When Naaman the Syrian was healed of leprosy in the record of 2 Kings chapter 5, he requested of the prophet to be given two mules’ burden of earth. What an odd request. So why did Naaman request the two mules? Perplexing question. Let’s read that part of the record.
2 Kings 5:17 And Naaman said, Shall there not then, I pray thee, be given to thy servant two mules’ burden of earth? for thy servant will henceforth offer neither burnt offering nor sacrifice unto other gods, but unto the LORD.
Naaman was the captain of the hosts of Syria, and he was a leper. (2 Kings 5) The king of Syria sent Naaman down to Israel to be healed of leprosy. Once the leprosy was healed, he wanted to offer burnt offerings and sacrifices to no other gods but unto the Lord, Jehovah. So how was he to do this back in Syria?
To understand his request for two mules’ burden of earth, we need to look at the religious settings of his times.
Israel was, by design, a monotheistic culture because of its religion. (Note: many cultural traditions are governed by the local religion). Monotheistic means they were to only worship ONE God! Jehovah/Elohim which is God over all the earth!
Exodus 20:1-4 And God spake all these words, saying, I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
Deuteronomy 6:4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:
Jehovah was one God, not three in one, and they were to have no other gods. Israel was to be monotheistic.
But most if not all the lands around Israel were polytheistic; they had many gods. These gods were thought to be gods over certain lands or territories as is indicated by the following verse. In some cases, they would revere one god over the other gods. In Egypt, for instance, Ra or Re was considered the top-dog god. Then there were other and perhaps subordinate gods to him.
1 Kings 20:28 And there came a man of God, and spake unto the king of Israel, and said, Thus saith the LORD, Because the Syrians have said, The LORD is God of the hills, but he is not God of the valleys, therefore will I deliver all this great multitude into thine hand, and ye shall know that I am the LORD.
Here we see that the Syrians, where Naaman was from, believed gods were gods only over certain lands or territories. Here they thought Jehovah was god in the mountains but not god in the valleys because Israel had defeated them in the mountains. The Syrians assumed this was because Israel’s God was a god of the mountain area. Syria was a polytheistic nation.
The truth about gods being gods of certain lands or territories is mentioned by several researchers.
Cambridge Bible for Schools and colleges: “Two mules’ burden of earth — Naaman still has no notion of Jehovah but as a territorial deity. He thinks therefore that by carrying with him a quantity of the soil of Israel, he may provide a place for acceptable sacrifice to Him (Jehovah) in his country of Syria.”
Israel at times worshiped the gods of the nations around them.
Judges 10:6 And the children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim, and Ashtaroth, and the gods of Syria, and the gods of Zidon, and the gods of Moab, and the gods of the children of Ammon, and the gods of the Philistines, and forsook the LORD, and served not him.
During this time, Israel would have been a polytheistic nation. They were worshiping the gods of the land of Moab, the gods of the land of the sons of Ammon, the gods of the land of the Philistines and the gods of the land of Syria. These people had their own gods that were gods over their lands or territories.
Israel, at times, thought the gods of the nations around them were wonderful and brought those gods to their land and worshipped them there. They made these gods groves and temples, so they could do sacrifice and give burnt offerings unto these gods in the land of Israel.
2 Kings 17:15-18 They rejected His statutes and His covenant which He made with their fathers and His warnings with which He warned them. And they followed vanity and became vain, and went after the nations which surrounded them, concerning which the Lord had commanded them not to do like them. They forsook all the commandments of the Lord their God and made for themselves molten images, even two calves, and made an Asherah and worshiped all the host of heaven and served Baal. Then they made their sons and their daughters pass through the fire, and practiced divination and enchantments, and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking Him.
Bringing home the gods of other nations to worship was common and is even found in the book of Acts.
Acts 17:16 Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was being provoked within him as he was observing the city full of idols.
Another book that speaks about polytheistic religions is: *Royal Administrations and National Religion in Ancient Palestine by G.W. Ahlstrom. This work talks about the gods of the countries that surrounded Israel.
Here are some quotes from that work:
“… A not uncommon epithet of ancient Near Eastern kings was “the good shepherd”, a title which is often found in Assyrian building inscriptions. In addition, the king was frequently called … ASSur, Assur’s vicar,’ a phrase expressing the basic ideology of the king’s position; he ruled over the country of the god.”
“… The nation as God’s territory: … descriptive epithets for the king were aklu(m), “overseer” and the priest title Sangu, “administrator”. The king administered the god’s territory and his people.”
“… As mentioned above, the capital was the ruling center of the nation (the territory of the god). More specifically, the acropolis was this center and, as such, provided the basis for the king’s functions and policies.”
“… The above makes quite understandable the fact that religion and religious policy were part of the king’s duties. Indeed, it is evident that the king, as the administrator of his god’s territory, was not only the organizer and the builder of the country but was, in principle, the organizer of the cult as well. A few examples should be cited. A Hittite text states that the storm god made the king, the /abarna, the governor of the land of Hatti. In Egypt the “supreme god, Ré, entrusted the land to his son, the king.””
Syria, where Naaman came from, was a polytheistic culture and believed that gods were gods over only certain territories or lands as we read previously: “Because the Syrians have said, The LORD is God of the hills, but he is not God of the valleys.”
God had defeated them in the hills, so they decided to attack Israel in the valleys. This was their understanding in their polytheistic culture/religion, that gods were not gods overall but only gods of certain territories or lands.
Therefore, Naaman requested two mules’ burden of earth. Then he states why, “for thy servant will henceforth offer neither burnt offering nor sacrifice unto other gods, but unto the LORD.” He needed some of the land or territory of Jehovah, so he could build an altar back in Syria and offer burnt offerings and sacrifices in the land of Syria but only to Jehovah the God that had healed him. This was his understanding of how gods worked. No matter his cultural upbringing what a great believer. Thus, Two Mules for Brother Naaman! What a wonderful believer he was. Someday we will get to meet him.
*Royal Administrations and National Religion in Ancient Palestine