Loading the studies…
1 Kings 19
The TorahRooted Bible (TRB), translated directly from the Hebrew and Greek.
Elijah flees from Jezebel
1 Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. 2 Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, "So may the gods do to me, and more also, if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life as the life of one of them." 3 And when he saw that, he arose and went for his life, and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there. 4 But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a broom tree; and he asked that he might die, and said, "It is enough; now, Yahweh, take my life, for I am no better than my fathers." 5 And he lay down and slept under a broom tree; and there was an angel touching him, and he said to him, "Arise and eat." 6 He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water. So he ate and drank, and lay down again. 7 And the angel of Yahweh came again a second time and touched him and said, "Arise and eat, for the journey is too great for you." 8 So he arose and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights as far as Horeb, the mountain of Elohim.
Yahweh meets Elijah at Horeb
9 There he came to the cave and lodged there; and there the word of Yahweh came to him, and He said to him, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" 10 He said, "I have been very zealous for Yahweh Elohim Tsevaot; for the children of Israel have forsaken Your covenant, torn down Your altars, and killed Your prophets with the sword. And I, I alone, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away." 11 And He said, "Go out and stand on the mountain before Yahweh." And there, Yahweh was passing by, and a great and strong wind was tearing the mountains and breaking the rocks in pieces before Yahweh; but Yahweh was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake; but Yahweh was not in the earthquake. 12 And after the earthquake a fire; but Yahweh was not in the fire. And after the fire, the sound of a gentle whisper. 13 And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And there came a voice to him and said, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" 14 He said, "I have been very zealous for Yahweh Elohim Tsevaot; for the children of Israel have forsaken Your covenant, torn down Your altars, and killed Your prophets with the sword. And I, I alone, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away."
15 And Yahweh said to him, "Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus. When you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael to be king over Aram. 16 And Jehu the son of Nimshi you shall anoint to be king over Israel; and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah you shall anoint to be prophet in your place. 17 And it shall be that whoever escapes from the sword of Hazael, Jehu shall put to death; and whoever escapes from the sword of Jehu, Elisha shall put to death. 18 Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him."
The call of Elisha
19 So he departed from there and found Elisha the son of Shaphat, who was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen before him, and he was with the twelfth. Elijah passed by him and threw his mantle upon him. 20 And he left the oxen and ran after Elijah and said, "Please let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you." And he said to him, "Go back again, for what have I done to you?" 21 So he turned back from following him, and took the yoke of oxen and sacrificed them, and boiled their meat with the oxen's equipment, and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he arose and went after Elijah and served him.
Notes
- 19:2 Jezebel uses Israel's familiar oath, "Elohim do so to me and more also" (2:23), but the verb is plural, "may the gods do," so the TRB translates "the gods": she swears, it seems, by her own gods, Baal and Asherah. The Greek Bible begins her message, "If you are Elijah, I am Jezebel."
- 19:3 The Hebrew vowels read vayyar, "and he saw"; the same consonants can be read vayyira, "and he was afraid," as the Greek Bible and many Hebrew manuscripts have it. Either way, Elijah runs for his life from the north to Beersheba, at the southern edge of Judah, outside Ahab's kingdom, and then a day's journey beyond it into the wilderness.
- 19:8 Horeb is Mount Sinai, "the mountain of Elohim" (Exodus 3:1), where Yahweh made His covenant with Israel. Elijah's forty days and forty nights recall Moses, who "was on the mountain forty days and forty nights" (Exodus 24:18; 34:28). Now the prophet who called Israel back to that covenant goes back to the place where it was given, sustained by food from heaven.
- 19:12 The wind, the earthquake and the fire recall Sinai, where Yahweh came down "in fire" and "the whole mountain trembled greatly" (Exodus 19:18), and the cave and Yahweh "passing by" recall Moses in "a cleft of the rock" (Exodus 33:22; 34:6). This time Yahweh is not in those signs. Qol demamah daqqah is literally "a sound (or voice) of thin silence": demamah is stillness or calm, and daqqah means fine or thin. The Hebrew points to something so quiet it is almost silence, yet it is a sound that Elijah hears (verse 13).
- 19:16 Yahweh answers Elijah's complaint not with a rebuke but with work still to be done. As the story goes on, Elijah himself calls Elisha (verses 19-21); Elisha later tells Hazael that he will be king (2 Kings 8:13), and one of the sons of the prophets, sent by Elisha, anoints Jehu (2 Kings 9:1-6). The commission given to Elijah is carried out through the prophet who follows him.
- 19:18 Elijah thought he alone was left (verses 10, 14); Yahweh answers that He Himself will leave seven thousand. "I will leave" is hish'arti, from the root of she'ar, "remnant." Kissing the idol was an act of worship (Hosea 13:2). Paul quotes this answer in Romans 11:4 and draws the lesson: "So too at the present time there is a remnant according to the election of grace" (Romans 11:5).