Bible Strands
2 Kings 5:13
Naaman’s servants, however, approached him and said, “My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he tells you, ‘Wash and be cleansed’?”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Naaman’s servants draw near him after he turns away in rage and speak to him, urging compliance with Elisha’s command.
The words — אָבִי (aVi) carries the literal sense “father” or “would that,” and דָּבָר גָּדוֹל (daVar gaDol) translates directly to “a great thing.”
The thread — The address אָבִי appears when Elisha addresses Elijah (2 Kings 2:12), when the king of Israel addresses Elisha (2 Kings 6:21), and when Jehoash addresses the dying Elisha (2 Kings 13:14).
Why it lands — The text records the servants’ logical appeal to Naaman’s pride, contrasting a hypothetical great task with the simple command to wash. The passage demands a reader to observe how immediate obedience to a humble directive precedes the stated outcome of restoration.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And his servants came near, and spake unto him, and said, My father, if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldest thou not have done it? how much rather then, when he saith to thee, Wash, and be clean?
Cross-references
- 2 Kings 6:21 And when the king of Israel saw them, he asked Elisha, “My father, shall I kill them? Shall I kill them?”
- 2 Kings 2:12 As Elisha watched, he cried out, “My father, my father, the chariots and horsemen of Israel!” And he saw Elijah no more. So taking hold of his own clothes, he tore them in two.
- 2 Kings 13:14 When Elisha had fallen sick with the illness from which he would die, Jehoash king of Israel came down to him and wept over him, saying, “My father, my father, the chariots and horsemen of Israel!”
- Revelation 7:14 “Sir,” I answered, “you know.” So he replied, “These are the ones who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
- Job 32:8 But there is a spirit in a man, the breath of the Almighty, that gives him understanding.
- Jeremiah 38:7 Now Ebed-melech the Cushite, a court official in the royal palace, heard that Jeremiah had been put into the cistern. While the king was sitting at the Gate of Benjamin,
- 1 Peter 3:21 And this water symbolizes the baptism that now saves you also—not the removal of dirt from the body, but the pledge of a clear conscience toward God—through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
- Acts 22:16 And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized, and wash your sins away, calling on His name.’
- Ephesians 5:26 to sanctify her, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word,
- Titus 3:5 He saved us, not by the righteous deeds we had done, but according to His mercy, through the washing of new birth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.