2 Kings 6:29

_SO WE BOILED MY SON, AND DID EAT HIM: AND I SAID UNTO HER ON THE NEXT DAY, GIVE THY SON, THAT WE MAY EAT HIM: AND SHE HATH HID HER SON._ We boiled my son, and did eat him - (see the notes at Deuteronomy 28:53.)...

24-33 Learn to value plenty, and to be thankful for it; see how contemptible money is, when in time of famine it is so freely parted with for any thing that is eatable! The language of Jehoram to the woman may be the language of despair. See the word of God fulfilled; among the threatenings of God's judgments upon Israel for their sins, this was one, that they should eat the flesh of their own children, Deuteronomy 28:53-5. The truth and the awful justice of God were displayed in this horrible transaction. Alas! what miseries sin has brought upon the world! But the foolishness of man perverts his way, and then his heart frets against the Lord. The king swears the death of Elisha. Wicked men will blame any one as the cause of their troubles, rather than themselves, and will not leave their sins. If rending the clothes, without a broken and contrite heart, would avail, if wearing sackcl...

Verse 29. _SO WE BOILED MY SON_] This is horrible; but for the sake of humanity we must allow that the children _died_ through hunger, and then became food for their starved, desperate parents. _SHE HATH HID HER SON._] He was already dead, says _Jarchi_; and she hid him, that she might eat him alone. This very evil Moses had foretold should come upon them if they forsook God; see Deuteronomy 28:53; Deuteronomy 28:57. The same evil came upon this wretched people when besieged by Nebuchadnezzar; see Ezekiel 5:10. And also when Titus besieged Jerusalem; see _Josephus_, De Bell. Judaic. lib. vi., cap. 3, and _Clarke's notes on "_

The prophecy alluded to in the marginal references was now fulfilled, probably for the first time. It had a second accomplishment when Jerusalem was besieged by Nebuchadnezzar Lamentations 4:10, and a third in the final siege of the same city by Titus....

EXPOSITION VERSE 1-7:20 FURTHER MIRACLES WROUGHT BY ELISHA. The historian relates first a (comparatively) private miracle wrought by Elisha in the vicinity of Jericho, for the benefit of one of the "sons of the prophets" (2 Kings 7:1). He then tells us briefly of a series of public miracles which brought Elisha into much note and prominence. War, it appears, had again broken out in a pronounced form between Israel and Syria, Syria being the aggressor. The Syrian monarch prepared traps for his adversary, encamping in places where he hoped to take him at a disadvantage. But Elisha frustrated these plans, by addressing warnings to the King of Israel, and pointing out to him the various positions occupied ...

SO WE BOILED MY SON, AND DID EAT HIM,.... Thus what was predicted, by way of threatening, began to be accomplished, Deuteronomy 28:53, Deuteronomy 28:53, and of which there were other instances of a like kind at the siege of Jerusalem, both by Nebuchadnezzar and Vespasian: AND I SAID UNTO HER ON THE NEXT DAY; after her child had been wholly ate up: GIVE THY SON, THAT WE MAY EAT HIM; according to agreement: AND SHE HATH HID HER SON; either to save him alive, or to eat him herself alone....

5. ELISHA AND THE SYRIANS CHAPTER 6 _ 1. The lost axe-head recovered (2 Kings 6:1)_ 2. Elisha makes known Ben-hadad's plans (2 Kings 6:8) 3. Elisha's arrest planned (2 Kings 6:13) 4. The blinded Syrians led to Samaria (2 Kings 6:18) 5. Samaria besieged (2 Kings 6:24) 6. The king's wrath against Elisha (2 Kings 6:31) It has been truly said that the miracle of the swimming axe-head reveals the condescension of

AN AXEHEAD SWIMS. ELISHA AND THE SYRIANS AT DOTHAN. In several minor miracles Elisha is always represented as working them not by his word, but by some expedient. Thus he heals the miscarrying waters by salt, and the pot by meal, and recovers the axehead by casting a stick into the water. The prophet appears in the second narrative as the moving spirit in the Syrian war. Whenever the king of Syria devised an ambush (2 Kings 6:8, with a slight alteration of reading), Elisha revealed the secret. Elisha was at Dothan (2 Kings 6:13), a city standing on a hill about 10 miles N. of Samaria, on the caravan road from Egypt to Damascus (Genesis 37:17, p. 30). Elisha was defended, as we are finely told, by horses and chariots of f

WE BOILED. Compare Deuteronomy 28:53....

_she hath hid her son_ So hath famine changed the nature of those whom Jeremiah calls -the pitiful women". The king cannot answer such an appeal, though starvation have made the mother feel that it is a just one....