samaria in Famine

24 And it happened after this that oBen-Hadad king of Syria gathered all his army, and went up and besieged Samaria. 25 And there was a great pfamine in Samaria; and indeed they besieged it until a donkey’s head was sold for eighty shekels of silver, and one-fourth of a 1kab of dove droppings for five shekels of silver.

26 Then, as the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried out to him, saying, “Help, my lord, O king!”

27 And he said, “If the Lord does not help you, where can I find help for you? From the threshing floor or from the winepress?” 28 Then the king said to her, “What is troubling you?”

And she answered, “This woman said to me, ‘Give your son, that we may eat him today, and we will eat my son tomorrow.’ 29 So qwe boiled my son, and ate him. And I said to her on the next day, ‘Give your son, that we may eat him’; but she has hidden her son.”

30 Now it happened, when the king heard the words of the woman, that he rtore his clothes; and as he passed by on the wall, the people looked, and there underneath he had sackcloth on his body. 31 Then he said, s“God do so to me and more also, if the head of Elisha the son of Shaphat remains on him today!”

32 But Elisha was sitting in his house, and tthe elders were sitting with him. And the king sent a man ahead of him, but before the messenger came to him, he said to the elders, u“Do you see how this son of va murderer has sent someone to take away my head? Look, when the messenger comes, shut the door, and hold him fast at the door. Is not the sound of his master’s feet behind him?” 33 And while he was still talking with them, there was the messenger, coming down to him; and then the king said, “Surely this calamity is from the Lord; wwhy should I wait for the Lord any longer?”

7 Then Elisha said, “Hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord: a‘Tomorrow about this time a 1seah of fine flour shall be sold for a shekel, and two seahs of barley for a shekel, at the gate of Samaria.’ ”

2 bSo an officer on whose hand the king leaned answered the man of God and said, “Look, cif the Lord would make windows in heaven, could this thing be?”

And he said, “In fact, you shall see it with your eyes, but you shall not eat of it.”

The Syrians Flee

3 Now there were four leprous men dat the entrance of the gate; and they said to one another, “Why are we sitting here until we die? 4 If we say, ‘We will enter the city,’ the famine is in the city, and we shall die there. And if we sit here, we die also. Now therefore, come, let us surrender to the earmy of the Syrians. If they keep us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall only die.” 5 And they rose at twilight to go to the camp of the Syrians; and when they had come to the outskirts of the Syrian camp, to their surprise no one was there. 6 For the Lord had caused the army of the Syrians fto hear the noise of chariots and the noise of horses—the noise of a great army; so they said to one another, “Look, the king of Israel has hired against us gthe kings of the Hittites and the kings of the Egyptians to attack us!” 7 Therefore they harose and fled at twilight, and left the camp intact—their tents, their horses, and their donkeys—and they fled for their lives. 8 And when these lepers came to the outskirts of the camp, they went into one tent and ate and drank, and carried from it silver and gold and clothing, and went and hid them; then they came back and entered another tent, and carried some from there also, and went and hid it.

9 Then they said to one another, “We are not doing right. This day is a day of good news, and we remain silent. If we wait until morning light, some 2punishment will come upon us. Now therefore, come, let us go and tell the king’s household.” 10 So they went and called to the gatekeepers of the city, and told them, saying, “We went to the Syrian camp, and surprisingly no one was there, not a human sound—only horses and donkeys tied, and the tents intact.” 11 And the gatekeepers called out, and they told it to the king’s household inside.

12 So the king arose in the night and said to his servants, “Let me now tell you what the Syrians have done to us. They know that we are ihungry; therefore they have gone out of the camp to 3hide themselves in the field, saying, ‘When they come out of the city, we shall catch them alive, and get into the city.’ ”

13 And one of his servants answered and said, “Please, let several men take five of the remaining horses which are left in the city. Look, they may either become like all the multitude of Israel that are left in it; or indeed, I say, they may become like all the multitude of Israel left from those who are consumed; so let us send them and see.” 14 Therefore they took two chariots with horses; and the king sent them in the direction of the Syrian army, saying, “Go and see.” 15 And they went after them to the Jordan; and indeed all the road was full of garments and weapons which the Syrians had thrown away in their haste. So the messengers returned and told the king. 16 Then the people went out and plundered the tents of the Syrians. So a seah of fine flour was sold for a shekel, and two seahs of barley for a shekel, jaccording to the word of the Lord.

17 Now the king had appointed the officer on whose hand he leaned to have charge of the gate. But the people trampled him in the gate, and he died, just kas the man of God had said, who spoke when the king came down to him. 18 So it happened just as the man of God had spoken to the king, saying, l“Two seahs of barley for a shekel, and a seah of fine flour for a shekel, shall be sold tomorrow about this time in the gate of Samaria.”

19 Then that officer had answered the man of God, and said, “Now look, if the Lord would make windows in heaven, could such a thing be?”

And he had said, “In fact, you shall see it with your eyes, but you shall not eat of it.” 20 And so it happened to him, for the people trampled him in the gate, and he died.

The King Restores the Shunammite’s Land

8 Then Elisha spoke to the woman awhose son he had restored to life, saying, “Arise and go, you and your household, and stay wherever you can; for the Lord bhas called for a cfamine, and furthermore, it will come upon the land for seven years.” 2 So the woman arose and did according to the saying of the man of God, and she went with her household and dwelt in the land of the Philistines seven years.

3 It came to pass, at the end of seven years, that the woman returned from the land of the Philistines; and she went to make an appeal to the king for her house and for her land. 4 Then the king talked with dGehazi, the servant of the man of God, saying, “Tell me, please, all the great things Elisha has done.” 5 Now it happened, as he was telling the king how he had restored the dead to life, that there was the woman whose son he had erestored to life, appealing to the king for her house and for her land. And Gehazi said, “My lord, O king, this is the woman, and this is her son whom Elisha restored to life.” 6 And when the king asked the woman, she told him.

So the king appointed a certain officer for her, saying, “Restore all that was hers, and all the proceeds of the field from the day that she left the land until now.”

Death of Ben-Hadad

7 Then Elisha went to Damascus, and fBen-Hadad king of Syria was sick; and it was told him, saying, “The man of God has come here.” 8 And the king said to gHazael, h“Take a present in your hand, and go to meet the man of God, and iinquire of the Lord by him, saying, ‘Shall I recover from this disease?’ ” 9 So jHazael went to meet him and took a present with him, of every good thing of Damascus, forty camel-loads; and he came and stood before him, and said, “Your son Ben-Hadad king of Syria has sent me to you, saying, ‘Shall I recover from this disease?’ ”

10 And Elisha said to him, “Go, say to him, ‘You shall certainly recover.’ However the Lord has shown me that khe will really die.” 11 Then he 1set his countenance in a stare until he was ashamed; and the man of God lwept. 12 And Hazael said, “Why is my lord weeping?”

He answered, “Because I know mthe evil that you will do to the children of Israel: Their strongholds you will set on fire, and their young men you will kill with the sword; and you nwill dash their children, and rip open their women with child.”

13 So Hazael said, “But what ois your servant—a dog, that he should do this gross thing?”

And Elisha answered, p“The Lord has shown me that you will become king over Syria.”

14 Then he departed from Elisha, and came to his master, who said to him, “What did Elisha say to you?” And he answered, “He told me you would surely recover.” 15 But it happened on the next day that he took a thick cloth and dipped it in water, and spread it over his face so that he died; and Hazael reigned in his place.