2 Raja-raja 3:19

3:19 You will defeat every fortified city and every important ¹  city. You must chop down ²  every productive ³  tree, stop up all the springs, and cover all the cultivated land with stones.” ⁴ 

2 Raja-raja 7:6

7:6 The Lord had caused the Syrian camp to hear the sound of chariots and horses and a large army. Then they said to one another, “Look, the king of Israel has paid the kings of the Hittites and Egypt to attack us!”

2 Raja-raja 7:19

7:19 But the officer replied to the prophet, “Look, even if the Lord made it rain by opening holes in the sky, could this happen so soon?” ⁵  Elisha ⁶  said, “Look, you will see it happen with your own eyes, but you will not eat any of the food!” ⁷ 

2 Raja-raja 13:23

13:23 But the Lord had mercy on them and felt pity for them. ⁸  He extended his favor to them ⁹  because of the promise he had made ¹⁰  to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He has been unwilling to destroy them or remove them from his presence to this very day. ¹¹ 

2 Raja-raja 16:14

16:14 He moved the bronze altar that stood in the Lord’s presence from the front of the temple (between the altar and the Lord’s temple) and put it on the north side of the new ¹²  altar.

2 Raja-raja 17:35

17:35 The Lord made an agreement ¹³  with them ¹⁴  and instructed them, “You must not worship other gods. Do not bow down to them, serve them, or offer sacrifices to them.

2 Raja-raja 18:12

18:12 This happened because they did not obey ¹⁵  the Lord their God and broke his agreement with them. ¹⁶  They did not pay attention to and obey all that Moses, the Lord’s servant, had commanded. ¹⁷ 

2 Raja-raja 18:21

18:21 Now look, you must be trusting in Egypt, that splintered reed staff. If a man leans for support on it, it punctures his hand and wounds him. That is what Pharaoh king of Egypt does to all who trust in him.

2 Raja-raja 18:32

18:32 until I come and take you to a land just like your own – a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olive trees and honey. Then you will live and not die. Don’t listen to Hezekiah, for he is misleading you when he says, “The Lord will rescue us.”

2 Raja-raja 19:25

19:25 ¹⁸ Certainly you must have heard! ¹⁹ 

Long ago I worked it out,

In ancient times I planned ²⁰  it;

and now I am bringing it to pass.

The plan is this:

Fortified cities will crash

into heaps of ruins. ²¹ 

2 Raja-raja 20:6

20:6 I will add fifteen years to your life and rescue you and this city from the king of Assyria. I will shield this city for the sake of my reputation and because of my promise to David my servant.”’” ²² 

2 Raja-raja 21:3

21:3 He rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had destroyed; he set up altars for Baal and made an Asherah pole just like King Ahab of Israel had done. He bowed down to all the stars in the sky ²³  and worshiped ²⁴  them.

2 Raja-raja 21:7

21:7 He put an idol of Asherah he had made in the temple, about which the Lord had said to David and to his son Solomon, “This temple in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, will be my permanent home. ²⁵ 

2 Raja-raja 23:5-6

23:5 He eliminated ²⁶  the pagan priests whom the kings of Judah had appointed to offer sacrifices ²⁷  on the high places in the cities of Judah and in the area right around Jerusalem. (They offered sacrifices ²⁸  to Baal, the sun god, the moon god, the constellations, and all the stars in the sky.) 23:6 He removed the Asherah pole from the Lord’s temple and took it outside Jerusalem to the Kidron Valley, where he burned it. ²⁹  He smashed it to dust and then threw the dust in the public graveyard. ³⁰ 

2 Raja-raja 23:11

23:11 He removed from the entrance to the Lord’s temple the statues of horses ³¹  that the kings of Judah had placed there in honor of the sun god. (They were kept near the room of Nathan Melech the eunuch, which was situated among the courtyards.) ³²  He burned up the chariots devoted to the sun god. ³³ 

2 Raja-raja 23:19

23:19 Josiah also removed all the shrines on the high places in the cities of Samaria. The kings of Israel had made them and angered the Lord. ³⁴  He did to them what he had done to the high place in Bethel. ³⁵ 

2 Raja-raja 23:27

23:27 The Lord announced, “I will also spurn Judah, ³⁶  just as I spurned Israel. I will reject this city that I chose – both Jerusalem and the temple, about which I said, “I will live there.” ³⁷ 

2 Raja-raja 24:14

24:14 He deported all the residents of Jerusalem, including all the officials and all the soldiers (10,000 people in all). This included all the craftsmen and those who worked with metal. No one was left except for the poorest among the people of the land.

2 Raja-raja 25:25

25:25 But in the seventh month ³⁸  Ishmael son of Nethaniah, son of Elishama, who was a member of the royal family, ³⁹  came with ten of his men and murdered Gedaliah, ⁴⁰  as well as the Judeans and Babylonians who were with him at Mizpah.

[3:19]  ¹ tn Heb “choice” or “select.”

[3:19]  ² 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]  ³ tn Heb “good.”

[3:19]  ⁴ tn Heb “and ruin every good portion with stones.”

[7:19]  ⁵ tn Heb “the Lord was making holes in the sky, could this thing be?” See the note at 7:2.

[7:19]  ⁶ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Elisha) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[7:19]  ⁷ tn Heb “you will not eat from there.”

[7:19]  tn In the Hebrew text vv. 18-19a are one lengthy sentence, “When the man of God spoke to the king…, the officer replied to the man of God, ‘Look…so soon?’” The translation divides this sentence up for stylistic reasons.

[13:23]  ⁸ tn Or “showed them compassion.”

[13:23]  ⁹ tn Heb “he turned to them.”

[13:23]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “because of his covenant with.”

[13:23]  ¹¹ tn Heb “until now.”

[16:14]  ¹² tn The word “new” is added in the translation for clarification.

[17:35]  ¹³ tn Or “covenant.”

[17:35]  ¹⁴ sn That is, the descendants of Jacob/Israel (see v. 35b).

[18:12]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “listen to the voice of.”

[18:12]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “his covenant.”

[18:12]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “all that Moses, the Lord’s servant, had commanded, and they did not listen and they did not act.”

[19:25]  ¹⁸ tn Having quoted the Assyrian king’s arrogant words in vv. 23-24, the Lord now speaks to the king.

[19:25]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Have you not heard?” The rhetorical question expresses the Lord’s amazement that anyone might be ignorant of what he is about to say.

[19:25]  ²⁰ tn Heb “formed.”

[19:25]  ²¹ tn Heb “and it is to cause to crash into heaps of ruins fortified cities.” The subject of the third feminine singular verb תְּהִי (tÿhi) is the implied plan, referred to in the preceding lines with third feminine singular pronominal suffixes.

[20:6]  ²² tn Heb “for my sake and for the sake of David my servant.”

[21:3]  ²³ sn See the note at 2 Kgs 17:16.

[21:3]  ²⁴ tn Or “served.”

[21:7]  ²⁵ tn Heb “In this house and in Jerusalem, which I chose from all the tribes of Israel, I will place my name perpetually (or perhaps “forever”).”

[23:5]  ²⁶ tn Perhaps, “destroyed.”

[23:5]  ²⁷ tn Or “burn incense.”

[23:5]  ²⁸ tn Or “burned incense.”

[23:6]  ²⁹ tn Heb “and he burned it in the Kidron Valley.”

[23:6]  ³⁰ tc Heb “on the grave of the sons of the people.” Some Hebrew, Greek, Syriac, Aramaic, and Latin witnesses read the plural “graves.”

[23:6]  tn The phrase “sons of the people” refers here to the common people (see BDB 766 s.v. עַם), as opposed to the upper classes who would have private tombs.

[23:11]  ³¹ tn The MT simply reads “the horses.” The words “statues of” have been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[23:11]  ³² tn Heb “who/which was in the […?].” The meaning of the Hebrew term פַּרְוָרִים (parvarim), translated here “courtyards,” is uncertain. The relative clause may indicate where the room was located or explain who Nathan Melech was, “the eunuch who was in the courtyards.” See M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 288-89, who translate “the officer of the precincts.”

[23:11]  ³³ tn Heb “and the chariots of the sun he burned with fire.”

[23:19]  ³⁴ tc Heb “which the kings of Israel had made, angering.” The object has been accidentally omitted in the MT. It appears in the LXX, Syriac, and Vulgate versions.

[23:19]  ³⁵ tn Heb “and he did to them according to all the deeds he had done in Bethel.”

[23:19]  map For location see Map4 G4; Map5 C1; Map6 E3; Map7 D1; Map8 G3.

[23:27]  ³⁶ tn Heb “Also Judah I will turn away from my face.”

[23:27]  ³⁷ tn Heb “My name will be there.”

[25:25]  ³⁸ 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]  ³⁹ tn Heb “[was] from the seed of the kingdom.”

[25:25]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “and they struck down Gedaliah and he died.”