Elijah

(my God is my strength, or God is the Lord), the Tishbite, from the Gileadite village of Tishbe in the tribe of Naphtali, was, after Isaiah, the most remarkable of the Old Testament prophets and the head of the company of the sons of the prophets in the kingdom of Israel (1 Kings 17:1). We first meet Elijah in 1 Kings 17:1, standing before Ahab with the dreadful announcement of three and a half years without rain and of the famine that would follow. 'As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand,' he declared to Ahab, 'there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word' (compare Luke 4:25; Jas 5:17).

From the ancient narrative we see that soon after visiting the king, the prophet Elijah had to withdraw to the brook Cherith. There he remained for some time, miraculously fed morning and evening with bread and meat brought by ravens (1 Kings 17:5-6). When the brook dried up because of the drought, the prophet withdrew to Zarephath, a village on the Phoenician coast almost midway between Tyre and Sidon. In Jerome's day a tower stood at this place, and in later times a church stood on the site of the widow's house; there visitors were shown the room in which the prophet Elijah had lived, called in Greek Chereion (Acta Sanctorum).

Here he lodged in the house of a poor widow, whose meal and oil were miraculously not exhausted during the whole time the prophet stayed with her. During this period the widow's only son died, and Elijah restored him to life through his prayers. After this Elijah is called for the first time a man of God (1 Kings 17). Three years later, when the distress of the famine in Samaria had reached its height, and Ahab himself, together with Obadiah, governor of his house, was searching for pasture for his cattle, the prophet Elijah appeared first to Obadiah and then to the king himself.

'Art thou he that troubleth Israel?' Ahab exclaimed when he saw the prophet. 'I have not troubled Israel,' Elijah answered, 'but thou, and thy father's house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim' (1 Kings 18:17-18). He then proposed that the king gather all the people of the kingdom of Israel, together with the priests of Baal and Ashtoreth who enjoyed Jezebel's special protection, upon Mount Carmel, to pray for the end of the famine.

Ahab accepted the proposal, and 850 priests of Baal and Ashtoreth stood before the pagan altar; but from morning until noon they raved in vain and begged Baal to send fire upon their sacrifice. 'Cry aloud,' Elijah told them, 'for he is a god; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked' (1 Kings 18:27). In the evening Elijah himself built an altar of twelve stones and, calling upon the name of his Lord, by prayer brought down fire from the Lord out of heaven.

It consumed the burnt offering, the wood, the stones, and the dust, and even licked up the water that was in the trench. Struck by this miracle, the people cried out: 'The Lord, He is the God! The Lord, He is the God!' The false prophets of the idols were led down to the brook Kishon and slain by Elijah in accordance with the law of Moses, which commanded that all who seduced the people into idolatry be treated in this way (1 Kings 18:1-40). After the priests had been destroyed, Elijah said to Ahab, 'Get thee up, eat and drink; for there is a sound of abundance of rain.' He himself went to the summit of Carmel and bowed his face between his knees in prayer to the Lord. And indeed, in answer to his prayer the sky was covered on every side with rain clouds, and torrents of rain poured down.

Ahab entered his chariot, wept, and hastened toward Jezreel; but Elijah, strengthened by the power of God, girded up his loins and ran before Ahab's chariot as far as the gates of the city (1 Kings 18:41-46). Thus, having completed the prophet's work, he rendered the king the honor due him as his subject (Luke 4:25; Jas 5:17-18; Heb 11:35). When Ahab told his wife, the idolatrous Jezebel, what fate had befallen the priests of Baal, she became furiously angry and threatened Elijah with immediate death.

Learning of this, Elijah went to Beersheba, in the kingdom of Judah, to save his life, for there he could consider himself safe from the persecution of Ahab and Jezebel. Beersheba lay about ninety miles from Jezreel, but he was not content merely to reach the city. Leaving his servant there, he went still farther south into the wilderness. There he stopped, sat beneath a broom shrub, and asked God that he might die. 'It is enough; now, O Lord,' he said, 'take away my life; for I am not better than my fathers.' Then he lay down and slept.

An angel touched him and said, 'Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for thee.' Looking about, Elijah saw at his head a cake, such as was commonly baked upon heated stones, and a jar of water. Strengthened by this food miraculously sent to him, Elijah rose and for forty days traveled through the wild, rocky, and dangerous desert of the Sinai Peninsula until he reached Mount Horeb. There he found refuge in a cave and spent the night. Then he heard the voice of the Lord: 'What doest thou here, Elijah?' 'I have been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts,' Elijah replied, 'for the children of Israel have forsaken Thy covenant, thrown down Thine altars, and slain Thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.' The Lord commanded him to leave the cave and stand upon the mountain, awaiting the revelation of God. Terrifying signs began.

First came a mighty storm with a violent wind that rent the mountains and broke the rocks; after the storm came an earthquake, and after the earthquake a fire. After the fire came a still small voice - and there was the Lord. He revealed Himself not in the storm, not in the earthquake, not in the fire, but in the cool of evening, in the still small voice. 'Return,' the Lord said to Elijah, 'and go to Damascus: and when thou comest, anoint Hazael to be king over Syria; and Jehu the son of Nimshi shalt thou anoint to be king over Israel; and Elisha the son of Shaphat, of Abel-meholah, shalt thou anoint to be prophet in thy room.' At the same time the Lord comforted Elijah by telling him that He had reserved for Himself seven thousand men among the Israelites who had not bowed the knee to Baal and whose mouths had not kissed the idol (1 Kings 19:1-18).

Having heard the will of God, Elijah again set out and found Elisha near Abel-meholah. He anointed him as prophet by casting his mantle upon him as a symbolic sign of consecration to the prophetic office. Elisha at once followed him and became his servant (1 Kings 19). Later 1 Kings relates that Elijah received a command from God to appear once more before Ahab and announce the dreadful judgment of God that was to fall upon him and his house because Naboth had been murdered and his vineyard seized.

'Hast thou killed, and also taken possession?' Elijah said sternly to Ahab when he appeared before him in Naboth's vineyard. 'Thus saith the Lord,' he continued, 'In the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine.' Ahab said to Elijah, 'Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?' 'I have found thee,' Elijah replied, 'because thou hast sold thyself to work evil in the sight of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will bring evil upon thee... and will make thine house like the house of Jeroboam...

and the dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel.' Hearing this, Ahab repented, rent his clothes, put sackcloth upon his flesh, and fasted, so that the Lord deferred His righteous judgment upon Ahab's house until the reign of his son Ahaziah (1 Kings 21:17-29). After Ahab's death, the prophet Elijah was sent to his son King Ahaziah to tell him that he would die because of his ungodly life. Here the sacred writer gives several interesting details about the man of God's outward appearance.

'What manner of man was he which came up to meet you?' Ahaziah asked the messengers he had sent to inquire of Baal-zebub concerning his illness, whom Elijah, by God's command, had met on the way. 'He was an hairy man, and girt with a girdle of leather about his loins,' the messengers answered. The king replied, 'It is Elijah the Tishbite.' Twice the king then sent captains of fifty to seize the prophet, and on both occasions they and their companies were miraculously consumed by fire from heaven.

The third captain and his company were spared because of his earnest supplication to the prophet; Elijah went with him and, standing fearlessly before the bed of the sick Ahaziah, repeated God's sentence of death upon him (2 Kings 1:1-17). The time of Elijah's taking up into heaven was approaching. Elisha and the sons of the prophets knew by divine revelation what was to occur, and Elisha did not leave Elijah for a single step. They came to the Jordan River. Elijah struck the river with his mantle; the waters divided to either side, and both passed over on dry ground.

'Ask what I shall do for thee, before I be taken away from thee,' Elijah said. 'I pray thee, let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me,' Elisha replied. 'Thou hast asked a hard thing,' said Elijah; 'nevertheless, if thou see me when I am taken from thee, it shall be so unto thee; but if not, it shall not be so.' They continued walking and talking together. Then a chariot of fire and horses of fire separated them, and Elijah was carried up into heaven by a whirlwind. 'My father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof!' Elisha cried; and he saw him no more.

He took hold of his own clothes and rent them in two pieces. He also took up the mantle of Elijah that had fallen from him, went back, and stood upon the bank of the Jordan. Following Elijah's example, he struck the water with the mantle and cried, 'Where is the Lord God of Elijah?' The Jordan divided to one side and the other, and Elisha crossed to the western bank. The sons of the prophets searched for Elijah's body in vain for three days: he was no longer there and did not appear upon the earth again until the event of the Lord's Transfiguration on Mount Tabor, when the Lord's disciples Peter, James, and John saw him speaking with the Lord together with Moses (Matt 17:3-8).

A remarkable reference to the prophet Elijah is found in the prophet Malachi (4:5-6): 'Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: and he shall turn the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.' From the New Testament we know that in this passage the name Elijah refers to John the Baptist (Matt 11:14; Mark 9:11-13; Luke 1:17). The Forerunner of the Lord, John the Baptist, was to fulfill his ministry in the spirit and power of Elijah, preparing the way of the Lord; and the Gospel narrative directly and explicitly calls him by Elijah's name (Matt 17:10-12).

Finally, according to the belief of the Orthodox Church, the prophet Elijah together with Enoch will come again upon the earth before the Second Coming of the Lord (Rev 11:3-12). In conclusion, Mohammed speaks with great praise of the prophet Elijah in the Koran. Muslims, like the Jews, regard him as a mediator between heaven and earth who appears in human form to devout people on earth, visits them in mosques and synagogues, and communicates divine revelations, especially to pious men and rabbis.

In the Orthodox Church, as in the other Eastern Christian churches, the name of the prophet Elijah occupies a very high place. The name is often given to children at birth; many churches in Russia have been erected in honor of the prophet of God Elijah, and his commemoration on July 20 is celebrated by the Church as a great feast. In the Ethiopian, Coptic, and certain other churches, the prophet Elijah is likewise entered in their calendars as a saint, and his memory is celebrated on February 8 and December 1.