The king said to 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.’
Parallel Translations
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The king said to 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.’
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And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to day, and we will eat my son to morrow.
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And the king said unto her: 'What aileth thee?' And she answered: 'This woman said unto me: Give thy son, that we may eat him to-day, and we will eat my son to-morrow.
Cross-references (14)
Passages linked to 2 Kings 6:28 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- 2 Samuel 14:5 The king said to her, “What ails you?” She answered, “Truly I am a widow, and my husband is dead.
- Judges 18:23 As they called to the children of Dan, they turned their faces, and said to Micah, “What ails you, that you come with such a company?”
- Lamentations 4:10 The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children. They were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.
- Genesis 21:17 God heard the voice of the boy. The angel of God called to Hagar out of the sky, and said to her, “What troubles you, Hagar? Don’t be afraid. For God has heard the voice of the boy where he is.
- Leviticus 26:29 You will eat the flesh of your sons, and you will eat the flesh of your daughters.
- Deuteronomy 28:53-57 You will eat the fruit of your own body, the flesh of your sons and of your daughters, whom Yahweh your God has given you, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemies will distress you. The man who is tender among you, and very delicate, his eye will be evil toward his brother, toward the wife whom he loves, and toward the remnant of his children whom he has remaining, so that he will not give to any of them of the flesh of his children whom he will eat, because he has nothing left to him, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy will distress you in all your gates. The tender and delicate woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye will be evil toward the husband that she loves, toward her son, toward her daughter, toward her young one who comes out from between her feet, and toward her children whom she bears; for she will eat them secretly for lack of all things in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy will distress you in your gates.
- 1 Samuel 1:8 Elkanah her husband said to her, “Hannah, why do you weep? Why don’t you eat? Why is your heart grieved? Am I not better to you than ten sons?”
- Psalms 114:5 What was it, you sea, that you fled? You Jordan, that you turned back?
- Isaiah 9:20-21 One will devour on the right hand, and be hungry; and he will eat on the left hand, and they will not be satisfied. Everyone will eat the flesh of his own arm: Manasseh, Ephraim; and Ephraim, Manasseh; and they together shall be against Judah. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.
- Isaiah 22:1 The burden of the valley of vision. What ails you now, that you have all gone up to the housetops?
- Isaiah 49:15 “Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yes, these may forget, yet I will not forget you!
- Ezekiel 5:10 Therefore the fathers will eat the sons within you, and the sons will eat their fathers. I will execute judgments on you; and I will scatter the whole remnant of you to all the winds.
- Matthew 24:18-21 Let him who is in the field not return back to get his clothes. But woe to those who are with child and to nursing mothers in those days! Pray that your flight will not be in the winter, nor on a Sabbath, for then there will be great suffering, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, nor ever will be.
- Luke 23:29 For behold, the days are coming in which they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.’
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (7 sources)
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 2Ki 6:28 And the king said unto her, What…
2Ki 6:28 And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to day, and we will eat my son to morrow.
Ver. 28. Give thy son, that we may eat him.] The like fell out among the Turks and Tartars in Hungary; {a} the Germans in Transylvania, 1604; the Tunetans in Africa; and the English here in Edward II’s time, A.D. 1316: so terrible was the famine, that horses, dogs, yea, men and children, were stolen for food; and the thieves newly brought into the jails were torn in pieces, and eaten presently, half-alive, by such as had been longer there. {b}
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{a} Turk. Hist., 1060.
{b} Purch., Pilgrim., 289. Speed, 674.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain And it came to pass, when the king heard…
And it came to pass, when the king heard the words of the woman, that he rent his clothes,.... At the horror of the fact reported, and through grief that his people were brought into such distress through famine:
and he passed by upon the wall; returning to his palace:
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and the people looked, and, behold, he had sackcloth upon his flesh; which, in token of humiliation for averting the calamities he was under, he had put there before, and now was seen through the rending of his clothes.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain 2Ki 6:28-29. The king said, What aileth thee? —…
2Ki 6:28-29. The king said, What aileth thee? — Is there any thing singular in thy case? Dost thou fare worse than thy neighbours? Truly, yes: she and one of her neighbours had made a barbarous agreement, that, all provisions failing, they should boil and eat her son first, and then her neighbour’s: hers was eaten, (who can think on it without horror?) and now her neighbour hid hers. This shocking story is a terrible effect of the divine vengeance, which Moses, about six hundred years before, had warned the Israelites would fall upon them in case of their apostacy from, and rebellion against, God; as the reader may see in the passages referred to in the margin. The same dreadful calamity befell them at two other times besides this; at the siege of Jerusalem, under Nebuchadnezzar, Lam 2:20; Eze 5:10; and that under Titus. See Joseph., Jewish War, lib. 7, c. 10.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain The king had assumed that the cry of the…
The king had assumed that the cry of the woman was for food. Her manner indicated that it was not so. He therefore proceeded to inquire what she wanted of him.
This woman - Both women, it would seem, were present; and the aggrieved one pointed to the other.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 28. What aileth thee?] The woman’s cry is not…
28. What aileth thee?] The woman’s cry is not stopped by his answer. She has more to speak about than to ask him for food.
This woman said unto me] It would appear as if she had brought her neighbour along with her, that what she deemed justice might be done her at once. That they should be brought to such hardships and horrors as are here described had been foretold to Israel in early times (Lev_26:29; Deu_28:53-57); cf. also Lament. 2Ki_2:20; 2Ki_4:10; Eze_5:10. Josephus relates the like dreadful sufferings in the siege of Jerusalem by Titus (B. J. 6:3. 4).
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my son] According to the history the children were both sons. Josephus represents only one of them as a boy.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (28) And the king said.—When she had explained what…
(28) And the king said.—When she had explained what she wanted. With the hideous facts here recorded, comp. Deu_28:56, seq. Similar things were done during the sieges of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar (1Sa_4:10; Eze_5:10), and by Vespasian and Titus (Josephus, Bell. Jud. vi. 3, 4).
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain And the king said unto her, What aileth thee?…
And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? Probably, as Bahr suggests, the woman explained to the king that she did not appear before him to beg food, but to claim his interposition as judge, in a case in which she considered herself to be wronged. Such an appeal the king was bound to hear; and he therefore asks," What aileth thee?" i.e. "What is thy ground of complaint?" Then she tells her story. And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him today, and we will eat my son tomorrow. Compare the prophecy in Deuteronomy, "The tender and delicate woman among you, which would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil towards the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, and toward her daughter, and toward her young one that cometh out from between her feet, and toward her children which she shall bear: for she shall eat them for want of all things secretly in the siege and straitness, wherewith thine enemy shall distress thee in thy gates". (Deu_28:56, Deu_28:57) There is historical testimony that the prophecy was three times fulfilled; viz.
(1) in Samaria on the present occasion;
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(2) in Jerusalem during the last siege by Nebuchadnezzar; (Lam_4:10) and (3) in Jerusalem during the last siege by Titus (Josephus, "Bell. Jud:," 6:3. In modern sieges surrender is made before the population is driven to such straits.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.