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Rabbi Elchanan Samet has a book called Pirkei Elisha about all the Elisha stories in II Kings. In that book, Rabbi Samet is making one basic argument: there isn't a single Elisha story that is intended to show: "Elisha can do magic." Through a careful literary and historical reading of each story, Rabbi Samet tries to show how broad social implications and ...

Read in isolation, 2 Kings 4:38-41 can be understood as a story about a foul tasting soup that Elisha improved by adding a new flavor. However, the context in II Kings is miracles performed by Elisha to save people from death by famine. From within that context it seems that the "death in the pot," was an actual danger that required Elisha's intervention. ...

I see two possibilities: The text doesn't actually tell us how the Israelites saw it; it just says it was water, regardless of appearance. So there may not be any contradiction. Granted, they drank that water and the text doesn't comment on this, but the Israelites knew the water was of divine origin because Elisha told them so. (And there are lots of ...

The phenomenon described in II Kings 3:20-23 is well known in the area. Rain can fall in the higher areas such as Edom (now Jordan) or in the Judean hills while down in the Jordan valley on either side of the river, the sky is clear and sunny. When this happens, the wadis (gulleys) that drain the uplands erupt suddenly in flash floods that endanger ...

I'm reasonably certain that 24 oxen is, well, a lot of cow. What can we learn from this? First and foremost, that Elisha's family or clan was well-off. The entire Elisha cycle is a set of legendary stories with strong echoes in folklore all-over. (My book on the subject is not with me today, or I'd give the reference. Expect an edit in a week when I get ...

The word in Hebrew, verse 40, is maveth. It means death, as in pestilence. It is used in the Bible where death and destruction is conveyed as a meaning. It's not talking about bitterness. The message is, the prophet intervenes for these men due to Yahweh's mercy. Ref.: Gesenius's Lexicon of Hebrew and English and my knowledge of Hebrew.

A wild gourd is just that. A gourd which grows in the wild. It would be difficult to say which species of gourd it might be though. "There was no more death in the pot" has also been translated "there was no more bitterness in the pot" or "there was no more harm in the pot". Starch, by my understanding, does have the ability to mitigate certain bitterness ...