Scripture · Old Testament
2 Kings 6:25
2 Kings 6:25 is verse 25 of 2 Kings chapter 6, shown here in the Berean Standard Bible.
Berean Standard Bible
So there was a great famine in Samaria. Indeed, they besieged the city so long that a donkey’s head sold for eighty shekels of silver, and a quarter cab of dove’s dung sold for five shekels of silver.
80 shekels is approximately 2 pounds or 907.2 grams of silver.
Or a quarter cab of seed pods; that is, approximately 0.28 dry quarts or 0.31 liters
5 shekels is approximately 2 ounces or 57 grams of silver.
King James Version
And there was a great famine in Samaria: and, behold, they besieged it, until an ass’s head was sold for fourscore pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a cab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.
World English Bible
There was a great famine in Samaria. Behold, they besieged it until a donkey’s head was sold for eighty pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.
A kab was about 2 liters, so a fourth of a kab would be about 500 milliliters or about a pint
Read in context
2 Kings 6:23–27 · Berean Standard Bible
23 So the king prepared a great feast for them, and after they had finished eating and drinking, he sent them away, and they returned to their master. And the Aramean raiders did not come into the land of Israel again.
24 Some time later, Ben-hadad king of Aram assembled his entire army and marched up to besiege Samaria.
25 So there was a great famine in Samaria. Indeed, they besieged the city so long that a donkey’s head sold for eighty shekels of silver, and a quarter cab of dove’s dung sold for five shekels of silver.
26 As the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried out to him, “Help me, my lord the king!”
27 He answered, “If the LORD does not help you, where can I find help for you? From the threshing floor or the winepress?”
Read all of 2 Kings 6Hebrew words
Data created by STEPBible.org based on work at Tyndale House Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Study 2 Kings 6:25
Cross-references
The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge lists these related verses. Scripture text comes from the Berean Standard Bible.
2 Kings 6:28Then the king asked her, “What is the matter?” And she answered, “This woman said to me, ‘Give up your son, that we may eat him, and tomorrow we will eat my son.’
2 Kings 6:29So we boiled my son and ate him, and the next day I said to her, ‘Give up your son, that we may eat him.’ But she had hidden her son.”
2 Kings 7:4If we say, ‘Let us go into the city,’ we will die there from the famine in the city; but if we sit here, we will also die. So come now, let us go over to the camp of the Arameans. If they let us live, we will live; if they kill us, we will die.”
2 Kings 25:3By the ninth day of the fourth month, the famine in the city was so severe that the people of the land had no food.
1 Kings 18:2So Elijah went to present himself to Ahab. The famine was severe in Samaria,
Jeremiah 14:13“Ah, Lord GOD!” I replied, “Look, the prophets are telling them, ‘You will not see the sword or suffer famine, but I will give you lasting peace in this place.’”
Jeremiah 14:14“The prophets are prophesying lies in My name,” replied the LORD. “I did not send them or appoint them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a false vision, a worthless divination, the futility and delusion of their own minds.
Jeremiah 14:15Therefore this is what the LORD says about the prophets who prophesy in My name: I did not send them, yet they say, ‘No sword or famine will touch this land.’ By sword and famine these very prophets will meet their end!
Jeremiah 14:18If I go out to the country, I see those slain by the sword; if I enter the city, I see those ravaged by famine! For both prophet and priest travel to a land they do not know.’”
Jeremiah 32:24See how the siege ramps are mounted against the city to capture it. And by sword and famine and plague, the city has been given into the hands of the Chaldeans who are fighting against it. What You have spoken has happened, as You now see!
Jeremiah 52:6By the ninth day of the fourth month, the famine in the city was so severe that the people of the land had no food.
Ezekiel 4:13Then the LORD said, “This is how the Israelites will eat their defiled bread among the nations to which I will banish them.”
Ezekiel 4:14“Ah, Lord GOD,” I said, “I have never defiled myself. From my youth until now I have not eaten anything found dead or mauled by wild beasts. No unclean meat has ever entered my mouth.”
Ezekiel 4:15“Look,” He replied, “I will let you use cow dung instead of human excrement, and you may bake your bread over that.”
Ezekiel 4:16Then He told me, “Son of man, I am going to cut off the supply of food in Jerusalem. They will anxiously eat bread rationed by weight, and in despair they will drink water by measure.