Day 124: 2 Kings 1-2

Were these "little children" a threat to Elijah? Most likely they were, and our translation makes it ambiguous. In Genesis 34:19, the same word is used for Shechem, the young man who slept with Dinah, Jacob's daughter. In 1 Kings 3:7, Solomon, who has just been made king, calls himself a "little child" yet we learn he reigns a total of 40 years, (1 Kings 11:42), and Rehoboam was 41 when he began to reign. (1 Kings 14:21) So if there were 42 young men pursuing and mocking Elisha, they were certainly a threat, just as the captains of fifties had been to Elijah in 1 Kings 1:9-15.

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