silver, 6,000 pieces of gold, and ten changes of clothes. Naaman brought the king of Israel the letter, which asked the king of Israel to cure Naaman of his leprosy. When the king of Israel read the letter, he rent his clothes and complained that he was not God with power over life and death, but the king of Aram must have been seeking some pretext to attack Israel. When Elisha heard, he invited the king to send Naaman to him, and so Naaman came to Elisha's house with his horses and his chariots. Elisha sent a messenger to Naaman to tell him to wash seven times in the Jordan River and be healed, but that angered Naaman, who expected Elisha to come out, call on the name of God, and wave his hands over Naaman. Naaman asked whether the Amanah and Pharpar rivers of Damascus were not better than any river in Israel, so that he might wash in them and be clean. But Naaman's servants advised him that if Elisha had directed him to do some difficult thing he would have done it, so how much more should he do what Elisha directed when he said merely to wash and be clean. So Naaman dipped himself seven times in the Jordan, and his flesh came back like the flesh of a little child. Naaman returned to Elisha, avowed that there is no God except in Israel, and asked Elisha to take a present, but Elisha declined. Naaman asked if he might take two mule loads of Israel's earth so that Naaman might make offerings to God, and he asked that God might pardon Naaman when had had to bow before the Aramean idol Rimmon when the king of Aram leaned on Naaman to bow before Rimmon. And Elisha told Naaman to go in peace. Connection to the parashah Both the parashah and the haftarah report the treatment of skin disease, the parashah by the priests, and the haftarah by the prophet Elisha. Both the parashah and the haftarah frequently employ the term for skin disease (, tzara'at). A Midrash deduced from the characterization of Naaman as a "great man" in that Naaman was haughty on account of his being a great warrior, and as a result was smitten with leprosy. And fundamentally, both the parashah and the haftarah view skin disease as related to the Divine sphere and