Good News Translation GNT
World English Bible WEB
1 The widow of a member of a group of prophets went to Elisha and said, "Sir, my husband has died! As you know, he was a God-fearing man, but now a man he owed money to has come to take away my two sons as slaves in payment for my husband's debt."
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Now there cried a certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets to Elisha, saying, Your servant my husband is dead; and you know that your servant did fear Yahweh: and the creditor is come to take to him my two children to be bondservants.
2 "What shall I do for you?" he asked. "Tell me, what do you have at home?" "Nothing at all, except a small jar of olive oil," she answered.
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Elisha said to her, What shall I do for you? tell me; what have you in the house? She said, Your handmaid has nothing in the house, except a pot of oil.
3 "Go to your neighbors and borrow as many empty jars as you can," Elisha told her.
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Then he said, Go, borrow you vessels abroad of all your neighbors, even empty vessels; borrow not a few.
4 "Then you and your sons go into the house, close the door, and start pouring oil into the jars. Set each one aside as soon as it is full."
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You shall go in, and shut the door on you and on your sons, and pour out into all those vessels; and you shall set aside that which is full.
5 So the woman went into her house with her sons, closed the door, took the small jar of olive oil, and poured oil into the jars as her sons brought them to her.
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So she went from him, and shut the door on her and on her sons; they brought [the vessels] to her, and she poured out.
6 When they had filled all the jars, she asked if there were any more. "That was the last one," one of her sons answered. And the olive oil stopped flowing.
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It happened, when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, Bring me yet a vessel. He said to her, There isn't another vessel. The oil stayed.
7 She went back to Elisha, the prophet, who said to her, "Sell the olive oil and pay all your debts, and there will be enough money left over for you and your sons to live on."
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Then she came and told the man of God. He said, Go, sell the oil, and pay your debt, and live you and your sons of the rest.
8 One day Elisha went to Shunem, where a rich woman lived. She invited him to a meal, and from then on every time he went to Shunem he would have his meals at her house.
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It fell on a day, that Elisha passed to Shunem, where was a great woman; and she constrained him to eat bread. So it was, that as often as he passed by, he turned in there to eat bread.
9 She said to her husband, "I am sure that this man who comes here so often is a holy man.
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She said to her husband, See now, I perceive that this is a holy man of God, that passes by us continually.
10 Let's build a small room on the roof, put a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp in it, and he can stay there whenever he visits us."
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Let us make, Please, a little chamber on the wall; and let us set for him there a bed, and a table, and a seat, and a lamp stand: and it shall be, when he comes to us, that he shall turn in there.
11 One day Elisha returned to Shunem and went up to his room to rest.
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It fell on a day, that he came there, and he turned into the chamber and lay there.
12 He told his servant Gehazi to go and call the woman. When she came,
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He said to Gehazi his servant, Call this Shunammite. When he had called her, she stood before him.
13 he said to Gehazi, "Ask her what I can do for her in return for all the trouble she has had in providing for our needs. Maybe she would like me to go to the king or the army commander and put in a good word for her." "I have all I need here among my own people," she answered.
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He said to him, Say now to her, Behold, you have been careful for us with all this care; what is to be done for you? would you be spoken for to the king, or to the captain of the host? She answered, I dwell among my own people.
14 Elisha asked Gehazi, "What can I do for her then?" He answered, "Well, she has no son, and her husband is an old man."
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He said, What then is to be done for her? Gehazi answered, Most assuredly she has no son, and her husband is old.
15 "Tell her to come here," Elisha ordered. She came and stood in the doorway,
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He said, Call her. When he had called her, she stood in the door.
16 and Elisha said to her, "By this time next year you will be holding a son in your arms." "Oh!" she exclaimed. "Please, sir, don't lie to me. You are a man of God!"
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He said, At this season, when the time comes round, you shall embrace a son. She said, No, my lord, you man of God, do not lie to your handmaid.
17 But, as Elisha had said, at about that time the following year she gave birth to a son.
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The woman conceived, and bore a son at that season, when the time came round, as Elisha had said to her.
18 Some years later, at harvest time, the boy went out one morning to join his father, who was in the field with the harvest workers.
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When the child was grown, it fell on a day, that he went out to his father to the reapers.
19 Suddenly he cried out to his father, "My head hurts! My head hurts!" "Carry the boy to his mother," the father said to a servant.
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He said to his father, My head, my head. He said to his servant, Carry him to his mother.
20 The servant carried the boy back to his mother, who held him in her lap until noon, at which time he died.
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When he had taken him, and brought him to his mother, he sat on her knees until noon, and then died.
21 She carried him up to Elisha's room, put him on the bed and left, closing the door behind her.
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She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, and shut [the door] on him, and went out.
22 Then she called her husband and said to him, "Send a servant here with a donkey. I need to go to the prophet Elisha. I'll be back as soon as I can."
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She called to her husband, and said, Please send me one of the servants, and one of the donkeys, that I may run to the man of God, and come again.
23 "Why do you have to go today?" her husband asked. "It's neither a Sabbath nor a New Moon Festival." "Never mind," she answered.
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He said, Why will you go to him today? it is neither new moon nor Sabbath. She said, It shall be well.
24 Then she had the donkey saddled, and ordered the servant, "Make the donkey go as fast as it can, and don't slow down unless I tell you to."
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Then she saddled a donkey, and said to her servant, Drive, and go forward; don't slacken me the riding, except I bid you.
25 So she set out and went to Mount Carmel, where Elisha was. Elisha saw her coming while she was still some distance away, and he said to his servant Gehazi, "Look, there comes the woman from Shunem!
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So she went, and came to the man of God to Mount Carmel. It happened, when the man of God saw her afar off, that he said to Gehazi his servant, Behold, yonder is the Shunammite:
26 Hurry to her and find out if everything is all right with her, her husband, and her son." She told Gehazi that everything was all right,
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please run now to meet her, and ask her, Is it well with you? is it well with your husband? is it well with the child? She answered, It is well.
27 but when she came to Elisha, she bowed down before him and took hold of his feet. Gehazi was about to push her away, but Elisha said, "Leave her alone. Can't you see she's deeply distressed? And the Lord has not told me a thing about it."
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When she came to the man of God to the hill, she caught hold of his feet. Gehazi came near to thrust her away; but the man of God said, Let her alone: for her soul is vexed within her; and Yahweh has hid it from me, and has not told me.
28 The woman said to him, "Sir, did I ask you for a son? Didn't I tell you not to get my hopes up?"
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Then she said, Did I desire a son of my lord? Didn't I say, Do not deceive me?
29 Elisha turned to Gehazi and said, "Hurry! Take my walking stick and go. Don't stop to greet anyone you meet, and if anyone greets you, don't take time to answer. Go straight to the house and hold my stick over the boy."
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Then he said to Gehazi, Gird up your loins, and take my staff in your hand, and go your way: if you meet any man, Don't greet him; and if anyone greets you, don't answer him again: and lay my staff on the face of the child.
30 The woman said to Elisha, "I swear by my loyalty to the living Lord and to you that I will not leave you!" So the two of them started back together.
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The mother of the child said, As Yahweh lives, and as your soul lives, I will not leave you. He arose, and followed her.
31 Gehazi went on ahead and held Elisha's stick over the child, but there was no sound or any other sign of life. So he went back to meet Elisha and said, "The boy didn't wake up."
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Gehazi passed on before them, and laid the staff on the face of the child; but there was neither voice, nor hearing. Therefore he returned to meet him, and told him, saying, The child has not awakened.
32 When Elisha arrived, he went alone into the room and saw the boy lying dead on the bed.
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When Elisha was come into the house, behold, the child was dead, and laid on his bed.
33 He closed the door and prayed to the Lord.
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He went in therefore, and shut the door on them both, and prayed to Yahweh.
34 Then he lay down on the boy, placing his mouth, eyes, and hands on the boy's mouth, eyes, and hands. As he lay stretched out over the boy, the boy's body started to get warm.
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He went up, and lay on the child, and put his mouth on his mouth, and his eyes on his eyes, and his hands on his hands: and he stretched himself on him; and the flesh of the child grew warm.
35 Elisha got up, walked around the room, and then went back and again stretched himself over the boy. The boy sneezed seven times and then opened his eyes.
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Then he returned, and walked in the house once back and forth; and went up, and stretched himself on him: and the child sneezed seven times, and the child opened his eyes.
36 Elisha called Gehazi and told him to call the boy's mother. When she came in, he said to her, "Here's your son."
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He called Gehazi, and said, Call this Shunammite. So he called her. When she was come in to him, he said, Take up your son.
37 She fell at Elisha's feet, with her face touching the ground; then she took her son and left.
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Then she went in, and fell at his feet, and bowed herself to the ground; and she took up her son, and went out.
38 Once, when there was a famine throughout the land, Elisha returned to Gilgal. While he was teaching a group of prophets, he told his servant to put a big pot on the fire and make some stew for them.
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Elisha came again to Gilgal. There was a dearth in the land; and the sons of the prophets were sitting before him; and he said to his servant, Set on the great pot, and boil stew for the sons of the prophets.
39 One of them went out in the fields to get some herbs. He found a wild vine and picked as many gourds as he could carry. He brought them back and sliced them up into the stew, not knowing what they were.
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One went out into the field to gather herbs, and found a wild vine, and gathered of it wild gourds his lap full, and came and shred them into the pot of stew; for they didn't recognize them.
40 The stew was poured out for the men to eat, but as soon as they tasted it they exclaimed to Elisha, "It's poisoned!" - and wouldn't eat it.
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So they poured out for the men to eat. It happened, as they were eating of the stew, that they cried out, and said, man of God, there is death in the pot. They could not eat of it.
41 Elisha asked for some meal, threw it into the pot, and said, "Pour out some more stew for them." And then there was nothing wrong with it.
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But he said, Then bring meal. He cast it into the pot; and he said, Pour out for the people, that they may eat. There was no harm in the pot.
42 Another time, a man came from Baal Shalishah, bringing Elisha twenty loaves of bread made from the first barley harvested that year, and some freshly-cut heads of grain. Elisha told his servant to feed the group of prophets with this,
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There came a man from Baal-shalishah, and brought the man of God bread of the first fruits, twenty loaves of barley, and fresh ears of grain in his sack. He said, Give to the people, that they may eat.
43 but he answered, "Do you think this is enough for a hundred men?" Elisha replied, "Give it to them to eat, because the Lord says that they will eat and still have some left over."
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His servant said, What, should I set this before a hundred men? But he said, Give the people, that they may eat; for thus says Yahweh, They shall eat, and shall leave of it.
44 So the servant set the food before them, and as the Lord had said, they all ate, and there was still some left over.
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So he set it before them, and they ate, and left of it, according to the word of Yahweh.