2 Kings 8:9

9 So Hazael loaded down forty camels with the finest products of Damascus as a gift for Elisha. He went to him and said, “Your servant Ben-hadad, the king of Aram, has sent me to ask, ‘Will I recover from this illness?’”

2 Kings 8:9 Meaning and Commentary

2 Kings 8:9

So Hazael went to meet him, and took a present with him
As was usual when a prophet or seer was consulted, see ( 1 Samuel 9:7 )

even of every good thing of Damascus;
which was a very fruitful place, and had abundance of gardens and orchards in it, which yielded excellent fruit, and of such it is probable the present consisted, and which was large:

even forty camels' burden:
which, as they are strong creatures, will bear a great deal. Abarbinel thinks, bread, flesh, and wine, and fowls, were in the present, but not gold, silver, and raiment, which the prophet had refused to take of Naaman; the Jews have a fable, that there was a precious stone in it, worth all the good things of Damascus:

and came and stood before him, and said, thy son Benhadad, king of
Syria, hath sent me to thee, saying, shall I recover of this disease?
he calls him his son, in veneration of the prophet as a father, as such men were called.

2 Kings 8:9 In-Context

7 Elisha went to Damascus, the capital of Aram, where King Ben-hadad lay sick. When someone told the king that the man of God had come,

8 the king said to Hazael, “Take a gift to the man of God. Then tell him to ask the LORD, ‘Will I recover from this illness?’”

9 So Hazael loaded down forty camels with the finest products of Damascus as a gift for Elisha. He went to him and said, “Your servant Ben-hadad, the king of Aram, has sent me to ask, ‘Will I recover from this illness?’”

10 And Elisha replied, “Go and tell him, ‘You will surely recover.’ But actually the LORD has shown me that he will surely die!”

11 Elisha stared at Hazael with a fixed gaze until Hazael became uneasy. Then the man of God started weeping.