Open English Translation 2KI Chapter 1

1 After the death of Israel’s King Ahab, Moab rebelled against Israel.

2 One day, King Ahazyah fell through a lattice in his upper room in Shomron (Samaria) and was injured, so he sent messengers to go and ask Ekron’s God Baal-Zevuv if he would recover. 3 But Yahweh’s messenger told Eliyyah (from Tishbe), “Leave here and go and meet the Shomron king’s messengers and ask them, ‘Is it because there’s no God in Israel that you’re all going to inquire from Ekron’s God Baal-Zevuv? 4 Becase of that, Yahweh says that the king won’t get out of the bed that he’s lying in—he’s definitely going to die.”

So Eliyyah told them and continued on his way. 5 When the messengers returned to the king, he asked them, “What’s this? Why are you back here so soon?”

6 “A man came to meet us,” they told him, “and he said to us, ‘Go and return to the king who sent you, and tell him that Yahweh says this: Is it because there’s no God in Israel that you are sending messengers to inquire from Ekron’s God Baal-Zevuv? Therefore you’ll never leave that bed that you’re lying in but you’ll certainly die in it.’ ”

7 “What was the man like,” the king asked them, “who meet you and gave you all that message?”

8 “He had a cloak made of animal hair,” they answered, “and was wearing a leather belt.”

“Ah,” said the king. “That’s Eliyyah from Tishbe.”

9 So he sent a captain with his fifty soldiers to look for Eliyyah and they found him sitting on the top of a hill. The captain called out, “Man of God, the king wants to see you.”

10 But Eliyyah replied, “Well, if I am a man of God, let fire come down from the sky and consume you and your men,” and fire came down from the sky, and it burnt up the captain and his men.

11 So the king sent another captain with his fifty men and they went to where Eliyyah was and called out to him, “Prophet, the king commands that you come with us right now.”

12 Again Eliyyah replied, “If I am a man of God, let fire come down from the sky and consume you and your men,” and the God’s fire came down from the sky, and it burnt up the captain and his men.

13 So the king sent a third captain with his fifty men. They went to where Eliyyah was and the officer knelt down in front of him and pleaded, “Prophet, I beg you, be kind to me and my fifty soldiers, and don’t kill us. 14 Listen, fire came down from the sky and burnt up the first two captains and their men, but please treat my life as valuable in your sight.”

15 Then Yahweh’s messenger told Eliyyah, “Go with them. Don’t be afraid of him.”

So Eliyyah went with them to the king 16 and told him, “Yahweh says that you sent messengers to inquire from Ekron’s God Baal-Zevuv, the god of Ekron as if there’s no God in Israel to ask? Therefore, he says, you certainly won’t get off that bed that you’re on because you’ll die in it.”

17 So King Ahazyah died just as Yahweh had said via Eliyyah. Then Ahazyah’s younger brother Yehoram (Joram) became king in his place, because Ahazyah didn’t have any sons. This happened in the second year of the reign of Yehoshafat’s son King Yehoram over Yehudah. 18 Everything else that Ahazyah said and did is written in the book of the events of the kings of Israel.