11. The gatekeepers announced this and it was reported within the palace.
12. Though it was night, the king got up; he said to his servants, “Let me tell you what the Arameans have done to us. Knowing that we are starving, they have left their camp to hide in the field. They are thinking, ‘The Israelites will leave the city and we will take them alive and enter it.’”
13. One of his servants, however, suggested: “Let some of us take five of the horses remaining in the city—they are just like the whole throng of Israel that has reached its limit—and let us send scouts to investigate.”
14. They took two chariots, and horses, and the king sent them to reconnoiter the Aramean army with the order, “Go and find out.”
15. They followed the Arameans as far as the Jordan, and the whole route was strewn with garments and other objects that the Arameans had thrown away in their haste. The messengers returned and told the king.
16. The people went out and plundered the camp of the Arameans.Then a seah of fine flour sold for a shekel and two seahs of barley for a shekel, according to the word of the Lord.
17. The king had put in charge of the gate the officer upon whose arm he leaned; but the people trampled him to death at the gate, just as the man of God had predicted when the messenger came down to him.
18. This was in accordance with the word the man of God spoke to the king: “Two seahs of barley will sell for a shekel, and a seah of fine flour for a shekel at this time tomorrow in the market of Samaria.”
19. The adjutant had answered the man of God, “Even if the Lord were to make windows in heaven, how could this happen?” And Elisha had replied, “You shall see it with your own eyes, but you shall not eat of it.”
20. And that is what happened to him, for the people trampled him to death at the gate.