But the Lord's angelic messenger told Elijah the Tishbite, "Get up, go to meet the messengers from the king of Samaria. Say this to them: 'You must think there is no God in Israel! That explains why you are on your way to seek an oracle from Baal Zebub the god of Ekron.

They replied, "A man came up to meet us. He told us, "Go back to the king who sent you and tell him, 'This is what the Lord says: "You must think there is no God in Israel! That explains why you are sending for an oracle from Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron. Therefore you will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die."'"

The king asked them, "Describe the appearance of this man who came up to meet you and told you these things."

The king sent a captain and his fifty soldiers to retrieve Elijah. The captain went up to him, while he was sitting on the top of a hill. He told him, "Prophet, the king says, 'Come down!'"

The king sent another captain and his fifty soldiers to retrieve Elijah. He went up and told him, "Prophet, this is what the king says, 'Come down at once!'"

The king sent a third captain and his fifty soldiers. This third captain went up and fell on his knees before Elijah. He begged for mercy, "Prophet, please have respect for my life and for the lives of these fifty servants of yours.

The Lord's angelic messenger said to Elijah, "Go down with him. Don't be afraid of him." So he got up and went down with him to the king.

Just before the Lord took Elijah up to heaven in a windstorm, Elijah and Elisha were traveling from Gilgal.

Elijah took his cloak, folded it up, and hit the water with it. The water divided, and the two of them crossed over on dry ground.

As they were walking along and talking, suddenly a fiery chariot pulled by fiery horses appeared. They went between Elijah and Elisha, and Elijah went up to heaven in a windstorm.

He picked up Elijah's cloak, which had fallen off him, and went back and stood on the shore of the Jordan.

He went up from there to Bethel. As he was traveling up the road, some young boys came out of the city and made fun of him, saying, "Go on up, baldy! Go on up, baldy!"

You will defeat every fortified city and every important city. You must chop down every productive tree, stop up all the springs, and cover all the cultivated land with stones."

When they got up early the next morning, the sun was shining on the water. To the Moabites, who were some distance away, the water looked red like blood.

When they approached the Israelite camp, the Israelites rose up and struck down the Moabites, who then ran from them. The Israelites thoroughly defeated Moab.

They tore down the cities and each man threw a stone into every cultivated field until they were covered. They stopped up every spring and chopped down every productive tree. Only Kir Hareseth was left intact, but the slingers surrounded it and attacked it.

So he took his firstborn son, who was to succeed him as king, and offered him up as a burnt sacrifice on the wall. There was an outburst of divine anger against Israel, so they broke off the attack and returned to their homeland.

So he picked him up and took him to his mother. He sat on her lap until noon and then died.

She went up and laid him down on the prophet's bed. She shut the door behind her and left.

The mother of the child said, "As certainly as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you." So Elisha got up and followed her back.

Now Gehazi went on ahead of them. He placed the staff on the child's face, but there was no sound or response. When he came back to Elisha he told him, "The child did not wake up."

He got up on the bed and spread his body out over the boy; he put his mouth on the boy's mouth, his eyes over the boy's eyes, and the palms of his hands against the boy's palms. He bent down over him, and the boy's skin grew warm.

Elisha went back and walked around in the house. Then he got up on the bed again and bent down over him. The child sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.

She came in, fell at his feet, and bowed down. Then she picked up her son and left.

Someone went out to the field to gather some herbs and found a wild vine. He picked some of its fruit, enough to fill up the fold of his robe. He came back, cut it up, and threw the slices into the stew pot, not knowing they were harmful.

Naaman said, "Please accept two talents of silver. He insisted, and tied up two talents of silver in two bags, along with two suits of clothes. He gave them to two of his servants and they carried them for Gehazi.

The prophet's attendant got up early in the morning. When he went outside there was an army surrounding the city, along with horses and chariots. He said to Elisha, "Oh no, my master! What will we do?"

So they got up and fled at dusk, leaving behind their tents, horses, and donkeys. They left the camp as it was and ran for their lives.

So they went and called out to the gatekeepers of the city. They told them, "We entered the Syrian camp and there was no one there. We didn't even hear a man's voice. But the horses and donkeys are still tied up, and the tents remain up."

The king got up in the night and said to his advisers, "I will tell you what the Syrians have done to us. They know we are starving, so they left the camp and hid in the field, thinking, 'When they come out of the city, we will capture them alive and enter the city.'"

During his reign Edom freed themselves from Judah's control and set up their own king.

So Jehu got up and went inside. Then the prophet poured the olive oil on his head and said to him, "This is what the Lord God of Israel says, 'I have designated you as king over the Lord's people Israel.

Jehoram ordered, "Hitch up my chariot." When his chariot had been hitched up, King Jehoram of Israel and King Ahaziah of Judah went out in their respective chariots to meet Jehu. They met up with him in the plot of land that had once belonged to Naboth of Jezreel.

Jehu ordered his officer Bidkar, "Pick him up and throw him into the part of the field that once belonged to Naboth of Jezreel. Remember, you and I were riding together behind his father Ahab, when the Lord pronounced this judgment on him,

"Know for sure that I saw the shed blood of Naboth and his sons yesterday," says the Lord, "and that I will give you what you deserve right here in this plot of land," says the Lord.' So now pick him up and throw him into this plot of land, just as the Lord said."

When King Ahaziah of Judah saw what happened, he took off up the road to Beth Haggan. Jehu chased him and ordered, "Shoot him too." They shot him while he was driving his chariot up the ascent of Gur near Ibleam. He fled to Megiddo and died there.

Jehu approached Jezreel. When Jezebel heard the news, she put on some eye liner, fixed up her hair, and leaned out the window.

He looked up at the window and said, "Who is on my side? Who?" Two or three eunuchs looked down at him.

He wrote them a second letter, saying, "If you are really on my side and are willing to obey me, then take the heads of your master's sons and come to me in Jezreel at this time tomorrow." Now the king had seventy sons, and the prominent men of the city were raising them.

When he left there, he met Jehonadab, son of Rekab, who had been looking for him. Jehu greeted him and asked, "Are you as committed to me as I am to you?" Jehonadab answered, "I am!" Jehu replied, "If so, give me your hand." So he offered his hand and Jehu pulled him up into the chariot.

Jehu sent invitations throughout Israel, and all the servants of Baal came; not one was absent. They arrived at the temple of Baal and filled it up from end to end.

But Jehu did not carefully and wholeheartedly obey the law of the Lord God of Israel. He did not repudiate the sins which Jeroboam had encouraged Israel to commit.

The royal bodyguard took their stations, each holding his weapon in his hand. They lined up from the south side of the temple to the north side and stood near the altar and the temple, surrounding the king.

Jehoiada then drew up a covenant between the Lord and the king and people, stipulating that they should be loyal to the Lord.

When they saw the chest was full of silver, the royal secretary and the high priest counted the silver that had been brought to the Lord's temple and bagged it up.

Azariah built up Elat and restored it to Judah after the king had passed away.

Menahem son of Gadi went up from Tirzah to Samaria and attacked Shallum son of Jabesh. He killed him and took his place as king.

Ahaz sent messengers to King Tiglath-pileser of Assyria, saying, "I am your servant and your dependent. March up and rescue me from the power of the king of Syria and the king of Israel, who have attacked me."

This happened because the Israelites sinned against the Lord their God, who brought them up from the land of Egypt and freed them from the power of Pharaoh king of Egypt. They worshiped other gods;

They set up sacred pillars and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree.

The Lord solemnly warned Israel and Judah through all his prophets and all the seers, "Turn back from your evil ways; obey my commandments and rules that are recorded in the law. I ordered your ancestors to keep this law and sent my servants the prophets to remind you of its demands."

They rejected his rules, the covenant he had made with their ancestors, and the laws he had commanded them to obey. They paid allegiance to worthless idols, and so became worthless to the Lord. They copied the practices of the surrounding nations in blatant disregard of the Lord's command.

To this very day they observe their earlier practices. They do not worship the Lord; they do not obey the rules, regulations, law, and commandments that the Lord gave the descendants of Jacob, whom he renamed Israel.

Instead you must worship the Lord, who brought you up from the land of Egypt by his great power and military ability; bow down to him and offer sacrifices to him.

You must carefully obey at all times the rules, regulations, law, and commandments he wrote down for you. You must not worship other gods.

He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother was Abi, the daughter of Zechariah.

He eliminated the high places, smashed the sacred pillars to bits, and cut down the Asherah pole. He also demolished the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for up to that time the Israelites had been offering incense to it; it was called Nehushtan.

In the fourth year of King Hezekiah's reign (it was the seventh year of the reign of Israel's King Hoshea, son of Elah), King Shalmaneser of Assyria marched up against Samaria and besieged it.

This happened because they did not obey the Lord their God and broke his agreement with them. They did not pay attention to and obey all that Moses, the Lord's servant, had commanded.

In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah's reign, King Sennacherib of Assyria marched up against all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them.

The king of Assyria sent his commanding general, the chief eunuch, and the chief adviser from Lachish to King Hezekiah in Jerusalem, along with a large army. They went up and arrived at Jerusalem. They went and stood at the conduit of the upper pool which is located on the road to the field where they wash and dry cloth.

Furthermore it was by the command of the Lord that I marched up against this place to destroy it. The Lord told me, 'March up against this land and destroy it.'"'"

Hezekiah took the letter from the messengers and read it. Then Hezekiah went up to the Lord's temple and spread it out before the Lord.

Through your messengers you taunted the sovereign master, 'With my many chariots I climbed up the high mountains, the slopes of Lebanon. I cut down its tall cedars, and its best evergreens. I invaded its most remote regions, its thickest woods.

I dug wells and drank water in foreign lands. With the soles of my feet I dried up all the rivers of Egypt.'

That very night the Lord's messenger went out and killed 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp. When they got up early the next morning, there were all the corpses.

"Go back and tell Hezekiah, the leader of my people: 'This is what the Lord God of your ancestor David says: "I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears. Look, I will heal you. The day after tomorrow you will go up to the Lord's temple.

Hezekiah had said to Isaiah, "What is the confirming sign that the Lord will heal me and that I will go up to the Lord's temple the day after tomorrow?"

He rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had destroyed; he set up altars for Baal and made an Asherah pole just like King Ahab of Israel had done. He bowed down to all the stars in the sky and worshiped them.

He passed his son through the fire and practiced divination and omen reading. He set up a ritual pit to conjure up underworld spirits, and appointed magicians to supervise it. He did a great amount of evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.

I will not make Israel again leave the land I gave to their ancestors, provided that they carefully obey all I commanded them, the whole law my servant Moses ordered them to obey."

But they did not obey, and Manasseh misled them so that they sinned more than the nations whom the Lord had destroyed from before the Israelites.

I will destroy Jerusalem the same way I did Samaria and the dynasty of Ahab. I will wipe Jerusalem clean, just as one wipes a plate on both sides.

because they have done evil in my sight and have angered me from the time their ancestors left Egypt right up to this very day!'"

"Go up to Hilkiah the high priest and have him melt down the silver that has been brought by the people to the Lord's temple and has been collected by the guards at the door.

The king went up to the Lord's temple, accompanied by all the people of Judah, all the residents of Jerusalem, the priests, and the prophets. All the people were there, from the youngest to the oldest. He read aloud all the words of the scroll of the covenant that had been discovered in the Lord's temple.

The king stood by the pillar and renewed the covenant before the Lord, agreeing to follow the Lord and to obey his commandments, laws, and rules with all his heart and being, by carrying out the terms of this covenant recorded on this scroll. All the people agreed to keep the covenant.

(Now the priests of the high places did not go up to the altar of the Lord in Jerusalem, but they did eat unleavened cakes among their fellow priests.)

He removed from the entrance to the Lord's temple the statues of horses that the kings of Judah had placed there in honor of the sun god. (They were kept near the room of Nathan Melech the eunuch, which was situated among the courtyards.) He burned up the chariots devoted to the sun god.

The king tore down the altars the kings of Judah had set up on the roof of Ahaz's upper room, as well as the altars Manasseh had set up in the two courtyards of the Lord's temple. He crushed them up and threw the dust in the Kidron Valley.

Josiah also got rid of the ritual pits used to conjure up spirits, the magicians, personal idols, disgusting images, and all the detestable idols that had appeared in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem. In this way he carried out the terms of the law recorded on the scroll that Hilkiah the priest had discovered in the Lord's temple.

So King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came against Jerusalem with his whole army and set up camp outside it. They built siege ramps all around it. He arrived on the tenth day of the tenth month in the ninth year of Zedekiah's reign.

But the Babylonian army chased after the king. They caught up with him in the plains of Jericho, and his entire army deserted him.

They captured the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah, where he passed sentence on him.