The Siege of Samaria
24 After this, Benhadad king of Syria gathered all his army, and went up and besieged Samaria. 25 There was a great famine in Samaria. Behold, they besieged it until a donkey’s head was sold for eighty pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver. 26 As the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried to him, saying, “Help, my lord, O king!” 27 He said, “If Yahweh doesn’t help you, where could I get help for you? From the threshing floor, or from the wine press?” 28 Then the king asked her, “What is your problem?” She answered, “This woman said to me, ‘Give your son, that we may eat him today, and we will eat my son tomorrow.’ 29 So we boiled my son and ate him; and I said to her on the next day, ‘Give up your son, that we may eat him;’ and she has hidden her son.” 30 When the king heard the words of the woman, he tore his clothes. Now he was passing by on the wall, and the people looked, and behold, he had sackcloth underneath on his body. 31 Then he said, “God do so to me, and more also, if the head of Elisha the son of Shaphat stays on him today.” 32 But Elisha was sitting in his house, and the elders were sitting with him. Then the king sent a man from before him; but before the messenger came to him, he said to the elders, “Do you see how this son of a murderer has sent to take away my head? Behold, when the messenger comes, shut the door, and hold the door shut against him. Isn’t the sound of his master’s feet behind him?” 33 While he was still talking with them, behold, the messenger came down to him. Then he said, “Behold, this evil is from Yahweh. Why should I wait for Yahweh any longer?”
A famine so complete that women eat their children, a king in sackcloth under his robes — and his conclusion is to behead the prophet.
There was a great famine in Samaria. Behold, they besieged it until a donkey’s head was sold for eighty pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.
The price list is the report. A donkey's head is the least edible part of an unclean animal and it costs a fortune; the other item is either a foul fuel or a plant nickname, and either way people are paying silver for it by the handful. This is what a siege does to a city, described in the currency of a market that has stopped meaning anything.
28 Then the king asked her, “What is your problem?” She answered, “This woman said to me, ‘Give your son, that we may eat him today, and we will eat my son tomorrow.’ 29 So we boiled my son and ate him; and I said to her on the next day, ‘Give up your son, that we may eat him;’ and she has hidden her son.”
The woman's appeal to the king is not for food. It is a contract dispute about cannibalism — she has kept her side of a bargain and her neighbor has not — and the flatness with which she says it is the most horrifying thing in the book. Starvation has taken her past grief into accountancy.
And the law had said this would happen. The covenant curses name it precisely: a siege in which a mother eats her own children Deuteronomy 28:53–57 Leviticus 26:29. The narrative does not cite the passage. It simply lets a woman on a wall recite the fulfillment of it.
When the king heard the words of the woman, he tore his clothes. Now he was passing by on the wall, and the people looked, and behold, he had sackcloth underneath on his body.
The detail is genuinely double-edged. He has been wearing mourning next to his skin, unseen — some real grief, some real humbling, hidden under the royal robes. And the discovery of it changes nothing about what he does next.
Then he said, “God do so to me, and more also, if the head of Elisha the son of Shaphat stays on him today.”
His conclusion from hearing that his people are eating their children is that the prophet must die. It is his family's oldest instinct — Ahab called Elijah the troubler of Israel 1 Kings 18:17 — and it is what a man does when he has understood that the famine has a cause and cannot face the cause.
But Elisha was sitting in his house, and the elders were sitting with him. Then the king sent a man from before him; but before the messenger came to him, he said to the elders, “Do you see how this son of a murderer has sent to take away my head? Behold, when the messenger comes, shut the door, and hold the door shut against him. Isn’t the sound of his master’s feet behind him?”
Elisha, sitting with the elders, knows the executioner is on the road and knows the king is close behind him. The phrase son of a murderer is not abuse; Jehoram is Ahab's son, and Naboth's vineyard is the reference 1 Kings 21:19.
While he was still talking with them, behold, the messenger came down to him. Then he said, “Behold, this evil is from Yahweh. Why should I wait for Yahweh any longer?”
The last sentence is the king's, arriving in person, and it is the most honest thing he says. He has correctly identified where the disaster came from — this evil is from Yahweh — and drawn the conclusion that waiting is pointless. He is one step from repentance and takes the other road: not how long must I wait but why should I.
And the answer is in the next verse, which he has not heard yet: by this time tomorrow, flour will be cheap in the gate 2 Kings 7:1. He gives up on God roughly twelve hours before the deliverance.
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