Bible Strands
2 Kings 7:3
Now there were four men with leprosy at the entrance of the city gate, and they said to one another, “Why just sit here until we die?
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Four men afflicted with a skin disease stationed at the city gate during a famine address one another, questioning the futility of passively waiting for death. They speak to each other at a moment of paralyzed decision-making, forced to weigh three fatal options.
The words — מְצֹרָעִ֖ים (me.tzo.ra.'Im) literally denotes those afflicted with a spreading skin disease, marking their ritually excluded condition. וַ/יֹּֽאמְרוּ֙ (va/i.yo.me.Ru) signals the shift from static isolation to active, mutual deliberation.
The thread — Their forced location outside the city gate aligns with the Torah’s command to isolate those with skin diseases (Leviticus 13:45; Numbers 5:2). The immediate context in 2 Kings 7:4 continues their dialogue as they systematically list the certain death awaiting them in every direction.
Why it lands — The passage records a logical dead end where human agency yields only death, demanding the reader acknowledge the impossibility of the situation. It functions as a narrative threshold that requires divine action to break the stated cycle of inevitable demise.
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 there were four leprous men at the entering in of the gate: and they said one to another, Why sit we here until we die?
Cross-references
- Leviticus 13:45 A diseased person must wear torn clothes and let his hair hang loose, and he must cover his mouth and cry out, ‘Unclean, unclean!’
- Numbers 5:2 “Command the Israelites to send away from the camp anyone with a skin disease, anyone who has a bodily discharge, and anyone who is defiled by a dead body.
- 2 Kings 7:4 If we say, ‘Let us go into the city,’ we will die there from the famine in the city; but if we sit here, we will also die. So come now, let us go over to the camp of the Arameans. If they let us live, we will live; if they kill us, we will die.”
- Numbers 12:14 But the LORD answered Moses, “If her father had but spit in her face, would she not have been in disgrace for seven days? Let her be confined outside the camp for seven days; after that she may be brought back in.”
- 2 Kings 8:4 Now the king had been speaking to Gehazi, the servant of the man of God, saying, “Please relate to me all the great things Elisha has done.”
- Jeremiah 8:14 Why are we just sitting here? Gather together, let us flee to the fortified cities and perish there, for the LORD our God has doomed us. He has given us poisoned water to drink, because we have sinned against the LORD.
- Jeremiah 27:13 Why should you and your people die by sword and famine and plague, as the LORD has decreed against any nation that does not serve the king of Babylon?
- 2 Kings 5:1 Now Naaman, the commander of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man in his master’s sight and highly regarded, for through him the LORD had given victory to Aram. And he was a mighty man of valor, but he was a leper.