מלכים ב, פרק ו׳, פסוק כ״ט

Amidst a severe famine, two women made a horrific pact to consume their own children on consecutive days. After the first mother tragically fulfilled her end of the bargain, boiling and sharing her son, the time came for the second mother to offer her child. However, when the next day arrived, she broke the gruesome agreement [ביאור שטיינזלץ]. Instead of surrendering her son, she hid him away [מצודת ציון].

The underlying motive for hiding the child remains a subject of debate among commentators. One perspective suggests that her actions were driven by natural maternal mercy. In this view, she sought to keep her child alive and spare him from a cruel fate, holding onto the hope that rescue and relief might somehow arrive from another source [רלב״ג, רד״ק]. A much darker and more shocking interpretation, however, argues that the child had already died. According to this approach, the mother hid the corpse out of pure selfishness, intending to eat her son all by herself without having to share the remains with her companion [רש״י, רד״ק].