2 Kings Chapter 7    

¹Elisha said, “Hear the word of Yahweh. This is what Yahweh says: ‘Tomorrow about this time a seah^a of fine flour will be sold for a shekel^b and two seahs^c of barley for a shekel in the gate of Samaria.’”
 

²Then the officer on whose hand the king leaned answered the man of God and said, “Behold, if Yahweh makes windows in heaven, could this thing happen?” And he said, “Behold, you will see it with your eyes but will not eat of it.”
 

³Now there were four leprous men at the entrance of the gate. They said one to another, “Why do we sit here until we die?
  ⁴If we say, ‘We will enter into the city,’ then the famine is in the city and we will die there. And if we sit here, we will die. So now, let’s go and surrender to the army of the Syrians. If they let us live, we will live, and if they kill us, then we will die.”
 

⁵They rose up in the twilight to go to the camp of the Syrians. But when they came to the edge of the camp of the Syrians, behold, there was no one there.
  ⁶For the Lord had made the army of the Syrians to hear the sound of chariots and the sound of horses; the sound of a great army, so they said to one another, “Behold, the king of Israel has hired against us the kings of the Hittites and the kings of the Egyptians to come against us.”
  ⁷So they arose and fled in the twilight, and left their tents and their horses and their donkeys—the camp as it was—and fled for their lives.
 

⁸So when these lepers came to the edge of the camp, they went into one tent, and ate and drank and carried away from there silver, and gold, and clothing, and went and hid it. Then they came back and entered into another tent, and carried away things from there also and went and hid it.
  ⁹Then they said to one another, “We are not doing right. This day is a day of good news, and we are keeping silent. If we wait until the morning light, punishment will overtake us. So now come, let’s go and tell the king’s house.”
 

¹⁰So they came and called to the gatekeepers of the city, and they told them, saying, “We came to the camp of the Syrians, and behold, there was no one there, nor even the sound of a man, only the horses tied and the donkeys tied, and the tents just as they were.”
  ¹¹Then the gatekeepers called out, and they told it to those inside the king’s house.
 

¹²Then the king arose in the night and said to his servants, “I will now tell you what the Syrians have done to us. They know that we are hungry, so they have gone out of the camp to hide in the field, saying, ‘When they come out of the city, we will take them alive and get into the city.’”
 

¹³But one of his servants answered and said, “Please let some men take five of the horses that remain, which remain in the city. Look, they are like all the people of Israel that remain in it. Look, they are like all the people of Israel that are done for. Let us send and see.”
 

¹⁴So they took two chariots with horses, and the king sent them after the army of the Syrians, saying, “Go and see.”
  ¹⁵So they went after them to the Jordan, and behold, the whole way was full of clothing and other items that the Syrians had thrown away in their haste. Then the messengers returned and told the king.
  ¹⁶Then the people went out and plundered the camp of the Syrians. So a seah^d of fine flour was sold for a shekel and two seahs of barley for a shekel according to the word of Yahweh.
  ¹⁷Now the king had appointed the officer on whose hand he leaned to be in charge of the gate, and the people trampled on him in the gate and he died, just as the man of God had spoken, just as he had spoken when the king came down to him.
  ¹⁸It happened just like the man of God had spoken to the king, saying, “Two seahs^e of barley for a shekel and a seah^f of fine flour for a shekel, will be sold tomorrow about this time in the gate of Samaria,”
  ¹⁹and that officer answered the man of God and said, “Now, behold, if Yahweh makes windows in heaven, could such a thing happen?” and he said, “Behold, you will see it with your eyes, but will not eat of it.”
  ²⁰And it happened like that to him. The people trampled him in the gate, and he died.