2 Kings 1-3

Amplified Bible, Classic Edition

1 Moab rebelled against Israel after the death of Ahab.

² [King] Ahaziah fell down through a lattice in his upper chamber in Samaria and lay sick. He sent messengers, saying, Go, ask Baal-zebub, the god of [Philistine] Ekron, if I shall recover from this illness.

³ But the angel of the Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite, Arise, go up to meet the messengers of the king in Samaria and say to them, Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going to inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron?

⁴ Therefore the Lord says: You [Ahaziah] shall not leave the bed on which you lie, but shall surely die. And Elijah departed.

⁵ When the messengers returned to Ahaziah, he said, Why have you turned back?

⁶ They replied, A man came up to meet us who said, Go back to the king who sent you and tell him, Thus says the Lord: Is there no God in Israel that you send to inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron? Therefore you shall not leave the bed on which you lie, but shall surely die.

⁷ The king asked, What was the man like who came to meet you saying these things?

⁸ They answered, He was a hairy man with a girdle of leather about his loins. And he said, It is Elijah the Tishbite.

⁹ Then the king sent to Elijah a captain of fifty men with his fifty [to seize him]. He found Elijah sitting on a hilltop and said, Man of God, the king says, Come down.

¹⁰ Elijah said to the captain of fifty, If I am a man of God, then let fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty. And fire fell from heaven and consumed him and his fifty.

¹¹ Again King [Ahaziah] sent to him another captain of fifty with his fifty. And he said to Elijah, Man of God, the king has said, Come down quickly!

¹² And Elijah answered, If I am a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty. And the fire of God came down from heaven and consumed him and his fifty.

¹³ Ahaziah sent again a captain of a third fifty with his fifty. And the third captain of fifty went up and fell on his knees before Elijah and besought him and said to him, O man of God, I pray you, let my life and the lives of these fifty, your servants, be precious in your sight.

¹⁴ Behold, fire came down from heaven and burned up the two captains of the former fifties with their fifties. Therefore let my life now be precious in your sight.

¹⁵ The angel of the Lord said to Elijah, Go down with him; do not be afraid of him. So he arose and went with him to the king.

¹⁶ Elijah said to [King] Ahaziah, Thus says the Lord: Since you have sent messengers to inquire of Baal-zebub, god of Ekron, is it because there is no God in Israel of Whom to inquire His word? Therefore you shall not leave the bed on which you lie, but shall surely die.

¹⁷ So Ahaziah died according to the word of the Lord which Elijah had spoken. ^[a]Joram [also a son of Ahab] reigned in Israel in his stead in the second year of Jehoram son of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, because Ahaziah had no son [but his brother].

¹⁸ Now the rest of the acts of Ahaziah, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel?

2 When the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were going from Gilgal.

² And Elijah said to Elisha, Tarry here, I pray you, for the Lord has sent me to Bethel. But Elisha replied, As the Lord lives and as your soul lives, I will not leave you. So they went down to Bethel.

³ The prophets’ sons who were at Bethel came to Elisha and said, Do you know that the Lord will take your master away from you today? He said, Yes, I know it; hold your peace.

⁴ Elijah said to him, Elisha, tarry here, I pray you, for the Lord has sent me to Jericho. But he said, As the Lord lives and as your soul lives, I will not leave you. So they came to Jericho.

⁵ The sons of the prophets who were at Jericho came to Elisha and said, Do you know that the Lord will take your master away from you today? And he answered, Yes, I know it; hold your peace.

⁶ Elijah said to him, Tarry here, I pray you, for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan. But he said, As the Lord lives and as your soul lives, I will not leave you. And the two of them went on.

⁷ Fifty men of the sons of the prophets also went and stood [to watch] afar off; and the two of them stood by the Jordan.

⁸ And Elijah took his mantle and rolled it up and struck the waters, and they divided this way and that, so that the two of them went over on dry ground.

⁹ And when they had gone over, Elijah said to Elisha, Ask what I shall do for you before I am taken from you. And Elisha said, I pray you, let a double portion of your spirit be upon me.

¹⁰ He said, You have asked a hard thing. However, if you see me when I am taken from you, it shall be so for you—but if not, it shall not be so.

¹¹ As they still went on and talked, behold, a chariot of fire and horses of fire parted the two of them, and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.

¹² And Elisha saw it and he cried, My father, my father! The chariot of Israel and its horsemen! And he saw him no more. And he took hold of his own clothes and tore them in two pieces.

¹³ He took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and went back and stood by the bank of the Jordan.

¹⁴ And he took the mantle that fell from Elijah and struck the waters and said, Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah? And when he had struck the waters, they parted this way and that, and Elisha went over.

¹⁵ When the sons of the prophets who were [watching] at Jericho saw him, they said, The spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha. And they came to meet him and bowed themselves to the ground before him.

¹⁶ And they said to him, Behold now, there are among your servants fifty strong men; let them go, we pray you, and seek your master. It may be that the Spirit of the Lord has taken him up and cast him on some mountain or into some valley. And he said, You shall not send.

¹⁷ But when they urged him till he was embarrassed, he said, Send. So they sent fifty men, who sought for three days but did not find him.

¹⁸ When they returned to Elisha, who had waited at Jericho, he said to them, Did I not tell you, Do not go?

¹⁹ And the men of the city said to Elisha, Behold, inhabiting of this city is pleasant, as my lord sees, but the water is bad and the locality causes miscarriage and barrenness [in all animals].

²⁰ He said, Bring me a new bowl and put salt [the symbol of God’s purifying power] in it. And they brought it to him.

²¹ Then Elisha went to the spring of the waters and cast the salt in it and said, Thus says the Lord: I [not the salt] have healed these waters; there shall not be any more death, miscarriage or barrenness [and bereavement] because of it.

²² So the waters were healed to this day, as Elisha had said.

²³ He went up from Jericho to Bethel. On the way, ^[b]young [maturing and accountable] boys came out of the city and mocked him and said to him, Go up [in a whirlwind], you baldhead! Go up, you baldhead!

²⁴ And he turned around and looked at them and called a curse down on them in the name of the Lord. And two she-bears came out of the woods and ripped up forty-two of the boys.

²⁵ Elisha went from there to Mount Carmel, and from there he returned to Samaria.

3 Joram son of Ahab began to reign over Israel in Samaria in the eighteenth year of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, and reigned twelve years.

² He did evil in the sight of the Lord, but not like his father and mother; for he put away the pillar of Baal that his father had made.

³ Yet he clung to the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which made Israel to sin; he departed not from them.

^4 [c]Mesha king of Moab was a sheepmaster, and paid in tribute to the king of Israel [annually] 100,000 lambs and 100,000 rams, with the wool.

⁵ But when Ahab died, the king of Moab rebelled against the king of Israel.

⁶ So King Joram went out of Samaria at that time and mustered all Israel.

⁷ And he sent to Jehoshaphat king of Judah, saying, The king of Moab has rebelled against me. Will you go with me to war against Moab? And he said, I will go; I am as you are, my people as your people, my horses as your horses.

⁸ Joram said, Which way shall we go up? Jehoshaphat answered, The way through the Wilderness of Edom.

⁹ So the king of Israel went with the king of Judah and the king of Edom. They made a circuit of seven days’ journey, but there was no water for the army or for the animals following them.

¹⁰ Then the king of Israel said, Alas! The Lord has called [us] three kings together to be delivered into Moab’s hand!

¹¹ But Jehoshaphat said, Is there no prophet of the Lord here by whom we may inquire of the Lord? One of the king of Israel’s servants answered, Elisha son of Shaphat, who served Elijah, is here.

¹² Jehoshaphat said, The word of the Lord is with him. So Joram king of Israel and Jehoshaphat and the king of Edom went down to Elisha.

¹³ And Elisha said to the king of Israel, What have I to do with you? Go to the prophets of your [wicked] father Ahab and your [wicked] mother Jezebel. But the king of Israel said to him, No, for the Lord has called [us] three kings together to be delivered into the hand of Moab.

¹⁴ And Elisha said, As the Lord of hosts lives, before Whom I stand, surely, were it not that I respect the presence of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, I would neither look at you nor see you [King Joram].

¹⁵ But now bring me a minstrel. And while the minstrel played, the hand and power of the Lord came upon [Elisha].

¹⁶ And he said, Thus says the Lord: Make this [dry] brook bed full of trenches.

¹⁷ For thus says the Lord: You shall not see wind or rain, yet that ravine shall be filled with water, so you, your cattle, and your beasts [of burden] may drink.

¹⁸ This is but a light thing in the sight of the Lord. He will deliver the Moabites also into your hands.

¹⁹ You shall smite every fenced city and every choice city, and shall fell every good tree and stop all wells of water and mar every good piece of land with stones.

²⁰ In the morning, when the sacrifice was offered, behold, there came water by the way of Edom, and the country was filled with water.

²¹ When all the Moabites heard that the kings had come up to fight against them, all who were able to put on armor, young and old, gathered and drew up at the border.

²² When they rose up early next morning, and the sun shone upon the water, the Moabites saw the water across from them as red as blood.

²³ And they said, This is blood; the kings have surely been fighting and have slain one another. Now then, Moab, to the spoil!

²⁴ But when they came to the camp of Israel, the Israelites rose up and smote the Moabites, so that they fled before them. And they went forward, slaying the Moabites as they went.

²⁵ They beat down the cities [walls], and on every good piece of land every man cast a stone, covering it [with stones]. And they stopped all the springs of water and felled all the good trees, until only the stones [of the walls of Moab’s capital city] of Kir-hareseth were left standing, and the slingers surrounded and took it.

²⁶ And when the king of Moab saw that the battle was against him, he took with him 700 swordsmen to break through to the king of Edom, but they could not.

²⁷ Then he [Moab’s king] took his eldest son, who was to reign in his stead, and offered him for a burnt offering on the wall [in full view of the horrified enemy kings]. And there was great indignation, wrath, and bitterness against Israel; and they [his allies Judah and Edom] withdrew from [Joram] and returned to their own land.