168
There could have been no occasion for his resorting to Jezreel.
169
It matters little whether we regard the expression "great" as referring to wealth, or, which from the after history
seems more likely, to standin g and family (comp. 1 Samuel 25:2; 2 Samuel 19:32). The further question, why the
mistress, not the master, of the house is named, may be answered by the suggestion that the property had originally
been hers, or else that her piety made her take the lead in all good works, to which her husband was more the
consenting than the proposing party.
170
"A table" was not ordinarily placed in a mere sleeping-room, while the expression "chair," not "stool," as in the
A.V., indicates a seat of honor. Comp. here 1 Kings 10:19; 1 Samuel 1:9, 4:13; Psalm 122:5; Nehemiah 3:7. The
conceit of the Rabbis that the Shunammite was a sister of Abishag (1 Kings 1) needs not refutation. If the latter had
lived, she would at that time have probably been about 140 years old.
171
The word means unrest and trouble, rather than care.
172
Probably "Valley of Vision." The name is perhaps derived from his birth-place, which may have been so called from
the sojourn there, or near it, of a prophet.
173
From ver. 13, we infer that the subject in the last sentence of ver. 12 is Gehazi, not Elisha.
174
Our Rabbis have it that of three treasures God reserves to Himself the key: of rain, of children, and of raising the
dead.
175
Comp. Sketches of Jewish Social Life in the Days of Christ, pp. 103,
176
So also in Isaiah 9:6. For an enumeration of the passages in which the different designations are used, see Sketches
of Jewish Social Life.
177
Lamentations 4:4: "The tongue of the yonek cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst: the olalim asks bread."
178
The inference does not, indeed, seem absolutely certain, but it appears implied that in the time when this narrative is
laid the interpretation of the fourth commandment was not so rigidly literal as to forbid the use of an ass for such
purposes as that in the text.
179
The word is the same as in reference to Jehu: "for he driveth madly" (2 Kings 9:20).
180
It seems well nigh the extreme of critical misunderstanding when these words of Elisha are regarded as meaning
that, if Elisha had known it, he would h ave hastened to Shunem. Comp. The opposite conduct of our Lord in the case of
Lazarus (John 11:6).
181
The attempts at natural explanation of this miracle - such as by animal magnetism, by the administration of
something to smell, or of some drug - are so u tterly childish as not to deserve discussion.
182
From the time of Origen a somewhat fanciful allegorical view of this history has been presented. The dead lad
represented the human race dead in sin; the staff of Gehazi, the law of Moses, which could not set free from sin and
death; while Elisha was the type of the Son of God, Who, by His Incarnation, had entered into fellowship with our
flesh, and imparted a new life to our race.
183
This, rather than "herbs." It evidently refers to such "green" stuff as was boiled and eaten.
184
The cucumis agrestis or asininus. Others understand by the Hebrew expression the cucumis colocynthi, or colocynth
plant. But, from the Hebrew etymology of the word, the former explanation seems the more likely.