25 There was a great famine in Samaria: and, behold, they besieged it, until a donkey's head was sold for eighty [pieces] of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove's dung for five [pieces] of silver.
When I break your staff of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall deliver your bread again by weight: and you shall eat, and not be satisfied.
Elijah went to show himself to Ahab. The famine was sore in Samaria.
The king said to her, What ails you? She answered, This woman said to me, Give your son, that we may eat him today, and we will eat my son tomorrow. So we boiled my son, and ate him: and I said to her on the next day, Give your son, that we may eat him; and she has hid her son.
If we say, We will enter into the city, then the famine is in the city, and we shall die there; and if we sit still here, we die also. Now therefore come, and let us fall to the host of the Syrians: if they save us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall but die.
On the ninth day of the [fourth] month the famine was sore in the city, so that there was no bread for the people of the land.
Then said I, Ah, Lord Yahweh! behold, the prophets tell them, You shall not see the sword, neither shall you have famine; but I will give you assured peace in this place. Then Yahweh said to me, The prophets prophesy lies in my name; I didn't send them, neither have I commanded them, neither spoke I to them: they prophesy to you a lying vision, and divination, and a thing of nothing, and the deceit of their own heart. Therefore thus says Yahweh concerning the prophets who prophesy in my name, and I didn't send them, yet they say, Sword and famine shall not be in this land: By sword and famine shall those prophets be consumed.
If I go forth into the field, then, behold, the slain with the sword! and if I enter into the city, then, behold, those who are sick with famine! for both the prophet and the priest go about in the land, and have no knowledge.
Behold, the mounds, they are come to the city to take it; and the city is given into the hand of the Chaldeans who fight against it, because of the sword, and of the famine, and of the pestilence; and what you have spoken has happened; and, behold, you see it.
Yahweh said, Even thus shall the children of Israel eat their bread unclean, among the nations where I will drive them. Then said I, Ah Lord Yahweh! behold, my soul has not been polluted; for from my youth up even until now have I not eaten of that which dies of itself, or is torn of animals; neither came there abominable flesh into my mouth. Then he said to me, Behold, I have given you cow's dung for man's dung, and you shall prepare your bread thereon. Moreover he said to me, Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and they shall eat bread by weight, and with fearfulness; and they shall drink water by measure, and in dismay:
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on 2 Kings 6
Commentary on 2 Kings 6 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 6
In this chapter we have,
The relief of it is another of the wonders wrought by Elisha's word, which we shall have the story of in the next chapter. Elisha is still a great blessing both to church and state, both to the sons of the prophets and to his prince.
2Ki 6:1-7
Several things may be observed here,
2Ki 6:8-12
Here we have Elisha, with his spirit of prophecy, serving the king, as before helping the sons of the prophets; for that, as other gifts, is given to every man to profit withal; and, whatever abilities any man has of doing good, he is by them made a debtor both to the wise and unwise. Observe here,
2Ki 6:13-23
Here is,
2Ki 6:24-33
This last paragraph of this chapter should, of right, have been the first of the next chapter, for it begins a new story, which is there continued and concluded. Here is,