Above: Elisha Makes the Axe Swim
Image in the Public Domain
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READING 1-2 SAMUEL, 1 KINGS, 2 KINGS 1-21, 1 CHRONICLES, AND 2 CHRONICLES 1-33
PART LXXXV
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2 Kings 6:1-23
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If it had not been the LORD who was on our side,
let Israel now say–
if it had not been the LORD who was on our side,
when men rose up against us,
then they would have swallowed us up alive,
when their anger was kindled against us;
then the flood would have swept us away,
the torrent would have gone over us;
then over us would have gone
the raging waters.
Blessed be the LORD,
who has not given us
as prey to their teeth!
We have escaped as a bird
from the snare of the fowlers;
the snare is broken,
and we have escaped!
Our help is in the name of the LORD,
who made heaven and earth.
–Psalm 124, Revised Standard Version–Second Catholic Edition (2002)
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King Jehoram/Joram of Israel (Reigned 851-842 B.C.E.)
King Ben-Hadad I of Aram (Reigned 880-842 B.C.E.)
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As one who pays close attention to this series of posts ought to know, I keep asking, in relation to stories, a guiding question:
What is really going on here?
Consider 2 Kings 6:1-7, for example, O reader.
Elisha had a band of disciples. If we have not known that, we have not paid sufficiently close attention to 2 Kings 2 (in which he inherited it from Elijah) and 2 Kings 4. Elisha’s disciples lived in a community near Jericho and the River Jordan.
Axe heads were expensive. One of Elisha’s disciples lost a borrowed axe head in the River Jordan. Elisha may have poked a stick into the axe head’s hole then lifted the axe head out of the river, as one commentary I read suggested. If Elisha did that, so be it. How he retrieved the axe head was beside the point. The prophet spared a disciple from a would-be onerous debt. Elisha solved one man’s problem. Such issues mattered greatly to the prophet.
They should matter to us, too.
Elisha also dealt with geopolitical and military issues. God worked through him to foil Aramean raiders in Israel. The lavish feast for the raiders, followed by their release, must have astonished King Ben-Hadad I of Aram. That combination did not dissuade him from besieging Samaria, though.
That siege, one of the topics of 2 Kings 6:24-7:20, will be the subject of my next blog post.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
OCTOBER 29, 2020 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF JAMES HANNINGTON, ANGLICAN BISHOP OF EASTERN EQUATORIAL AFRICA; AND HIS COMPANIONS, MARTYRS, 1885
THE FEAST OF BARTHOLOMAUS HELDER, GERMAN LUTHERAN MINISTER, COMPOSER, AND HYMN WRITER
THE FEAST OF JOSEPH GRIGG, ENGLISH PRESBYTERIAN MINISTER AND HYMN WRITER
THE FEAST OF PAUL MANZ, DEAN OF LUTHERAN CHURCH MUSIC
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