NAAMAN
“pleasant”.
(a) Grandson of Benjamin and son of Bela; founder of a family (Gen. 46:21; Num. 26:40).
(b) General of the army of Ben-hadad, king of Damascus. This general, who was used to free the Syrians, was a leper. Despite his repugnant character, leprosy was not a cause of exclusion of the patient in Syrian society, unlike what happened in Israel.
An Israelite girl, who had been given as a slave to Naaman’s wife, suggested that the general visit the prophet Elisha in Samaria, so that he would be healed of his leprosy. Was. To break Naaman’s pride and convince him that he only owed his healing to God, Elisha did not go to meet the general or his entourage.
He sent his servant to tell him to bathe in the Jordan seven times. Offended and enraged, Naaman turned his back, saying, “Are Abana and Pharfar, the rivers of Damascus, not better than all the waters of Israel? If I wash in them, will I not also be clean?
His servants calmed him, and begged him to go down to the Jordan. He bathed seven times in the Jordan, and was healed. Full of gratitude, the general wanted to reward Elisha, which he refused, in order to make him understand the gratuitousness of divine blessings.
But Gehazi, the prophet’s servant, burning with greed, acted falsely to obtain gifts. Naaman, transformed into a worshiper of Jehovah, asked permission to take two mule loads from the land of Israel, undoubtedly to raise an altar to the true God. Living within paganism, he could not completely escape its customs.
The king of Syria worshiped Rimon. Naaman had the duty to support his lord when he entered the sanctuary of this idol and prostrated himself before it. This obligation worried the general.
Elisha authorized him to fulfill his secular duties even if it involved his presence in a pagan temple (2 Kings 5). The prophet knew that the Lord would finish the work begun in Naaman’s heart, and that he would lead him in due time to break all ties with idolatry.
In the NT, the case of Naaman is presented as an example of God’s sovereign action in grace outside of Israel, and in the face of an apostate and rebellious Israel (Lk. 4:27), already intimating the work of grace that was going to go to the world by the hardening of Israel (cf. Rom. 11:12).