Go to Related Reading
About this book

2 Kings

About this book
Chapter 1

1 After Ahab died, Moab rebelled against Israel. 2 Ahaziah fell through a window lattice in his upper chamber in Samaria and was injured. He sent messengers with these orders, “Go, ask Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron, if I will survive this injury.”⁠ 3 But the angel of the Lord told Elijah the Tishbite, “Get up; go to meet the messengers from the king of Samaria. Say this to them: ‘You must think there is no God in Israel! That explains why you are on your way to seek an oracle from Baal Zebub the god of Ekron.⁠ 4 Therefore this is what the Lord has said, “You will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die!”’” So Elijah went on his way. 5 When the messengers returned to the king, he asked them, “Why have you returned?” 6 They replied, “A man came up to meet us. He told us, ‘Go back to the king who sent you and tell him, “This is what the Lord has said: ‘You must think there is no God in Israel! That explains why you are sending for an oracle from Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron. Therefore you will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die.’”’” 7 The king asked them, “Describe the appearance of this man who came up to meet you and told you these things.” 8 They replied, “He was a hairy man and had a leather belt tied around his waist.” The king said, “He is Elijah the Tishbite.”⁠ 9 The king sent a captain and his 50 soldiers to retrieve Elijah. The captain went up to him while he was sitting on the top of a hill. He told him, “Prophet, the king says, ‘Come down!’” 10 Elijah replied to the captain, “If I am indeed a prophet, may fire come down from the sky and consume you and your 50 soldiers!”⁠ Fire then came down from the sky and consumed him and his 50 soldiers. 11 The king sent another captain and his 50 soldiers to retrieve Elijah. He went up and told him, “Prophet, this is what the king says, ‘Come down at once!’” 12 Elijah replied to them, “If I am indeed a prophet, may fire come down from the sky and consume you and your 50 soldiers!” Fire from God came down from the sky and consumed him and his 50 soldiers.⁠ 13 The king sent a third captain and his 50 soldiers. This third captain went up and fell on his knees before Elijah. He begged for mercy, “Prophet, please have respect for my life and for the lives of these 50 servants of yours. 14 Indeed, fire came down from the sky and consumed the two captains who came before me, along with their men. So now, please have respect for my life.” 15 The angel of the Lord said to Elijah, “Go down with him. Don’t be afraid of him.” So he got up and went down with him to the king. 16 Elijah said to the king, “This is what the Lord has said, ‘You sent messengers to seek an oracle from Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron. Is it because there is no God in Israel from whom you can seek a message? Therefore you will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die.’” 17 And he did die in keeping with the Lord’s message that he had spoken through Elijah. In the second year of the reign of King Jehoram son of Jehoshaphat over Judah, Ahaziah’s brother Jehoram replaced him as king of Israel, because he had no son.⁠ 18 The rest of the events of Ahaziah’s reign, including his accomplishments, are recorded in the scroll called the Annals of the Kings of Israel.

Texts in conversation

Compare 2 Kings 1:17 and LXX 2 Kings 1:17

Hebrew Bible · Septuagint

Share:

Summary

In the Hebrew version of 2 Kings, Joram of Israel becomes king in the second year of Judah’s Jehoram, a detail the Greek Septuagint translation omits. Hebrew scribes flagged the line as out of place, and the Greek times the reigns differently.

Passages

2 Kings 1:17

Hebrew Bible
16 Elijah said to the king, “This is what the Lord has said, ‘You sent messengers to seek an oracle from Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron. Is it because there is no God in Israel from whom you can seek a message? Therefore you will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die.’” 17 And he did die in keeping with the Lord’s message that he had spoken through Elijah. In the second year of the reign of King Jehoram son of Jehoshaphat over Judah, Ahaziah’s brother Jehoram replaced him as king of Israel, because he had no son. 18 The rest of the events of Ahaziah’s reign, including his accomplishments, are recorded in the scroll called the Annals of the Kings of Israel.
600–501 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in 2 Kings

LXX 2 Kings 1:17

Septuagint
16 And Elijah spoke to him, and said, Thus says the Lord, Why have you sent messengers to inquire of Baal fly, the god of Ekron? it shall not be so: the bed on which you have gone up, you shall not come down from it, for you shall surely die. 17 So he died according to the word of the Lord which Elijah had spoken. 18 And the rest of the acts of Ahaziah which he did, look, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel?
100–1 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in LXX 2 Kings

References

... in the second year of Jehoram, son of Jehoshaphat king of Judah. This clause breaks the syntactic connection between verse 17a (“Jehoram his brother succeeded him”) and 17c (“because he did not have a son”); its intrusive nature is marked in the Masoretic Text pisqaʾ beʾ emṣaʿ pasuq, a long spacing. The function of this masoretic notation is still undetermined, though it surely meant to call the reader’s attention to a problem in the text tradition. Moreover, the synchronism of Jehoram’s reign here is at variance with that given in 3:1; it is part of an alternate chronological system preserved for the most part in Lucianic manuscripts of the Septuagint, which have four additional verses (1:18a-d). For fuller details, see J. D. Shenkel, Chronology and Recensional Development in the Greek Text of Kings (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968), 68-82. ...
Mordechai Cogan and Hayim Tadmor, II Kings: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (Anchor Bible 11) (New York: Doubleday, 1988), 27.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

Your feedback

2 Kings 1:17 and LXX 2 Kings 1:17

Leave a comment

Your questions and comments are welcome!

Comments

Glossary

Search the Library