Therefore his servants said to him, “Let a young woman be sought for my lord the king, and let her wait on the king and be in his service. Let her lie in your arms, that my lord the king may be warm.”

So they sought for a beautiful young woman throughout all the territory of Israel, and found Abishag the Shunammite, and brought her to the king.

The young woman was very beautiful, and she was of service to the king and attended to him, but the king knew her not.

The one woman said, “Oh, my lord, this woman and I live in the same house, and I gave birth to a child while she was in the house.

Then on the third day after I gave birth, this woman also gave birth. And we were alone. There was no one else with us in the house; only we two were in the house.

But the other woman said, “No, the living child is mine, and the dead child is yours.” The first said, “No, the dead child is yours, and the living child is mine.” Thus they spoke before the king.

Then the woman whose son was alive said to the king, because her heart yearned for her son, “Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death.” But the other said, “He shall be neither mine nor yours; divide him.”

Then the king answered and said, “Give the living child to the first woman, and by no means put him to death; she is his mother.”

And the Lord said to Ahijah, “Behold, the wife of Jeroboam is coming to inquire of you concerning her son, for he is sick. Thus and thus shall you say to her.” When she came, she pretended to be another woman.

Elijah Raises the Widow's Son

After this the son of the woman, the mistress of the house, became ill. And his illness was so severe that there was no breath left in him.

And the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth.”