2 Raja-raja 13:18-19

13:18 Then Elisha ¹  said, “Take the arrows,” and he did so. ²  He told the king of Israel, “Strike the ground!” He struck the ground three times and stopped. 13:19 The prophet ³  got angry at him and said, “If you had struck the ground five or six times, you would have annihilated Syria! ⁴  But now, you will defeat Syria only three times.”

2 Raja-raja 3:24

3:24 When they approached the Israelite camp, the Israelites rose up and struck down the Moabites, who then ran from them. The Israelites ⁵  thoroughly defeated ⁶  Moab.

2 Raja-raja 6:21

6:21 When the king of Israel saw them, he asked Elisha, “Should I strike them down, ⁷  my master?” ⁸ 

2 Raja-raja 10:32

10:32 In those days the Lord began to reduce the size of Israel’s territory. ⁹  Hazael attacked their eastern border. ¹⁰ 

2 Raja-raja 14:5

14:5 When he had secured control of the kingdom, ¹¹  he executed the servants who had assassinated his father. ¹² 

2 Raja-raja 25:21

25:21 The king of Babylon ordered them to be executed ¹³  at Riblah in the territory ¹⁴  of Hamath. So Judah was deported from its land.

2 Raja-raja 6:22

6:22 He replied, “Do not strike them down! You did not capture them with your sword or bow, so what gives you the right to strike them down? ¹⁵  Give them some food and water, so they can eat and drink and then go back to their master.”

2 Raja-raja 10:25

10:25 When he finished offering the burnt sacrifice, Jehu ordered the royal guard ¹⁶  and officers, “Come in and strike them down! Don’t let any escape!” So the royal guard and officers struck them down with the sword and left their bodies lying there. ¹⁷  Then they entered the inner sanctuary of the temple of Baal. ¹⁸ 

2 Raja-raja 12:20

12:20 His servants conspired against him ¹⁹  and murdered Joash at Beth-Millo, on the road that goes down to Silla. ²⁰ 

2 Raja-raja 15:10

15:10 Shallum son of Jabesh conspired against him; he assassinated him in Ibleam ²¹  and took his place as king.

2 Raja-raja 15:30

15:30 Hoshea son of Elah conspired against Pekah son of Remaliah. He assassinated him ²²  and took his place as king, in the twentieth year of the reign of Jotham son of Uzziah.

2 Raja-raja 21:24

21:24 The people of the land executed all those who had conspired against King Amon, and they ²³  made his son Josiah king in his place.

2 Raja-raja 3:19

3:19 You will defeat every fortified city and every important ²⁴  city. You must chop down ²⁵  every productive ²⁶  tree, stop up all the springs, and cover all the cultivated land with stones.” ²⁷ 

2 Raja-raja 3:23

3:23 The Moabites ²⁸  said, “It’s blood! The kings are totally destroyed! ²⁹  They have struck one another down! Now, Moab, seize the plunder!”

2 Raja-raja 8:21

8:21 Joram ³⁰  crossed over to Zair with all his chariots. The Edomites, who had surrounded him, attacked at night and defeated him and his chariot officers. ³¹  The Israelite army retreated to their homeland. ³² 

2 Raja-raja 9:7

9:7 You will destroy the family of your master Ahab. ³³  I will get revenge against Jezebel for the shed blood of my servants the prophets and for the shed blood of all the Lord’s servants. ³⁴ 

2 Raja-raja 10:11

10:11 Then Jehu killed all who were left of Ahab’s family in Jezreel, and all his nobles, close friends, and priests. He left no survivors.

2 Raja-raja 10:17

10:17 He went to Samaria and exterminated all the members of Ahab’s family who were still alive in Samaria, ³⁵  just as the Lord had announced to Elijah. ³⁶ 

2 Raja-raja 14:7

14:7 He defeated ³⁷  10,000 Edomites in the Salt Valley; he captured Sela in battle and renamed it Joktheel, a name it has retained to this very day.

2 Raja-raja 15:14

15:14 Menahem son of Gadi went up from Tirzah to ³⁸  Samaria and attacked Shallum son of Jabesh. ³⁹  He killed him and took his place as king.

2 Raja-raja 18:8

18:8 He defeated the Philistines as far as Gaza and its territory, from the watchtower to the city fortress. ⁴⁰ 

2 Raja-raja 19:35

19:35 That very night the Lord’s messenger went out and killed 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp. When they ⁴¹  got up early the next morning, there were all the corpses. ⁴² 

2 Raja-raja 2:14

2:14 He took the cloak that had fallen off Elijah, ⁴³  hit the water with it, and said, “Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?” When he hit the water, it divided and Elisha crossed over.

2 Raja-raja 9:27

9:27 When King Ahaziah of Judah saw what happened, he took off ⁴⁴  up the road to Beth Haggan. Jehu chased him and ordered, “Shoot him too.” They shot him while he was driving his chariot up the ascent of Gur near Ibleam. ⁴⁵  He fled to Megiddo ⁴⁶  and died there.

2 Raja-raja 10:9

10:9 In the morning he went out and stood there. Then he said to all the people, “You are innocent. I conspired against my master and killed him. But who struck down all of these men?

2 Raja-raja 12:21

12:21 His servants Jozabad son of Shimeath and Jehozabad son of Shomer murdered him. ⁴⁷  He was buried ⁴⁸  with his ancestors in the city of David. His son Amaziah replaced him as king.

2 Raja-raja 13:17

13:17 Elisha ⁴⁹  said, “Open the east window,” and he did so. ⁵⁰  Elisha said, “Shoot!” and

he did so. ⁵¹  Elisha ⁵²  said, “This arrow symbolizes the victory the Lord will give you over Syria. ⁵³  You will annihilate Syria in Aphek!” ⁵⁴ 

2 Raja-raja 13:25

13:25 Jehoahaz’s son Jehoash took back from ⁵⁵  Ben Hadad son of Hazael the cities that he had taken from his father Jehoahaz in war. Joash defeated him three times and recovered the Israelite cities.

2 Raja-raja 14:10

14:10 You thoroughly defeated Edom ⁵⁶  and it has gone to your head! ⁵⁷  Gloat over your success, ⁵⁸  but stay in your palace. Why bring calamity on yourself? Why bring down yourself and Judah along with you?” ⁵⁹ 

2 Raja-raja 15:16

15:16 At that time Menahem came from Tirzah and attacked Tiphsah. He struck down all who lived in the city and the surrounding territory, because they would not surrender. ⁶⁰  He even ripped open the pregnant women.

2 Raja-raja 15:25

15:25 His officer Pekah son of Remaliah conspired against him. He and fifty Gileadites assassinated Pekahiah, as well as Argob and Arieh, in Samaria in the fortress of the royal palace. ⁶¹  Pekah then took his place as king.

2 Raja-raja 19:37

19:37 One day, ⁶²  as he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch, ⁶³  his sons ⁶⁴  Adrammelech and Sharezer struck him down with the sword. ⁶⁵  They escaped to the land of Ararat; his son Esarhaddon replaced him as king.

2 Raja-raja 25:25

25:25 But in the seventh month ⁶⁶  Ishmael son of Nethaniah, son of Elishama, who was a member of the royal family, ⁶⁷  came with ten of his men and murdered Gedaliah, ⁶⁸  as well as the Judeans and Babylonians who were with him at Mizpah.

2 Raja-raja 2:8

2:8 Elijah took his cloak, folded it up, and hit the water with it. The water divided, and the two of them crossed over on dry ground.

2 Raja-raja 14:12

14:12 Judah was defeated by Israel, and each man ran back home. ⁶⁹ 

2 Raja-raja 2:13

2:13 He picked up Elijah’s cloak, which had fallen off him, and went back and stood on the shore of the Jordan.

2 Raja-raja 18:24

18:24 Certainly you will not refuse one of my master’s minor officials and trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen. ⁷⁰ 

[13:18]  ¹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[13:18]  ² tn Heb “and he took [them].”

[13:19]  ³ tn Heb “man of God.”

[13:19]  ⁴ tn Heb “[It was necessary] to strike five or six times, then you would strike down Syria until destruction.” On the syntax of the infinitive construct, see GKC 349 §114.k.

[3:24]  ⁵ tn Heb “they.”

[3:24]  ⁶ tc The consonantal text (Kethib) suggests, “and they went, striking down,” but the marginal reading (Qere) is “they struck down, striking down.” For a discussion of the textual problem, see M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 46.

[6:21]  ⁷ tn Heb “Should I strike them down? I will strike them down.” In the Hebrew text the first person imperfect form is repeated; the first form has the interrogative he prefixed to it; the second does not. It is likely that the second form should be omitted as dittographic or that the first should be emended to an infinitive absolute.

[6:21]  ⁸ tn Heb “my father.” The king addresses the prophet in this way to indicate his respect. See 2 Kgs 2:12.

[10:32]  ⁹ tn Heb “began to cut off Israel.”

[10:32]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “Hazael struck them down in all the territory of Israel, from the Jordan on the east.” In the Hebrew text the phrase “from the Jordan on the east” begins v. 33.

[14:5]  ¹¹ tn Heb “when the kingdom was secure in his hand.”

[14:5]  ¹² tn Heb “he struck down his servants, the ones who had struck down the king, his father.”

[25:21]  ¹³ tn Heb “struck them down and killed them.”

[25:21]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “land.”

[6:22]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “Are [they] ones you captured with your sword or your bow (that) you can strike (them) down?”

[10:25]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “runners.”

[10:25]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “and they threw.” No object appears. According to M. Cogan and H. Tadmor (II Kings [AB], 116), this is an idiom for leaving a corpse unburied.

[10:25]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and they came to the city of the house of Baal.” It seems unlikely that a literal city is meant. Some emend עִיר (’ir), “city,” to דְּבִיר (dÿvir) “holy place,” or suggest that עִיר is due to dittography of the immediately preceding עַד (’ad) “to.” Perhaps עִיר is here a technical term meaning “fortress” or, more likely, “inner room.”

[12:20]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “rose up and conspired [with] a conspiracy.”

[12:20]  ²⁰ tn Heb “Beth Millo which goes down [toward] Silla.”

[15:10]  ²¹ tc The MT reads, “and he struck him down before the people and killed him” (cf. KJV, ASV, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT). However, the reading קָבָל עָם (qaval ’am), “before the people,” is problematic to some because קָבָל is a relatively late Aramaic term. Nevertheless, the Aramaic term qobel certainly antedates the writing of Kings. The bigger problem seems to be the unnecessary intrusion of an Aramaic word at all here. Most interpreters prefer to follow Lucian’s Greek version and read “in Ibleam” (בְיִבְלְעָם, bÿivle’am). Cf. NAB, TEV.

[15:30]  ²² tn Heb “and struck him down and killed him.”

[21:24]  ²³ tn Heb “the people of the land.” The pronoun “they” has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons, to avoid the repetition of the phrase “the people of the land” from the beginning of the verse.

[3:19]  ²⁴ tn Heb “choice” or “select.”

[3:19]  ²⁵ tn Elisha places the object first and uses an imperfect verb form. The stylistic shift may signal that he is now instructing them what to do, rather than merely predicting what would happen.

[3:19]  ²⁶ tn Heb “good.”

[3:19]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and ruin every good portion with stones.”

[3:23]  ²⁸ tn Heb “they”; the referent (the Moabites) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[3:23]  ²⁹ tn The translation assumes the verb is חָרַב (kharav, “to be desolate”). The infinitive absolute precedes the finite verb form for emphasis. (For another example of the Hophal infinitive with a Niphal finite verb, see Lev 19:20. Cf. also IBHS 582 §35.2.1c.) Some prefer to derive the verb from a proposed homonym meaning “at HALOT 349 s.v. II חרב and BDB 352 s.v. חָרְבָה).

[8:21]  ³⁰ sn Joram is a short form of the name Jehoram.

[8:21]  ³¹ tn Heb “and he arose at night and defeated Edom, who had surrounded him, and the chariot officers.” The Hebrew text as it stands gives the impression that Joram was surrounded and launched a victorious night counterattack. It would then be quite natural to understand the last statement in the verse to refer to an Edomite retreat. Yet v. 22 goes on to state that the Edomite revolt was successful. Therefore, if the MT is retained, it may be better to understand the final statement in v. 21 as a reference to an Israelite retreat (made in spite of the success described in the preceding sentence). The translation above assumes an emendation of the Hebrew text. Adding a third masculine singular pronominal suffix to the accusative sign before Edom (reading אֶתוֹ [’eto], “him,” instead of just אֶת [’et]) and taking Edom as the subject of verbs allows one to translate the verse in a way that is more consistent with the context, which depicts an Israelite defeat, not victory. There is, however, no evidence for this emendation.

[8:21]  ³² tn Heb “and the people fled to their tents.”

[9:7]  ³³ tn Or “strike down the house of Ahab your master.”

[9:7]  ³⁴ tn Heb “I will avenge the shed blood of my servants the prophets and the shed blood of all the servants of the Lord from the hand of Jezebel.”

[10:17]  ³⁵ tn Heb “and he struck down all the remaining ones to Ahab in Samaria until he destroyed him.”

[10:17]  ³⁶ tn Heb “according to the word of the Lord which he spoke to Elijah.”

[14:7]  ³⁷ tn Or “struck down.”

[15:14]  ³⁸ tn Heb “and came to.”

[15:14]  ³⁹ tn Heb “went up from Tirzah and arrived in Samaria and attacked Shallum son of Jabesh in Samaria.”

[18:8]  ⁴⁰ sn See the note at 2 Kgs 17:9.

[19:35]  ⁴¹ tn This refers to the Israelites and/or the rest of the Assyrian army.

[19:35]  ⁴² tn Heb “look, all of them were dead bodies.”

[2:14]  ⁴³ tn Heb “Elijah’s cloak, which had fallen off him.” The wording is changed slightly in the translation for the sake of variety of expression (see v. 13).

[9:27]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “and Ahaziah king of Judah saw and fled.”

[9:27]  ⁴⁵ tn After Jehu’s order (“kill him too”), the MT has simply, “to the chariot in the ascent of Gur which is near Ibleam.” The main verb in the clause, “they shot him” (וַיִּכְהוּ, vayyikhhu), has been accidentally omitted by virtual haplography/homoioteleuton. Note that the immediately preceding form הַכֻּהוּ (hakkuhu), “shoot him,” ends with the same suffix.

[9:27]  ⁴⁶ map For location see Map1 D4; Map2 C1; Map4 C2; Map5 F2; Map7 B1.

[12:21]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “struck him down and he died.”

[12:21]  ⁴⁸ tn Heb “they buried him.”

[13:17]  ⁴⁹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[13:17]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “He opened [it].”

[13:17]  ⁵¹ tn Heb “and he shot.”

[13:17]  ⁵² tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[13:17]  ⁵³ tn Heb “The arrow of victory of the Lord and the arrow of victory over Syria.”

[13:17]  ⁵⁴ tn Heb “you will strike down Syria in Aphek until destruction.”

[13:25]  ⁵⁵ tn Heb “from the hand of.”

[14:10]  ⁵⁶ tn Or “you have indeed defeated Edom.”

[14:10]  ⁵⁷ tn Heb “and your heart has lifted you up.”

[14:10]  ⁵⁸ tn Heb “be glorified.”

[14:10]  ⁵⁹ tn Heb “Why get involved in calamity and fall, you and Judah with you?”

[15:16]  ⁶⁰ tn Heb “then Menahem attacked Tiphsah and all who were in it and its borders from Tirzah, for it would not open, and he attacked.”

[15:16]  tn Instead of “Tiphsah,” the LXX has “Tirzah,” while Lucian’s Greek version reads “Tappuah.” For discussion see M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 171.

[15:25]  ⁶¹ tn Heb “and he struck him down in Samaria in the fortress of the house of the king, Argob and Arieh, and with him fifty men from the sons of the Gileadites, and they killed him.”

[15:25]  sn The precise identity of Argob and Arieh, as well as their relationship to the king, are uncertain. The usual assumption is that they were officials assassinated along with Pekahiah, or that they were two of the more prominent Gileadites involved in the revolt. For discussion see M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 173.

[19:37]  ⁶² sn The assassination probably took place in 681 b.c.

[19:37]  ⁶³ sn No such Mesopotamian god is presently known. Perhaps the name is a corruption of Nusku.

[19:37]  ⁶⁴ tc Although “his sons” is absent in the Kethib, it is supported by the Qere, along with many medieval Hebrew mss and the ancient versions. Cf. Isa 37:38.

[19:37]  ⁶⁵ sn Extra-biblical sources also mention the assassination of Sennacherib, though they refer to only one assassin. See M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 239-40.

[25:25]  ⁶⁶ sn It is not altogether clear whether this is in the same year that Jerusalem fell or not. The wall was breached in the fourth month (= early July; Jer 39:2) and Nebuzaradan came and burned the palace, the temple, and many of the houses and tore down the wall in the fifth month (= early August; Jer 52:12). That would have left time between the fifth month and the seventh month (October) to gather in the harvest of grapes, dates and figs, and olives (Jer 40:12). However, many commentators feel that too much activity takes place in too short a time for this to have been in the same year and posit that it happened the following year or even five years later when a further deportation took place, possibly in retaliation for the murder of Gedaliah and the Babylonian garrison at Mizpah (Jer 52:30). The assassination of Gedaliah had momentous consequences and was commemorated in one of the post exilic fast days lamenting the fall of Jerusalem (Zech 8:19).

[25:25]  ⁶⁷ tn Heb “[was] from the seed of the kingdom.”

[25:25]  ⁶⁸ tn Heb “and they struck down Gedaliah and he died.”

[14:12]  ⁶⁹ tn Heb “and Judah was struck down before Israel and they fled, each to his tent.”

[18:24]  ⁷⁰ tn Heb “How can you turn back the face of an official [from among] the least of my master’s servants and trust in Egypt for chariots and horsemen?” In vv. 23-24 the chief adviser develops further the argument begun in v. 21. His reasoning seems to be as follows: “In your weakened condition you obviously need military strength. Agree to the king’s terms and I will personally give you more horses than you are capable of outfitting. If I, a mere minor official, am capable of giving you such military might, just think what power the king has. There is no way the Egyptians can match our strength. It makes much better sense to deal with us.”