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LXX 2 Kings

Septuagint

About this book
Chapter 1

1 And Moab rebelled against Israel after the death of Ahab. 2 And Ahaziah fell through the lattice that was in his upper chamber in Samaria and was sick; and he sent messengers, and said to them, Go and inquire of Baal fly, the god of Ekron, whether I shall recover of this my sickness. And they went to inquire of him. 3 And an angel of the Lord called Elijah the Tishbite, saying, Arise, and go to meet the messengers of Ahaziah king of Samaria, and you shall say to them, Is it because there is no God in Israel, that you go to inquire of Baal fly, the God of Ekron? 4 But it shall not be so; for thus says the Lord, The bed on which you have gone up, you shall not come down from it, for you shall surely die. And Elijah went, and said so to them. 5 And the messengers returned to him, and he said to them, Why have you returned? 6 And they said to him, A man came up to meet us, and said to us, Go, return to the king that sent you, and say to him, Thus says the Lord, Is it because there is no God in Israel, that you go 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. 7 And he said to them, What was the manner of the man who went up to meet you, and spoke to you these words? 8 And they said to him, He was a hairy man, and fastened with a leather belt about his waist. And he said, This is Elijah the Tishbite. 9 And he sent to him a captain of fifty and his fifty; and he went up to him: and, look, Elijah sat on the top of a mountain. And the captain of fifty spoke to him, and said, man of God, the king has called you, come down. 10 And Elijah answered and said to the captain of fifty, And if I am a man of God, fire shall come down out of heaven, and devour you and your fifty. And fire came down out of heaven, and devoured him and his fifty. 11 And the king sent a second time to him another captain of fifty, and his fifty. And he went up, and the captain of fifty spoke to him, and said, man of God, thus says the king, Come down quickly. 12 And Elijah answered and spoke to him, and said, If I am a man of God, fire shall come down out of heaven, and devour you and your fifty. And fire came down out of heaven, and devoured him and his fifty. 13 And the king sent yet again a captain and his fifty. And the third captain of fifty came, and knelt on his knees before Elijah, and implored him, and spoke to him and said, man of God, let my life, and the life of these fifty your servants, be precious in your eyes. 14 Look, fire came down from heaven, and devoured the two first captains of fifty and their fifties: and now, I pray, let the life of your servants be precious in your eyes. 15 And the angel of the Lord spoke to Elijah, and said, Go down with him, do not be afraid of them. And Elijah rose up, and went down with him to the king. 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? 18a And Joram son of Ahab reigns over Israel in Samaria twelve years beginning in the eighteenth year of Jehoshaphat king of Judah: 18b and he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, only not as his brothers, nor as his mother: 18c and he removed the pillars of Baal which his father made, and broke them in pieces: only he was joined to the sins of the house of Jeroboam, who led Israel to sin; he did not depart from them. 18d And the Lord was very angry with the house of Ahab.

Texts in conversation

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

Hebrew Bible · Septuagint

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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.

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