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[74]
Now what Elisha had thus foretold came to pass in the manner following:
There was a law at Samaria 1
that those that had the leprosy, and whose bodies were not cleansed from
it, should abide without the city: and there were four men that on this
account abode before the gates, while nobody gave them any food, by reason
of the extremity of the famine; and as they were prohibited from entering
into the city by the law, and they considered that if they were permitted
to enter, they should miserably perish by the famine; as also, that if
they staid where they were, they should suffer in the same manner, — they
resolved to deliver themselves up to the enemy, that in case they should
spare them, they should live; but if they should be killed, that would
be an easy death. So when they had confirmed this their resolution, they
came by night to the enemy's camp. Now God had begun to affright and disturb
the Syrians, and to bring the noise of chariots and armor to their ears,
as though an army were coming upon them, and had made them suspect that
it was coming nearer and nearer to them. In short, they were in such a dread
of this army, that they left their tents, and ran together to Benhadad,
and said that Joram the king of Israel had hired for auxiliaries both the
king of Egypt and the king of the Islands, and led them against them for
they heard the noise of them as they were coming. And Benhadad believed
what they said (for there came the same noise to his ears as well as it
did to theirs); so they fell into a mighty disorder and tumult, and left
their horses and beasts in their camp, with immense riches also, and betook
themselves to flight. And those lepers who had departed from Samaria, and
were gone to the camp of the Syrians, of whom we made mention a little
before, when they were in the camp, saw nothing but great quietness and
silence: accordingly they entered into it, and went hastily into one of
their tents; and when they saw nobody there, they eat and drank, and carried
garments, and a great quantity of gold, and hid it out of the camp; after
which they went into another tent, and carried off what was in it, as they
did at the former, and this did they for several times, without the least
interruption from any body. So they gathered thereby that the enemies were
departed; whereupon they reproached themselves that they did not inform
Joram and the citizens of it. So they came to the walls of Samaria, and
called aloud to the watchmen, and told them in what state the enemies were,
as did these tell the king's guards, by whose means Joram came to know
of it; who then sent for his friends, and the captains of his host, and
said to them, that "he suspected that this departure of the king of Syria
was by way of ambush and treachery, and that out of despair of ruining
you by famine, when you imagine them to be fled away, you may come out
of the city to spoil their camp, and he may then fall upon you on a sudden,
and may both kill you, and take the city without fighting; whence it is
that I exhort you to guard the city carefully, and by no means to go out
of it, or proudly to despise your enemies, as though they were really gone
away." And when a certain person said that he did very well and wisely
to admit such a suspicion, but that he still advised him to send a couple
of horsemen to search all the country as far as Jordan, that "if they
were seized by an ambush of the enemy, they might be a security to your
army, that they may not go out as if they suspected nothing, nor undergo
the like misfortune; and," said he, "those horsemen may be numbered
among those that have died by the famine, supposing they be caught and
destroyed by the enemy." So the king was pleased with this opinion,
and sent such as might search out the truth, who performed their journey
over a road that was without any enemies, but found it full of provisions,
and of weapons, that they had therefore thrown away, and left behind them,
in order to their being light and expeditious in their flight. When the
king heard this, he sent out the multitude to take the spoils of the camp;
which gains of theirs were not of things of small value, but they took
a great quantity of gold, and a great quantity of silver, and flocks of
all kinds of cattle. They also possessed themselves of [so many] ten thousand
measures of wheat and barley, as they never in the least dreamed of; and
were not only freed from their former miseries, but had such plenty, that
two seahs of barley were bought for a shekel, and a seah of fine flour
for a shekel, according to the prophecy of Elisha. Now a seah is equal
to an Italian modius and a half. The captain of the third band was the
only man that received no benefit by this plenty; for as he was appointed
by the king to oversee the gate, that lm might prevent the too great crowd
of the multitude, and they might not endanger one another to perish, by
treading on one another in the press, he suffered himself in that very
way, and died in that very manner, as Elisha had foretold such his death,
when he alone of them all disbelieved what he said concerning that plenty
of provisions which they should soon have.
1 This law of the Jews, for the exclusion of lepers out of the camp in the wilderness, and out of the cities in Judea, is a known one, Leviticus 13:46; Numbers 5:14.
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