2 Kings 5:12 (DRB)

Passage

Are not the Abana, and the Pharphar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel, that I may wash in them, and be made clean? So as he turned, and was going away with indignation,

Nearby Context

2 Kings 5:10 And Eliseus sent a messenger to him, saying: Go, and wash seven times in the Jordan, and thy flesh shall recover health, and thou shalt be clean.

2 Kings 5:11 Naaman was angry, and went away, saying: I thought he would have come out to me, and standing, would have invoked the name of the Lord his God, and touched with his hand the place of the leprosy, and healed me.

2 Kings 5:12 Are not the Abana, and the Pharphar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel, that I may wash in them, and be made clean? So as he turned, and was going away with indignation,

2 Kings 5:13 His servants came to him, and said to him: Father, if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, surely thou shouldst have done it: how much rather what he now hath said to thee: Wash, and thou shalt be clean?

2 Kings 5:14 Then he went down, and washed in the Jordan seven times, according to the word of the man of God; and his flesh was restored, like the flesh of a little child: and he was made clean.

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "abana", "pharphar", "rivers", "damascus", "better", "than", "waters", and "israel". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "abana" and "pharphar", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 11's "Naaman was angry and went away saying..." into verse 13's "His servants came to him and said...", so "abana" and "pharphar" belong inside that flow. In 2 Kings context, the local focus is covenant, worship, and faithfulness.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "abana" and "pharphar" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.