“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.”
My Notes
What Does 2 Kings 6:25 Mean?
This verse describes the horrifying reality of siege warfare in ancient Samaria. The famine had become so severe that people were paying eighty pieces of silver for a donkey's head—an animal considered unclean and normally worthless as food—and five pieces of silver for a tiny measure of dove's dung, likely either a type of wild plant or literal animal waste used as fuel or desperate sustenance. These prices represent economic collapse and human desperation at its most extreme.
The siege was carried out by Ben-hadad, king of Syria, and it reduced God's people to conditions that would have been unimaginable in times of peace. This wasn't just poverty—it was the complete inversion of normal life. Things that were worthless became precious. Things that were unclean became desirable. Famine doesn't just empty stomachs; it rewrites the entire value system of a society.
Scripture doesn't sanitize this reality. It records the actual prices, the specific grotesque details, because the Bible is honest about what happens when people are cut off from provision. This verse sits in a larger narrative about Israel's spiritual condition—their repeated turning from God had consequences that played out not just spiritually but in the most physical, visceral terms imaginable.
Reflection Questions
- 1.Have you ever been in a season where your 'normal' value system shifted because of desperation or scarcity? What did that feel like?
- 2.Why do you think Scripture includes such graphic, uncomfortable details about suffering rather than skipping to the deliverance?
- 3.When you're in a season of extreme lack, what's the difference between compromising out of wisdom and compromising out of desperation?
- 4.How do you hold onto hope when you're stuck in what feels like the worst chapter, with no visible sign that things are about to change?
Devotional
This is one of those verses that's hard to read. An ass's head for eighty pieces of silver. Dove's dung for five. The specificity of these details isn't accidental—Scripture wants you to feel the weight of what siege and famine actually looked like for real people.
When you're in a season of extreme lack—whether financial, emotional, relational, or spiritual—everything gets distorted. Things you'd normally never consider become options. Your value system shifts under pressure. You start making compromises you never thought you'd make, not because you're weak, but because desperation rewrites the rules.
This verse doesn't offer a quick fix or a cheerful promise. It simply tells the truth about how bad things got. And sometimes that honesty is what you need most from Scripture—not a platitude, but an acknowledgment that yes, life can become this hard. God's word doesn't look away from suffering. It records it, sits in it, and ultimately points through it.
The larger story here is that God was about to intervene dramatically. The very next chapter describes supernatural deliverance that no one saw coming. But in this moment, the people didn't know that. They only knew the hunger and the impossible prices. If you're in your own version of this chapter—where everything feels scarce and the costs feel absurd—know that the story isn't over. God has a history of showing up in the chapter right after the worst one.
Commentary
Trusted original commentary from respected historical Bible scholars and theologians.
And he said, if the Lord do not help thee, whence shall I help thee?.... Mistaking her meaning, as if she prayed him to…
As the donkey was “unclean,” it would not be eaten except in the last resort; and its head would be its worst and…
And, behold, they besieged it - They had closed it in on every side, and reduced it to the greatest necessity.
An ass's…
This last paragraph of this chapter should, of right, have been the first of the next chapter, for it begins a new…
a great famine in Samaria The walls were protection enough, but the enemy lay outside, and the provisions came to an…
Cross References
Related passages throughout Scripture