⁷ The king then said to the prophet, “Come home with me and have something to eat, so that I may give you a gift.”^{[a] 8} But the prophet said to the king, “Even if you were to give me half your possessions,^[b] I would not go with you. I am not allowed to eat food or drink water in this place. ⁹ For this is how I was commanded in the Lord’s message, ‘Eat no food. Drink no water. And do not return by the way you came.’”