(3) And there were four leprous men at the entering in of the gate: and they said one to another, Why sit we here until we die?

(4) If we say, We will enter into the city, then the famine {is} in the city, and we shall die there: and if we sit still here, we die also. Now therefore come, and let us fall unto the host of the Syrians: if they save us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall but die.

(5) And they rose up in the twilight, to go unto the camp of the Syrians: and when they were come to the uttermost part of the camp of Syria, behold, {there was} no man there.

(6) For the Lord had made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, {even} the noise of a great host: and they said one to another, Lo, the king of Israel hath hired against us the kings of the Hittites, and the kings of the Egyptians, to come upon us.

(7) Wherefore they arose and fled in the twilight, and left their tents, and their horses, and their asses, even the camp as it {was}, and fled for their life.

(8) And when these lepers came to the uttermost part of the camp, they went into one tent, and did eat and drink, and carried thence silver, and gold, and raiment, and went and hid {it}; and came again, and entered into another tent, and carried thence {also}, and went and hid {it}.

(9) Then they said one to another, We do not well: this day {is} a day of good tidings, and we hold our peace: if we tarry till the morning light, some mischief will come upon us: now therefore come, that we may go and tell the king's household.

(10) So they came and called unto the porter of the city: and they told them, saying, We came to the camp of the Syrians, and, behold, {there was} no man there, neither voice of man, but horses tied, and asses tied, and the tents as they {were}.

(11) And he called the porters; and they told {it} to the king's house within.

(12) And the king arose in the night, and said unto his servants, I will now shew you what the Syrians have done to us. They know that we {be} hungry; therefore are they gone out of the camp to hide themselves in the field, saying, When they come out of the city, we shall catch them alive, and get into the city.

(13) And one of his servants answered and said, Let {some} take, I pray thee, five of the horses that remain, which are left in the city, (behold, they {are} as all the multitude of Israel that are left in it: behold, {I say}, they {are} even as all the multitude of the Israelites that are consumed:) and let us send and see.

(14) They took therefore two chariot horses; and the king sent after the host of the Syrians, saying, Go and see.

(15) And they went after them unto Jordan: and, lo, all the way {was} full of garments and vessels, which the Syrians had cast away in their haste. And the messengers returned, and told the king.

(16) And the people went out, and spoiled the tents of the Syrians. So a measure of fine flour was {sold} for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, according to the word of the Lord.

(17) And the king appointed the lord on whose hand he leaned to have the charge of the gate: and the people trode upon him in the gate, and he died, as the man of God had said, who spake when the king came down to him.

(18) And it came to pass as the man of God had spoken to the king, saying, Two measures of barley for a shekel, and a measure of fine flour for a shekel, shall be to morrow about this time in the gate of Samaria:

(19) And that lord answered the man of God, and said, Now, behold, {if} the Lord should make windows in heaven, might such a thing be? And he said, Behold, thou shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.

(20) And so it fell out unto him: for the people trode upon him in the gate, and he died.

5. Now what Elisha had thus foretold came to pass in the manner following:--There was a law at Samaria, that those that had the leprosy, and whose bodies were not cleansed from it, should abide without the city.

And there were four men that on this account abode before the gates, while nobody gave them any food, by reason of the extremity of the famine; and as they were prohibited from entering into the city by the law, and they considered that if they were permitted to enter, they would miserably perish by the famine; as also, that if they stayed where they were, they should suffer in the same manner, they resolved to deliver themselves up to the enemy, that in case they should spare them, they should live; but if they should be killed, that would be an easy death.

So when they had confirmed this their resolution, they came by night to the enemy's camp.

Now God had begun to affright and disturb the Syrians, and to bring the noise of chariots and armor to their ears, as though an army were coming upon them, and had made them suspect that it was coming nearer and nearer to them.

In short, they were in such a dread of this army, that they left their tents, and ran together to Benhadad, and said that Joram, the king of Israel, had hired for auxiliaries both the king of Egypt and the king of the Islands, and led them against them; for they heard the noise of them as they were coming; and Benhadad believed what they said, (for there came the same noise to his ears as well as it did to theirs); so they fell into a mighty disorder and tumult, and left their horses and beasts in their camp, with immense riches also, and betook themselves to fight.

And those lepers who had departed from Samaria, and were gone to the camp of the Syrians, of whom we made mention a little before, when they were in the camp, saw nothing but great quietness and silence; accordingly they entered into it, and went hastily into one of their tents; and when they saw nobody there, they ate and drank, and carried garments, and a great quantity of gold, and hid it out of the camp; after which they went into another tent, and carried off what was in it, as they did at the former, and this did they for several times, without the least interruption from anybody; so they gathered thereby that the enemies were departed; whereupon they reproached themselves that they did not inform Joram and the citizens of it.

So they came to the walls of Samaria, and called aloud to the watchmen, and told them in what state the enemies were, as did these tell the king's guards, by whose means Joram came to know of it; who then sent for his friends, and the captains of his host, and said to them, that he suspected that this departure of the king of Syria was by way of ambush and treachery; "and that out of despair of ruining you by famine, when you imagine them to be fled away, you may come out of the city to spoil their camp, and he may then fall upon you on a sudden, and may both kill you, and take the city without fighting; whence it is that I exhort you to guard the city carefully, and by no means to go out of it, or proudly to despise your enemies, as though they were really gone away."

And when a certain person said that he did very well and wisely to admit such a suspicion, but that he still advised him to send a couple of horsemen to search all the country as far as Jordan, that "if they were seized by an ambush of the enemy, they might be a security to your army, that they may not go out as if they suspected nothing, nor undergo the like misfortune; and," said he, "those horsemen may be numbered among those that have died by the famine, supposing they be caught and destroyed by the enemy."

So the king was pleased with this opinion, and sent such as might search out the truth, who performed their journey over a road that was without any enemies; but found it full of provisions, and of weapons, that they had therefore thrown away, and left behind them, in order to their being light and expeditious in their flight.

When the king heard this, he sent out the multitude to take the spoils of the camp; which gains of theirs were not of things of small value; but they took a great quantity of gold, and a great quantity of silver, and flocks of all kinds of cattle.

They also possessed themselves of (so many) ten thousand measures of wheat and barley, as they never in the least dreamed of; and were not only freed from their former miseries, but had such plenty, that two sheafs of barley were bought for a shekel, and a seah of fine flour for a shekel, according to the prophecy of Elisha.

Now a seah is equal to an Italian modius and a half.

 The captain of the third band was the only man that received no benefit by this plenty; for as he was appointed by the king to oversee the gate, that he might  prevent the too great crowd of the multitude, and they might not endanger one another to perish, by treading on one another in the press, he suffered himself in that very way, and died in that very manner, as Elisha had foretold this his death, when he alone of them all disbelieved what he said concerning that plenty of provisions which they should soon have.

(1) Then spake Elisha unto the woman, whose son he had restored to life, saying, Arise, and go thou and thine household, and sojourn wheresoever thou canst sojourn: for the Lord hath called for a famine; and it shall also come upon the land seven years.

(2) And the woman arose, and did after the saying of the man of God: and she went with her household, and sojourned in the land of the Philistines seven years.

(3) And it came to pass at the seven years' end, that the woman returned out of the land of the Philistines: and she went forth to cry unto the king for her house and for her land.

(4) And the king talked with Gehazi the servant of the man of God, saying, Tell me, I pray thee, all the great things that Elisha hath done.

(5) And it came to pass, as he was telling the king how he had restored a dead body to life, that, behold, the woman, whose son he had restored to life, cried to the king for her house and for her land. And Gehazi said, My lord, O king, this {is} the woman, and this {is} her son, whom Elisha restored to life.

(6) And when the king asked the woman, she told him. So the king appointed unto her a certain officer, saying, Restore all that {was} hers, and all the fruits of the field since the day that she left the land, even until now.

(7) And Elisha came to Damascus; and Benhadad the king of Syria was sick; and it was told him, saying, The man of God is come hither.

(8) And the king said unto Hazael, Take a present in thine hand, and go, meet the man of God, and inquire of the Lord by him, saying, Shall I recover of this disease?

(9) So Hazael went to meet him, and took a present with him, even of every good thing of Damascus, forty camels' burden, and came and stood before him, and said, Thy son Benhadad king of Syria hath sent me to thee, saying, Shall I recover of this disease?

(10) And Elisha said unto him, Go, say unto him, Thou mayest certainly recover: howbeit the Lord hath shewed me that he shall surely die. (11) And he settled his countenance stedfastly, until he was ashamed: and the man of God wept.

(12) And Hazael said, Why weepeth my lord? And he answered, Because I know the evil that thou wilt do unto the children of Israel: their strong holds wilt thou set on fire, and their young men wilt thou slay with the sword, and wilt dash their children, and rip up their women with child.

(13) And Hazael said, But what, {is} thy servant a dog, that he should do this great thing? And Elisha answered, The Lord hath shewed me that thou {shalt be} king over Syria.

(14) So he departed from Elisha, and came to his master; who said to him, What said Elisha to thee? And he answered, He told me {that} thou shouldest surely recover.

(15) And it came to pass on the morrow, that he took a thick cloth, and dipped {it} in water, and spread {it} on his face, so that he died: and Hazael reigned in his stead.

6. Hereupon, when Benhadad, the king of Syria, had escaped to Damascus, and understood that it was God himself that cast all his army into this fear and disorder, and that it did not arise from the invasion of enemies, he was mightily cast down at his having God so greatly for his enemy, and fell into a distemper.

Now it happened that Elisha the prophet, at that time, was gone out of his own country to Damascus, of which Benhadad was informed; he sent Hazael, the most faithful of all his servants, to meet him, and to carry him presents; and bade him inquire of him about his distemper, and whether he should escape the danger that it threatened.

So Hazael came to Elisha with forty camels, that carried the best and most precious fruits that the country of Damascus afforded, as well as those which the king's palace supplied.

He saluted him kindly, and said that he was sent to him by king Benhadad, and brought presents with him, in order to in inquire concerning his distemper, whether he should recover from it or not.

Whereupon the prophet bade him tell the king no melancholy news; but still he said he would die.

So the king's servant was troubled to hear it; and Elisha wept also, and his tears ran down plenteously at his foresight at what miseries his people would undergo after the death of Benhadad; and when Hazael asked him what was the occasion of this confusion he was in, he said, that he wept out of commiseration for the multitude of the Israelites, and what terrible miseries they will suffer by thee; "for thou wilt slay the strongest of them, and wilt burn their strongest cities, and wilt destroy their children, and dash them against the stones, and wilt rip up their women with child."

And when Hazael said, "How can it be that I should have power enough to do such things?" the prophet replied, that God had informed him that he should be king of Syria.

So when Hazael was come to Benhadad, he told him good news concerning his distemper; but on the next day he spread a wet cloth, in the nature of a net, over him, and strangled him, and took his dominion.

He was an active man, and had the good will of the Syrians, and of the people of Damascus, to a great degree; by whom both Benhadad himself, and Hazael, who ruled after him, are honored to this day as gods, by reason of their benefactions, and their building them temples, by which they adorned the city of the Damascens.

They also every day do with great pomp pay their worship to these kings, and value themselves upon their antiquity; nor do they know that these kings are much later then they imagine, and that they are not yet eleven hundred years old.

Now when Joram, the king of Israel, heard that Benhadad was dead, he recovered out of the terror and dread he had been in on his account, and was very glad to live in peace.

1.  Now Jehoram, the king of Jerusalem, (for we have said before that he had the same name with the king of Israel,) as soon as he had taken the government upon him, betook himself to the slaughter of his brethren and his father's friends, who were governors under him, and thence made a beginning and a demonstration of his wickedness: nor was he at all better than those kings of Israel who at first transgressed against the laws of their country, and of the Hebrews, and against God's worship: and it was Athaliah, the daughter of Ahab, whom he had married who taught him to be a bad man in other respects, and also to worship foreign gods. 

Now God would not quite root out this family, because of the promise he had made to David. 

However, Jehoram did not leave off the introduction of new sorts of customs to the propagation of impiety, and to the ruin of the customs of his own country. 

And when the Edomites about that time had revolted from him, and slain their former king, who was in subjection to his father, and had set up one of their own choosing, Jehoram fell upon the land of Edom, with the horsemen that were about him, and the chariots, by night, and destroyed those that lay near to his own kingdom; but did not proceed further. 

However, this expedition did him no service, for they all revolted from him, with those that dwelt in the country of Libnah. 

He was indeed so mad as to compel the people to go up to the high places of the mountains, and worship foreign gods.

2.  As he was doing this, and had entirely cast his own country laws out of his mind, there was brought him an epistle from Elijah the prophet, which declared, that god would execute judgements upon him, because he had not imitated his own fathers, but had followed the wicked courses of the kings of Israel: and had compelled the tribe of Judah and the citizens of Jerusalem to leave the holy worship of their own God and to worship idols, as Ahab had compelled the Israelites to do, and because he had slain his brethren, and the men that were good and righteous. 

And the prophet gave him notice in this epistle what punishment he should undergo for these crimes, namely, the destruction of his people, with the corruption of the king's own wives and children; and that he should himself die of a distemper in his bowels, with long torments, those his bowels falling out by the violence of the inward rottenness of the parts, insomuch that, though he see his own misery, he shall not be able at all to help himself, but shall die in that manner. 

This it was which Elijah denounced to him in that epistle.*

(20) In his days Edom revolted from under the hand of Judah, and made a king over themselves.

(21) So Joram went over to Zair, and all the chariots with him: and he rose by night, and smote the Edomites which compassed him about, and the captains of the chariots: and the people fled into their tents.

(22) Yet Edom revolted from under the hand of Judah unto this day. Then Libnah revolted at the same time.

(23) And the rest of the acts of Joram, and all that he did, {are} they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?

(24) And Joram slept with his fathers, and was buried with his fathers in the city of David: and Ahaziah his son reigned in his stead.

(25) In the twelfth year of Joram the son of Ahab king of Israel did Ahaziah the son of Jehoram king of Judah begin to reign.

(8) In his days the Edomites revolted from under the dominion of Judah, and made themselves a king.

(9) Then Jehoram went forth with his princes, and all his chariots with him: and he rose up by night, and smote the Edomites which compassed him in, and the captains of the chariots.

(10) So the Edomites revolted from under the hand of Judah unto this day. The same time {also} did Libnah revolt from under his hand; because he had forsaken the Lord God of his fathers.

(11) Moreover he made high places in the mountains of Judah and caused the inhabitants of Jerusalem to commit fornication, and compelled Judah {thereto}.

(12) And there came a writing to him from Elijah the prophet, saying, Thus saith the Lord God of David thy father, Because thou hast not walked in the ways of Jehoshaphat thy father, nor in the ways of Asa king of Judah,

(13) But hast walked in the way of the kings of Israel, and hast made Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to go a whoring, like to the whoredoms of the house of Ahab, and also hast slain thy brethren of thy father's house, {which were} better than thyself:

(14) Behold, with a great plague will the Lord smite thy people, and thy children, and thy wives, and all thy goods:

(15) And thou {shalt have} great sickness by disease of thy bowels, until thy bowels fall out by reason of the sickness day by day.

(16) Moreover the Lord stirred up against Jehoram the spirit of the Philistines, and of the Arabians, that {were} near the Ethiopians:

(17) And they came up into Judah, and brake into it, and carried away all the substance that was found in the king's house, and his sons also, and his wives; so that there was never a son left him, save Jehoahaz, the youngest of his sons.

(18) And after all this the Lord smote him in his bowels with an incurable disease.

(19) And it came to pass, that in process of time, after the end of two years, his bowels fell out by reason of his sickness: so he died of sore diseases. And his people made no burning for him, like the burning of his fathers.

(20) Thirty and two years old was he when he began to reign, and he reigned in Jerusalem eight years, and departed without being desired. Howbeit they buried him in the city of David, but not in the sepulchers of the kings.

3.  It was not long after this that an army of those Arabians that lived near to Ethiopia, and of the Philistines, fell upon the kingdom of Jehoram, and spoiled the country and the king's house; moreover, they slew his sons and his wives; one only of his sons was left him, who escaped the enemy; his name was Ahaziah; after which calamity, he himself fell into that disease which was foretold by the prophet, and lasted a great while, (for God inflicted this punishment upon him in his belly, out of his wrath against him,) and so he died miserably, and saw his own bowels fall out. 

The people also abused his dead body; I suppose it was because they thought that such his death came upon him by the wrath of God, and that therefore he was not worthy to partake of such a funeral as became kings. 

Accordingly, they neither buried him in the sepuichres of his fathers, nor vouchsafed him any honors, but buried him like a private man, and this when he had lived forty years, and reigned eight; and the people of Jerusalem delivered the government to his son Ahaziah.

(25) In the twelfth year of Joram the son of Ahab king of Israel did Ahaziah the son of Jehoram king of Judah begin to reign.

(26) Two and twenty years old {was} Ahaziah when he began to reign; and he reigned one year in Jerusalem. And his mother's name {was} Athaliah, the daughter of Omri king of Israel.

(27) And he walked in the way of the house of Ahab, and did evil in the sight of the Lord, as {did} the house of Ahab: for he {was} the son in law of the house of Ahab.

(28) And he went with Joram the son of Ahab to the war against Hazael king of Syria in Ramothgilead; and the Syrians wounded Joram.

(29) And king Joram went back to be healed in Jezreel of the wounds which the Syrians had given him at Ramah, when he fought against Hazael king of Syria. And Ahaziah the son of Jehoram king of Judah went down to see Joram the son of Ahab in Jezreel, because he was sick.

(1) And the inhabitants of Jerusalem made Ahaziah his youngest son king in his stead: for the band of men that came with the Arabians to the camp had slain all the eldest. So Ahaziah the son of Jehoram king of Judah reigned.

(2) Forty and two years old {was} Ahaziah when he began to reign, and he reigned one year in Jerusalem. His mother's name also {was} Athaliah the daughter of Omri.

(3) He also walked in the ways of the house of Ahab: for his mother was his counsellor to do wickedly.

(4) Wherefore he did evil in the sight of the Lord like the house of Ahab: for they were his counsellors after the death of his father to his destruction.

(5) He walked also after their counsel, and went with Jehoram the son of Ahab king of Israel to war against Hazael king of Syria at Ramothgilead: and the Syrians smote Joram.