Did Elijah really cause she-bears to kill little children?? (2 Kings 2:23-24)

This is one of those times I love to use the Blue Letter Bible to find out the original Hebrew for the words used in our English Bible.  The word “little children” comes from the Hebrew קְטַנִּים וּנְעָרִים (Qatan na’ar).  There are a LOT of possible translations to this, but taking into account the footnote for 2 Kinds 2:23a it is mostly likely that this phrase means unimportant youth.  Again, this word “youth” can be misunderstood.  In our time that means someone 18 or younger, but in ancient Israel the word “youth” could indicate someone up until they reached the age of thirty!  There seems to have been a group of almost 50 of them (some records even indicate they may have been stoning Elisha) so Elisha could have been in actual physical danger.  

It’s also worth noting that in 2 Kings 2:24 it says that the bears “tare” the youths.  Taking another look at the Blue Letter Bible this clarifies that it means to be “torn open”— not necessarily killed.  So while Elisha may have called on God’s protection against a large pack of unruly young men, there is no record than any of them were actually killed. 

(For a totally different but interesting interpretation of this story, check out this link here.