2 Kings 4:34

Contextual Overview

¹⁸The child grew and one day went out to his father and the harvesters. ¹⁸ When the child was grown, it fell on a day, that he went out to his father to the reapers. ¹⁸ And when the child was grown, it fell on a day, that he went out to his father to the reapers. ¹⁸ When the child had grown, he went out one day to his father among the reapers. ¹⁸ The boy grew up and one day went out to his father, who was with the grain harvesters. ¹⁸ The boy grew and one day he went out to see his father who was with the harvest workers. ¹⁸When the child was grown, the day came that he went out to his father, to the reapers. ¹⁸ When the child was grown, the day came that he went out to his father, to the reapers. ¹⁸ And when the childe was growen, it fell on a day, that he went out to his father, and to the reapers. ¹⁸Then the child was grown. And the day came that he went out to his father to the reapers.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

1 Kings 17:21, Acts 20:10

Reciprocal: 2 Kings 13:16 - Elisha Mark 7:33 - he took Mark 9:29 - by prayer Luke 8:51 - he suffered

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And he went up,.... To the bed, which was on an ascent in the chamber, :- and lay upon the child; as Elijah did on the widow's son of Zarephath, 1 Kings 17:21

and put his mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his hands upon his hands, and stretched himself upon the child; that is, he did each of these one after another, since the disproportion of their bodies would not admit of their being done together:

and the flesh of the child waxed warm; not from any virtue imparted to it by these motions and actions of the prophet, but from life being infused into it by the Lord, which caused an heat in the several parts of the body.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Be stretched himself - Or, “prostrated himself.” The word is a different one from that used of Elijah, and expresses closer contact with the body. Warmth may have been actually communicated from the living body to the dead one; and Elisha’s persistence Hebrews 11:35, may have been a condition of the child’s return to life.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 34. Lay upon the child — Endeavoured to convey a portion of his own natural warmth to the body of the child; and probably endeavoured, by blowing into the child's mouth, to inflate the lungs, and restore respiration. He uses every natural means in his power to restore life, while praying to the Author of it to exert a miraculous influence. Natural means are in our power; those that are supernatural belong to God. We should always do our own work, and beg of God to do his.