2 Kings 4:20

And when he had taken him, and brought him to his mother, he sat on her knees till noon, and then died.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(20) Taken.—Carried.

Brought him.—Brought him in—i.e., in-doors.

Till noon.—We gather from this that the boy was hurt in the forenoon.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

4:18-37 Here is the sudden death of the child. All the mother's tenderness cannot keep alive a child of promise, a child of prayer, one given in love. But how admirably does the prudent, pious mother, guard her lips under this sudden affliction! Not one peevish word escapes from her. Such confidence had she of God's goodness, that she was ready to believe that he would restore what he had now taken away. O woman, great is thy faith! He that wrought it, would not disappoint it. The sorrowful mother begged leave of her husband to go to the prophet at once. She had not thought it enough to have Elisha's help sometimes in her own family, but, though a woman of rank, attended on public worship. It well becomes the men of God, to inquire about the welfare of their friends and their families. The answer was, It is well. All well, and yet the child dead in the house! Yes! All is well that God does; all is well with them that are gone, if they are gone to heaven; and all well with us that stay behind, if, by the affliction, we are furthered in our way thither. When any creature-comfort is taken from us, it is well if we can say, through grace, that we did not set our hearts too much upon it; for if we did, we have reason to fear it was given in anger, and taken away in wrath. Elisha cried unto God in faith; and the beloved son was restored alive to his mother. Those who would convey spiritual life to dead souls, must feel deeply for their case, and labour fervently in prayer for them. Though the minister cannot give Divine life to his fellow-sinners, he must use every means, with as much earnestness as if he could do so.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The child's malady was a sunstroke. The inhabitants of Palestine suffered from this (Psalm 121:6; Isaiah 49:10; Judith 8:3).

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

19. My head, my head!—The cries of the boy, the part affected, and the season of the year, make it probable that he had been overtaken by a stroke of the sun. Pain, stupor, and inflammatory fever are the symptoms of the disease, which is often fatal.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And when he had taken him, and brought him to his mother,.... The lad led him home, and delivered him to his mother:

he sat on her knees till noon, and then died; out of her great affection, she took him on her knees, and laid his head in her bosom to sooth the pain, and in this posture he continued until the middle of the day, and then expired; by which it appears it was in the morning when he went into the field, and when the sun was pretty high, and beat strongly on him; which, it may be, produced a fever, and which issued in his death.

Geneva Study Bible

And when he had taken him, and brought him to his mother, he sat on her knees till noon, and then died.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

20. he sat on her knees till noon] The attack was in the early part of the day, when the oblique rays of the sun appear to be most dangerous. The mother’s affection shews itself in her unbroken attention.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 20. - And when he had taken him, and brought him to his mother, he sat on her knees till noon. It was in the morning, therefore, that the child received his sunstroke - an unusual, but not an unknown, occurrence. In the East the sun often becomes intensely hot by ten o'clock. And then died. There is no ambiguity here, no room for doubt; the child not only became insensible, but died. The historian could not possibly have expressed himself more plainly. 2 Kings 4:20

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

But even the faith of the pious woman was soon to be put to the test, and to be confirmed by a still more glorious revelation of the omnipotence of the Lord, who works through the medium of His prophets. When the child presented to her by God had grown up into a lad, he complained one day to the reapers of the field of a violent headache, saying to his father, "My head, my head!" He was then taken home to his mother, and died at noon upon her knees, no doubt from inflammation of the brain produced by a sunstroke.