2 RoisChapitre 4

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A certain woman, the wife of one of the sons of the prophets, cried out to Elisha, "Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared the LORD. Now the creditor has come to take my two boys as his slaves."

Elisha said to her, "What can I do for you? Tell me, what do you have in the house?" She answered, "Your servant has nothing at all in the house except a jar of oil."

Then he said, "Go out and borrow vessels from all your neighbors—empty vessels, and don't ask for just a few.

Then go inside, shut the door behind you and your sons, and pour oil into all these vessels, setting aside each one as it is filled."

So she left him and shut the door behind her and her sons, and while they kept bringing the vessels to her, she kept pouring.

When the vessels were full, she said to her son, "Bring me another vessel." But he said to her, "There are no more." Then the oil stopped.

She came and told the man of God, and he said, "Go, sell the oil and pay your debt; you and your sons can live on what is left."

One day Elisha was passing through Shunem, where a wealthy woman lived, and she urged him to stay for a meal. So whenever he passed by, he would stop there to eat.

She said to her husband, "I know that this man who so often comes our way is a holy man of God.

Let's build a small room on the roof and put a bed there for him, with a table, a chair, and a lamp, so that whenever he comes to us he can stay there."

One day when he came, he went up to the room and lay down there.

He said to Gehazi, his servant, "Call this Shunammite woman." So he called her, and she stood before him.

Elisha said to him, "Tell her, 'You have gone to all this trouble for us. What can be done for you? Should a word be spoken on your behalf to the king or to the commander of the army?'" She answered, "I live among my own people."

"What then can be done for her?" he asked. Gehazi said, "Well, she has no son, and her husband is old."

Then he said, "Call her." So he called her, and she stood in the doorway.

And Elisha said, "About this time next year you will hold a son in your arms." "No, my lord, man of God," she said, "do not deceive your servant."

But the woman conceived, and at that time the next year she bore a son, just as Elisha had told her.

The child grew, and one day he went out to his father, who was with the harvesters.

He said to his father, "My head! My head!" His father said to a servant, "Carry him to his mother."

The servant lifted him up and brought him to his mother. He sat on her lap until noon, and then he died.

She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, shut the door behind her, and went out.

She called to her husband and said, "Please send me one of the servants and one of the donkeys, so I can hurry to the man of God and come back."

"Why go to him today?" he asked. "It is neither new moon nor Sabbath." "It is all right," she said.

She saddled the donkey and said to her servant, "Drive on; don't slow down for me unless I tell you."

So she set out and came to the man of God at Mount Carmel. When the man of God saw her in the distance, he said to Gehazi his servant, "Look, there is the Shunammite.

Run out to meet her and ask her, 'Are you all right? Is your husband all right? Is the child all right?'" "Everything is all right," she said.

When she came to the man of God at the mountain, she took hold of his feet. Gehazi came to push her away, but the man of God said, "Leave her alone; she is in bitter distress, and the LORD has hidden it from me and not told me."

Then she said, "Did I ask my lord for a son? Didn't I say, 'Do not raise my hopes'?"

Elisha said to Gehazi, "Tuck your cloak into your belt, take my staff in your hand, and go. If you meet anyone, do not greet him, and if anyone greets you, do not answer. Lay my staff on the boy's face."

But the boy's mother said, "As surely as the LORD lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you." So he got up and followed her.

Gehazi went on ahead and laid the staff on the boy's face, but there was no sound, no response. So he went back to meet Elisha and told him, "The boy has not awakened."

When Elisha reached the house, there was the boy, dead, lying on his bed.

He went in, shut the door on the two of them, and prayed to the LORD.

Then he got on the bed and lay on the boy, mouth to mouth, eyes to eyes, hands to hands. As he stretched himself out over him, the boy's body grew warm.

Elisha turned away and walked back and forth in the room, then got on the bed and stretched out over him once more. The boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.

Elisha called Gehazi and said, "Call the Shunammite." He called her, and when she came, Elisha said, "Take your son."

She came in, fell at his feet, and bowed to the ground. Then she took her son and went out.

Elisha returned to Gilgal, and there was a famine in the land. While the sons of the prophets were sitting before him, he said to his servant, "Put the large pot on the fire and cook some stew for these sons of the prophets."

One of them went out into the field to gather herbs and found a wild vine. He gathered some of its gourds and filled the fold of his cloak. When he came back, he cut them up into the pot of stew, though no one knew what they were.

They poured it out for the men to eat, but as they were eating the stew they cried out, "Man of God, there is death in the pot!" And they could not eat it.

Elisha said, "Bring some flour." He threw it into the pot and said, "Pour it out for the people to eat." And there was no longer anything harmful in the pot.

A man came from Baal Shalishah, bringing the man of God twenty loaves of barley bread from the first ripe grain, along with some fresh heads of grain in his sack. "Give it to the people to eat," Elisha said.

But his attendant said, "How can I set this before a hundred men?" Elisha answered, "Give it to the people to eat, for this is what the LORD says: 'They will eat, and there will be some left over.'"

So he set it before them, and they ate and had some left over, just as the LORD had said.

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Résumé2

Chapitre 4

Main Theme: Elisha performs four miracles that demonstrate God's care for people in distress.

Content: The chapter recounts four miraculous deeds. Elisha helps a poor widow, the wife of a prophet, by miraculously multiplying her oil so she can pay her debts and save her sons from slavery. He promises a childless, hospitable woman from Shunem that she will have a son; when the boy later dies, Elisha raises him from the dead through prayer. At Gilgal, he neutralizes poison in a pot for the company of prophets, and feeds one hundred men with twenty loaves of barley bread—leaving food left over.

Key Words/Images:

The Oil That Never Ran Out – God's ability to provide beyond natural limits, conditioned on faith and obedience.
The Closed Door – Both the widow's oil miracle and the resurrection take place behind closed doors, symbolizing an intimate space with God.
Man of God (אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים) – This title is used repeatedly and emphasizes Elisha's role as God's representative.
Food Left Over – Points forward to God's abundance and Jesus' miracle of the loaves (John 6).

Contexte historique

Historical and Cultural Context for 2 Kings 4

People

The Shunammite woman is described as a "great woman" (אִשָּׁה גְדוֹלָה), an expression denoting social status and wealth, not physical size. She and her husband could afford to build a special room for the prophet, indicating considerable riches. Her independent actions—furnishing the guest room, seeking out the prophet alone, and making decisions without consulting her husband—show that wealthy women in ancient Israel could have significant autonomy.

Gehazi (גֵּחֲזִי) serves as Elisha's personal servant and intermediary. His role illustrates the hierarchical relationship between prophets and their disciples. The meaning of his name is uncertain but may be related to Hebrew roots for "valley" or "vision."

Places

Shunem (שׁוּנֵם) was located in the Jezreel Valley, identified with the village of Sulam (modern Shunem/Solem) at the foot of Mount Gilboa. The place held strategic importance along the main road between Samaria and Galilee, which explains why Elisha "often passed through" there. The city is also mentioned in Joshua 19:18 as a town within the territory of the tribe of Issachar.

Mount Carmel served as Elisha's base and is the same mountain where Elijah confronted the prophets of Baal. The distance from Shunem to Mount Carmel was approximately 20–25 kilometers, a journey the Shunammite woman made on a donkey in her desperation.

Gilgal, mentioned toward the end of the chapter, was a center for prophetic communities, not the same Gilgal near the Jordan associated with Joshua. This Gilgal was likely located in the hill country near Bethel.

Baal-Shalishah (בַּעַל שָׁלִשָׁה) was a place in the hills of Ephraim, possibly near modern Kafr Thilth. The name means "Baal of Shalishah" or "Lord of the Third," testifying to the region's Canaanite past.

Events and Customs

Debt slavery was an accepted practice in the ancient Near East. When a man died with unpaid debts, the creditor had the right to take the debtor's children as slaves until the debt was paid off. This practice is regulated in Exodus 21:2–11 and Leviticus 25:39–43, which limited the period of servitude to a maximum of six years for Israelites. The widow's situation in verses 1–7 illustrates the vulnerable position of women without a male provider.

The guest room (עֲלִיַּת־קִיר) built by the Shunammite woman was a small upper chamber on the roof, a common architectural solution in the region. The furnishings—a bed, table, chair, and lamp—represented basic comforts for a guest of rank. Such rooms are known from archaeological excavations of Israelite houses.

Visits on the new moon and Sabbath (verse 23) show that these days were established times for seeking out prophets and holy men. The husband's question suggests that religious consultations normally took place on such holy days.

Key Terms

"Sons of the prophets" (בְנֵי הַנְּבִיאִים) were not biological sons of prophets but members of prophetic communities or disciples of prophets. These groups lived together, shared meals, and received instruction from a leading prophet such as Elisha. The chapter shows their simple living conditions and community life centered around the prophet.

Firstfruits bread (לֶחֶם בִּכּוּרִים) in verse 42 was normally dedicated to God and the priests (Numbers 18:13). The fact that the man from Baal-Shalishah brought this to Elisha shows that the prophet was regarded as a holy man worthy of such gifts, and possibly suggests that Levitical institutions were weakened in the northern kingdom.

Wild gourds (פַּקֻּעֹת שָׂדֶה) were likely colocynth (Citrullus colocynthis), also known as bitter apple or wild gourd, a bitter and poisonous plant that grows wild in the Middle East. It resembles edible gourds, which explains the confusion.

Personnages2

Gehazi (Elisha's servant)5 Elisha8

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Mots-clés8

Elisha — A prophet in Israel who served God and performed miracles.
Shunammite woman — A wealthy woman from Shunem who helped Elisha by giving him shelter.
Son — The child of the Shunammite woman, who dies and is later brought back to life by Elisha.
Miracle — A supernatural act performed by God through Elisha, such as raising the son and multiplying oil.
Oil — An important resource in biblical times, used both for cooking and lighting. Elisha multiplies a widow's oil to help her out of poverty.
Widow — A woman who has lost her husband and is in financial distress, receiving help from Elisha.
Bread — Food that Elisha miraculously multiplies to feed many people.
Gehazi — Elisha's servant who commits a sin by accepting gifts from Naaman and is punished with leprosy.