2 Kings 4 Study Notes

4:27 Elisha modeled both sensitivity and a recognition of his own limitations. His words the Lord has hidden it from me showed limitation to the knowledge and power God granted him.

4:28 Her ecstatic hopes are suddenly dashed, and her spirits are lower now than they had been before she was blessed with a son. Some grief is too painful to share with just anyone. Concealing her thoughts from her husband and from Gehazi, the woman wanted to deal with God’s prophet Elisha, the source of her blessing.

4:29-31 When sent to bring healing to the woman’s son, Gehazi was to be focused on the task. Gehazi’s failed attempt to bring healing also revealed the human limitations of the man of God. Elisha had seemed confident that sending Gehazi was sufficient to heal the woman’s son.

4:32-37 When Elisha arrived, he carried out a more complicated procedure for healing the son. In that day and time, even some sincere worshipers of the Lord might have taken this healing act to be a result of magical power given by God. In this way some may have mistakenly taken Elisha to be a man gifted with rare powers. Such notions are contrary to biblical revelation. We must understand that in the era of epic power encounters between the men of God and representatives of darkness, men such as Elisha performed spectacular feats only because they served as channels for God’s miraculous power. There was no magic to it, nor were the powers given to the men of God in such a way as to make the powers their own. Here Elisha’s success was dependent on his prayer to the Lord.

4:38 Since the text had earlier placed Elisha and the prophets in a northern Gilgal near Bethel (see note at 2:1), this is likely that same northern Gilgal. The prophets’ way of life, at least on some occasions, demanded that they forage for their food. Apparently they partly supported themselves by such foraging and partly by gifts from pious Israelites.

4:39-40 While foraging, one of the prophets gathered some poisonous gourds. This may have happened on other occasions as well, but this time the occasion gave an opportunity for a miraculous provision.

4:41 Elisha neutralized the poison with another miraculous deed. The lesson was that God’s power could protect his people from careless dangers even in a serious famine.

4:42 Another opportunity for a miraculous provision occurred when a supporter brought a gift of bread to the prophets. This gift could indicate that the giver had rejected the apostate priesthood of the north since he gave this gift to the faithful prophets of the Lord. The location of Baal-shalishah remains uncertain.

4:43-44 This miracle sounds remarkably similar to the feeding of the 5,000 in the NT—similar enough that one could wonder if there are deeply rooted, long-lived reasons for the similarities (Mt 14:13-21). Perhaps Jesus consciously imitated this episode as yet another indication that he was the fulfillment of the OT (Mt 5:17). Here the instructive value of the miraculous work includes elements such as questioning the sufficiency of the gift, making an insufficient gift sufficient, distributing the food, and having more than was needed. The global lesson is God’s ability to provide.