2 Kings 6:24-31 | The Way of Scripture

2 Kings 6:24-31

How severe is the suffering inside besieged Samaria?

Berean Standard Bible

24 Some time later, Ben-hadad king of Aram assembled his entire army and marched up to besiege Samaria. 25 So there was a great famine in Samaria. Indeed, they besieged the city so long that a donkey’s head sold for eighty shekels of silver, and a quarter cab of dove’s dung sold for five shekels of silver. 26 As the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried out to him, “Help me, my lord the king!” 27 He answered, “If the LORD does not help you, where can I find help for you? From the threshing floor or the winepress?” 28 Then the king asked her, “What is the matter?” And she answered, “This woman said to me, ‘Give up your son, that we may eat him, and tomorrow we will eat my son.’ 29 So we boiled my son and ate him, and the next day I said to her, ‘Give up your son, that we may eat him.’ But she had hidden her son.” 30 When the king heard the words of the woman, he tore his clothes. And as he passed by on the wall, the people saw the sackcloth under his clothes next to his skin. 31 He announced, “May God punish me, and ever so severely, if the head of Elisha son of Shaphat remains on his shoulders through this day!”

What is the context?

Ben-hadad besieges Samaria, and famine drives the price of even desperate food supplies extraordinarily high. The account’s prices convey the city’s extremity without requiring conversion into modern money.

A woman appeals to the king and reports that she and another woman ate her son, but the other woman has hidden hers. This is the horror of the siege, not a practice the narrator permits or commends.

The king tears his clothes, revealing sackcloth underneath. Yet his response turns toward a vow to kill Elisha. His visible distress and religious mourning do not themselves become patient trust or a just response to the prophet.

How is this passage commonly understood?

Wesley and the USCCB notes connect the women’s dreadful experience with the siege warnings in Deuteronomy 28. They also discuss the uncertain meaning of the food called dove’s dung. The BSB’s wording can be preserved while acknowledging that uncertainty rather than confidently identifying a particular edible plant.

What is our position?

We don't have a position on this passage yet. When our study reaches a conclusion the text supports, it will appear here.

Where can I study this further?

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