2 Kings 3 Study Notes

3:13 The man of God boldly stated God’s attitude toward the apostate Joram. This structurally highlighted the apostasy of Israel and God’s mercy in delivering the nearly helpless kings. For a king with as little faith in God as Joram exhibited, it was hubris to say, it is the Lord who has summoned these three kings.

3:14-18 God responded only because of the godly Jehoshaphat. Elisha’s musician provided the setting in which he could attend to God rather than being distracted. The result was that Elisha received and communicated God’s word, giving instructions for receiving God’s deliverance. Once again miraculous works revealed God’s character and power, but Israel continued to reject his miraculous works.

3:19 God’s command to devastate Moab contrasted with his command to care for the land of Palestine (Dt 20:19). Once again, the reader is struck by the severity of God. We should not expect to easily understand or explain God’s judgments.

3:20-24 Moab, fully mobilized, attacked and was defeated. The full details of how this worked are not clear, but it is no surprise that three invading armies were able to defeat Moab.

3:25 Then the combined armies devastated Moab, except for the capital city, Kir-hareseth, modern Kerak. This devastation was also a blow to the north-south caravan route that passed through Transjordan and particularly through the Moabite capital.

3:26-27 Finally the devastation came to the point at which the king of Moab offered his own crown prince and heir as a human sacrifice. The lesson of these two chapters is clear: God’s miraculous power could bring unfaithful Israel to the verge of victory, but God could also take that victory away. Whether from battle fatigue in foreign lands, shock at the desperate step the king of Moab took in sacrificing his son, superstitious fear of the magic power that such a sacrifice aimed to produce, or from seeing the wrath (whether of the Moabites or of God Almighty; the text is unclear), the coalition withdrew, and Moab remained independent, though thoroughly devastated.