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2 Kings 5 Bible study: Wash, and be clean
Naaman's story runs from "a little girl" (5:2) to flesh "like the flesh of a little child" (5:14): in Hebrew, one noun, feminine then masculine. A king of Israel sent to Ekron as if there were "no God in Israel" (1:3); a Syrian commander says, "there is no God in all the earth, but in Israel" (5:15). And Jesus names him: "not one of them was cleansed, except Naaman, the Syrian" (Luke 4:27).
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“Then went he down and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God; and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean.”
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“In 2 Kings 5, a little girl taken captive from Israel was the one who first spoke of the prophet in Samaria.”
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What's really going on
A great man and a little girl
The chapter's first verse lists everything Naaman is: "captain of the army of the king of Syria", "a great man with his master, and honorable, because by him the LORD had given victory to Syria; he was also a mighty man of valor, but he was a leper" (5:1). In Hebrew the verse ends on that word, leper (tap leper). The next verse turns to the smallest person in the story: "a little girl", taken captive "out of the land of Israel", who "waited on Naaman’s wife" (5:2). She is the one who says, "I wish that my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria!" (5:3). At the Jordan, "his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child" (5:14). In Hebrew, little girl (5:2) is na'arah qetannah, and little child (5:14) is na'ar qaton: na'arah is the feminine of na'ar, and Strong's lists qatan and qaton, little, as one word (tap child). The great man's flesh ends up like a little boy's, and a little girl's word began it.
Where it leads to Jesus
Jesus names Naaman
2 Kings 5:14leads toLuke 4:27
Naaman "dipped himself seven times in the Jordan… and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean" (5:14). In the synagogue at Nazareth (Luke 4:16), just after naming the widow of Zarephath (Luke 4:26), Jesus said, "There were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed, except Naaman, the Syrian" (Luke 4:27). Of all the lepers in Elisha's time, the one Jesus names as cleansed is this chapter's Syrian. Jesus doesn't say more about why Naaman alone, and these notes don't either.
Honest questions
Questions people ask about 2 Kings 5
That was a taste
The rest of 2 Kings 5 is waiting in Favor
- "No God in Israel"?
- The same oath, two ways
- "Please take the gift"
- "Is all well?"
- As white as snow
- 9 questions as you read
- 13 more Hebrew words
- A short check at the end
- Your notes, saved as you go
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The Hebrew word behind it
טָהֵרtahersay ta-HEIR
Brown-Driver-Briggs: "be clean, pure", and for the simple form used in this chapter, "be clean, i.e. (miraculously) freed from leprosy by washing in the Jordan": this chapter is the example it names. The word comes four times. Elisha: "Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall come again to you, and you shall be clean" (5:10). Naaman: "Couldn’t I wash in them and be clean?" (5:12). His servants: "Wash, and be clean" (5:13). And at last, "he was clean" (5:14). These are its only four uses in 2 Kings. It is the verb of the law of the leper's cleansing in Leviticus 13 and 14, where the priest "shall pronounce him clean" (Leviticus 14:7).
For your group
2 Kings 5 Bible study questions
- 1Naaman's servants asked him, "if the prophet had asked you do some great thing, wouldn’t you have done it?" (5:13). What plain, simple thing might God be asking of you that feels too small to matter?
- 2A girl taken captive, far from home, said, "I wish that my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria!" (5:3). Who around you, even somewhere you didn't choose to be, could you point toward help?
- 3Gehazi said, "Your servant went nowhere" (5:25), and Elisha answered, "Didn’t my heart go with you…?" (5:26). What makes it hard to be honest about something you think nobody saw?
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