1A woman, the wife of one of the sons of the prophets, cried out to Elisha. She said, "Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared the LORD. Now the man he owed money to has come to take my two sons to be his slaves."
2Elisha said to her, "What shall I do for you? Tell me, what do you have in the house?" She said, "Your servant has nothing at all in the house, except a pot of oil."
3Then he said, "Go and borrow jars from all your neighbours outside, empty jars. Do not borrow only a few."
4"When you come in, shut the door behind you and your sons. Then pour oil into all those jars, and set aside each one as it is filled."
5So she left him and shut the door behind herself and her sons. They brought the jars to her, and she poured.
6When the jars were full, she said to her son, "Bring me another jar." He said to her, "There is not one jar left." And the oil stopped.
7Then she came and told the man of God. He said, "Go, sell the oil and pay your debt. You and your children can live on what is left."
8One day Elisha went over to Shunem. A wealthy woman lived there, and she urged him to stay and eat some food. So after that, whenever he passed by, he turned in there to eat.
9She said to her husband, "Look, I know that this man who keeps passing by us is a holy man of God."
10"Please let us make a small room on the roof. Let us put a bed in it for him, and a table, and a chair, and a lampstand. Then when he comes to us, he can stay there."
11One day he came there, and he went into the room and lay down.
12He said to Gehazi his servant, "Call this woman from Shunem." When he had called her, she stood in front of him.
13Elisha said to Gehazi, "Say to her, 'Look, you have gone to all this trouble for us. What can be done for you? Shall a word be spoken for you to the king, or to the commander of the army?'" She answered, "I live among my own people."
14He said, "What then can be done for her?" Gehazi answered, "She has no child, and her husband is old."
15He said, "Call her." When he had called her, she stood in the doorway.
16He said, "About this time next year you will hold a son in your arms." She said, "No, my lord, you man of God, do not lie to your servant."
17The woman became pregnant and gave birth to a son at that same time the next year, just as Elisha had said to her.
18The child grew. One day he went out to his father, who was with the reapers.
19He said to his father, "My head, my head." His father said to a servant, "Carry him to his mother."
20The servant picked him up and brought him to his mother. The boy sat on her knees until noon, and then he died.
21She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God. She shut the door on him and went out.
22She called to her husband and said, "Please send me one of the servants and one of the donkeys, so I can hurry to the man of God and come back."
23He said, "Why go to him today? It is not the new moon, and it is not the sabbath." She said, "It will be well."
24Then she saddled a donkey and said to her servant, "Drive on, and go forward. Do not slow down for me unless I tell you."
25So she set out and came to the man of God at Mount Carmel. When the man of God saw her a long way off, he said to Gehazi his servant, "Look, there is that woman from Shunem."
26"Please run now to meet her, and ask her, 'Is it well with you? Is it well with your husband? Is it well with the child?'" She answered, "It is well."
27When she came to the man of God on the hill, she took hold of his feet. Gehazi came near to push her away, but the man of God said, "Leave her alone, for her soul is in bitter distress. The LORD has hidden it from me and has not told me."
28Then she said, "Did I ask my lord for a son? Did I not say, 'Do not deceive me'?"
29Then he said to Gehazi, "Tie up your clothes for travel, take my staff in your hand, and go. If you meet anyone, do not greet him, and if anyone greets you, do not answer him. Lay my staff on the face of the child."
30But the mother of the child said, "As the LORD lives, and as you live, I will not leave you." So he got up and followed her.
31Gehazi went on ahead of them and laid the staff on the face of the child, but there was no voice and no response. So he went back to meet Elisha and told him, "The child has not woken up."
32When Elisha came into the house, there was the child, dead, laid on his bed.
33So he went in, shut the door on the two of them, and prayed to the LORD.
34Then he got up on the bed and lay on the child. He put his mouth on the child's mouth, his eyes on his eyes, and his hands on his hands. He stretched himself out on the child, and the child's body grew warm.
35Then he got up and walked back and forth in the house. He went up again and stretched himself out on him, and the child sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.
36Elisha called Gehazi and said, "Call this woman from Shunem." So he called her. When she came in to him, he said, "Pick up your son."
37Then she came in and fell at his feet and bowed to the ground. Then she picked up her son and went out.
38Elisha came again to Gilgal. There was a famine in the land, and the sons of the prophets were sitting in front of him. He said to his servant, "Put the large pot on the fire and boil stew for the sons of the prophets."
39One of them went out into the field to gather herbs. He found a wild vine and gathered as many wild gourds from it as his coat would hold. He came back and cut them up into the pot of stew, for they did not know what they were.
40So they poured out the stew for the men to eat. But as they were eating it, they cried out, "Man of God, there is death in the pot." And they could not eat it.
41But he said, "Then bring some meal." He threw it into the pot and said, "Pour it out for the people, so they may eat." And there was nothing harmful in the pot.
42A man came from Baalshalisha and brought the man of God bread from the firstfruits, twenty loaves of barley and fresh ears of grain in his sack. Elisha said, "Give it to the people, so they may eat."
43His servant said, "How can I set this in front of a hundred men?" He said again, "Give it to the people, so they may eat. For this is what the LORD says: They will eat, and there will be some left over."
44So he set it in front of them, and they ate, and there was some left over, just as the LORD had said.