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DEPOSITED BY THE
LINONIAN AND BROTHERS LIBRARY

ELIJAH: HIS LIFE AND TIMES.

ELIJAH :
HIS LIFE AND TIMES.

REV. W. MILLIGAN, D.D.,
FKOl'ESSOB OF DIVINITY AND BIBLICAL CRITICISM, ABERDEEN.

FIFTH THOUSAND.

JAMES NISBET AND CO.,
21, BERNERS STREET, W.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
FAGB
The Desire of all Nations ....... i
The life of Jesus the earthly manifestation of the Divine4ife of
Jehovah— Historical character of that life upon the basj/of the
Four Gospels definitely accepted — The doctrine of development
historicallyapplied — The prcsfaraiio Evangelica — ^Thelinsatisfied
spiritual deS^es of nations — The Roman unsatisfied by power,
the Greek by thought, the Jew by Rabbinism, the Buddhist by
Nirvana — The Desire of all nations the fulfilment of unsatisfied
spiritual needs, individual, national ; and His religion alone uni
versal — Jesus the U,niversal Ideal and Example, and the universal
and only moral dynamic CHAPTER II.
The Messianic Hope within the Canon ..... 9
Divine differentiation selecting from the woman's seed a nation,
a tribe — Typical characters and offices foreshadowing different
aspects of the Son of Man — Spiritual and devotional preparation
— The Ideal of the Prophets-T'The King — The Suffering Servant
of God — Post-exilian hope — :The ptiestly hope — Minor and rela
tive ideals contribute to the'fulness of the complete hope — Unique
hope in history — The Divine Man a fulfilment of multitudinous
foreshadowings. / ' >,
' CHAPTER III.
The Post-canonic^ Messianic Hope  i3
Debased period-^-Hope persistent — In Apocrypha impersonal and
national — In .'Uie Apocalypses personal and national — In the
Talmud — I^bbinism — Christ's worlc to re-create and transform
as well as fiilfil the Messianic Ideal — What might have been.
\
CHAPTER IV.
The p/viNE Babe  29
t'he country priest's home — Zacharias in the Temple — The Angel
/of promise to the priest — The Angel of promise to the 'Virgin—
The meeting of the holy women — The spiritual songs — The
journey to Bethlehem — The holy Nativity — The angelic anthem —
The visit of the shepherds.

vi CONTENTS.
CHAPTER IV. FAGB
Elijah and the breaking up of the Drought (i Kings
xviii. 41-46)  61
Delay in the fulfilment of the promise— Necessity of waiting upon
God in prayer — Elijah re-ascends Carmel— Mission to his servant
— The cloud as a man's hand— Rain granted — Ahab's return to
Jezreel — Elijah running before his chariot — Arrival at Jezreel —
Nature and power of prayer— Objection to prayer answered —
Physical phenomena — Mental phenomena — Characteristics of the
prayers of Elijah as mentioned by St. James — Answer expected,
and not simply reflex influence — For spiritual blessings — For
others — Fervency in prayer — Prayer in faith — Power of such
prayers. CHAPTER V.
Elijah at Horeb (i Kings xix. 1-13)  80
Feelings of Elijah at Horeb — His mistaken notions as to the
character of the Almighty — His despondency — Not due to physi
cal fatigue or loneliness, but to thought that he had failed — Injus
tice thus done by him to God — To himself — To the past history
of his people — Evils of despondency — Reason why Elijah fled to
Horeb — God reveals Himself by an angel — Horeb and Elijah's
cave — Former revelation of the Almighty there — The prophet
questioned — His answer — ^^I'he revelation granted him — Lesson
of the revelation — Divine judgment and mercy — What law can
accomplish — Value and importance of law — The message of love
— Its greater power. CHAPTER VL
Revelation at Horeb {continued) (i Kings xix. 13-21) . . <^
Our right and responsibiUty to judge Elijah at Horeb — ^The
prophet again questioned — His answer — Further revelation of
God to him — God still a God of judgment — Hazael, Jehu,
Elisha ; each an instrument of judgment — Mercy of God revealed
— Meaning of the 7,000 — The promise contained in the words —
The revelation of God thus made continues : first, in judgment ;
secondly, in the preservation of a faithful remnant — General
teaching of Scripture upon this point — The same truths always
applicable to the Church — Elijah leaves Horeb— Abel-meholah
¦ — Call of Elisha — Meaning of Ehsha's farewell salutations and
feast^Spirit in which Elisha enters on his work — Close of Elijah's
special mission. CHAPTER Vn.
Elijah and Naboth's Vineyard (i Kings xxi. 1-29) . , iig
Elijah disappears for a time — Naboth the Jezreelite — Ahab desires
possession of his vineyard— Failure of his attempt to obtain it
and the effect upon him— Jezebel's plot — Its success — Naboth's

CONTENTS. vil

PAGE

trial and death — Ahab takes possession of the vineyard— Elijah
appears before him there— Judgment pronounced on Ahab and
Jezebel and their house— Execution of the judgment by Jehu-
Fulfilment of woe uttered by Elijah— Effect on Ahab of Elijah's
words— Objects of the narrative : To impress us with a deep
sense -of the wickedness of Ahab and Jezebel— To show the
righteous retributions of God upon the sinner — To reveal God's
readiness to pardon the penitent.

CHAPTER VIII.
Elijah and the Companies of Ahaziah (2 Kings i. 1-16) . 139
Elijah again retires from view — Importance of the interval to
Ahab — To Israel — Accession of Ahaziah — His character — His
illness and recourse to Baal-Zebub— Elijah appears to his messen
gers — His message to the king — Ahaziah s r^ge— He sends first
captain and his fifty ; their fate— Second captain and his fifty
sent ; their fate— Third captain and his fifty — Elijah goes to
Ahaziah — His message — General character of the narrative ex
amined — Comparison with other Scripture narratives of a similar
kind — Principles upon which such destruction of life to bejustified
— Words of our Lord in Luke ix. 51-56 — Methods of dealing
with nations in different ages must be different — Teaching of
Matt. V. considered — AppUcation to state of Israel in days of
Elijah — General considerations on the subject.
CHAPTER IX.
The -Ascension of Elijah (2 Kings n. 1-12) . . , .159
Elij'ah drawing near the close of his life— Gilgal— Departure of
Elijah from Gilgal — Elisha persists in accompanying him — Bethel
and the sons of the prophets there— Jericho and the sons of the
prophets there— Jordan — Passage openeil through the river —
Converse of Elijah and Elisha — The request of Elisha and its
meaning — The translation of Elijah— Difficulty of the passage —
No merely "natural" explanation can suffice — But not on that
account are we to be indifferent to the amount of miracle involved
— Modes of thought of the writer and of his age to be kept in
view — Application of these principles to the narrative — The true
meaning of its different parts — Elisha's cry^— His return to the
Jordan — River again opened — Vain search for Elijah — Conclud-
mg observations on the translation of Elijah.

CHAPTER X.

V

Letter of Elijah to Jehoram, King of Judah — Character
AND Work, of the Prophet (2 Chron. xxi. 12-15). • 176
Elijah's letter to Jehoram king of Judah — Difficulties connected
with it — Most probable solution — Contents of the letter — Charac
ter of Jehoram— Fulfilment of Elijah's warnings— General con
siderations on Elijah's character and work— The circumstances

I CONTENTS. FAGI
amidst which he appeared — The school out of which he came —
Prophedy in Judah and in Israel— The particular work given
Elijah to do — The leading featiu-es of his character— His sim-
phcity of faith and singleness of aim— His fearlessness of action
— His sternness of spirit — Comparison with Elisha — Estimate of
the prophet in after times — Book of Ecclesiasticus — New Testa
ment references — His grandeur and uniqueness.

CHAPTER XL
The Second Elijah .  19a
Passages in the New Testament in which we read of a second
Elijah — an integral part of Messianic hope — John i. 19-21 ; Luke
ix. 7, 8 ; Matt. xvi. 14, xvii. 10, xi. 13, 14 ; Mark xv. 34, 35 —
Rabbinical testimonies to same beUef— Founded on Malachi iv.
5, 6 — Inquiry whether such passages are fulfilled in the coming
of the Baptist-r-Alford, Moberly — Examination of Luke i. 17 ;
Matt. xvii. 11, 12 — Character of the Baptist's work — Conclusion
that in the Baptist we have the second Elijah— Reference of
the words in Malachi, "The great and dreadful day of the
Lord " — Applicable to the beginning as well as the close of the
Christian era — Jewish mode of looking at the Messianic age —
Christian mode of doing so — Character of the age, not historical
development, at first thought of— Judgment not less than mercy
connected with it — Objection from 2 Thess. ii. 1-3 — Objection
answered — General conclusion that no second appearance of
Elijah to be looked for

CHAPTER I.
ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH, AND THE FIRST APPEAR
ANCE OF THE PROPHET ( I KINGS XVII. l).
State of Israel — First appearance of Elijah— Gilead— Elijah's training-
Civil condition of the Northern Kingdom — Its religious condition—
Ahab and Jezebel — Peculiar sinfulness of the idolatry of the time — Im
portance of -the era^Elijah comes forth — His outward appearance —
His message and its nature— Elijah withdraws from Ahab— Light from
the Apocalypse — Witnessing to facts, and theology.
It is with the suddenness of a flash of lightning and a clap of
thunder out of an Eastern sky, that Elijah the prophet bursts
upon us in the narrative of the Old Testament. As he was
taken away, when his work was done, in a chariot of fire, with
horses of fire, going up by a whirlwind into heaven, so it may
be said he came. Everything was going on in Israel in its
ordinary way. The people werejai peace ; and nothing seems
to have disturbed their king/asne pursued the evil courses on
which he had embarked ; as, not content with walking in the
sins of Jeroboam, he formed his unhappy alliance with Jezebel
the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Zidonians ; or as, yielding^
lo the influence of her more wicked and powerful mind, "he
reared up an altar for Baal in the house of Baal, which he had
built in Samaria, and made a grove, and did more to provoke
the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel
that were before him" (chap. xvi. 32, 33). It, is true that, even
in the midst of all this wickedness, God still proved Himself to
be the living God, and fulfilled, in dispensations of His provi
dence well calculated to rouse the careless and to alarm the
guilty, the words of threatening spoken by His servants in

2 ELIJAH.
former times, for in these days " did Hiel the Bethelite build
Jericho : he laid the foundation thereof in Abiram his firstborn,
and set up the gates thereof in his youngest son Segub, accord
ing to the word of the Lord, which he spake by Joshua the son .
of Nun " (chap. xvi. 34). No effect, however, would appear to
have been produced by this upon either prince or people, and
the sacred narrative leads only to one conclusion — that a flood
of infidelity and idolatry, with all their attendant immoralities,
was sweeping unchecked over the land.
All at once Elijah comes upon the scene. Without a word of
previous information regarding him we are simply told that
"Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the inhabitants of Gilead, said
unto Ahab, As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand,
there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to
my word." With the very first mention made of him, he is
before us in all the fulness of his mission and in all the strength
of that bold, uncompromising character which he ever after
wards displayed.
Of the early history of the prophet we know almost nothing.
He is called the Tishbite, but it is uncertain what the expres
sion means. Distinguished Oriental scholars of modern times
have suggested that the word may mean simply " the stranger,"
and that the first clause of the chapter ought to read, " And
Elijah the stranger, one of the strangers who dwelt in Gilead." "
Could the suggestion be accepted, a fresh and even startling
light would be thrown upon Elijah's history, and he would take
his place beside such men as Melchizedek and Balaam, who
were drawn from heathen nations to perform the part of divinely-
called priests and prophets towards Abraham and the chosen
people. It is better, amidst the wholly unproved character of
any new proposals, to abide by the long-received interpretation,
that the word "Tishbite" is properly formed from " Tishbi,"
the name of the town, whether the Tishbi in Gilead or in
Galilee is not stated, in which Elijah was born.
It is of more importance to notice that Elijah was " of tha
inhabitants of Gilead," for Gilead was one of those divisions of
Palestine on the eastern side of the river Jordan which possessed
an entirely different character, and nurtured an entirely dif
ferent population from those in Palestine proper. The land
was higher, opener, and more extensive ; not divided so much
' Smith's " Dictionary of the Bible,'' Tishbite.

ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH. 3
by nature into the small patches of hill or valley or level
meadow which marked the country westward between the river
Jordan and the sea, but consisting of large rolling plains rising
ever and again into rocky hills, and the boundaries of which
were lost in the distance. No part of the world is more favour
able to the habits of the roaming Arab ; and the traveller who
has thought himself alone in these vast scTlitudes is often
startled by the sudden appearance of a mounted horseman
coming round the base or starting up on the top of a hill, as well
as \>y his equally sudden disappearance again. Nor this only,
for that rocky nature of the country which expressed itself in the
name Gilead, as well as its position on the extreme east of the
Holy Land, made it the key of Palestine on that side, and
fostered a warlike spirit in the tribes that had settled there.
Jephthah, the most striking specimen of an undaunted, but wild
and reckless captain, belonged to Gilead. It was famous for
its gteat strategical positions ; and, as in the case of Ishbosheth
(2 Sam. ii. 8), and at a later time of David, when fleeing before
Absalom (2 Sam. xvii. 24), its strong and precipitous fastnesses
afforded shelter to the exile. Mahanaim, the place of the two
hosts, and so famous throughout the whole early and middle
history of the Israelites, seems to have been in Gilead, and may
be taken as typical of the land. In such scenes men are nerved
to the physical strength, the patient endurance, and even the
moral fearlessness, by which Elijah was so strikingly distin
guished. There, too, apart from the ways of men, the prophet
would learn to commune with God alone ; and would come to
feel the full force of that relation to the Almighty which he was
wont afterwards to express in his own graphic formula, " As the
Lord God of Israel liveth before whom I stand."' We cannot
fail to trace at least a correspondence between such scenes and
those fits of despondency by which Elijah was at times over
taken. Of what small account was he with those vast depths of
sky above his head, and that expanse of country stretching
away to a horizon beyond which only the same view would be
repeated. When nature presented herself to him upon such a
scale he might well feel, What can the littleness of man accom
plish ? It may even be better for him to die (chap. xix. 4).
After all, however, we know almost nothing of the early influ-
¦ Chap. xvii. i ; xviii. 15. The formula was afterwards used by Elishii
2 Kings iii. 14 ; v. 16).

4 ELIJAH.
ences which surrounded the prophet, or which may have more
or less contributed to make him what he was. It is not neces
sary that we should know them. Elijah's work was very dif
ferent from that of iVIoses, of whom, as the appointed human
author both of the religious and the civil polity of his people, it
is well that we should be told that he " was instructed in -all the
wisdom of the Egyptians " (Acts vii, 22). It was no less dif
ferent from that of Samuel who so long judged Israel, and whose
early training in the service of the tabernacle did so much to
prepare him for his task. At the hands of Elijah no new
polity was needed. He had to frame no new laws. His work,
it may be almost said, was to be summarized in one great act ;
in so far as it was done in the sight of men, it was to be begun
and completed in a day. The stream of the nation's life, at the
time when he appeared, was flowing in the channel cut for
it ; was fashioned in the outward mould prepared for it, by God.
Elijah had only to heal that life by one sudden, bold, unexpected
stroke, and the right constituting of the relation between his own
soul and Israel's heavenly King, rather than the varied influ
ences of an ordinary development amidst his fellows, was what
he required. We do not, therefore, need to be informed as to
his early training. Enough, if we know that, in communion
with God and his own heart, he learned what no schools and no
mere intercourse with men can teach — the greatness of the one
Creator and Ruler of all ; that faith in the Divine power which
makes him feel, along with the deepest sense of his own weak
ness, that he can say to the mountain before him, " Be th<ju
removed, and be thou cast into the sea ; " and that superiority
to the shows and fashions of a fleeting world which communion
with the everlasting hills, and with Him who planted them or
shakes them at His pleasure, is so well fitted to impart. John
the Baptist, the second Elijah, "was in the deserts till the
day of his showing unto Israel " (Luke i. 80). We have no
reason to believe that the first Elijah was trained in any other
ivay. In order to understand both the meaning and the aim of
Elijah's mission, we have first of all to try to form to ourselves
some notion of his times. About fifty-six years had passed
from the disastrous hour when the once great and firmly united
kingdom of Solomon had been separated, through the revolt of
the ten tribes, into its two parts, and the date— B.C. 919 — when

- ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH. 5
Ahab ascended the throne of Israel as distinguished from
Judah. During the whole of that half century the northern
kingdom had been harassed by war without, and by bloodshed
and misery within. Nadab, who succeeded Jeroboam, its first
king, was, after a short reign of two years, murdered by Baasha,
who seized the throne and, with the merciless policy of Eastern
despotism, immediately put to death all the members of the
house of Jeroboam (chap. xv. 29). After having reigned twenty-
four years he was succeeded by his son Elah, who, in less than
two years, was slain by Zimri, one of the captains of his
chariots, while he was " drinking himself drunk in the house of
Arza, which was over the household in Tirzah" (chap. xvi. 9).
Zimri followed the cruel example of . Elah's father, for, as
soon as he took possessiori of the throne, he smote all the
house of Baasha, leaving him not a single man child, neither
of his kinsfolks, nor of his friends (chap. xvi. 11). But he en
joyed his honours only for a moment. A portion of the Israelites
were then engaged at the siege of Gibbethon, in the tribe of
Dan, which had been taken by the Phihstines; and, no sooner
did they hear of what had happened, than they broke up the
siege and marched against Tirzah, the then capital of Israel, in
which Zimri's court was held. The city was taken, and Zimri,
setting fire to the palace (after a reign of seven days), perished
in ,the flames (chap. xvi. 18). Omri, the leader of the attack,
did not at once secure the royal honours which he coveted.
Only after four years, during which a bitter internecine contest
was carried on between him and Tibni, another claimant to the
throne, and with half the people on his side, did Omri attain
his object, and become king of Israel. Full of spirit and
enterprise as a ruler, this founder of a new dynasty made
himself' especially famous by his conquest of Moab (2 Kings
iii. 4), by his purchase of the hill Shomron from its owner
Shemer, and by his building there the city of Samaria which,
instead of Tirzah, became thenceforth the capital of the land.
In other respects Omri's was still an evil reign. He " wrought
evil in the eyes of the Lord, and did worse than all that were
before him" (chap. xvi. 25). Six years he had reigned in
Tirzah. Six years more he reigned in Samaria after the re
moval of his Court to the new city— twelve years in all. Then
he died, and Ahab his son succeeded him.
. Jeroboam, Nadab, Baasha, Elah, Zimri, Omri, six kings

6 ELIJAH.
between the date of the division of the tribes and the appear
ance of Elijah, with a seventh now upon the throne ; and three
of the six either murdered or brought to a cruel end through
the usurpers by whom they were expelled ; — the record is little
better than one of tumult and violence and blood ; while at the
same time foreign wars, with the Syrians in the North and
the Philistines from the South, helped to fill up the cup of
national misery.
Still more fatal however to the prosperity and happiness of
Israel was its rehgious condition. The bond which had mainly
held the twelve tribes together had .been a religious bond.
Jerusalem was their common centre ; and the temple of God
there, now reared by Solomon in all its glory, was the common
object of their affections and their pride. Three times a year
every Jew was required to present himself at the great feasts,
which were so closely associated with all the former triumphs,
and all the present prosperity, of the kingdom as a whole.
Three times a year they did this. From all parts of the
country they collected in pilgrim bands, animated by the
loftiest sentiments of patriotism to their fatherland, and of de
votion to its Heavenly King. The Psalms sung by them on
the way to the Holy City, glow with that poetic feeling which
can spring only from the deepest emotions of the heart. The
valley of mourning became a valley of rejoicing. The dry and
dusty highways of that Eastern clime were changed to paths
through fields covered with the blessings of the early rain. At
each step, as they approached the goal of their journey, their
strength increased. The courts of the Almighty were before
them, and a day in His courts was better than a thousand;
they would rather be doorkeepers in the house of their God
than dwell in the tents of wickedness (Psa. Ixxxiv. 5-10). All
this time, too, it was the unity of the different tribes of the
nation that was one leading object of the people's thoughts.
They beheld Jerusalem builded as a city that is compact tq-
gether, whither the tribes went up, the tribes of the Lord ; and,
when at length its towers and bulwarks rose before their de
lighted eyes, they cried out with one acclaim, " Pray for the
peace of Jerusalem, they shall prosper that love thee. Peace
be within tny walls and prosperity within thy palaces. For
our brethren and companions' sakes we will now say, Peace be
within thee" (Psa. cxxii).

ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH. 7
Such tvas the unity of the Jewish people ; and Jeroboam,
king of the ten separated tribes, felt that he must break it, or
see his kingdom soon wrested from his hand. Accordingly no
sooner did he ascend the throne than he set himself to sub
vert the community of religious faith which existed between
Israel and Judah. For this purpose he "made two calves of
gold, and said unto his people, It is too much for you to go up
to Jerusalem : behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee
out of the land of Egypt " (l Kings xii . 28). It was a repetition
of what had already happened in an earlier age when, in the
absence of Moses on Mount Sinai, Aaron, in order to appease
the murmuring of the people, " made a molten calf, and the
people said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee
up out of the land of Egypt" (Exod. xxxii. 4.) Neither in the
one case nor in the other was there any deliberate intention to
deny Jehovah and His deeds. Rather, in both cases, would
Israel remember them. Nevertheless, it was a dangerous
thing to do this by means of images of man's devising, and He
who knew the human heart had framed the second command
ment of the ten for the express purpose of guarding against the
idolatry which would soon degenerate into the actual worship
of stocks and stones. Jeroboam either did not know this or
recklessly disregarded it. He set up his golden calves at the
two extremities of his kingdom, Bethel in the south, and Dan
in the north, and sought to connect the memory of that great
deliverance, which was the starting-point of the people's history
as a nation, with a Being to be worshipped at these two places
instead of Jerusalem. With the same object in view, he no
longer continued the line of the priesthood in the tribe of Levi
and family of Aaron, but for the sake, in all probability, of
winning the popular favour, he chose his priests from the
lowest of the people, and out of every tribe. Nay, he even
offered sacrifice and burned incense himself ; while, finally, to
complete his revolution he changed the season of observing one
at least of the great religious festivals, and made that which he
had " devised out of his own heart " and substituted for the
feast of the Almighty, a time of worldly indulgence to his sub
jects (l Kings xii., xiii.). All this, too, Jeroboam carried out with
a distinctness of apprehension, a clearness of vision, and a
fixity of purpose which, combined with the occasion and date
of his mounting the throne, made his reign one of the most

8 ELIJAH.
memorable in the history of God's ancient people. In the
strong language of the sacred writer, he " drave Israel from
following the Lord, and made them sin a great sin " (2 Kings '
xvii. 21). As king after king is noted for his wickedness, it is
with the words that he " departed not from the sins of Jeroboam
the son of Nebat, wherewith he made Israel to sin " (2 Kings
X. 29 ; xiii. 2, 11 ; xiv. 24 ; xv. 9, 18, 24, 28). For a period of
two centuries and a half, down to the time of the Assyrian
invasion, when Israel ceased to be a nation, the same direful
language is continued. Jeroboam's evil example was the type
and instigation of nearly all the faithlessness that followed it.
He gave, indeed, a new departure to the history of Israel.
Thenceforward idolatry never ceased to contend with the
ancient faith until it was at last purged out by the wholesome,
though painful discipline of the Captivity.
In Ahab's days, the days with which we are immediately
concei;ned, all this evil culminated. In some respects, indeed,
Ahab appears to have been a skilful ruler, and one possessed
of more than common insight into the temporal "necessities of
a nation, as these would be judged of by mere worldly states
manship. Following in the footsteps of his father Omri, his
aim was to - increase at once the internal dignity and the ex
ternal prosperity of Israel. He loved peace and the arts of
peace. His fame as a builder of cities and of palaces received
particular notice in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of
Israel (i Kings xxii. 39). Among the latter was his new palace
at Jezreel, which, with its extensive gardens, was to prove so
fatal a spot in the history of his family ; while either there or at
Samaria, he erected for himself that "ivory house" which
appears to have attracted, in a greater than ordinary degree, the
admiration of men (i Kings xxii. 39). Ewald remarks that " in
the time of Solomon ivory was first used for a chair of state ;
"Ahab decorated with it an entire house." ' To nothing, how
ever, does Ahab appear to have devoted himself more than to
extending the commercial prosperity of Israel, and it was in
connection with this that the weaker side of his character and
the more evil influences of his reign appeared. He was thus
led to draw closer the bonds of friendship between himself and
the powerful Phcenicians in the West. His marriage with
Jezebel is in no small degree to be traced to the same cause.
' " History of Israel." Edited by Carpenter, iv. 40.

ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH. 9
Animated by no truly religious spirit, and especially worldly iij
the whole tone of his mind, it was nothing to him that he thus
ran the risk of strengthening any idolatrous tendencies in his
subjects, as well as of defeating the purpose for the sake of
which the Almighty had separated them from the other nations
¦oi the world. He envied the maritime greatness of Phoenicia.
He saw the commercial advantages to be derived from sharing
in its trade, and he did not scruple for a moment to sacrifice
to such ends the higher and nobler destinies of Israel. Ahab
was, in short, pre-eminently a weak and worldly king, thoroughly
secular in his aims, destitute of all firmness even of worldly
principle, ready to enjoy the rewards of wickedness which he
had not strength enough to devise, and thus an easy tool in .
the hands of others more daring than himself. No darker
account, therefore, could well be given of any king than that
which is given of him by the sacred writer. " He did evil," we
are told, " in the sight of the Lord, above all that were before
him. And it came to pass, as if it had been a light thing for
him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he
took to wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Zi
donians, and went and served Baal, and worshipped him. And
he reared up an altar for Baal in the house of Baal, which he
had built in Samaria. And Ahab made the Asherah : and Ahab
did yet more to provoke the Lord, the God of Israel, to anger
than all the kings of Israd that were before him" (i Kings
xvi. 30-33). It was the first time that a king of Israel had
allied himself by marriage with a heathen princess : and the
alliance was in this case of a peculiarly disastrous kind. Jeze
bel has stamped her name on history as the representative of all
that is designing, crafty, malicious, revengeful, and cruel.^ She
is the first great instigator of persecution against the saints of
God.' Guided by no principle, restrained by no fear of either
God or man, passionate in her attachment to her heathen
worship, she spared no pains to maintain idolatry around her
in all its splendour. Four hundred and fifty prophets ministered
under her care to Baal, besides four hundred prophets of the
groves which ate at her table (chap, xviii. 19). The idolatry,
too, was of the most debased and sensual kind. The worship
of Baal was combined with that of Ashtaroth, sometimes under
stood to be the moon, at other times to be the planet Venus.
But whichever of the two she was, there can be no doubt as to

lO ELIJAH.
the effect produced upon the people. In the Epistle to the
Church at Thyatira, contained in the Revelation of St. John,
ive have an Inspired commentary on the character and rule of
Jezebel which throws a sad and lurid light, alike upon her and
upon the times of which we are now speaking. " But I have
this against thee," it is there said, " that thou sufferest thy wife
Jezebel which calleth herself a prophetess ; and she teacheth-
and seduceth my servants to commit fornication and to eat
things sacrificed to idols. And I gave her time that she should
repent ; and she willeth not to repent of her fornication " (chap.
ii. 20, 2i). It is the same terrible combination of idolatry and
licentiousness which so often meets us in the ancient world ; .
and with which St. Paul had to war at Corinth. We see the
Zidonian queen, not perhaps licentious herself, — there is not
sufficient evidence to entitle us to think that — but reckless of it
as a consequence of the idolatrous practices which she fostered,
and with her strong determined will forcing these by every
means in her power upon her deluded subjects.
There is still another feature of this idolatry which ought not
to be omitted when we would estimate aright the irreUgious
condition of Israel in Ahab's days. When, in another passage
of his narrative, the sacred writer sums up the character of the
king he does it in the words, " But there was none like unto -
Ahab which did sell himself to work wickedness in the sight of
the Lord, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up. And he did very
abominably in following idols, according to all things as did the
Amorites, whom the Lord cast out before the children of Israel"
(chap. xxi. 25, 26). In these words we have land bare the crown
ing aggravation of the people's wickedness. They had apos
tatized from God to the very sins for which the ancient in
habitants of Canaan had been driven out before their fathers,
and visited with such severity of punishment as to be well-nigh
exterminated. The old altars were again reared, the old
sacrifices again offered, the old iniquities again practised ;
and the worship introduced into the land defeated, in so far as
it was yielded to, every end at which the theocratic people were
to aim. It is a fresh start, then, in the degeneracy of Israel
that we have now presented to our view. Before this time idols
had been fashioned, and altars and high places built for their
unholy rites. But as yet the idols had been always intended to
represent the great I AM. Now the gods of strange nations

ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH. II
were introduced. The ideas of power separated from righteous
ness and of lust substituted for love appealed to the worst
tendencies of the corrupt hearts of Israel. And in its de
gradation Israel answered the appeal. The narrative leads con
clusively to the belief that idolatry had overspread the land.
There can have been but few who had not bowed the knee to
Baal, for we shall by and by see that it is only by a mistransla
tion that we are wont to speak of seven thousand who had
remained true to the God of their fathers. Even those, again,,
who had stood firm in their faithfulness had been compelled
to such an extent to conceal themselves that Elijah believed, in
his despondency, that no worshipper of the true God was left
except himself. The very prophets were become corrupt, and
were for the most part ready to flatter rather than to speak the
truth (2 Chron. xviii. 5). Every surviving element of good
seems to have been watched by Jezebel with jealous eye ; and
when Obadiah, in high authority in the palace, sought to
rescue some of the Lord's prophets from the cruel hands of the
queen, he had been obliged to resort to stratagem, and to hide
an hundred of them by fifties in a cave, where he fed them
with bread and water. Baal worship had swept like a flood
over Samaria, and the weak Ahab, with his strong-minded but
guilty wife, had transformed the whole northern kingdom of
Israel, containing a much larger population than that of Judah,
into the scene of everything that was impious and vile. The
day was at its very darkest, and every ray of light was threatening
taperish, when Elijah appeared.
The point, therefore, at which we stand is not an ordinary
point in the history of degenerate and degenerating Israel. It
is one wholly by itself. It marks a new stage in the people's
fall distinct from every other stage to which they had previously
sunk.- No era of the same character had as yet been seen.
Either Israel must for ever forfeit its position among the nations,
and in the religious history of the world, or the Almighty must
interpose and show Himself as He was, the only living and true
God, the God of holiness and righteousness. A greater crisis
does not exist in the history of the Jewish people ; and a more
remarkable prophet does not claim our notice until we come to
the days of Him in whom all men recognized a second Elijah.
Such, then, was' the condition of Israel at the moment when
Eliiah is introduced to us. Even his outward appearance

12 ELIJAH.
arrests our attention. We are told elsewhere that " he was an
hairy man, and girt with a girdle of leather about his loins"
(3 Kings i. 8). The" hairiness spoken of refers not to that of his
body, but of his dress. In the margin of the Revised Version
the meaning is correctly given as that of " a man with a gar
ment of hair," that is a garment made of goats' or camels' hair,
at once dark and rough, and worn by him, not as a mere ascetic,
but that it might be a symbol of his sorrow for the sins of the
people and the Divine judgments that had been incurred by
them.' A similar dress, and most probably for a similar pur
pose, was worn by the Baptist (Matt. iii. 4) ; and, when the
writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews describes the sufferings of
the saints of old, amidst which they remained faithful even unto
death, he enumerates among them that "they went about in
sheep-skins and goat-skins," at once the tokens of their poverty
and the signs of their humiliation in a sinful world. This garb
of Elijah is elsewhere called his " mantle." With it he covered
his face when at the mouth of his cave in Horeb he heard the
still small voice in which the glory of the Lord appeared (l
Kings xix. 13), and with it also he smote the waters of Jordan
so that he and Elisha went over upon dry ground (2 Kings
ii. 8). The leathern girdle again, also like that of the Baptist,
was more in harmony with the garment of hair than the ordi- -
nary girdle of linen or cotton would have been. In addition to
this, however, it would seem that there must have been some
thing peculiar either about Elijah's dress or about the manner
in which he wore it ; for, when the messengers of Ahaziah, in
reply to the inquiry of their master, what like the person was
Isy whom the message had been sent him that he should die,
referred to the dress of the man whom they had met, the king
at once recognized the prophet by the description, and ex
claimed, " It is Elijah the Tishbite " (2 Kings i.-S^ The dres^-
of the prophet, indeed, both told of the nature of that region of
the country from which he came, and corresponded to his mis
sion. He was no dweller in royal courts. He was nourished"
by no food from Jezebel's table. He did not even mingle in
society ; he did not eat and drink like the ordinarysons of men.
He came from the solitudes of the_ wild'efflSiS', and what he
was when he had been there he also was when he entered into
the presence of kings. Ahab must have been startled by the
' Keil, Comm. in loc.

ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH. I3
sudden and strange apparition, so startled that he could neither
speak nor act, for neither speech nor action is recorded of him.
In an instant Elijah was before him. In an instant he had
delivered his message ; and then, without any effort being made
to detain him, the next instant he was gone.
If, however, even Elijah's outward appearance would startle
the king, much more would his message do so : " As -the Lord
God of Israel Hveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be
dew or Vain these years, but according to my word." Much in
these words demands our attention.
I. The threatening uttered in them had in it nothing arbi
trary. It had been one of the special characteristics by which
the promised land, in comparison with Egypt, had been origi
nally commended to the Jews that it was " a land which drank
water of the rain of heaven ;" and God had promised His people
that, if they would hearken to the commandments of the Lord
their God, and would love Him and serve Him with all their
heart. He would give " the rain of their land in its season, the
former rain and the latter rain, that they might gather in
their corn and their wine and their oil." On the other hand,
the people had been warned that, if they turned aside, and
served other gods and worshipped them, " the anger of the Lord
would be kindled against them, and He would shut up the
heaven, that there should be no rain, and the land should not
yield her fruit" (Deut. xi. 11, 13-17)- The punishment now
threatened was, therefore, not arbitrary. It was the theocratic
penalty with which Ahab had been long familiar ; and the words
of the prophet must have told him, not merely of punishment,
but of the particular sin for which that punishment was to be
inflicted. It was not in presumption, therefore, that some un
known preacher had now entered into his presence uttering
angry denunciations of his own devising, but it was one who
spoke from trie very heart of that Divine Economy which Ahab
was bound to uphold, and who, at least, claimed to be a mes
senger of Him to whom both king and people owed all that they
possessed. 2. The light in which God is here presented to us. He is
" the living God," and the " God of Israel." As the former He
stood in contrast with all those objects of idolatrous worship to
which Ahab and his people had been paying homage. These
were no more than "dead idols," having no life themselves,

14 ELIJAH.
unable to give life to others, without power or even reality, fitly
represented by the stocks and stones that were worshipped in
their names. But the God of Israel lived. He had Hfe in Him
self. He was from everlasting to everlasting. His eyes were
upon His creatures. His ears were open to them. He took
account of their actions ; and, as life could only be main
tained in holiness, as sin was self-destructive. He could give
life to none but the obedient, and the wages of sin was
•death. As the God of Israel, again. He was the people's
covenant God. He had not kept Himself at a distance from
them. He had drawn near to them in their past history ; and,
as the unchangeable Jehovah, He was still drawing near to
them. Not by the dread of His power only, but by the thought
of His love, had He bound them to His service, and their whole
past history testified to the fact. They could recall their patri
archs, their prophets, the victories that had waited upon their
arms, the plenty that had crowned the labours of the year in
their pleasant land. And the experience of the past was the
promise of the future, for the gifts and calling of a living and
covenant God could not be otherwise than without repentance.
All that could either save or win the heart lay in the words,
<' The Lord God of Israel liveth."
- 3. Elijah's own personal relation to God. This finds expres
sion in the words, " Before whom I stand ; " and these words
tell far more than that the prophet at that moment was in the
presence of God, and that he spoke as one into whose mouth a
message had been put, of the faithful delivery of which he would
have to give account. An habitual attitude of the soul is pointed
at in Elijah's language. To hold constant intercourse with
God, to become familiar with Him, to have always an open ear
for His words, to be always ready to listen to and proclaim His
pleasure was the spirit of the prophet's life. Hence his autho
rity ; hence his strength. Before one who could and did so
live, earthly distinctions faded. The Apostle James reminds us
¦of this general principle when he says, " My brethren, hold not
the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with re
spect of persons" (chap. ii. i). The distinctions of riches and
poverty fade in the light of the glory of the Lord ; and thus it
was with Elijah. As a king, Ahab might inspire with terror
the subjects who would approach him. But there was a far
greater Ruler than he, one who cutsoff the spirit of princes.

ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH. 1 5
and who is terrible to the kings of the earth. Before Him,
before His messages and His messengers, the highest poten
tates of the world, when they are found in rebellion against Him,
may tremble.
4. One point remains still to be noticed in what Elijah said,
the manner in which he ends' his threatening, " but according
to my word." He does not mean that he was to send drought
or rain at his pleasure ; and that, as his temper or inclination
varied, Ahab might expect now the one and now again the
other. He had proclaimed a distinct and definite drought,
to begin then and there : " There shall not be dew or rain these
years." That is the threatening, the punishment. But it need
not be always so. He who has withheld the rain may again
send it ; and, when He sends it, it will be at His servant's word.
This is always the spirit of a truly Divine communication. If
there is punishment for the guilty there is also pardon for the
penitent. The decree that carries judgment in its bosom is not
irreversible. The threatened doom may be escaped. Let Israel
turn and repent, and he whose commission it is to bind has also
a commission to loose. The dew and the rain will again de
scend. The pastures will be clothed with flocks and the valleys
with corn.
Elijah's message is delivered, and the prophet does not wait to
observe its effect. He knows, in all probability, that it will have
none. But, whether he knows this or not, he must leave his
words to vindicate themselves. Prophets, messengers, minis
ters of God are apt to be in every age too anxious about the
immediate results of their work. There is no doubt a sense in
which they ought to be so, and a sense too in which they ought
to expect results. When these do not appear it may be a proof,
not that the Almighty's dealings are mysterious, but that our
methods are wrong. Good men have too often been blind to
tlie imperfection of their plans or of their modes of working
them, because their thoughts of God rested mainly in this, that
God giveth no account of any of His matters. A juster view of
the connection between wisdom and success might have led
to the discovery that their failure was due to the weakness of
their own human counsels rather than to the mysterious deal
ings of One whose footsteps are not known. But though this
be an error on the one side,, there, is an error on the other to be
equally avoided. Even the best and wisest may not succeed at

1 6 ELIJAH.
once. Let them leave the issue in the hands of One who
turneth the king's heart as the rivers of water. If they know
that their word is His they know also that it will prosper. Paul
may plant, and ApoUos water, " God gave (not, will give) the
increase" (i Cor. iii. 6). Let them speak earnestly, boldly,
faithfully, with no self-seeking, content to take all that comes
so that God be glorified. The work is theirs : the issue is with
Him. Thus the first great step in Elijah's work is taken ; and
again the Revelation of St. John, a book written out of the very
.heart both of the Old Testament and the New, and which often
elucidates the former as much as it is elucidated by it, shows
us' the point of view under which the prophet is to be contem
plated. In that book we read of the two witnesses, "And if
any man desire to hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, .
and devoureth their enemies : and if any man desire to hurt
them, in this manner must he be killed. These have power to
shut the heaven, that it rain not during the days of their pro
phecy " (chap. xi. 5, 6). No one will doubt for a moment that
the incidents lying at the bottom of this symbolic language are
to be found in the history of Elijah ; and, if so, the sacred
writer points out to us the nature of that light in which we are
especially to regard the prophet. He is a " witness,'' and his
prophetic work among men is "witnessing." The message
which he proclaims to men is a testimony to fads, independent
of himself and of any speculations of his own. As the apostle
John says of the Baptist, so we may say of the prophet who
preceded him in his spirit, " The same came for witness,
that he might bear witness concerning the Light" (chap. i. 7) ;
and the importance of the thought of " witnessing " is to be
learned from the frequency with which it meets us in the
writings of the beloved disciple. In various forms it occurs
fifty times in his Gospel, and about thirty or forty limes in his
Epistles and in the Apocalypse. It is one of his most charac
teristic words. What could he do but catch as far as possible
the rays that shone from His Divine Master, in order that,
simply as a mirror, he might reflect them again for light to the
world ? So was it with Elijah, and herein he comes before us |
as the type of the true prophet in every age, of the Christian '
minister as well as of the messenger of God to Israel. The,
Christian minister, not less than the prophet of old, is to forget

ISRAEL IN THE TIME OF ELIJAH. 17
himself. Not in original speculation on Divine things ; not even
first in exhortation or warning or encouragement ; but in a
simple presentation of facts He at once his chief sphere ot
action and his strength. How much has this been forgotten in
later ages of the Church, and how much in consequence has the
Church been weakened ! For the great dogmatic systems which,
in the course of the Church's history, have been prepared by
the piety and genius of true messengers of God, we can never
be too deeply thankful. They applied the facts of the New
Covenant to the difficulties, the doubts, and the longings
of the human heart in the times out of which they sprang, and
they have conquered many a department of the field of truth
for all time. We may honour and defend them. We may shun
the ignorance which affects not to understand or the narrow
ness of heart which cannot sympathize with them. But, except
in the presence of such errors as they met, they are not the
weapons of ministerial warfare, and they ought not to be made
the tests of ministerial faithfulness. There are few greater
mistakes than to imagine either that theology is fixed, or that
theological speculations are the aspects of Divine truth by
which we are to convert the. world. Theology, as distinguished
from the facts that underlie it, ought to be free ; and theo
logical speculation upon these facts is not for the world at all.
It is for the Church already formed, the Church that can sym
pathize with it, love it, and make clear to herself by means of
it the height and depth and length and breadth of the facts
upon which she rests. It was not by speculation about God
and man and judgment and eternity that our Lord convicted
the world ; it was by His Divine life of love and self-sacrifice
lived before its eyes ; and it was by the application of that life,
under the power of His Holy Spirit, that on the day of Pentecost
the Church was called into existence. Then came the period of
theology, but it is contained in letters to the churches, not in
sermons to men without their pale. The exam(>le has been too
mtich lost sight of. What has been called an orthodox theology
has been substituted for an orthodox life ; and practical love
and self-sacrifice have given way before the harsh voices, and
not less frequently the hard sentiments, of polemical divines.
The remedy is to return to that witnessing to facts which is the
true conception of the Church's function as she endeavours to
gather into her fold the many who still wander far from the
3

1 3 ELIJAH.
Shepherd's tent and the green pastures. St. John teaches us
that Elijah pursued his prophetic work as a " witness " ; and,
when we learn to pursue ours in the same spirit, then also shall
the other part of the figure employed by him in the same pas
sage be fulfilled in us. We shall be " the two olive trees and
the two candlesticks standing before the Lord of the earth"
(Rev. xi. 4. Comp. i Kings xvii. i). Our light will burn in the
tabernacle of the Lord with a bright and continuous flame ; and
v/hen we send it forth as the " stars,'' as the " angels " of the
Church, the earth will be lightened with its glory (comp. Rev.
xviii. ii.

CHAPTER II.
THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH.
(l KINGS XVII. 2-24.)
Second stage of Elijah's work and preparation for it— Lessons to be learned
by the prophet — Dependence upon God, and fellowship with man in
suffering— The brook Cherith— Elijah there miraculously sustained—
Learns dependence upon God — The brook dries up— The prophet is
sent to Zarephath— Learns fellowship with man in suffering — Second
great lesson as to the wideness of God's plan and His large and universal
love— Again miraculously sustained — Widow's child raised to life — ¦
Lesson ot the incidents at Zarephath — The mission of God wider than
we think — Need of similar lessons now — Importance of the means by
which Elijah was taught — Value of action.
The first stage in the drama of Elijah's life is over. He has
begun his mission with the firmness and boldness which are to
distinguish him throughout. He has met Ahab in the height
of his power. In the presence of the king, perhaps in his
palace at Samaria, he has announced himself as the prophet of
that living God whom Israel has forsaken, and he has pro
claimed the immediate approach of the most terrible of all
calamities to a land so dependent upon rain as was the land of
Palestine — a drought, and the famine which would inevitably
accompany it. That work is over, and the people have now to
be left for a time to experience the effects of the threatened
judgment. Meanwhile Elijah has before him a second stage ot
his work, greater, more public, more imposing, more full of far-
reaching issues than the first. His true work indeed, that for
which he had been especially raised up as a prophet of the Lord,
was still before him ; and for. it, as for almost all great work
recorded in the Bible, preparation was needed. Public, how-

20 ELIJAH.
ever, as the work was to be, the preparation for it was not to be
also public. The seed that is to grow into the stately tree does
not seek the upper air from the moment when it is committed
to the ground. It must be buried in the ground, and in the
silence and darkness there must germinate for a season until
its downward shoots have penetrated the soil, and have given
it such a hold of its position that it shall be able to resist the
scorching sun and the storms of vi'ind and rain that would other
wise overwhelm it when it bursts into the light. So it was with
Moses. It was no useless time, we may be sure, that was spent
by him in Midian, when for forty years he dwelt in the desert
where, at the very beginning of his retirement, God appeared to
him in the bush burning but not consumed. So was it with
John the Baptist, who was prepared for addressing Scribes and
Pharisees, priests and people, not in the crowded city of Jeru
salem, in the synagogue, or in the schools, but in those deserts of
Judffia and by the Jordan where he would rarely behold a human
countenance, and would seldom have an opportunity of listen
ing to a human voice. So was it with St. Paul, whose educa
tion at the feet of Gamaliel, and in all the learning of his day,
had to be supplemented by a visit of three years to Arabia, where
his surroundings, whatever they may have been, were certainly
widely different from the scenes in which he was afterwards to
move. And so, may it not with reverence be said, was it with
our Lord Himself, who not only waited till the age of thirty
before He was inaugurated to His work, but who was then led
up of the spirit, not to Nazareth where His first sermon was to
be preached, but into the wilderness, in order that, tempted of
the devil, He might overcome, as it were gathered together in
one focus, all the trials that were to meet Him during His earthly
ministry. Thus also was it with Elijah. No doubt he needed
to wait until the effects of the famine should be felt. But the
whole structure of the narrative before us forbids the thought
that this was the only reason for the withdrawal of the prophet
from Ahab and Jezebel, from the court and the people. A
period of retirement was necessary for him that in it he might
learn those lessons which an immediate public appearance
would have tended to dissipate rather than enforce.
In particular, Elijah had to be taught :
I. Dependence upon God, and fellowship with man in suffering.
2. That the God of Israel who sent him had a wider plan, and

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE. OF ELIJAH. 21
was animated by a larger and more universal love than he sup
posed. To the learning of those two lessons he must now
devote himself.
I. The first of them is learned by the brook Cherith— "And
the word of the Lord came unto Elijah, saying. Get thee hence,
and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the brook Cherith,
that is before Jordan. And it shall be that thou shalt drink of
the brook ; and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee
there." Much uncertainty prevails as to the exact position of
this brook. It is even possible that, though indicated with
sufficient clearness to the prophet by circumstances not men
tioned in the narrative, the" sacred historian has the idea of the
nature of the brook rather than any particular locality in view.
The word "Cherith" means "cut off" or "separated," and
Elijah was now to be separated from the world and to dwell for
a season alone. In entire accordance with that spirit of Hebrew
thought which delighted to give to places names that should
express their history or character, this brook might be called
the brook " Cherith," because of the use now made of it. Should
this possibility be rejected we have no certain knowledge where
it was. By some it is placed to the east of the Jordan in Gilead,
that portion of the country from which Elijah came, and to
which they think it natural that he should again be sent. By
others it is found on the west side of the Jordan, but at different
points, one higher up, another lower down, the stream. The
question is one of entirely subordinate importance, though
tradition points rather to the last of the three localities than to
either of the former two. It is enough for us to know that the
Cherith was one of those wadies or narrow defiles that are not
uncommon in the Holy Land, where steep banks, often taking
the form of perpendicular cliffs, confine the little stream that
rushes in the rainy season down the bottom of the valley.
These cliffs, composed of the limestone rock of the country, are
full of caves difficult to reach, and in those by the side of the
Cherith, according to the best established view of its position,
not a few of the early Anchorites of the Christian Church are
said to have found- refuge at one time from persecution, and at
another from the world. To one of these brooks or wadies
Elijah was directed by " the word of the Lord " to flee, that he
might escape the first outburst of the rage of Ahab, and that his
work of preparation might begin.

22 ELIJAH.
Let us follow him to the Cherith. He was far from the abodes
of men, or from any who could help him to obtain sustenance in
what was undoubtedly a remote and desert place. But he had
that promise of God to lean upon which immediately accom
panied His command, "And it shall be that thou shalt drink of
the brook ; and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee
there." Nay, not only was the promise given. Startling as it
was it was also fulfilled ; for, when he went and did according
to the word of the Lord, we are immediately informed that "the
ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning and bread
and flesh in the evening, and he drank of the brook." The
continuance of the supply of water need occasion us no sur
prise. It is not spoken of as if it were miraculous; audit is
perfectly conceivable that, if the stream came from the hilly
country of the South, which was less affected by the drotight
than the territory of Israel, water might have flowed much
longer there than in the northern districts of the land. Besides
which we know that after a short time its supply of water failed.-
Elijah's dependence upon the water of the Cherith is natural and
easily understood. His being fed by the ravens is the only
difficulty of the passage. The miracle, indeed, is so remarkable,
so much out of keeping with most even of the other miracles. of
Scripture, that even pious and devout minds may well be per
plexed by it, and we can feel no surprise at the numerous and
varied attempts which have been made to explain it in a more
simple manner than that which the words taken literally
suggest. Such attempts are not inconsistent with the most
profound reverence for the Word of God, and the highest
estimate of its practical value. They are, rather, not unfre-
quently, the result of a just persuasion that the Eastern mind
did not express itself in forms similar to those of the West, or
they are an effort to apply to the point before us the most-im
portant rule for the interpreter of the thoughts of others, — that
the idea in the mind of the speaker or writer, and not the
merely literal interpretation of what he says, is the meaning of
his words. We must protest, therefore, at the very outset,
against the harsh judgments often pronounced on those to
whom the literal interpretation of this passage presents insuper
able difficiflties, and who wouldfain resort to other explanations.
Those who do so cannot be fairly charged with rejecting, in
this and similar cases, the plain meaning of the Bible. Their

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH. 23
whole aim is to discover whether or not the plain meaning ii
the true one. In symbolical or figurative language these twa
meanings differ widely from one another. It may be so here ;
and, if it can be shown that it is so, the proof may not only
relieve us of difficulties, but may enrich our knowledge ot
Scripture by the new rule of interpretation which is given us.
Of the attempts thus made two may be noticed, but only to be
rejected upon e.Kegetical and historical grounds.
It has been proposed to translate the original word for
"ravens " by " Arabians," a change easily made by altering the
vowel points of the Hebrew which are of no authority. But
had this meaning been intended we should certainly have no
definite article prefixed to the noun, as it is impossible to think
that such a charge could have been committed to a race of men
at once so numerous and so widely spread. Again it has been
suggested that the original, as it stands, may mean either
" merchants " or inhabitants of Orbo, a small town in the
neighbourhood of the Jordan, not far from Beth-shan or Scy-
thopolis. But this solution has to face the difficulty of suppos
ing that the Cherith was in that particular neighbourhood;
besides which there is, as Rawlinson has said, " the impro
bability that men would come regularly, twice a daf, to supply
the prophet, thus giving themselves needless trouble and
increasing the chance of detection when they might easily have
left him a supply for several days." ' In both these interpreta
tions there is almost as much improbability as in ascribing to
the ravens what was done. Other suggestions are either so
trifling or so ludicrous as to be unworthy of notice.
If the miracle before us is not to be literally understood, the
solution of the difficulty presented by it must be sought in some
other way. So looking at it, the selection of the raven, as the
bird by which Elijah was to be fed, must at once strike the
mind, and the idea of that bird, as the Jews were accustomed
to think of it, must be determined. There is no difficulty in
coming to a conclusion on the latter point. The raven was
unclean. It was one of those birds which the children of Israel
Were to have in abomination among the fowls (Lev. xi. 15). In
the Book of Proverbs, if we adopt the marginal rendering of
the Revised Version, "the ravens of the brook" are, for their
carnivorous and cruel habits, classed with the young vultures.
• " Speaker's Commentary," in loc.

24 ELIJ.A.H.
" The eye that mocketh at his father and despiseth to obey his
mother the ravens of the brook shall pick it out, and the young
vultures shall eat it" (chap. xxx. 17) ; Avhile the prophet Isaiah
makes use of it in order to heighten his picture of the desolation
of the land of Idumeei, " And the owl and the raven shall dwell
therein " (chap, xxxiv. 11). Thus, then, it is at least -conceiv. ;
able that an explanation of the passage before us may be found.
The sacred writer may intend to express the thought that Elijah
was supported in circumstances the most desperate, by means
the very opposite of those likely to be helpful to him. An un
clean and ravenous bird shall nourish him. The thought may
be, in some degree, similar to that in St. Mark's account of the
Temptation of our Lord, when the Evangelist tells us that " He "
was with the wild beasts." The wild beasts of the wilderness
owned His presence, and submitted themselves to His sway.
"When a man's ways please the Lord He maketh even his
enemies to be at peace with him : " " Thou shalt tread upon the
lion and the adder ; the young lion and the serpent shalt thou
trample under feet : '' and when, in the Revelation of St. John,
the triumph of the Church is celebrated, it is in the words,
"Behold, I give of the synagogue of Satan, of them- which say
they are Jews and they are not, but do lie ; behold, I will make
them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I
have loved thee " (Prov. xvi. 7 ; Psa. xci. 13 ; Rev. iii. 9).
After all, however, it may well be asked whether it is neces
sary to have recourse to explanations such as these. To Elijah
it may have been of the utmost consequence to see that, in the
very moment of his severest trial, nature and the God of nature
were on his side ; and nothing could more effectually convey
that lesson to him than the service of these unclean and raven
ous birds. If, therefore, the whole scene be not a highly
poetic and figurative representation of this truth, little more can
be said to meet the difficulty. The interpretation of the Old Tes
tament has as yet made little really scientific progress. When it
has made the advance so much demanded in our day, we may
be better able to understand passages such as that before us.
In the meantime, while we wait for light, our proper attitude is
to accept the narrative as it stands. The value of the prophet's
experience is neither heightened by a literal, nor diminished
by a figurative, interpretation of what passed.
Thus, then, Elijah dwelt at the brook Cherith. He was not

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH. 2?
merely alone in the wilderness, with no patch of ground to
cultivate and no means of providing for himself. He was also
in flight, surrounded by enemies, not daring to show himself
amidst his fellow-men. Ahab, we may be sure, had already
begun that search for him which, as we afterwards learn, was
continued during the whole period of the drought. What was
he to do ? Let him trust in God. By " the word of the Lord "
he had betaken himself to his present solitude (\'er. 2) ; and
He who has sent him there will provide for him. Day by day,
as the sky over his head was brass, and the earth under his feet
was iron, he would feel how hopeless it was to think of de
pending upon any resources of his own. But an unfailing
supply of every want was granted him. Morning after morning,
evening after evening, bread and flesh were there. Could he
fail to remember the, manna and the quails with which God had
of old fed His peojtle in their wanderings, or the streams of
water with which in the -desert He had quenched their thirst ?
His position was precisely analogous to theirs. They were
passing through the wilderness in order to establish the Divine
polity of Israel. He was in the wilderness that, after that polity
had been forsaken, he might restore it to its ancient purity and
vigour. In such circumstances the old histories of his nation
would unquestionably come back upon him with renewed fresh
ness and power. He would accompany his fathers at every
step of their journeyings, his faith strengthening each morning
as he looked forward to the trials of the day, his peace deepening
each evening as he sought his nightly rest "a day's march
nearer home," until at length he would think of himself as en
tering with his fathers into the promised land. In like manner
would the living God now deal with him. There was strength,
comfort, joy, hope, in the thought. The wilderness around him
would become a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water
(Isa. xii. 18).
But this wa^not all. By the brook Cherith Elijah had to
learn not simply dependence upon God : he had to learn also
fellowship with man. In looking at the narrative before us it
seems obvious that the ministering of sustenance to the prophet,
while famine was everywhere around him, is not the only fact
upon which we are to dwell. For the brook dried up, although
it would have been as easy for the Almighty to supply water by
miracle as either flesh or bread. In addition, therefore, to the

26 ELIJAH.
lesson of dependence upon God, the prophet was taught that,
cared for as he was, he was not wholly separated from his
people in their sufferings, but that, along with them, he must
taste the consequences of their sin. We can easily imagine
what strange questionings would arise within his breast when
he first awoke to a full consciousness of the fact that the vv-ater
of the Cherith was beginning to fail. For anything that appears
there was no straitened supply of flesh and bread. Why then
should the water fail which was yet even more necessary to
life .'' The instrument of inflicting suffering upon others, he
may have imagined that in his own case there was to be no
suffering similar to theirs. The people had been faithless : let
them suffer. He had been faithful : why should suffering fall
on him ? He had broken all social bonds with these idolaters.
He had even fled from their country, and now he had no more
common cause with them. He had found another home in the
wilderness where bread was given him and his water was sure ;
and there, without having to engage further in the struggles of
the world, he might think that he should be permitted to end his
days in peace. The temptation was, and is, a great one. The
servant of God who has fully proclaimed the message of the
Divine judgment upon sin and sinners is peculiarly apt to think
that he may himself escape the consequences he has denounced
on others. And so he may ; but worse consequences may
follow. He may become selfish, indifferent, and hard ; and,
with neither sympathy in his heart nor tear in his eye, may fall
below the level of both the prophet and the man.
The Almighty therefore deals with us upon different prin
ciples. He has so united the various classes of society together
— the good and the bad, the believing and the unbelieving, the
rich and the poor, the master and the servant, the pastor and
his flock, the prophet and those to whom he prophesies— that
none of them can suffer without the others being more or less
involved in the same calamity. No one class, by attending only
to its own necessities, can save itself from ruin. All classes are
so bound up in the same bundle of life that what one loses or
gains is to a large extent gained or lost by all. Give the laws
of God free play and they will work out this conclusion for
themselves ; and, when they work it out, the effect will be per
manent. The process may be sometimes slow. We become
impatient, and we rush to legislation for an immediate cure.

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH. 27
But legislation cannot bind the different classes of society
together ; and, as it is generally the legislation of the strong
against the weak, whether of the aristocracy against the demo
cracy or of the, democracy against the aristocracy, it may mul
tiply rather than diminish obstacles to the carrying out of the
plans of a beneficent Creator. The true happiness of a people
can only spring from what a people are in heart and hfe.
Righteousness alone exalteth a nation, and one main part of
that righteousness is the binding all its members more and
more closely together in common sympathy and love. In the
midst of the wickedness or sorrows of the world we may some
times be disposed to ask. Why should' we concern ourselves ?
We can do no good : and then, if we cannot save others, we
may at least save ourselves. We may avoid their fate by shun
ning them, retiring from them, and nourishing a Divine life
within our own souls, whatever they may do. It cannot be.
The brook that has failed them will fail us also. The sources
of our own life will become dry.
Elijah had been taught his first great lesson — dependence
upon God and fellowship with man in suffering. His second
lesson had now to be impressed upon him.
2. He must learn that the God of Israel had a wider plan,
and was animated by a larger and -more universal love than he
supposed. Such is the point of view under which we are to
regard the narrative occupying the remainder of this chapter.
Our Lord has Himself given us its key. When, at the close of
His first sermon in Nazareth, His hearers would have demanded
of Him that, whatsoever they had heard of as done at Caper
naum, He should do also in His own country. He replied, " Of
truth I say unto you. There were many widows in Israel in the
days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and
six months, when there came a great famine over all the land ;
and unto none of them was Elijah sent, but only to Zarephath,
in the land of Sidon, unto a woman that was a widow " (Luke
iv. 25-26). These words disclose the light in which we are to
look at the incident as recorded here. Not the sustenance
afforded by the widow to the prophet, but that afforded through
the prophet to her and to her child, is intended to occupy our
thoughts. ISfot the lesson of dependence upon God and of fel
lowship with man is that now taught him whom the Almighty
was preparing for his coming work, but the further lesson that,

28 ELIJAH.
however he may have thought of judgment only as his work, he
had a mission of mercy to perform, and one too of the widest
and most comprehensive kind.
The incident is connected with Zarephath, a -small Phoenician
town situated between Tyre and Sidon, and possessing even
in Elijah's time no claims to notice, except in so far as it became
associated with the history of the prophet. The inhabitants
appear to have been descended from the ancient Canaanites ;
and we may be sure that they were worshippers of Baal, whose
worship was promoted by Ethbaal, king of the Zidonians, over
all that country. To this place, therefore, and into the very
midst of that idolatry against which he was by and by to
struggle was Elijah sent. " The word of the Lord came unto
him, saying. Arise, get thee to Zarephath, which belongeth to
Zidon, and dwell there : behold, I have commanded a widow
there to sustain thee." Nothing is yet said of the fact that the
widow was rather to be sustained through the agency of the
prophet. This Elijah will learn in time. He obeyed the com
mand thus given. He arose and went the long journey from
the valley of the Cherith to Zarephath ; and there is something
exceedingly touching in the account given of the manner in
which he fell in with the widow whom he sought. When he
came to the gate of the city she was there gathering sticks ;
and Elijah, perhaps already divining that this was the person
to whom he was commissioned, and weary with his toilsome
travelling, "called to her, and said. Fetch me, I pray thee, a
little water in a vessel, that I may drink." We are reminded
of Abraham's servant Eliezer when he went in search ot
Rebekah (Gen. xxiv. 14), and of our Lord's first greeting to the
woman of Samaria (John iv. 7). In readiness to help others
we often best show that preparation of the heart which makes
us ready for being helped ourselves. The woman at once
answered the appeal, for " the fresh streams of Lebanon," the
range of mountains at the base of which Zarephath lay, "would
retain their life-giving power after the scantier springs of Pales
tine had been dried up." ' She went away for the water, and .
as she went to fetch it the prophet cried after her, " Bring me,
I pray thee, a morsel of bread in thine hand." Then her full
misery was revealed, and Elijah knewby the very desperateness
of her condition that she was the woman whom he sought, and
' Stanley, "Lectures on Jewish Church," second series, lect. xxx.

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH. 29

that hers was the house which the Lord was to bless through
him. "As the Lord thy God hveth," she replied, " I have not
a cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil [the
olive oil of the country, an important element of food] in a-
cruse : and, behold, I am gathering two sticks, that I may go in
and dress it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die."
It was enough. The nature of the charge entrusted to him
burst in all its clearness upon the prophet's mind, and the
promise might now be uttered with the assurance that it applied
directly to her to whom he spoke it, " Thus saith the Lord God
of Israel, The barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall the
cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain upon
the earth." He accompanied her home, and she, and he, and
her house did " eat many days;'' and the barrel of meal wasted
not, and the cruse of oil failed not, " according to the word of
the Lord, which He spake by Elijah."
Nothing further is told us of the manner in which the prophet
employed the time spent by him in the house of the widow of
Zarephath. It is not indeed necessary to suppose that during
the whole interval between his entering it and his public appear
ance upon Carmel, a period probably not less than two years,
he remained in close seclusion within its walls. In particular,
we may well be permitted to imagine that he frequently crossed
the small intervening space of ground separating Zarephath from
Carmel, and that in the solitudes of that mountain range, which
seems to have had a special attraction for him, he sought and
found opportunities of converse with God. But, while within
the widow's house, there can be little doubt that, both by word
and by the tone and spirit of his life, he would discourage her
idolatry, and guide her to the truth. Nor, as we shall imme
diately see, was his labour vain.
One other incident, however, of Elijah's stay at Zarephath is
recorded, and must be considered before we are in a position to
estimate aright the effect upon the prophet of his residence in
the widow's house. " And it came to pass," we are told, " after
these things, that the son of the woman, the mistress of the house,
fell sick ; and his sickness was so sore, that there was no breath
left in him." The conjecture has been made, and even widely
entertained, that the apparent death was no more than a swoon.
Yet little is gained by the supposition, which is also at variance
with the general spirit, as well as with some of the particular

30 ' ELIJAH.
expressions of the passage. We can hardly be wrong, therefore,.
in accepting the commonly received interpretation, that the child
had actually died. It was a sore calamity, for the boy seems,
like the young man at Nain in the Gospel history, to have been
the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. The mother
felt all the bitterness of her loss, and it was no more than a
natural outburst of maternal feeling that led her to connect it,
in one way or another, with the presence of the prophet in her
house. As she held the child in her bosom she turned to Elijah
with the cry, " What have I to do with thee, O thou man of
God ? Thou art come unto me to bring my sin to remembrance,
and to slay my son." There is more, however, than maternal
feeling in these words. The instinct of man makes him fear
that he cannot see God and live, and that if he comes into
immediate contact either with God, or with any being, such as
angel or man, who is truly representative of His holiness, the
penalty can be nothing- less than death. So deeply engraven
on the human heart is the thought of the perfect righteousness
of the Sovereign Ruler of the universe, and at the same time of
its own desert of punishment because it has wandered from Him,
that its first conception of the Divine Being is always formed in
alarm, not in confidence, in terror, not in hope. Nor is it the
consideration of any particular sin of which we have been guilty
that produces this effect. A particular sin may be, and often is,
readily enough pardoned by a fellow creature ; why may it not
still more be pardoned by Him who knoweth our frame and
remembereth that we are dust.? It is the consciousness of a
sinful nature that inspires the fear ; the conviction that there is
a gulf between us and the Holy One to whom we owe ourselves ;
the feeling that we dare not stand in the presence of One who
cannot look upon sin but with abhorrence. A ray of the Divine
glory penetrates the soul, and the conclusion forces itself upon
us that that glory can only consume the sinner as a fire. " I
have heard of Thee," we cry, " with the hearing of the ear, but
now mine eye seeth Thee, wherefore I abhor myself, and repent
in dust and ashes " (Job xhi. s, 6). Thus it was that. Jacob beheld
with astonishment his life preserved at Peniel, though he had
there seen God (Gen. xxxii. 30) ; that, when Gideon perceived
that he had seen an angel of the Lord, he exclaimed, "Alas,
O Lord God ! because I have seen an angel of the Lord face to
face " (Judges vi. 22) ; and that when Manoah and his wife

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE 0F> ELIJAH. 31
saw their angehc visitant ascending unto heaven in the flame
of the altar, and knew that he was an angel of the Lord, Manoah
" said unto his wife. We shall surely die because we have seen
God" (Judges xiii. 22). Thus even was it in far later times ;
for, instead of starting up in joy and thankfulness when he
beheld the miraculous draught of fishes, Peter fell down at
Jesus' knees, _saying, " Depart from me ; for I am a sinful man,
O Lord" (Luke v. 8) ; and, when the exalted Redeemer revealed
Himself in His heavenly glory to the Apostle John in Patmos,
the beloved disciple himself tells us that he " fell at His feet as
one dead " (Rev. i. 17). Only then can we bear the glory of the
Divine when our consciences have been pacified by the assurance
that, not in ourselves, but in another who is the well-beloved of
the Father, we are one with God. Not therefore from the
thought of any particular transgression of which she had been
guilty, but because the tokens of something Divine were imme
diately before her eyes did the widow of Zarephath turn to Elijah
with the cry, " What have I to do with thee, O thou man of God ?
Thou art come to me to bring my sin to remembrance, and to
slay my son."
Elijah immediately entered into the mother's grief, but he
would act rather than speak for her in that hour of sorrow. At
once he said, " Give me thy son ; and he took him out of her
bosom, and carried him up into the chamber where he abode,
and laid him upon his own bed." Doubtless he might have
done all that he was to do in the chamber occupied by the
mother, and in her presence. But his own chamber was one
which he must have often sanctified by prayer ; his own bed
one on which, like David, he must often have prevented the
dawning of the morning with his cry, " Hear my voice,
according to Thy loving-kindness " (Psa. cxix. 147, 149) : and,
familiar as he was with the power of prayer, it was natural for
him now to seek the chamber and the bed where his- prayers
had been so often answered. If in one sense it is all the same
where we pray, in another it is not. It is a good thing to have
some familiar spot where we have been wont to cry to the
Hearer and Answerer of prayer, and where we know that He
has heard us. Thus Abram, when he returned from Egypt to
Canaan, " went on his journeys from the south even unto Bethel,
unto the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between
Bethel and Ai, unto the place of the altar which he had made

32 ELIJAH.
there at the first : and there Abram called on the name of the
Lord " (Gen. xiii. 3, 4 ; comp. xii. 8). Thus God said to Jacob,
" Go up to Bethel, and dwell there ; and make there an altar
unto God that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the
face of Esau thy brother." It was to Bethel that he was .to go,
the place where he had previously taken the stone that had
been his pillow and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil on the
top of it, and consecrated it as to him " none other than the
house of God and the gate of heaven '' (Gen. xxxv. i ; comp.
.xxviii. 18). Thus, also, it was that Daniel went to his chamber
with its windows open towards Jerusalem, when, in contravention
to the king's command, he worshipped according to the law of
his God (Dan. vi. lo) : nor can we forget how often our Lord
found on the Mount of Olives, and most probably on the same
spot, a little sanctuary in which to pray to His Father in heaven.
Yes, it is a good thing, not only to retire from the world for
prayer and communion with the Father of our spirits, but to
retire to some quiet retreat which we have often visited for the
same purpose, and which, by that power of association of ideas
so deeply planted in our nature, may do more than other places
to awaken within us a holy and a joyful fervour.
Under the influence of feelings like these then it was that
Elijah now took up the body of the widow's son to his own '
chamber ; and, laying it on his bed, " stretched himself upon
it three times (a number apparently intended to express the
fervour and earnestness of his feelings), and cried unto the Lord,
and said, O Lord my God, I pray Thee, let this child's soul
come unto him again." The action was the same as that of
Elisha, who, when he would restore the son of the Shunammite
woman to life, " went up, and lay upon the child, and put his
mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his
hands upon his hands, and he stretched himself upon the child "
(2 Kings iv. 34). It was the same also as that of St. Paul with
Eutychus, when the apostle " went down, and fell on him, and
embracing him said, Make ye no ado, for his life is in him "
(Acts XX. 10) ; and in all these cases the action was not intended
to be curative in itself, but was for the expression and the
strengthening of the faith of the supplicant. Such faith has
power with God. The " supphcation of a righteous man
availeth much in its working" (James v. 16) ; and He who willeth
not the death of any of His creatures answers the prayer for

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH. 33
mercy not less than for judgment. He did so now. " The
Lord hearkened unto the voice of Elijah ; and the soul of the
child came into him again and he revived. And Elijah took
the child, and brought him down out of his chamber into the
house," that is, into the lower apartment of the house, "and
delivered him unto his mother."
The effect was what might have been anticipated ; whatever
may have been the widow's doubts before, she could resist no
longer. Surely the presence and power of a far greater God
than any she had ever known were there. She recognized Him
of whom she had often heard, the Lord God of Elijah ; and, in
the spirit of the Galilean nobleman whose son Jesus restored
to life, she exclaimed to the prophet, " Now I know that thou
art a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in thy mouth
is truth." So far as we have any information given us we have
here the first-fruits of Elijah's ministry, and it will be observed
that they are reaped, not amongst his kinsmen, but amongst
aliens ; not among God's ancient people, but among Gentiles
beyond the pale of the covenant and involved in the thickest
-darkness. In now endeavouring to estimate the place which these
incidents at Zarephath hold in the history of Elijah, it is not
necessary that we should confine ourselves to the actual effect
- whicE they produced on him. That effect may be part, but it
may be only part, of the reason why they took place and are
recorded by the sacred penman. That Elijah did not always
comprehend the purpose of the Almighty's revelations of Him
self will appear clearly when we come to consider the vision
-presented to him at Horeb. Here, in like manner, we have to
deal with what God intends as well as with what His servant
understands. We may certainly expect to find a correspondence
between the two : but the correspondence may not be perfect,
and the one may not be the measure of the other. The lesson
may be in advance of the pupil, as indeed, to some extent at
least, it ought always to be.
What, then, was the tendency of these incidents at Zarephath?
It is of course easy to conceive that Elijah might have been
sent there, because Zarephath was in the very heart of the
idolatries of the Baal-worship ; and because, like Luther at
Rome, the great reformer of Israel would thus become ac
quainted with the worst features of the system he was to over-
4

34 ELIJAH.
throw. But, even though this may have been thought of, we
know, from the teaching of our Lord at Nazareth already
spoken of, that it was subordinate to the higher purpose of
widening the horizon and enlarging the sympathies, in the first
place of the prophet himself, and then of Israel.
The most remarkable feature in the whole narrative is obvi
ously this, that the incidents related happened in a family be
yond the borders of the promised land, in a Canaanitish home,
to one who by her own confession had not believed in the God
of Elijah, but had rather been a worshipper of Baal, a pupil in
the school of Ahab and of Jezebel. Surely there were many
widows in Israel to whom the prophet might have been sent on
his mission of mercy ; widows as poor, as helpless, and as
desolate as the widow of Zarephath, and who, perhaps, belonged
to the unseen remnant of faith still existing in the land. Yet
his mission had been directed to one beyond the pale of covenant
privilege, an alien, and a heathen. Once again, in the life ot
our Lord, an incident of almost exactly the same kind happened.
Jesus, too, came into these very parts, the borders of Tyre and
Sidon ; and there a Canaanitish woman besought Him that He
would heal her daughter. The disciples regarded her with dis
dain. Perhaps they would even have confined the blessings
bestowed by their Master to the lost sheep of the house ol
Israel ; and they intreated Jesus to send the petitioner away.
But Jesus pitied her, spoke to her, reasoned with her, and drew
out what was in her heart, until at last He exclaimed, " O
woman, great is thy faith, be it unto thee even as thou wilt ; and
her daughter was made whole from that'hour" (Matt. xv. 21-28)-
In both cases the lesson is essentially the same. The mission
of God is wider than we think. Children of God are to be
found scattered where, left to ourselves, we should hardly seek
for them. There is a covenant beyond the covenant. There are
those who are " of God," who are " of the truth," in scenes
where we imagine that those only are to be met with who are
the children of idolatry and falsehood. Jesus has " other sheep
which are not of this fold," and He says, " Them also I musv
bring, and they shall hear my voice ; and they shall become one
flock, one shepherd " (John x. 16). Now all this we are pecu
liarly liable to forget, and that, in exact proportion to ouf
earnestness. When we are most in earnest we are most in
danger of identifying some narrower cause which we advocate

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH. 35
with the cause of God. Elijah was the very embodiment of a
devoted and zealous prophet ; but his prophetic work had been
confined to Israel, and he had so struggled and, suffered in it
that he had come to look upon Israel as the only object of con
cern to the Almighty. The disciples of our Lord in their day
were again the very embodiment of faithfulness in the service
of their Master, but they, too, had come to think that the chosen
people alone ought to awaken interest in His heart. In neither
case probably was there much reasoning upon the point. Yet
they acquiesced the more cheerfully in the conclusion that it
appealed at once to feeling and to sight. It appealed to feeling,.
because it flattered their own self-importance. That they and
their people should be chosen, while others were passed by,
could not fail to please rather than humble the natural exclusive-
ness of the heart ; and, although Divine grace, allowed to operate
freely, will eventually subdue that spirit, it does not gain
the mastery in a moment. Narrowness of spirit appealed also
to sight. The thing believed in was more visible, tangible, one
may say, more material, than it would otherwise have been.
Israel as an outward institution was before the eye. Its boun
daries could be marked. The smoke of its offerings could be
seen ascending to heaven. Its bursts of music could be heard
sounding in every breeze that swept across the land. In the
other case the marks of the Divine Presence were far more
intangible, and could only be realized by a faith which pene
trates darkness, and which can hear in " impressive silence "
the song of praise. Not that this dependence upon the help of
the material is in every respect wrong. The incarnation of our
Lord has consecrated it for ever ; and the most spiritual of
the apostles has said, "That which we have heard, that
which we have seen with our eyes, that which we have beheld,
and our hands handled, concerning the Word of life (and the
life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and
declare unto you the life, the eternal life, which was with the
Father, and was manifested unto us) ; that which we have seen
and heard declare we unto you also, that ye also may have
fellowship with us : yea, and our fellowship is with the Father,
and with His Son Jesus Christ" (l John i. 1-3). We are not,
however, on this account justified in resting upon the outward
Christ. " Even though we have known Christ after the flesh,
yet now we know Him so no more" (2 Cor. v. 16).

36 ELIJAH.
Elijah in his day, the disciples of Jesus in their day, needed,
and we not less in our own time need, to be trained to this
spirit, for men are always prone to think that their own small
vineyard is the only one in which the great Husbandman can
ripen His fruits. He may there ripen them'better thah else
where. It does not follow that He ripens them only there ; and
it is absolutely essential that we should learn this lesson, if we
are to take any effective part in promoting God's kingdom in
the world. No one can rightly do the work of God, even in
any limited sphere in which he may have been placed, until hei
has learned that there is something wider than that sphere, and
that to the establishment of the wider, not the narrower, all the
plans of God ultimately tend. We cannot worship truly in the
temple built with hands unless we recognize the fact that there
is a temple built without hands. We cannot really love our
neighbour unless we own a neighbour in eyery child of Adam.
And we cannot successfully serve the Israel of God unless we
feel that those as yet beyond that Israel are also the objects of
our heavenly Father's love, and that He would have all men to
be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth
" There's a wideness in God's mercy
Like the wideness of the sea ;
There's a kindness in His justice,
Which is more than liberty.
For the love of God is broader
Than the measures of man's mind }
And the heart of the Eternal
Is most wonderfully kind.
But we make His love too narrow
By false limits of our own ;
And we magnify His strictness
With a zeal He will not own." '
The lesson thus impressed upon Elijah by his being sent to
Zarephath was one of infinite importance, and it is a part of the
great truth everywhere imbedded in the Old Testament, though
not clearly seen in every age^ that the God of Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob, was also the God of the whole earth, and that His
salvation was from the beginning designed to be universal.
Israel, no doubt, did not at first apprehend this truth, and had
to be educated more fully in it as it drew nearer to the age
" Faber.

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH. 37
of Him in whom all acknowledge that there is neither Jew
nor Greek, neither bond nor free, neither male nor female
(Gal. iii. 28). But the point to be particularly observed is that
the truth was in the Old Testament itself more than in the Old
Testament people. It was not a development as time ran on
and experience was gathered. To man it was so, not to God ;
and the simple fact that the clearest traces of it are to be met
with long before it was understood by the most enlightened
members of God's ancient covenant, is a testimony to the Divine
idea which lies at the bottom of the Old Testament, and to the
fact that Israel was guided throughout all its history by a Divine,
and not a human, hand.
If the lesson thus impressed upon Elijah was important,
hardly less imnortant were the means by which the lesson
was taught The prophet was not reasoned with, but was
sent to judge for himself of the sufferings of his fellow-creatures,
.and was instructed to relieve them. And he was to do this
independently of both national and religious ties. Nay, his
greatest exertions were to be made on behalf of those who were
the enemies at once of Israel and of Israel's God. Thus would
he learn to know the necessities of men as men, and in imitating
the example, would be most likely to catch the spirit, of Him
who " maketh His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and
sendeth rain on the just and the unjust " (Matt. v. 45)- Minister
ing to others was to be his great instructor, and experience
teaches us that there is none more powerful, whether we would
enlighten the intellect or enlarge the heart. By living only in
our own thoughts we become hard, narrow, and intolerant, while
others become to us like so many pieces upon a chessboard,
necessary to enable us to play our part, and only valuable when
they help us to beat our opponent in the game. Then, too, the
difficulties of thought spring up and threaten to master us. At
every step we are met by problems which we cannot solve. We
become involved in a labyrinth of speculation without a clue
to guide us. We rise only to fall. We hope only to sink
into despair. We reach the higher world in our flight, but we
find, or seem to find, that there we have no firm ground on
which to tread, and that we must sink again. This lower worid
and its laws has, at all events, something solid amidst the
airiness of loftier and nobler visions. Were it not well that,
without abandoning speculation, for we cannot abandon it, we

38 ELIJAH.
tried another way. Let us go down to men. Let us see that
they are flesh and blood as we are ; that they have feelings,
affections, desires, aspirations, hopes, as we have. Let us judge
of their temptations by the dire reahty of facts. Let us strive
to benefit them, and, as we do so, let us mark how the benefit
conferred, small though it may be, fills their hearts with grati
tude, and touches what to them was the darkness of the world
with light. This will do more to soften and enlarge our
hearts than the wisest reasoning or the most urgent expostula
tion. It will do more also to solve our difficulties and to dispel
our doubts. We cannot by the aid of the speculative reason
overcome every perplexity that troubles us in the sphere of
either nature or religion. Yet we must live in nature, and we
hve in it because we must. Action gives us a sufficient amount
of certitude ; and, while we grope in the darkness that surrounds
us, we hold upon our way. One generation builds upon another,
each acknowledging the frailty of the foundation, yet each raising
a fresh portion of the superstructure) because the instinct of life
is strong. It is not otherwise in religion, and especially in the
Christain faith. In its call to action, Christianity gives us a
help to certitude, at least sufficient for our purpose in the mean
while, that we shall hardly find in any other way. It appeals
to our sense of the practical needs of men. .It bids us relieve
the wants, instruct the ignorance, and heal the sorrows, of the
poor and wretched, of the fainting and dying. It shows us our
Divine Master going about continually doing good, and it bids
us follow in His footsteps. Then we see that, although not free
from difficulties, it can effect what nothing else can for our
fellow-creatures ; and, when the blind receive their sight, and
the lame walk, and the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear,
and the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel
preached to them, we learn to exclaim with joy, "There is none
occasion of stumbling in Christ " (Matt. xi. 5, 6).
Such, then, was the school to which God sent Elijah. In the
widow's house at Zarephath day by day, helping the poor
woman and her child ; preventing by prayer her little slock of
meal from wasting and the oil in her cruse from failing ; taking
the dead child from her bosom, carrying it to his chamber,
wrestling in prayer for its recovery, beholding life return to it,
and finally bringing it down to its mother and placing it, her
living child, once more in her arms — in all this Elijah either

THE TRAINING AND DISCIPLINE OF ELIJAH. 39
learned, or might have learned, that human-heartedness which
is so essential to the true prophet of the Lord. In all this he
either gained, or might have gained, those larger views and
more generous feelings which are in every age more powerful
instruments in the prophet's hand than the tempest, the earth
quake, or the fire.
One other lesson let us learn — a lesson for the missionary.
We send our missionaries into heathen lands as lands of nothing
but darkness and the shadow of death ; and, no doubt, the dark
ness is a darkness that may be felt, the shadow of death is as
deep as in the grave. But in the midst of the darkness there
are rays of light ; in the midst of the death there are sparks of
life, needing only to be kindled into flame. We ought not to
forget this. To remember it as we ought would make our
missionary efforts start from a new point, and would infuse into
them a fresh spirit. In order to stimulate to missionary zeal it
is not necessary to think that all to whom we send the message
of the gospel are without God and without hope. Such a
thought rather hampers our energy, for we know that, in the
inmost recesses of our hearts, we do not receive it as genuine
and true. Is it not enough that we know that there are " gems
of purest ray " scattered upon the mountains and in the valleys
of heathenism, and that we go to gather them that they may be
polished and made meet to shine in the Redeemer's crown?
The argument for missions has been too much associated with
the thought of simply plucking brands from the burning. There
is another view of them to be taken, by which this ought at
least to be always accompanied. We send our missionaries
into the field of heathenism that we may there discover those
who, already touched by the spirit of Christ, wait for the full
revelation to their souls of the Life and the Light of men.

CHAPTER III.
ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION (l KINGS XVIII. I-40).
Elijah enters upon his work of reformation — Effect of drought on Israel and
Ahab — Difficulty of the part which Elijah had to act — Soreness of the
famine — Persecution of Jezebel — Fears of Obadiah — Elijah meets
Obadiah — Presents himself to Ahab — Arrangements for the contest
with the prophets of Baal — Carmel — The place and its associations —
The contest — ^The prophets of Baal and their failure — Elijah's address
to the people — His arrangements for the sacrifice— His prayer — The
answer — Effect upon the people — ^The slaughter of Baal's prophets at
the Kishon — Restoration of Israel to the Covenant.
We left Elijah at Zarephath, the small heathen village in which
the house of the poor widow afforded him protection in that
troubled time ; where he and his hostess were miraculously
sustained by the barrel of meal that wasted not and the cruse
of oil that failed not ; and where, both by the continued miracle
and by the presence of the child whom he had raised to life, the
prophet's faith must have been kept alive amidst all that might
otherwise have filled him with despondency and gloom. How
long he dwelt there we do not exactly know. He had been for
" a while " (chap. xvii. 7) in the valley of the Cherith ; and the
incident upon which we are now to enter took place "after
many days" (chap, xviii. ]). In the words of our Lord at
Nazareth, and again in the Epistle of St. James, it is said that
it had not rained for three years and six months (Luke iv. 25 ;
James v. 17). But it may not be necessary to understand these
words literally, either as to the length of the period or as to the
absolute cessation of rain during the whole of it. On the one

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 4I
hand, in interpreting the Scriptures, so true in all their charac
teristics to that Eastern world from which they came, we have
to make allowance .for the tendency to hyperbole which pre
vailed there. On the other hand, we know from the Revelation
of St. John that the number 2}i, half of the covenant number
7, presented itself to the Jew as expressive of a period of want
and suffering. Both our Lord therefore and St. James, than
whom no writer of the New Testament is more marked by the
impassioned spirit of Hebrew poetry, might readily enough use
3J4 as a. round number by which to give utterance to their
thought. Yet, though thus not bound to think of three and a
half years in all their literalness, the narrative will not permit
us to depart far from the simple meaning of the words ; and we
cannot be wrong in supposing that, for a space of nearly at
least three years, a terrible drought had existed in Samaria,
that it had extended even to the neighbouring lands of Galilee
and Phoenicia, and that during all the later part of that period
it had been followed by famine, its natural and inevitable con-
• sequence. In Samaria especially the famine had been sore and
the suffering great. What effect had been produced upon the
people we are not informed. That they had not yet confessed
and forsaken their idolatry is clear. The decisive step had yet
to be taken that was to lead them to do so. But we can hardly
imagine that all that long time of suffering had passed in vain.
Israel had often before this been refined in the furnace of
affliction. Sorrow had awakened it to repentance, and had led
it to return and inquire early after God. A similar result had
in all probabihty, to some extent, been obtained now. The
cry on Mount Carmel soon to be uttered, "The Lord He is God ;
the Lord He is God," had been preceded by searchings of
heart which helped to prepare the people for the moment when
the scales of ignorance and obduracy were to fall from their
eyes. Whatever may have been the case with the people, there is
every reason to believe that no salutary result had been pro
duced in the mind of the king. None knew so well as he why
the suffering had been sent ; but he closed his heart against
conviction, and with the vain folly of persecutors in every age,
he sought to wreak his vengeance upon those who had warned
him of approaching punishment instead of repenting of the sin
by which the punishment had been provoked. He made every

42 ELIJAH.
effort to discover the hiding-place of Elijah (chap, xviii. lo).
Perhaps he did not try Phoenicia, for we again see Eastern
hyperbole in the words of Obadiah, which we find later in the
narrative, and it would hardly occur to Ahab that the prophet
should have fled to the very home and centre of that worship
which he had been commissioned to denounce. However this
may be, Ahab failed 'to discover the place where Elijah was
concealed, and God Himself planned their meeting.
Twice already we have read of the coming of the word of the
Lord to Elijah — when he was directed to take refuge by the
brook Cherith, and when he was sent to Zarephath. We now
read of it again. The real drama of the prophet's life was about
to begin, and the beginning was determined by Him whose
servant the prophet was. "And it came to pass," we are told,
" after many days that the word of the Lord came to Elijah, in
the third year, saying ; Go, show thyself unto Ahab, and I will
send rain upon the earth." The command and the promise
accompanying it are more closely connected in our minds, who
know what happened, than they could be in the mind of him to
whom they were addressed. To him the promise would but
little diminish the danger that belonged to the command, for
the first thing that he was to do was to show himself to the
king, whose rage was already to such a degree excited against
him, and who had been seeking him everywhere to make him
the object of his vengeance. It was enough, however, that the
command was given. Nothing remained for Elijah but to
obey. He " went to show himself unto Ahab."
The incidents next related by which the meeting was brought
about seem especially intended to illustrate the difficulty of the
part which Elijah had to act, and the bold and determined
spirit in which he executed his mission. Let us mark —
I. The severity of the drought and the soreness of the famine
in Samaria. It could not indeed be otherwise. For a space
of nearly three years rain had either not fallen, or had been
sent only in such trifling quantities as could scarcely relieve
the people's misery. Ahab had been getting more and more
alarmed. The cries of his famishing subjects must have been
ringing in his ears ; and, though he himself and his court, with
all the resources of the kingdom at their command, had probably
suffered little in comparison with others, the wolf was now at
length at his own door, and famine was stalking through his

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 43
¦own household. He determined to do more than he had yet
¦done; and to make a tour of inspection through the land.
Summoning Obadiah, the steward of his household, he said to
him, " Go through the land, unto all the fountains of water, and
unto all the brooks ; peradventure we may find grass, and save
the horses and mules alive, that we lose not all the beasts.
So they divided the land between them to pass throughout it.
Ahab went one way by himself; and Obadiah went another
way by himself" The arrangement was well calculated to
bring home to the mind of Ahab with greater impressiveness
than ever the sufferings of Israel, and to make him even more
determined than he had been in his pursuit of the prophet to
whom he traced them.
2. The persecution by yezebel. That cruel and unprincipled
queen had not been content with promoting to the utmost of
her power the worship of Baal and of Ashtaroth. It had not
been enough for her simply to support at her own cost a large
number of the prophets of her false divinities, and to maintain
them at her own table. She had also instituted a persecution
against the ancient faith of Israel, and had slain the prophets
of the Lord. Who could doubt that what she had done before
she would do again, and that even more than those who had
preceded him Elijah would be the object of her rage. Her
power too over the mind of Ahab must have been well known.
He would certainly prove a pliant tool at her bidding, and the
ready instrument of her designs.
3. The fears of Obadiah. There is something peculiarly
graphic in the manner in which these fears are mentioned by
the sacred -writer. Every particular noted in the narrative is
calculated to illustrate them. There is the character of Obadiah
himself. As in the case of so many of the Old Testament
worthies, his name is the index to what he was. He was a
"servant of the Lord," for that is the meaning of his name. It
is.said of him "that he feared the Lord greatly," and he says
of himself, " I thy servant fear the Lord from my youth." Nor
is there any reason to think that he had concealed his faith, and
accommodated himself outwardly to the heathenism amidst
which he moved. The whole account given of him leads rather
to the supposition that he was an honourable and upright man,
and the simple fact that he retained his position at the court of
Ahab is no evidence to the contrary. Both in sacred and

44 ELIJAH.
profane history there are to be found not a few instances of
persons in authority who had themselves cast off the obligations
of religion, but who gladly accepted, and highly valued the serr
vices of pious men, when in the secret of their hearts they either
despised or feared them. Thus Pharaoh prized Joseph, Saul
David, and Nebuchadnezzar Daniel, and thus in later times St.
Paul sent his Christian salutations to them that were of Caesar's
household. All these persons maintained the profession of
their faith openly and boldly, and why may we not think the
same of Obadiah when there is- not the slightest intimation to
the contrary? Again there is the confidence reposed in Obadiah
by his master. He was " over the household " of the king, in
all probability governor or chamberlain in the palace, a high
and responsible office. Nay, as if even that were not- enough,
this confidence of Ahab in his servant is brought still more
strikingly before us by the fact that, when the king desired to
search the whole land for fountains of water and brooks, he
divided it into two parts, himself taking one part and sending
Obadiah through the other. Nothing could afford a more
striking testimony to the esteem in which he held his servant,
or to his feeling that the loss of such a servant would be a mis
fortune to his house. Still further, there is the boldness with
which Obadiah could act when occasion called for it. '-' Was
it not told my lord," he exclaims, " what I did when Jezebel
slew the prophets of the Lord ; how I hid an hundred men of
the Lord's prophets by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread
and water ? " He who could act thus could have been neither
a feeble nor a cowardly man. Only at the peril of his life
could he have taken such a step. Yet now, notwithstanding
all this, notwithstanding the general manliness of his character,
the confidence reposed in him by Ahab, and the boldness with
which he had, probably at a recent date, rescued so many
prophets of the Lord, he trembles when Elijah says to him,
" Go, tell thy lord. Behold, Elijah is here."
The soreness of the famine, the persecution of Jezebel, the
fears of Obadiah — all illustrate the danger of that position in
which the prophet of the Lord was placed when, in obedience
to the Divine command, he set forth from Zarephath to show
himself to Ahab.
Yet he went without a moment's hesitation when the com
mandment came, and his first meeting was with Obadiah.

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 45
*' As Obadiah was in the way, behold, Elijah met him ; and he
knew him, and fell on his face, and said, Is it thou, my lord
Elijah ? " What connection Obadiah had had with Elijah
before ; where he had seen him, heard him, or learned to listen
to Him with awe, we have no means of knowing. Perhaps it
was enough to gaze upon that figure clothed in its rough gar
ment of hair, that lofty look and determined step, to be assured
that this could be no other than the dreaded prophet of the
Lord. Or perhaps he may even have been in the company of
Ahab at the moment when Elijah first denounced those woes
upon the land which had been so signally fulfilled. We need
not ask such questions. Obadiah said, as he bowed' to the
prophet with Oriental reverence, " Is it thou, my lord Elijah ? "
The answer was brief and emphatic, " It is I ; go, tell thy lord.
Behold, Elijah is here."
And now all the peril of the situation breaks forth in
Obadiah's answer — " And he said, Wherein have I sinned, that
thou wouldest deliver thy servant into the hand of Ahab to slay
me? As the Lord thy God liveth, there is no nation or kingdom
whither my Jord hath not sent to seek thee : and when they
said. He is not here, he took an oath of the kingdom and nation,
that they found thee not. And now thou sayest. Go, tell thy
lord, Behold, Elijah is here. And it shall come to pass, as soon
as I am gone from thee, that the Spirit of the Lord shall carry
thee whither I know not ; and so, when I come and tell Ahab,
and he cannot find thee, he shall slayme." And then the good
man dwells upon those claims to Elijah's consideration that
have been already spoken of, and ends with a third time
repeating those words of astonishment and alarm which show
so clearly what feelings were uppermost in his mind, "And now
thou sayest, Go, tell thy lord. Behold, Elijah is here, and he shall
slay me."
No prospect, however, of danger could arrest the prophet for
a moment, and, without even attempting to combat the fears
of Obadiah, he replies, "As the Lord God of hosts liveth,
before whom I stand, I will surely show myself to him to-day."
When Elijah first showed himself to Ahab he had said, " as
the Lord God of Israel liveth." Now he says, "as the Lord
God of hosts hveth." The change is not without signi
ficance. It shows that the prophet was fully alive to the dan
gerous position in which he stood, and to the power and hatred

46 ELIJAH.
of the king whom he was about to meet. But it shows also
that he knew in whom he believed. As in the case of Elisha^
his disciple and successor, he beheld around him, though not
visible to the eye of sense, the place full of chariots of fire and
horses of fire. He was well aware that He who was with hinv
was more than all they that could be against him. He had no
fears therefore of what might happen. Trusting in " the Lord
God of hosts " he would certainly show himself that day to
Ahab. Obadiah could no longer hesitate. He went to meet Ahab,.
and told him, and Ahab went to meet Elijah.
The two met — the prophet and the king — and it is almost the
only moment of Ahab's life when he displays something at least
of the spirit of a man. Generally in his personal, if not his
public, character he was a coward ; a weak, pusillanimous crea
ture in the hands of a wife far more strong-minded than himself
At this moment, whatever the cause, he appears like one who
feels that he has a part to act, and who is resolved to act it.
Whether it was that Elijah's flight had given him courage, or
that he was moved to the depths of his soul by the spectacles he
had lately witnessed with his own eyes, or that he sought by a
display of passion to conceal some inward trembling of his
heart, it is difficult to say ; but he has at least the appearance
of being bold, and he approaches Elijah with the words, " Is it
thou, thou troubler of Israel ?" It does not seem to occur to
him that he was himself the troubler of Israel. He followed the
course taken by the world in every age, when it lays the blame
of all that unsettledness of mind which so often disturbs it in
the midst of its sinful ease, upon those who would awaken it to
a sense of its responsibilities, and lead it to a deeper and more
abiding peace. As the words of Christ go out to their fulfil
ment — "I came not to send peace on earth, but a sword"
(Matt. X. 34) — men disturbed by the proclamation of the truth
turn round upon its preachers, and charge them with unduly
disquieting consciences that would otherwise be at ease, and
with unreasonably condemning practices which, but for them,
would be considered innocent. It is this Pharisaism, this
punctiliousness, this strictness of view, and this harshness of
judgment, they contend, that distract society. Let men alone,
and there will be peace. Thus it was that our Lord Himself,
the Prince of peace, was charged by the Jews before Pilate

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 4;
with Stirring up the people, as He taught throughout Judsea
beginning from Galilee, even unto Jerusalem (Luke xxiii. 5)
Thus it was -that the uproarious Jews at Thessalonica com
plained, before the rulers of the city, of St. Paul and his com
panions. " These that have turned the world upside down are
come hither also " (Acts xvii. 6). Thus it always is. Men whom
misfortune has overtaken, while they dislike the truth that might
have saved them, are ever ready to shift responsibility from them
selves, and to charge those as the authors of their sufferings
who have simply warned them that they will and must pay the
' penalty of their sins. In this spirit Ahab met Elijah now.
The prophet was equal to the occasion. Pointing to the
nature of the wicked courses which had brought calamity upon
Israel, he answered, " I have not troubled Israel ; but thou, and
thy father's house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments
of the Lord, and thou hast followed the Baalim." It may be
well to notice for a moment in passing that the word " Baalim "
is here used, as on many other occasions in the Old Testament,
in the plural number, as we should say " Baals." We are not
to understand by it images, but rather different and varied con
ceptions of the one heathen deity. Baal was properly the sun-
god of Phoenician worship, " the bearer and principle of the
-physical life, and of the productive, propagating, power of
nature, which was regarded as an effiux of his essence." ' The
idea connected with Baal became thus very comprehensive ;
and, as he not only gave birth to nature in all her different
aspects, but also preserved, ordered, and destroyed her, a dif
ferent conception of him belonged to each aspect of his work—
and there were many Baals. Against all of them did the
prophet direct his anger and his scorn, or rather the indigna
tion and the scorn of Him who hadlaid the foundation of true
religious worship and life in the one great truth : " Know, O
Israel, that the Lord thy God is one God."
Elijah was well aware, however, that he had not been sent to
meet Ahab in order to exchange with him stern or angry words.
A great crisis in the national history had come, and it was for
each of them to act his part aright. He prepared himself for
that allotted to him in the coming struggle. Let us notice the
proposal. " Now therefore," he said, " send, and gather to me all Israel
« Movers, ' Die Phoenizien," quoted by Keil in loc.

48 ELIJAH.
unto mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four hundred and
fifty, and the prophets of Asherah, four hundred, which eat at
Jezebel's table." Whether in fear or in hope Ahab immediately
complied with the request. He " sent unto all the children of
Israel, and gathered the prophets together unto mount Carmel,"
though it would seem that, for some reason or other unknown
to us, the prophets of the Asherah did not present themselves.
No mention' is made of them either at this point or in the
subsequent narrative ; but even without them the scene that
follows is one of the most striking recorded in Old Testament
history. The locality was Carmel. Instead of indulging in general
description, it may be well to take an account of it from the
writings of one long familiar with these scenes, and who has
written of them with both power and sympathy. "At the
eastern extremity of the ridge, where the wooded heights of
Carmel sink down into the usual bleakness of the hills of
Palestine, is a terrace of natural rock. It is encompassed by
dense thickets of evergreens, and upon it are the remains of
an old and massive square structure, built of largp hewn stones.
This is El-Muhrakah, and here, in all probability, stood
Elijah's altar. The situation and environs answer in every
particular to the various incidents in the narrative. A short
distance from the terrace is a fountain, whence the water may
have been brought which was poured round Elijah's sacrifice and
altar. The terrace commands a noble view over the whole plain
of Esdraelon, from the banks of the Kishon down at the bottom
of the steep declivity away to the distant hills of Gilboa, at whose
base stood the royal city of Jezreel. To the eight hundred and
fifty prophets, ranged doubtless on the wide upland sweep just
beneath the terrace, to the multitudes of people, many of whom
may have remained on the plain, the altar of Elijah would be
in full view, and they could all see in the evening twilight that
the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt-offering and
the wood and the stones and the dust, and licked up the water.
The people, then, trembling with fear and indignation, seized
at Elijah's bidding, the prophets of Baal ; and Elijah brought
them down to the brook Kishon, and slew them there. On
the lower declivities of the mountain is a mound called Tell-el-
Kusis, meaning the hill of the priests, which probably marks the
very scene of the execution. May not the present name of

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 49
the Kishon itself have originated in this tragic event, as it is
called Nahr-el-Mokatta, the river of slaughter ? " ' To this
description we may only add that from Carmel the eye stretches
in an unbroken course along the great plain of Esdraelon (in
Old Testament history, Megiddon), of which it speaks, the
mountains of Galilee on the north, those of Samaria on the
south, the isolated hill of Tabor, long, but erroneously, thought
to be the Mount of Transfiguration, as it stands like a great
sentinel at the extremity of the plain, filling the eye to the east ;
while the river Kishon, draining into the Mediterranean the
waters which come down from the surrounding hills, and pass
ing at times immediately below the cliffs of Carmel, at the feet
of the spectator, flows winding to the sea. A more remarkable
spot could not have been chosen for the purpose ; for, apart
from every other consideration, Elijah could see from its
heights the whole of the Samaritan portion of that noble land,
originally bestowed on Israel as a high tower for the light
of Divine revelation, but now shrouded in the thickest dark
ness. The memories of the scene were not less remarkable than the
locality itself. For Elijah could recall the fact that, in past
times of gloom, God had there savedHis people, not so much
by many as by few. In that country lying at his feet a woman
had been raised up to be the deliverer of Israel in one of its
darkest hours ; and the Song of Deborah, the grandest perhaps
of national triumphal odes, had celebrated the victory gained
by the terrified Israelites over Jabin, king of Hazor, and all his
host, so that "the land had rest forty years"(Jadg. v. 31).
There, too, Gideon had made the plain re-echo with his
famous war-cry, and with his three hundred men had routed
the huge army of the Midianites (Judg. vii.). Even in later ages
the plain of Megiddon has never failed to be a great Eastern
battlefield of the nations ; and, when the Seer in the Apocalpse
"describes the first issues of the struggle between the conquering
Redeemer and the embattled powers of " the whole worid," he
gathers them together " into the place which is called in Hebrew
Har-Magedon," or the mountain of Megiddon (chap. xvi. 16).
Such was the spot on which were transacted the events related
in this chapter.
If the locality was thus famous, both in itself and in its
¦ Dr. Porter, quoted in Taylor's " Elijah the Prophet," p. 108.
5

50 ELIJAH.
memories, the conflict now to be witnessed upon it was in
the highest degree momentous. Israel was then wavering
between the worship of the living God and that of Baal.
It had not yet surrendered itself completely to the dominion
of that idolatry which Ahab, and more particularly Jezebel,
had been labouring to introduce. Many, indeed, had pro
bably done so, but not the people as a whole. The God of
Israel may still have been acknowledged, but side by side
with Him Baal was acknowledged too. This, however, was en
tirely to defeat the purpose of God's revelation of Himself to
His chosen people. He was the one living and true God, and
no idol divinity could be permitted to share that throne which
was solely and exclusively His. Let Baal be honoured along
with Him, even although not substituted for Him, and not only
would the foundation of Israel's existence as a nation be over.
thrown, but the mission assigned to that people in the religious
training of the world would be defeated. In such circumstances
were the events now before us to be enacted.
Ahab's command for the gathering together of Israel has been
issued and obeyed. Elijah is on the one side of the mountain hol
low : four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal are on the other, —
one man, poor, wild, shaggy, apparently without a friend in the
great assembly that has been collected there, over against four
hundred and fifty, well-clad, sleek, prosperous, and popular ;
while around them stand the king and a great multitude of his
people watching the issue with strained eyes and eager expecta
tions. , Similar scenes have been not unfrequently witnessed in
the history of the world, for in the contests of truth with error,
and righteousness with unrighteousness, the few have generally
stood against the many. Athanasius contra mundum has even
passed into a proverb; and the example of Him. who before
Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession will ever be the chief
stay of those who feel that they have a prophet's message to
deliver to men. In that chosen group Elijah may certainly take
his place. One against four hundred and fifty : his tone, his
bearing, his gestures show that he was not afraid.
The contest is about to begin, and Elijah proposes the condi
tions. But first of all he appeals to the people as to the un-
worthiness of their present state of mind : " How long halt ye
between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow Him;
but if Baal, then follow him." It would seem that all were not

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 51
SO entirely given up to idolatry as Jezebel and Ahab. They
simply hesitated as to the being whom they were to worship and
obey. On the one hand they remembered the past. On the
other they were tempted by the present They could not forget
what the Almighty had done for their fathers ; yet they could not
steel themselves against the allurements of the sensuous idolatry
into which their king and his queen would lead them. They
halted between two opinions, incapable of determining, or un
willing to determine, what it were best to do. No state of mind
could be more utterly at variance with the claims of triith or the
possession of that truthfulness of character without which we
cannot hear God's voice. Again and again does the Bible pro
test against this divided service, against the idea that we can
listen to both God and Mammon, against our being neither cold
nor hot : while St. James, always ready with his rich poetical
allusions, exclaims, " He that doubteth is like the surge of the
sea driven by the wind and tossed. For let not that man think
that he shall receive anything of the Lord, a double-minded
man, unstable in all his ways " (chap. i. 6-8). The human con
science acknowledges the force of such an appeal ; and " the
people answered Elijah not a word."
Things were now ready for the contest, and little remained
but to see that the method and the terms of it should be clearly
understood. To this, therefore, the prophet next devoted him
self. But first he would have Israel own how much, according
to human calculation, the balance was against him. " I, even I
only," he said, " am left a prophet of the Lord ; but Baal's pro
phets are four hundred and fifty men." It is not necessary to
take the first words literally, or to suppose that all the other pro
phets, whom Obadiah had hid in a cave, had been before this
time massacred in one of Jezebel's bloody persecutions. Enough
that Elijah was alone now. No other prophet was there to
stand by him or to afford him encouragement in the trying posi
tion which he occupied. As far as mere human strength went what
-was he against four hundred and fifty ? We need not doubt
that the people saw it, and that in the bold attitude of that soli
tary man they may even have beheld some token that would
prepare them for his coming victory. Solitary as he was Elijah
asks no favour. There is no thought of weakness in his mind,
no idea of eliciting the sympathy of the multitude, and thus
fighting his battle with weapons which, if mainly Divine, shall

52 ELIJAH.
also be partly human. He will give every advantage to
his adversaries, that so it may more clearly appear that the ex
cellency of the power is not his but God's. " Let them give us
two bunocks," he said ; " and let them choose one bullock for
themselves, and cut it in pieces, and lay it on the wood, and put
no fire under ; and I will dress the other bullock, and lay it on
the wood, and put no fire under. And call ye on the name of
your god, and I will call on the name of the Lord ; and the God
that answereth by fire, let him be God." Nothing could be
fairer than the proposal ; or, if there was any inequality in the
parties, it was wholly against Elijah. Not only did he stand
there alone, but Baal was the sun-god, the god of fire. It would
thus be easy for him to answer the demands of his votaries if he
were able or disposed to do it, for he would only exert a power
which flowed from his very nature, and which he was supposed
to possess in an eminent degree. The people were alive to this,
and when the prophet's proposals had been made they answered
wit'n one voice, " It is well spoken."
The conditions of the contest had been laid down, and the
contest itself was now to begin. It is described at length, yet
in a manner only corresponding to its importance, by the sacred
writer. It began with the prophets of Baal, for to them Elijah
said, " Choose you one bullock for yourselves, and dress it
first ; for ye are many ; and call on the name of your god, but
put no fire under." The prophets, like the people, obeyed :
and from morning even until noon they cried, " O Baal, hear us."
The words are simple ; but, repeated as they were, they are
sufficient to convey to us a graphic picture of the melancholy
scene. Here for six hours was undoubtedly that " much speak
ing" of which our Lord complains when He warns His disciples
against resorting in prayer to the "vain repetitions" of the
Gentiles (Matt. vi. 7). Now perhaps from larger, now from
smaller, groups ; and yet again from the whole company of the
prophets, went forth hour after hour the same continuous,
earnest, eager cry, " O Baal, hear us." And, as time went on
and their excitement began to increase, they "leaped about the
altar which was made." " But there was no voice, neither any
that answered." No fire descended from the burning sky. The
sacrifice lay unconsumed, untouched, before the eyes of all.
Then followed what the most briUiant writer of modern
times upon the history of the Old Testament has spoken of as

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 53
if it displayed " a savage humour, a biting sarcasm in the tone
of Elijah which forms an exception alike to the general humanity
of the New Testament and the general seriousness of the Old.'"
The language is scarcely just. It is true that there is biting
sarcasm, but their is no want of humanity or seriousness. The
most cutting irony is not inconsistent either with the one or
with the other ; and here we may be assured that the prophet's
words produced no " burst of laughter," but only a deepened
sense of the disastrous nature of the issue that was at hand.
"And it came to pass," we are told, "at noon, that Elijah
mocked them, and said unto them. Cry aloud: for he is a god;
either he is musing, or he is gone aside, or he is in a journey,
or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked."
The irony went to the heart of those to whom it was ad
dressed, and stimulated them to still greater efforts. They
cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives
and lances, " until the blood gushed out upon them." The phe
nomenon may appear at first sight extraordinary, but it was by
no means uncommon in that Phoenician worship of Baal, which
had now been transferred to Palestine. " Many ancient writers
notice the custom, from whose statements the processions of
the strolling bands that wander about with the Syrian goddess
may be thus described. ' A discordant howling opens the scene.
Then they fly wildly through one another, with the head sunk
down to the ground, but turning round in circles, so that the
loose flowing hair drags through the mire ; thereupon they
first bite themselves on the arms, and at last cut themselves
with two-edged swords which they are wont to carry. Then
begins a new scene. One of them, who surpasses all the rest
in frenzy, begins to prophesy with sighs and groans, openly
accuses himself of his past sins which he now wishes to punish
by the mortifying of the flesh, takes a knotted whip which the
Qalli are wont to bear, lashes his back, cuts himself with
swords, until the blood trickles down from his mangled body.""
But it was not only in Phoenicia, or in the time of which we
are speaking, that these cruel rites existed. The commandment
in Deut. xiv. 1,2, though having direct reference to another point,
shows at once the practices of the surrounding nations, and the
tendency of Israel to imitate them : " Ye are the children of the
' Stanley, "Jewish Church," lect. xxx.
" Keil, on i Kings xviii. 26-29, quoting Movers, " Die Phoenizien."

54 ELIJAH
Lord your God; ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any
baldness betvi'een your eyes for the dead. For thou art an
holy people unto the Lord thy God, and the Lord hath chosen
thee to be a peculiar people unto Himself, above all peoples
that are upon the face of the earth." It was well, therefore,
that heathenism should now be manifested, not only in its
most revolting forms, but in forms in which the assembled
people might see it as it really was, and which they had been
expressly forbidden to imitate.
All this lasted for hours. At midday Elijah had addressed
the prophets with his words of burning scorn. From midday
onwards till the time of the offering of the evening oblation
there was no pause in the excitement But, as in the earlier,
so in the later part of the day it was unattended by the slightest
tokens of success. From noon till towards sunset the terrible
scene continued : but " there was neither voice, nor any to
answer, nor any that regarded." The cries, the shouts of
despair, the leapings about the altar, the cuttings with knives,
and the wounds inflicted upon themselves by the maddened
worshippers had been spent without effect. The bullock lay
untouched upon the altar. The wood of the sacriflce was as
cold and dead as it had been when it was first heaped upon
the pile. Exhausted nature could no longer stand it ; and,
with the gathering shades of evening, stillness fell upon the
prophets of Baal and the multitude — a strange expectant still
ness, more full of meaning than all the noise and shouting of
the day.
Then Elijah stepped forth, and his words and actions alike
betoken the calm and determined resolution with which he did
so. There is neither scorn nor irony in his tones. He has a
great work to do, and he will do it with the quietness, the
deliberateness, and the firmness which the work demands.
In the first place, he called the people to come near to him,.
that they might see in the clearest manner that there was no
deception in what he was about to do ; and the people
came. In the second place, he repaired the altar of God that had
been thrown down in the past idolatrous days of Jezebel.
It was a striking feature of his proceedings. He built no new
altar. His object was not to introduce a new worship, but to
restore the old. Like all true reformers he would connect him-

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 55
self with the past and not obliterate it. He felt, as we ought to
feel, at the very time when we are most sensible of the insuffi
ciency of the past, of its shortcomings and of its sins, that that
past has in great measure made us what we are. It has formed
the largest portion of our lives. It has trained and disciplined
the powers by which we are able to correct it. At no point
in the whole progress of the race is it possible to say that there
a great gulf divides it into two distinct and separate stages, and
that across that gulf there is no bridge. The Christian Dispen
sation itself, the mightiest revolution that ever occurred in the
history of man, was a fulfilling, not a destroying, of the past.
At the moment when it superseded that of the Old Testament,
acknowledging its weakness and announcing its vanishing away,
it paid it honour ; and if, in one sense, it may be said that, when
our Lord introduced Christianity with all its exalted privileges,
its higher life, and its glorious hopes into the world, He intro
duced a new thing, in another and still more important sense it
must be added, that it was only new because it was the fulfil
ment of the old. " I am not come," said the Saviour, " to
destroy, but to fulfil;" and in that single sentence He has
given us a principle of universal range and of inestimable
value. It is a lesson for the politician, telling him that in all
wise change he must take up those threads of the past which
have interwoven themselves with a nation's life, and that only
in so far as he does so can the measures by which he would
promote the progress of a people possess true adaptation to
their wants, secure a firm hold of their minds, gain that stability
for the time which is necessary to all real advance, and become
in their own turn a foundation upon which at some future day
a still higher fabric of national welfare may be reared. It is a
lesson for the rulers and guides of the Church, impressing upon
them that, in their efforts to carry the Church onward to the
perfection which they anticipate and long for, over-hastiness
will defeat their end ; and that if they grasp too suddenly at the
coming glory they will only unsettle instead of deepening con
viction, and will plunge us into confusion and darkness instead
of bringing us nearer to the perfect day. It is a lesson for the
Christian thinker, bidding him be careful that in all develop
ments of truth and life he recognize what has been true in days
which may have been less enlightened than his own, and that
his developments are certainly false if, in their loftier concep-

56 ELIJAH.
tions of belief and duty, they do not embrace the more imper
fect views of the generations that are gone. Finally, it is a
lesson for any man who would " forget what is behind and reach
on to what is before ; " reminding him that however he may
be dissatisfied with the present, there is yet a glory in the earth
even as it is ; that there is a light on the land and on the sea ;
that an entirely new world is not needed to accomplish either
the patriot's or the poet's dream, but that the arrangements
of society, the bonds that unite men in the family, in the neigh
bourhood, in the state, have a long and valuable history behind
them, and that to begin with subverting them would be to cut
down the very tree into whose stem and branches he would
introduce the sweeter sap of which he boasts.
" I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil ; " what words both
for the desponding and the hopeful, for those whose affections
linger in the past, and for those who press forward to the
future ! The old is not despised while the value of the new is
felt. The one does not die, while yet the other springs up in
power and beauty. By that single principle our Lord places
Himself upon a platform from which He commands the pro
gress of the race ; and we, if we imbibe His spirit, become " the
heirs of all the ages." We see that they have an inheritance
to bestow on us ; and, when we receive it, we learn to lay it
out in such a way that our children shall be richer and more
favoured than ourselves.
Thus, then, it was that Elijah acted now. That old altar, the
stones of which were lying neglected upon the mountain side,
had its history, its associations, and its memories. It told of
better days when the true God had been worshipped there, and
had there answered the prayers of His worshippers by the
blessings which He bestowed. It had a connection with the
most faithful and prosperous times of the Theocracy, and it
could appeal to Israel as no erection fashioned at the moment
could. A Divine wisdom guided Elijah when, instead of
building a new altar, he repaired the altar that had been
broken down.
In the third place, the prophet repaired the altar of God in
the way best fitted to remind the people of the brightest period
of their past, and of the high destiny to which the Almighty had
appointed them. There was a time when twelve stones had
been used before as a memorial of the signal favour which they

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 57
had enjoyed at the hands of Him who had delivered them from
Egyptian bondage, had led them through the wilderness, and
had opened for them a passage through the river Jordan into
the Promised Land. For " it came to pass, when all the nation
were clean passed over Jordan, that the Lord spake unto Joshua,
saying. Take you twelve men out of the people, out of every
tribe a man, and command ye them, saying. Take you hence
out of the midst of Jordan, out of the place where the priests'
feet stood firm, twelve stones, and carry them over with you,
and lay them down in the lodging place, where ye shall lodge
this night" And Joshua did so, and explained the reason of
the act : " That this may be a sign among you that, when your
children ask in time to come, saying. What mean ye by these
stones ? then ye shall say unto them. Because the waters of
Jordan were cut off before the Ark of the Covenant of the
Lord ; when it passed over Jordan, the waters of Jordan were
cut off: and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the
children of Israel for ever '' (Joshua iv. 1-3, 7). These twelve
stones could never be forgotten by the people : nor could they
ever fail to remind them of those manifestations of Divine
power and grace which had accompanied their settlement in
Canaan. So also was it now, for Elijah " took twelve stones,
according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob,
unto whom the word of the Lord came, saying, Israel shall be
thy name, and with the stones he built an altar in the name of
the Lord." From the disordered condition of Israel at the
moment when it had separated from Judah he turned to its still
deeper national and religious feelings. The Jewish people
could never forget that the twelve tribes had been originally
one nation. They had been the twelve tribes. They were des
tined, in spirit at Feast if not in the letter, to be the twelve
tribes again. Abraham was the father of them all. In Isaac
their covenant history began. The sons of Jacob, whom God
had surnamed Israel on that memorable night when as a prince
he had wrestled with God and had prevailed, were the heads of
its different sections ; and the one living God had made them
all in Himself one family. -Elijah had now to restore no separa
tist worship in which Judah should vex Ephraim or Ephraimenvy
Judah. He had to bear witness for the true worship of the
united parts of Israel as a whole ; and only in twelve not ten
stones, or in any other number, could that idea be expressed.

58 ELIJAH.
The altar was built ; but the prophet deemed it necessary to
take every precaution to convince the multitude around him of
the reality of that miraculous interposition of God upon which
he counted with so much confidence. His other arrangements
were directed to that end. " He made a trench about the altar,
as great as would contain two measures of seed. And he put
the wood in order, and cut the bullock in pieces, and laid it on
the wood." Then, calling others to aid him, he said, " Fill four
barrels with water, and pour it on the burnt-offering, and on the
wood," and it was done. " He said. Do it the second time ;
and they did it the second time. He said. Do it the third time ;
and they did it the third time. And the water ran round about
the altar ; and he filled the trench also with water."
All was now ready, and in the midst of the still multitude
Elijah raised his voice. He " came near, and said, O Lord, the
God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known this
day that Thou art God in Israel, and that I am Thy servant,
and that I have done all these things at Thy word. Hear me,
O Lord, hear me, that this people may know that Thou, Lord,
art God, and that Thou hast turned their heart back again."
The prayer was calm, simple, and touching ; and it presents a
striking contrast to the frantic cries and self-lacerations of the
prophets of Baal. The contrast is indeed so striking as almost
of itself to vindicate the truthfulness of the narrative. No painter
from the fancy could well have imagined, in the midst of a scene
so full of tumult and excitement, a prayer so sober, and so free
from exaggeration either of manner or of speech.
But, if even outwardly remarkable, Elijah's prayer was still
more remarkable in its contents. He addresses God as the
" God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel," a formula taking
us back to the moment when, at the burning bush, God had
first revealed Himself to Moses as Israel's covenant God : "And
God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the
children of Israel, The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God
of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent
me unto you : this is My name for ever, and this is My memorial
unto all generations" (Exod. iii. 15). Again, in this formula
Elijah designedly changes the name Jacob into that of" Israel,"
not so much, apparently, for the sake of bringing out the fact
that all the twelve tribes were one, as for the sake of giving
expression to the thought that the word " Israel " was peculiarly

ELIJAH'S WORK OF REFORMATION. 39
fitted to remind them of that all-prevailing power of prayer
which was now to be so strikingly exhibited. Once more, it
may be noticed, that the very essence of the relationship between
God and His people finds utterance in the petition, " Let it be
known this day that Thou art God in Israel, . . . that this
people may know that Thou, Lord, art God, and that Thou hast
turned their heart back again." Not the simple welfare of Israel,
and certainly not the glory of God's servant, except in so far as
represented through him, but the glory of God, is the main
object of the prophet's desire.
To the prayer thus offered the answer was immediately given.
" The fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and
the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water
that was in the trench." Nothing could be more complete, and
Elijah needed only to be silent, and to let the Lord work.
The effect upon the people corresponded to the sight which
they had witnessed. When they saw it, "they fell on their
faces and said. The Lord, He is the God ; the Lord, He is the
God." Their words were a reply to the alternative which had
been put before them by the prophet at the beginning of the
contest, " How long halt ye between two opinions ? If the Lord
be God follow Him ; but if Baal, then follow him." There was
no hesitation ; there was no halting ; there were no two opinions
now. The worship of Baal was at once renounced, and the God
of Israel was acknowledged to be the only God.
One thing yet remained to be done, and it may be said that it
was imposed upon both Elijah and the people by the necessities
of the case. Of these prophets of Baal we form an altogether
inaccurate idea if we imagine that any wholesome impression
would be produced upon them by the proceedings of the day.
No miracle, however great or striking, will convince one who
has resolved not to be convinced ; and there can be little doubt
that the prophets of Baal were in that condition. They were
interested in the degradation of the people. They were the
deceivers rather than the deceived ; and they must have been
marked by peculiar obduracy, when for the three years during
which the drought lasted, they still made, as they must have
made, every effort to prevent the eyes of Israel being opened.
Nothing, too, could be more terribly explicit than the law of
Moses on the question of dealing with those who endeavoured
to seduce the people to idolatry ; " If thy brother, the son of

6o ELIJAH.
thy rnother, or thy son or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom,
or thy friend which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly,
saying. Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not
known, thou, nor thy fathers ; of the gods of the peoples which
are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from
the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth j
thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him ; neither
shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou conceal him ; but
thou shalt surely kill him ; thine hand shall be first upon him
to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people "
(Deut. xiii. 6-9). It cannot surprise us, therefore, that at a
supremely critical moment, when the spirit of the old Theocracy
was being restored in all its sternness and vigour, Elijah should
have cried to the people, after all that had happened, " Take
the prophets of Baal, let not one of them escape." Nor was it
less natural that, when the command was given, it should be
instantly obeyed ; and that, in the first paroxysm of the popular
rage against those prophets who had proved themselves so weak,
the people should have laid hold of them, and hurried them
down the sides of Carmel to the Kishon, and slain them there.
It would almost appear, indeed, from the words of the sacred
narrative, that Elijah slew them with his own hand ; but it may
be doubted if such an interpretation is necessary. No more
may be intended than that he was the adviser and guide of the
slaughter that took place. What was done by his instructions
may be spoken of as if done by himself.
Consideration of the principles upon which such a destruction
of human life took place may be delayed till we can speak more
fully than could be done at the close of a chapter, of the sterner
aspects of Elijah's work. In the meantime we must be content
with noticing the fact that, before the sun went down that day
behind the range of Carmel, Israel had, for the time at least,
been restored to the covenant which it had dishonoured and
forsaken.

CHAPTER IV.
ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT
(l KINGS XVIIL 41-46).
Delay in the fulfilment of the promise — Necessity of waiting upon God in
prayer — Elijah re-ascends Carmel — Mission to his servant — The cloud
as a man's hand — Rain granted — Ahab's return to Jezreel — Elijah
running before his chariot — Arrival at Jezreel — Nature and power of
prayer — Objection to prayer answered^ Physical phenomena — Mental
phenomena — Characteristics of the prayers of Elijah as mentioned by
St. James — Answer expected, and not simply reflex influence — For
spiritual blessings — For others — Fervency in prayer — Prayer in faith —
Power of such prayers.
With the events recorded in our last chapter the great work
of Elijah's ministry was already accomplished. He had been
raised up as the prophet of Restoration, as the healer of that
breach which Israel had made of the Covenant of God, as the
recaller of an apostate people to their allegiance to Jehovah.
They who, but a little before, had owned the deities of the
heathen nations around them, and been sunk in all the abomi
nations of their worship, had now cried, with one simultaneous
shout, " The Lord, He is God," "The Lord, He is God ;" and,
inspired by a just indignation towards those who had misled
and betrayed them, had seized the prophets of Baal, hurried
them down the side of Carmel to the river Kishon, which flows
at the foot of the mountain ; and, in the spirit of the old dis
pensation, slain them there. Not one of them escaped. The
land was cleansed, and it remained only that the people
should return to their homes, sweep away what still remained
of the provision made for the rites of the heathen divinity_ for

62 ELIJAH.
whom they had forsaken the God of their fathers, and wait for
the blessings of which they had been so long deprived — the
early and the latter rain.
It is a significant circumstance that the blessing was not im
mediately bestowed. Already clouds might have gathered in
the sky, the heavens been black with tempest, and, instead of
the fire which but a little before had descended upon Carmel,
the showers been now pouring down refreshment and life upon the
parched and desolated ground. As yet, however, there were no
signs of change. The sun still burned in the heavens which
were stretched over the land like a molten looking-glass : the
eye was still pained by the fierce glare which there was no
" shadow of a cloud " to soften ; and the brown, withered grass
stretched away to the horizon, recalling past misery, emblem
as much as it had long been of hopelessness, heartlessness,
and despair. Why should it have been so ? Are the people to
be dealt with on the principle enunciated by our Lord, when
after the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand they fol
lowed Jesus, " not because they had seen signs, but because
they had eaten of the loaves, and had been filled" (John
vi. 26) ? Had they felt the power of the miracle, but not
understood the "sign"?- Was the reality of their new con
victions, the sincerity of their new devotion, to be further
tested ? Must they show that they no longer follow Baal but
God, because of what He is in Himself, and even at the time
when He may further try them ? He has chosen them in the
furnace of affliction. In that furnace is their dross to be
finally separated from the gold ?
Not, it would seem, for any of these reasons was the coming
of the rain delayed, but that the people, perhaps that Elijah
himself, might see, that even blessings promised must still be
sought for, until they are given, in continual prayer. It is not
enough, at any particular moment, to cast ourselves upon the
word of promise ; and, having received the assurance that it
will be fulfilled, to dismiss the subject from our minds until the
fulfilment comes. We must wait upon the Lord until He
answer us. We must not cease to "put Him in remembrance "
until He actually bestows what we require. We must cultivate
the spirit of the patriarch as he wrestled with God at Peniel,
" I will not let Thee go except Thou bless me." How much
Elijah acted in this spirit upon the present occasion we may

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT. 63
learn from more than one particular in the narrative. For he
knew that the drought was to be suspended at his word.
"There shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to
my word" had been his language to Ahab at the first, and
there can be no doubt that that language was the reasonable
interpretation of what had been communicated to him by the
Almighty. Yet he felt that he could not speak the "word"
without prayer to Him who would show him the precise moment
at which to do so. And again, although he heard even now,
with the ear of faith, the coming storm, he was convinced that
he must continue to pray. Not till the windows of heaven are
opened, and the longed-for treasures are discharged upon the
earth, may he desist from presenting his petitions before God.
For this, then, the prophet now makes preparation. He
cannot pray effectually where he is. Surrounded by the excited
multitude his thoughts would have been diverted from the duty,
and he would have been unable to concentrate upon it all the
energy of his soul. Then, too, at the spot where he stood by
the river Kishon, he was not in the most favourable position for
marking the first symptom of a favourable answer to his prayer.
The storm we know was to come from the west ; from that
quarter of the heavens he had no doubt heard the " sound " of
which he speaks ; but between the west and him the range of
Carmel lay. Two points therefore were to be gained — solitude,
and a station whence the eye might stretch over the wide range
of that Western sea across which the rain-clouds were to travel
to the Holy Land. These two points Elijah proceeded to
secure. First, he addressed himself to Ahab, who had gone down
with the multitude from the place of sacrifice to witness the
slaughter of the prophets of Baal, " Get thee up, eat and drink ;
for there is the sound of abundance of rain." The word used
in the original implies that Ahab was so far at least again to
ascend Mount Carmel from those banks of the Kishon, to which
a little before he had gone down. But it is by no means neces
sary to think that he was either to ascend to the top of the
mountain, or to return to the spot on which the fire had recently
descended from heaven. All the conditions of the narrative
are satisfied by the supposition, that he was to leave the spot
where the slaughter had taken place, and to seek one more
suitable to the new thoughts that filled his mind and the new

64 ELIJAH.
duties that were before him. Owing to the nature of the ground
he could hardly do this without going up the side of Carmel,
unless he were to proceed immediately on his journey to Jezreel,
and it was not desirable that he should do this until the events
of the day had been brought to a conclusion by the bursting
forth of the expected rain. Much ingenuity has also been
expended on the sense to be attached to the words " eat and
drink," some supposing that they were spoken simply with a
view to that fatigue by which Ahab must by this time have been
oppressed ; others that they were uttered in derision ; while
the conjecture has been made by one of the highest authorities
in Old Testament criticism (Ewald) that the king was novir
invited to that meal which usually followed the completion of
an offering. The suppositions are improbable or far-fetched.
Worn out with hunger, excitement, and anxiety the king might
indeed well be ; but it was hardly in keeping with the solemnity
of the moment, or with the thought of wliat still remained to be
done, that Elijah should have given so much attention to his
mere bodily necessities. To bring in the thought of derision,
again, is to introduce an element entirely out of harmony with
what must have been the tone of the prophet's spirit, to say
nothing of the fact that, had Ahab been thus addressed in scorn,
he would hardly have complied with the injunction so readily
as he is reported to have done. The last supposition, that of
Ewald, is not more tenable than these. The materials of a
sacrificial feast consisted mainly of those parts of the victim
which had not been used in the sacrifice. Here no such parts
remained, for the bullock sacrificed by Elijah had been entirely
consumed. The meaning of the command, therefore, can only
have been, that Ahab might now look upon his own trials and
those of his land as over. The drought was about to end.
The anxieties of the three past years, which might well have
disturbed the ordinary tenour of his life, might give place to
confidence and hope. He might eat and drink at peace ; and
he did eat and drink, because there was a sound of abundance
of rain.
Elijah's own anxieties, however, were not yet past. While
Ahab ate and drank he went up to the top of Carmel, not indeed
the very top, for he afterwards sent his servant to a point still
higher than that occupied by himself, but to some retired spot
near the top where he might give himself to prayer. There he

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT. 65
"bowed himself down upon the earth, and put his face between
his knees." The act was at once an act of prostration before
the majesty of God, and of such separation from all around him
as might leave undisturbed the singleness of his mind and the
fervour of his spirit of devotion. That he went to pray, and
that he prayed, we know (Jas. v. 18) ; but he not only prayed,
he looked for an answer to his prayer. To his servant who was
with him he said, " Go up now, look toward the sea." It may
seem at first sight strange that he did not himself go up to the
point from which the earliest symptom of the approaching storm
could be discerned. But he was probably aware that the
moment for that sight was not yet come. The same spirit of
God, through whose working in his soul he had heard the sound
of the abundance of rain, probably also taught him that before
the distant sound changed into the present reality God was still
in some way to ratify His covenant or to set His seal upon the
covenant long ago made and now renewed. By abstaining,
therefore, from going to the point whence he could see, he could
the better continue, in prayer, to keep alive his faith. It was
not a view of the distant approach of the blessing, it was the
blessing itself, that he desired.
The servant went, and looked, and came back with the tidings,
"There is nothing." Elijah said to him, "Go again seven
times ; " and in the number of visits thus referred to lies the
Divine seal of the covenant. It would occupy far too much
space were we now to endeavour to point out the singular use
of this number both in the Old Testament and in the New.
Everywhere throughout Scripture it is the number of the
covenant between God and man, the pledge of the close and
intimate relation which God has introduced between Himself
and those who were formerly estranged from Him. This mean
ing the number seven has here, and only at the seventh mission
does the promise begin to be fulfilled. " And it came to pass
at the seventh time that he said. Behold, there ariseth a cloud
out of the sea, as small as a man's hand." Geographers and
travellers often tell us of those great storms of wind and rain
which are thus indicated in the Levant, so that, while all around
their ship there is calm and sunshine, that little speck in the
sky near the horizon is so sure a symptom of the coming gale
that, as quickly as possible, the sails are furled and every pre
paration made for the tempest that is at hand. Such a speck,
6

66 ELIJAH.
small as a man's hand, may in the natural course of things have
been witnessed now, and Elijah may have known well what it
portended. The supposition, however, is of little use so far as
the miraculous element in the narrative is concerned. The
finger of God, if not traced in each individual detail of the scene
before us, cannot be excluded from the combination of details,
or from their adaptation to one another, in such a way as to
produce the final result. In the plagues of Egypt, and even in
the miracles of Christ, natural phenomena were supematurally
magnified and brought into action ; and it may have been so
here. There is nothing to prevent those who wish to think of
a Levantine storm from introducing it. But they cannot thus
banish the working of Him who sent the storm at the precise
instant when it was needed. That little cloud in the distant
sky told Elijah that the moment for which he had waited upon
God in all the eagerness and the constancy of fervent prayer
was come. He said to his servant, " Go up, say unto Ahab,
Make ready thy chariot, and get thee down, that the rain stop
thee not." What a moment must that have been for the pro
phet, for Ahab, for the land ! Suspense was over. The startling
events of the day were closed. The prophet of God whose life
hadso long been sought was vindicated in all that he had said
and done. Ahab himself, if not convinced and converted, was
silenced. The land was about to realize its covenant blessings.
The thirsty soil was about to drink of the water of the rain of
heaven. The fields would soon be covered with flocks, and the
valleys with corn. " And it came to pass in a little while, that
the heaven grew black with clouds and wind, and there was a
great rain."
In the meantime " Ahab rode, and went to Jezreel." It was
the place where he had built a summer palace for himself, and
where Jezebel seems to have been living at the time (chap. xix. i).
The distance from Carmel was not less than fourteen or fifteen
miles. Of the feelings with which he thus returned from Carmel
we are not informed. The first words indeed of the next chapter,
where it is said that " Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done,
and withal how he had slain all the prophets with the sword,"
make it too probable that his heart was yet untouched. We
may speak of miracles. Miracles have no power either to con
vince or to convert. There is not a reflecting man who cannot
satisfy himself that the most stupendous miracle might be

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT. 67
performed under his own eyes without producing upon him any
moral or religious impression. He would find a hundred ways
of escape from a conclusion he was determined to reject. " If
they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be
persuaded if one rise from the dead" (Luke xvi. 31). Ahab
may have gone home astonished, perplexed, confounded. It
is quite natural, and much more in consonance with his character
as it afterwards displayed itself, to think that he went home not
less steeled than ever against the truth.
One remarkable incident is still related of Elijah. " And the
hand of the Lord," it is said, " was on Elijah ; and he girded
up his loins, and ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel."
" The hand of the. Lord was upon him," words indicating that
he acted under a Divine impulse, and that he was upheld by
Divine power. Animated by this spirit he girded up his loins,
so that he might be unhampered by the long dress which would
otherwise have impeded his course, and ran before the chariot
of the king. There is no need to think that any extraordinary
speed was demanded. No doubt Ahab would drive with all the
haste with which his horses could carry him along ; but the
nature of the road was such that a quick runner would without
great difflculty be able to keep pace with him, while the prophet's
training amidst the hills of Gilead, and the physical discipline
by which his whole previous life had been marked, would now
stand him in good stead.
The action itself has been variously interpreted. Yet, as the
feelings and actions of the East change but little in the course
of centuries, the customs of the present may probably best
explain the customs of Elijah's time, and the interpretation that
would be put by the people on his act. There, then, even now,
when the ruler of the people drives abroad, he has his two
couriers before him, who run in one continuous race to clear
his way. So Elijah ran. He was as a courier to the king. The
contest between them was at an end. Ahab to all appearance
had, with his people, that day bowed in submission to Jehovah
and the prophet might well entertain the hope that the sub
mission was real. Ahab was once more the covenanted king
of a covenant nation. Why should he not receive every mark
of respect and honour ? It was the more necessary to pay this
because it might have been thought that Elijah was the victor
in the struggle that had taken place. In one sense he was ; in

68 ELIJAH.
another and a higher he was not. God was victor : Elijah was
His servant ; and, giving the glory to Him to whom it was due,
Elijah could only disclaim, in the most emphatic manner, all
personal aggrandizement, and show, in a way which no one
could misunderstand, that he returned to his old relations to
wards his king and country.
With these feelings we are told that he ran to the " entrance
of Jezreel," but we are not informed why he stopped there, in
stead of accompanying Ahab into his city and palace. It could
not be from any fear of Jezebel, for the suddenness of his flight
into the wilderness, recorded in the following chapter, can
hardly be explained, unless we suppose that the thought of the
vengeance of the queen came upon him as an unexpected blow.
The probability is that he acted still in the same spirit as that
which led him to run before Ahabs chariot. He was a servant,
an attendant, with no claim to honour. Why, though he might
run before the king, should he stand in his presence ? " They
that wear soft raiment are in kings' houses " (Matt. xi. 8). A
royal palace was no place for him, the plain rough prophet of
the truth. He stopped at the entrance of Jezreel, and Ahab
went his way to Jezebel.
At this point of his history the mission of Elijah may be said
to have been accomplished. In the face of every difficulty and
trial he had successfully vindicated the honour of the God of
Israel, had brought back His people to His covenant, and had
been the instrument of securing for them a restoration of the
blessings promised them while they continued faithful to Him
who had chosen them out of all nations for His name. It had
been part of the prayer of Solomon when the temple at Jeru
salem was dedicated to the Lord, " When the heaven is shut
up, and there is no rain, because they have sinned against
Thee ; if they pray towards this place, and confess Thy name,
and turn from their sin, when Thou dost afflict them ; then
hear Thou in heaven, and forgive the sin of Thy servants, and
of Thy people Israel, when Thou teachest them the good way
wherein they should walk, and send rain upon Thy land which
Thou hast given to Thy people for an inheritance " (l Kings
viii- 35) 36). That prayer had just been answered. In his
public capacity and in his relation to the people Elijah had
litrie more to do. We have still indeed to follow him through
important details of his personal history. He is still to be the

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT. 60
recipient of revelations of the Lord, full of lessons for the
Church in every age. But in its most prominent aspect his
work is done. From this time forward he never again met
assembled Israel, and the carrying forward of his work was to
be handed over immediately to other agencies and other men.
We have still, however, to look back upon the scene which
has been passing before our eyes ; for it is full of the most in
structive lessons. In doing so, it is unnecessary to dwell upon
the fact that many of the wonderful characteristics of the
prophet appear in it in as striking a light as in the events which
the earlier part of the same day had witnessed. In the one,
not less than in the other, we see his faith, his boldness, his
complete forgetfulness of self. Reference to these, however,
may at least for the present be omitted. One great lesson,
for which the narrative has been appealed to by an inspired
writer in the New Testament, may more properly engage, and
may at the same time be sufficient to occupy, our thoughts. It
is the narrative by which the apostle James illustrates the
nature and efficacy of prayer. That apostle might have found
illustrations of his theme in many another hero of the ancient
faith, in Abraham, or Isaac, or Jacob, or Moses, or Samuel, or
David. He names none of these, but he turns to Elijah. " Pray
for one another," he says, that ye may be healed. " The suppli
cation of a righteous man availeth much in its working " (chap.
v. 1 6), and then follow those words as to Elijah's prayer, first,
that it might not, and secondly, that it might, rain, which are
familiar to all. The circumstance that Elijah, rather than any
other saint of old, is thus appealed to, affords of itself a striking
proof how deeply this part of the prophet's history had impressed
itself upon the mind of the Jewish people. But more than
this : we have in the fact a Divine commentary on the nature
and power of prayer.
In this light, therefore, and guided by the language of the
apostle, we may now consider the prayer which was offered by
Elijah, and answered by the Almighty, at Carmel. What
characteristics of that prayer presented themselves to the mind
of St. James when he spoke of it in the language already quoted?
Before answering the question, it is impossible to forget
that, at the very threshold of the subject, an objection meets us
which, if well founded, at once disposes of the whole matter,
and makes further inquiry needless. The very idea of prayer.

70 ELIJAH.
Tire are told, is unscientific. Whatever earlier ages and rude
philosophies may have permitted men to believe, all modern in
quiry has demonstrated, vi-ith constantly increasing clearness, the
absurdity of supposing that, in compliance with any entreaties,
of His creatures, the Creator of the universe will, or even can,
interpose to avert consequences flowing from the operation ot
the known or discoverable rules by which He works. It is
maintained that the world is, and alwavs has been, governed by
immutable laws ; that these laws are inextricably interwoven
Tvith the whole constitution of nature ; that events are so
related to one another that, at every point in their eternal
evolution, each is absolutely dependent upon all the members
of the series which for the moment we may think of them as
closing ; that each could not be other than it is unless the
members of the series had been also other than they were ; that
herein lies the grandeur of the present system of things as it
stands in silent majesty before us from age to age ; and that to
think of the interposition of God at any particular instant is to
reflect upon the wisdom with which the system was originally
planned. Not, therefore, with any conscious intention of dis
honouring God does the disciple of this school come to his
conclusion. Rather, he would .urge, with the intention of saving
Him from all possibility of being charged with the wilfulness,
the caprices, and the arbitrary actings of Plis creatures. He
removes God, no doubt, from all interference in the affairs of
men after the great machine of the universe has been put in
motion ; but, by the very fact that He does not need to inter
fere ; that away, we know not where, occupied, we know not
how. He can leave the infinite variety of events continually
happening to the control of His eternal and unchangeable laws,
does He impress us with the loftiest conceptions of His great
ness. Here is no wilfulness, no caprice, no arbitrary acting, but
a majesty of unchanging order before which we can only bow
in admiration, and to which it is our highest duty to conform
ourselves. The answer to the difficulty thus proposed to us depends
upon our conception of the Being of God. If God be only a
blind, unintelligent, and uninterested force ; if He possess
nothing of what we mean by personality ; if He have no con
stantly active and operative will ; and if, after creating us as we
are, He limited Himself by laying aside all those affections and

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT. 71
emotions without which there can be no intercourse between
Himself and the creatures of affection and emotion that He has
formed, then certainly we must accept the conclusion offered
us. But the moment we conceive of Him as One who is to
maintain fellowship with us, and we with Him, that moment we
must also conceive of Him as One who may alter His relations
to us, and whose feelings towards us cannot but be affected by
our obedience or disobedience, by our love to Him or alienation
from Him. With a human brother in whom we recognize
nothing more than an automaton, incapable of any exercise of
will, and the victim only of immovable law, it would be out of
the question to speak of forming any intimate relation, and any
emotion that we might experience towards him would die in
disappointment when it was seen that there was no response.
It is not otherwise in our relation to God ; and if He be simply
a force, without an eye to see, an ear to hear, or a hand to save,
not only all positive prayer, but all possibility of communion
with Him is at once destroyed.
It is no reply to this to say that the possibility of effecting any
change in the Divine purposes by prayer is denied only with
reference to physical phenomena, and that the field of our
spiritual relations with the Divine Being is left untouched. If,
because of the idea of law and the dependence of phenomena
on one another, we may not pray for sunshine or rain, or a good
harvest, or safety in the midst of pestilence, or success in any
undertaking, no principle is left upon which we may pray for
spiritual blessings such as the enlightening of the intellect, the
softening of the affections, the subduing of the will, or the
strengthening within us of the graces of faith and hope and
love. The former, indeed, it is alleged, are the result of law
which has been operating throughout all past time and with
universal influence. Are the latter not so too, at least on the
supposition with which in this matter we have to deal ? Let us
imagine that, when we pray, our intellects are darkened or
our affections cold, that our wills refuse to bend in submission
to what has befallen us, or that our faith and hope and love are
weak and fitful. This state of things is not the result of some
arbitrary dealing on the part of God. We did not become what
we are, in these spiritual aspects of our nature, by some random
appointment of His Providence, or by some withdrawal of His
grace without a reason, and simply because He willed it. We

72 ELIJAH.
sank into a spiritual condition needing revival and improve
ment because we had sinned against those principles of the
Divine government of men which would have preserved us in
a more perfect state. In other words, we sinned against law,
against laws as real, as true, as powerful in the spiritual sphere
as are physical laws in the sphere appropriate to them. Every
step taken by us in our downward course was the consequence
of the non-fulfilment in our experience of some spiritual law
which we had violated ; and the consequences can only be
escaped by an interference of the Divine law of mercy with the
Divine law of retributive judgment. If a new law, a new order,
may come in in spiritual, why may it not also come in in
physical, things? The distinction attempted to be drawn
between these two spheres of the Divine action is altogether
futile ; and, if we are compelled to admit into the spiritual
sphere that limitation, though it be self-limitation, of the
Almighty which is alleged to exist in the physical sphere, to
what a result are we reduced ! To an unmitigated fatalism,
destroying all the dignity of man's nature, doing violence to our
dearest convictions as to our own powers, and extinguishing the
very idea of human responsibility. Such indeed is logically,
as well as actually, the issue of that conception of God which
denies the possibility of His being the answerer of prayer.
Everywhere hard, material, physical laws, laws in virtue of
which nothing could have been different from what it is, all
distinction between mind and matter destroyed at one fell
swoop, all the glory of human labour and suffering in the past
resolved into necessity which can merit no praise, and all hope
of our being able to quicken the wheels of the world's progress
into the brighter future for which we long, proclaimed a " pious
imagination," the fantastic delusion of a fevered dream ! Are
we prepared for this ? Better not to be than to believe that our
being is a delusion. We believe that man can modify the effect
of many a law by that power of will which God has given him ;
and surely what man may do is within the power of God.
It is forgotten too by those who urge the fixed course of all
events as an objection to the possibility of obtaining an answer
to prayer, that the very prayer, the efficiency of which they deny,
may be a part of the predetermined series. Elijah prayed and
there came drought : he prayed again and there came rain.
How do they know that the prophet's prayer had not been fore-

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING, UP OF THE DROUGHT. 73
seen and foreordained as well as its result? and that in the
original plan of the Almighty the one was not in some way de
pendent on the other ? or, if it be replied that this is to make
the prophet as much automatic as the rain, the answer is,
that the difficulty is thus transferred to the insoluble problem of
reconciling the absolute predestination of God with the free
action of man. Even if Elijah's prayer was in one sense the
result of necessity, in another and equally important sense the
prophet was free. Judged of according to his own feeling
of responsibility he was absolutely and entirely free. No theory
of the Divine predestination could have saved him from pro
nouncing judgment upon himself; and on the great day of
account the judgment of the Eternal God will be in harmony
with that of our own hearts, " Out of thine own mouth will I
condemn thee."
Prayer, then, may be answered ; and we turn again to the
language of St. James in order to learn from it what those cha
racteristics of Elijah's prayers on the present occasion were
which made the apostle behold in them an illustrious example
of the power of prayer.
I. They were prayers to which a positive answer conveying
the things asked for was anticipated. There is a mode of looking
at prayer to which not the slightest countenance is given in the
scene before us. Alive to the inextinguishable nature of the
instinct that leads men to pray, and fully convinced that without
prayer religion must perish ; yet at the same time unable to see
how the eternal series of causes and effects constituting the his
tory of the world can be infringed without the destruction of
all order, there are not a few who rest their defence of prayer
only upon its reflex influence. It does us good to pray. It is
the acknowledgment of our dependence upon God. It brings
us into communion and fellowship with Him. It teaches us to
acquiesce in His wise and well-ordered government ; and, in this
result produced upon ourselves, not from any expectation of ob
taining what we ask for, lies the benefit of prayer. Let us
acknowledge the value of the -reflex influence thus spoken of;
but what is it that it really springs from? Isit not most of all from
this that, in prayer, we approach One who will consider ourwants
with infinite love and -nisdom, and who will judge for us better
than we can ourselves ? In order to the reflex good it is obviously
necessary that the process through which we pass to the obtain-

74 ELIJAH.
ing of it shall be genuine, shall be at least real and true. But there
is no reality or truth in asking what we know beforehand can
neither be granted nor obtained, or what, if it is to come, will
come whether we ask or not. With what profit to himself shall
a son ask a father to change plans, which, by the very necessity
of his nature he cannot change ; or how long, with this convic
tion in his mind, will he continue his petitions ? The falseness
of his attitude will force itself upon him in every request he
makes ; and, so far from either honouring his father or benefiting
himself in continuing to make it, he will soon discover that he
is destroying the moral fibre of his own nature, and that he is
seeking an honest result by dishonest means. The reflex benefit
of prayer is wholly dependent upon our confidence that a direct
benefit may be secured. Like all indirect blessings it is made
ours when we are not thinking of it. To think of it changes it
at once to a blessing that is direct, and lands us in the very di
lemma from which we had been endeavouring to escape. Let
us suppose that we have but one petition to present at the throne
of the Almighty — that we may learn to acquiesce in the un
changeable order of things of which we are a part. Is not this
as direct a petition as any other that we can offer ? Does it not
involve the idea that our wills may be rebellious, and that we
desire to have them subdued into conformity with the Divine
will ? If the order of the universe be unchangeable we have
as much attempted to violate it as though we had asked for
any other blessing of which we had felt our need. To direct us
to the reflex benefit of prayer, and to bid us find in it our en
couragement to pray, is thus as inconsistent with reason and the
lessons of human experience as it is with the teaching of Scrip
ture, or with the example of the saints. It was not thus that
Elijah prayed. When he prayed for drought it was in expecta
tion that the drought would come ; when he prayed for rain it
was in the belief that rain would follow. In like manner must
we pray, believing that we may receive the blessing that we ask,
or we shall soon cease to pray. No thought of a reflex influence
upon ourselves will ever maintain within us the habit or the
attitude of prayer.
2. The prayers of Elijah were for spiritual blessings. It is true
that he prayed for rain and that the earth might again give
forth her fruit. But it is impossible not to see that, as his
prayer for drought had been connected with the people's sin.

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT. 75
and had been intended to awaken them to repentance, so his
prayer for rain was connected mainly with their spiritual re
covery, and the ratification of a spiritual covenant. It was not
mere rain for which he prayed ; it was the rain of the covenant,
the rain promised to the land so long as its inhabitants were
faithful to Him who had given them it in possession, that they
might fulfil His purpose in the history of the race. Nor is it
otherwise with St. James when he quotes Elijah in illustration
'of his argument He is not speaking only of the supply of
bodily wants, or the healing of bodily ills. At first sight it might
seem as if he confined himself to these things. " Is any among
you sick ? Let him call for the elders of the church ; and let
them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the
Lord : and the prayer of faith shall save him that is sick, and
the Lord shall raise him up." Temporal blessing, recovery from
sickness, is spoken of; but the apostle immediately adds, "And
if he have committed sins it shall be forgiven him " (Jas. v.
14, 15). The addition shows that bodily sickness was not the
only thing of which the apostle thought. He thought also of
sin, which, whether the direct cause of the sickness or not, was
yet inseparably connected with it. Had he been able to separate
the two, recovery from bodily ailment would probably have
seemed to him a point of subordinate importance. He shared
the feeling of the New Testament, that body and spirit cannot
be looked at apart from one another, that the body is the ex
pression of the spirit, and that the welfare of both is indispens
able to that welfare of the man which is contemplated in the
purposes of God.
Nor was it otherwise with our Lord Himself, who in many
passages associates salvation with the restoration to health or
soundness of the sick or the lame who came to Him ; while the
central petition of that prayer which He taught His disciples,
" Give us this day our daily bread," cannot well be regarded as
a petition for mere bodily sustenance. It certainly points also
to that spiritual support which is ministered to us by " the bread
of hfe."
This conjunction of the spiritual and the temporal corresponds
in-deed with the whole tone and genius of the gospel dispensa
tion. We are not forbidden to ask for temporal blessings ; but,
if we are to receive them, our asking must never be separated
from the thought of God's kingdom in ourselves and others. In

76 ELIJAH.
the advancement of that kingdom lies our main interest. All
else is subordinate to it. Its progress regulates the fate of em
pires, and much more the history of individual lives. Christ is
not only Head over all things, but He is over them for His
Church (Ephes. i. 22). No prayer therefore can be agreeable
to Him which does not flow from this as the paramount con
sideration in our minds ; and we have no ground to expect an
answer to our prayers if, here as well as elsewhere, we are not
of the same mind with Him who presents our supplications to
the Father, and whom the Father heareth always.
3. The prayers of Elijah were for others rather than him
self. This aspect of his prayers seems to be especially
present to the mind of St. James when he refers to his example.
" Confess your sins one to another," he says, " and pray one
for another, that ye may be healed." "One for another" is
thus the key-note of his words. He had, indeed, in an earlier
part of his Epistle, exhorted and encouraged Christians to pray
for themselves, " But if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of
God who giveth to all liberally, and upbraideth not, and it shall
be given him." When he refers to the case of Elijah, however,
he refers to prayer for others, and it is not unimportant to
remember this. For in what way, it is often asked, in spirit if
not in words, can others be affected by our prayers ? " Suppli
cations, prayers, intercessions, thanksgivings made for all men"
(i Tim. ii. 1) may procure blessings for ourselves, but how
is it possible that they should procure blessings for others ?
The persons for whom we pray are what they are by influences
coming down for many generations, as well as by those surround
ings of their own, which, whatever be our prayers on their
behalf, will remain the same as they have been. How can they
be affected by prayers of which they have probably never heard ?
It is conceivable that our interest in them and longing for their
welfare, when seen by them or told them, may soften their
hearts or awaken their sympathy with our designs on their
behalf. But what good can be done when they neither see us
nor hear us, nor know of our existence ? How can our prayers
turn the stream of tendency which courses through their veins,
or the disposition of those molecules which, with every new
thought that they cherish and every new resolution that they
make, must change their relation to one another ? We have
already replied to such an argument, and need say no more of

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT. 77
it Enough for our present purpose that the Apostle repeats
his words, " one to another," " one for another."
And he is right, for he is speaking not of prayer only but of
•effective prayer ; and one of the most important elements of
effective prayer is that we pray for others. In family, or even
in private, prayer, there can be no greater mistake than that of
confining our petitions to our own necessities. Interest in
others enlarges the heart, and brings us nearer to the mind of
God. Our Lord Himself has taught us to say "our" Father
which art in heaven. We cannot approach the Father without
being interested in His children. We cannot love God whom
we have not seen unless we love our brother whom we have
seen : and the expression of the heart in both cases is insepa
rably connected with its expansion in either case. Let men test
themselves, or examine the record of their own experience.
They will find that prayer from which intercession for others
has been excluded speedily languishes or becomes formal : and
they will equally find that, when they have been most importu
nate in entreating for the good of their brethren, they have also
been enabled to rise into the deepest earnestness of supplication
for themselves.
4. The prayers of Elijah were fervent. We have already seen
this in the very attitude which he assumed in prayer. That
stretching himself out upon the earth and that bowing of his
head between his knees were evidently more than the expres
sion of reverence. They were to secure to the prophet freedom
from the distraction of surrounding objects, and opportunity
for giving himself with all the earnestness of his heart to the
task in which he was engaged. The same spirit of fervency
appears in his prayer in the earlier part of the day, " Hear me,
O Lord, hear me." How strikingly does a similar spirit show
itself in the prayers of Daniel and of St. Paul ; or, if we turn
to the highest example of all, what shall we say of the prayers
of Jesus, of whom we are told that, during His agony in the
garden. He three times retired to pray saying the same words,
" O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass away from
me " (Matt. xxvi. 44), and of whom the writer of the Epistle to
the Hebrews tells us that, in the days of His flesh, He offered
up prayers and suppUcations " with strong crying and tears,"
and that He was heard for His " godly fear " (Heb. v. 7) ? Thus
St James says of Elijah that he " prayed fervently " (Jas. v. 17).

78 ELIJAH.
Without such fervency, indeed, prayer is little else than a pro
fession, a pretence, a form of words. What we really desire
we must ask for with an earnestness and importunity that will
not be denied. Because of this, the man in the parable of our _
Lord who came seeking bread from his friend in the dead hours
of the night was heard. Because of this, the widow in the
parable, spoken for the express purpose of teaching us that we
ought always to pray " and not to faint," received an answer
from the unjust judge ; and when God's elect cry unto Him to
vindicate His own cause they do so "day and night" (Luke
xviii. 7). Want of fervency in prayer shows that we take no
real interest in the blessing asked ; and how, in these circum
stances, shall we expect to be heard and answered ?
5. Once more the prayer of Elijah was a prayer of faith, and
again this characteristic of it is present to the mind of St. James,
when he turns to the prophet for an illustration of the fact that
"the prayer of faith shall save him that is sick" (chap. v. 15).
In the very opening of his Epistle he had taught the same
lesson, " But if any of you lacketh wisdom, let him ask of God
who giveth to all liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be
given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing doubting : for he
that doubteth' is like the surge of the sea driven by the wind
and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive
anything of the Lord ; a double-minded man, unstable in all his
ways" (chap. i. 5-8). Without faith it is indeed impossible to
be well-pleasing unto God ; " for he that cometh to God must
believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that
seek after Him" (Heb. xi. 6). Such faith is an unwavering
conviction that God has promised, and that what He has pro
mised He is " able also to perform " (Rom. iv. 2i), — not, as so
often quoted, " both able and willing to perform," but simply
" able." The will is already there. It is found in the very
utterance of the promise. Faith grasps not only the will, but
the power of God ; and, knowing that His power is irresistible,
it asks in full assurance that the blessing promised will be
obtained. How mighty then is such prayer as Elijah's was ! It moves
the arm of the Omnipotent Creator and Governor of the uni
verse, who speaks and it is done, who commands and all things
stand fast (Psa. xxxiii. 9). It secures for us " in everything "
either what we suppose that we stand in need of, or that "peace of

ELIJAH AND THE BREAKING UP OF THE DROUGHT. 79
God " which makes us feel that it is better to have our requests
denied than granted. It is one of the mightiest weapons of our
Christian warfare — "¦We conquer heaven by prayer.''
In the history of Elijah we see one of the most striking
instances of what it can accomplish, and he was " a man of like
passions with us." Let no one ever hesitate to cry to Him who
heareth and answereth prayer, and no one will fail to find that
" the supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its work
ing" (Jas. V, 16).

CHAPTER V.
ELIJAH AT HOREB (l KINGS XIX. I-13).
Feehngs of Elijah at Horeb — His mistaken notions as to the character ot
the Almighty— His despondency— Not due to physical fatigue or
lonehness, but to thought that he had failed — Injustice thus done by
him to God— To himself— To the past history of his people— Evils of
despondency— Reason why Elijah fled to Horeb— God reveals Himself
by an angel— Horeb and Elijah's cave— Former revelation of the
Almighty there — The prophet questioned— His answer— The revelation
granted him — Lesson of the revelation — Divine judgment and mercy —
¦What law can accomphsh— 'Value and importance of law— The message
of love — Its greater power.
Of all the sudden and startling changes presented to us in the
life of the great prophet of what we may call the second Refor
mation in Israel, none is more striking than that recorded after
the events of the last chapter. It might have seemed that
Elijah had then attained the summit of his prosperity and the
main object of his mission. In the presence of the king and
assembled Israel he had vindicated the honour of the true God
against all the forces of a magnificent and popular idolatry. He
had been the means of leading Israel to abandon its false
worship and to return to its early faith. He had destroyed the
priests of Baal in the terrible slaughter at the river Kishon ;
and, finally, at his word ' the long-continued drought had been
brought to an end, a great rain had fallen, the hearts of the
people as well as the parched soil were rejoicing in the prospect
of plenty in the land ; and, as we see shortly after this in the
case of Elisha, " the husbandman had returned to the plough
' Compare Jas. v. 18. ' 1 Kings xix. 19.

ELIJAH AT HOREB. 8l
Every expectation of the prophet seems to have been fulfilled.
He could desire nothing more.
Suddenly there is a change. Neither from his present nor
his future action is there any reason to believe that Ahab, though
silenced, had been converted. His weak, cowardly nature was
incapable of receiving any deep impression. He was still the
same as he had all along been, a man unable to rise to the
height of a pure and lofty monotheism, the victim of his own
guilty passions, and a tool in the hands of Jezebel. His first
care was to report to the queen "all that Elijah had done, and
withal how he had slain all the prophets with the sword." The
words forbid the supposition that Ahab told this with any
humble acknowledgment of the nature of that Divine interven
tion which he had so lately witnessed. The sacred writer, in
describing his action, does not speak of the prophets of Baal.
He does not even say that Ahab told Jezebel that Elijah had
slain all her prophets in particular. He speaks simply of " all
the prophets," and by so speaking he appears still to identify
Ahab with them, as if they were the prophets whom the king
honoured and obeyed.
The burst of rage which Jezebel's nature might have led us to
anticipate immediately followed, and a messenger was sent by her
to Elijah, saying, " So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I
make not thy life as the life of one of them by to-morrow at this
time." It was a firm and determined message uttered by a woman
of firm and determined character, who would undoubtedly leave
no stone unturned that might help her to execute her threats.
But what should all that have been to the prophet of the Lord ?
Surely the God who at his word had sent down fire from heaven
upon Mount Carmel to consume the sacriflce, had given him the
victory over four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal, and in
answer to his prayer had brought the famine to an end, will
enable him to prevail over a woman, however powerful and cruel.
Surely he might have been satisfied that He who was with him
was far more than all that could be against him. It is easy to
reason thus, but the experience 6f life refutes our reasoning.
Strong and passionate natures are peculiarly liable to reaction.
Depression follows close upon exultation, and despair upon
hope. It was so with Moses in a crisis of his life very similar
to that here before us, when " he said unto the Lord, See, Thou
sayest unto me, Bring up this people ; and Thou hast not let
7

82 ELIJAH.
me know whom Thou wilt send with me." ' It was so with the
Baptist when his heart failed him in his prison ; and when,
notwithstanding all that he had witnessed of the glory of Jesus,
and all the testimony that he had borne to Him, he yet sent to
Him two of his disciples saying, "Art Thou He that cometh, or
look we for another ? " = And it was so with the Apostle Peter,
when, bold as he had been in' walking upon the waters to come
to Jesus, he no sooner saw the wind than he was afraid, and,
beginning to sink, cried out, " Lord, save me."-'' In like manner
was it now with Elijah. His nature had been too intensely
strung during the last few hours, and it could no longer bear the
strain. But more than this. We learn, from what follows, that the
education of Elijah was not yet completed. He had mistaken
one special manifestation of the Almighty for a revelation of
His essential nature ; and he had to learn that not by fire and
storm such as he had beheld, but in calmer, gentler ways, dots
God accomplish His purposes and train the race for its final
destiny. The message of Jezebel delivered to Elijah terrified him, and
his terror was obviously deep and unfeigned. He immediately
arose, and went for his life to Beersheba, far beyond the
boundary of Samaria, at the most southern extremity of
Judah, where the cultivated land begins to sink into the
desert Not content with this, he left there the servant who
had accompanied him, and went a day's journey into the
wilderness, and sat down under a juniper tree, one of those
bushes of broom, rising at times to a height of many feet, which
are so grateful to the weary traveller in his journeys over the
scorching sand. There he requested for himself that he might
die ; and said, " It is enough, now, O Lord, take away my life ;
for I am not better than my fathers ; " and, having said this, he
fell asleep.
What a change, vre may well exclaim, is here ! A few days
only have passed since Elijah stood on Carmel, the victorious
prophet of God, and Israel bowed in submission at his feet.
Now he is alone in the wilderness, wearied in body, depressed
in spirit, as weak as the generations that, one after another, had
disappeared before him. Whither, he, as it were, exclaims, are
" Exod. xxxiii. 12, compare chap, xxxiv.
« Matt. xi. 2, 3. 3 Matt. xiv. 30,

ELIJAH AT HOREB. 83
these generations gone ? Their name and their memorial are
as completely blotted out as footprints are blotted out that have
been left upon the sand within reach of the rising tide. And,
notwithstanding all that has happened, it is to be the same with
me. In this lay the secret of his despondency. We are not to
seek it mainly in the exhaustion of his physical frame. Elijah
was a hardy son of the desert who had long been accustomed
to privation and toil, to scanty food, and the fatigue and ex
posure of a desert life. But a day or two previous he had run
before the chariot of Ahab sixteen miles from Carmel to Jezreel,
and, even after he was strengthened by food miraculously
supplied from heaven, he continued as despondent as before.
Nor was loneliness and want of sympathy the cause. He had
all his life lived alone. No wife, no companion, had cheered
him in his desert solitude. On Carmel he had stood one man
against four hundred and fifty, and he had rather gloried in his
solitary strength. Even on the present occasion he need not
have been alone. His servant had accompanied him when he
fled from Samaria, but he had left him behind at Beersheba
that he might be alone. Men are to be met with who in such
circumstances are strongest. It is not desirable that it should
be so, but it is a fact. As a general rule the prophet, the
minister, the missionary, ought never to be alone. And our
Lord proceeded upon His deep knowledge of human nature
when, in sending'forth his disciples, he sent them two by two.
Without Silas or Timothy St. Paul would have been weaker
than he was ; and so would St. Peter without St. John or St.
Mark. But it does not seem to have been so with Elijah. He
did not " faint or fear to live alone." In solitude he braced his
soul for the warfare he had to maintain and the trials he had to
endure. It was his apparent want of success that troubled him.
He thought that he had failed, that his mission had been fruit
less, and that the reformation he had effected at Carmel was
but a momentary burst of enthusiasm without reality, without
depth, to be forgotten in a moment and for ever. The trial is
one often experienced by the eager and passionate reformer,
and the more, the more eager and passionate he is. Strong
in his own beUef of the truth he has proclaimed, in the power of
his arguments, and in the unselfishness of his motives, the
reformer will not doubt for an instant that he shall prevaiL The
minds of all who hear him will open to his summons. They

84 ELIJAH.
will see themselves and their true interests as he sees them.
They will yield to the higher order of things he would introduce.
The shout of applause with which he is at first welcomed is the
proof that he is right ; and before it, continued, repeated, re
doubled, as before the shout of assembled Israel, he seems to
behold the walls of Jericho fall flat Alas ! how often is he
quickly undeceived. Sin is not thus at once forsaken.
Prejudices are not thus at once dispelled. Old habits are not
thus at once thrown off. The tide of error which had been
driven back to its furthest verge sweeps in again with a mightier
than its usual volume, and more than had been apparently
gained is lost. Then comes the trial of faith, the weakness
despondency and despair.
But such despondency, whatever it may spring from, is
entirely wrong. Mark how it affected Elijah in the present
instance. It led him to do injustice
I. To God. He thought that God was failing to vindicate
His own truth. He had himself been " very jealous for the
Lord, the God of hosts," but his language implies the doubt
whether God had been so. Had He continued to exert the
power which He had manifested on Carmel His prophet would
not have been where he was that day. Could not He who had
sent down fire from heaven to consume the sacrifice, have also
by a similar fire consumed Ahab and Jezebel and every obstinate
worshipper of Baal in the land ? Then why had He not done
it ? Why was Jezebel in all probability again triumphing in her
palace at Jezreel, setting up fresh altars, appointing new pro
phets of Baal, persecuting the faithful, sweeping before her
'every trace of the reformation he had accomplished ? It seemed
to him that there was only one explanation. The Almighty
had been less zealous than His servant, had forsaken His own
cause, and was either unable or unwilling to secure for it the
victory which it deserved. Here was faithlessness, distrust of
God, a presumptuous pronouncing upon plans that he did not
comprehend. He would be wiser than his Maker. The short
sighted child of the dust would direct Him who sees the end from
the beginning, and who best knows how to further His own
kingdom among men.
2. It led him to do injustice to himself. " He requested for
himself that he might die, and said, It is enough : now, O Lord,
take away my life." We are reminded of a moment, in one

ELIJAH AT HOREB. 85
respect at least similar, in the life of the Apostle of the Gentiles.
He was a prisoner at Rome, in the hands of a tyrant who, in
any moment of unregulated passion, might send him forth to
execution without pity and without remorse. Nay more, his op
ponents were taking advantage of his absence from the field, were
preaching Christ out of contention, and were striving to alienate
the affections of his converts from him. St. Paul felt the pangs
which these things caused, and he exclaimed, " I am in a strait
betwixt the two, having a desire to depart and be with Christ,
for it is very far better ; " " to die is gain." Yet no sooner had
he said this than he cried out, " Yet to abide in the flesh is
more needful for your sake. And having this confidence, I
know that I shall abide, yea, and abide with you all, for your
progress and joy in the faith" (Phil. i. 23-25). And so he
returned to his work, and went on preaching, warring, con
quering, until in God's own time the end came, and he entered
into his rest. So ought it to have been with Elijah, but it was
not. Similar temptation, indeed, often comes to an earnest but
disappointed labourer in the Lord's vineyard — the wish that he
may die, that he may have no more experience of disappoint
ment and sorrow, that he may at length find rest. We have no
right to wish this. Our times are in God's hands, and not in
our own. He gave us our being. He appointed our labours at
the first ; and it is His alone to bring either the one or the
other to a close. So long as we have strength to work we are
to work. So long as life is ours we are to look upon it as a talent
committed to our care, and to hsten to the command, "Trade
ye herewith till I come " (Luke xix. 13). It may be hard, it may
be disappointing ; but it is the only path of duty. Anything
else is injustice to ourselves as well as God.
3. It led him to do injustice to the past. " Take away my
life," he said, " for I am not better than my fathers." The re
flection is indeed a sad one for him who would reform and
renew the world, but who appears to fail in his attempt, that it
has been to some extent at least the same in every age. " Our
fathers where are they, and the prophets do they live for ever ? "
They are gone, and of most of them the very names have per
ished. A few names live. The heroism, the genius, the intel
lectual grandeur, the moral and religious worth of those who
bore them are not forgotten. But what of the mass of those
who, before they fell asleep, served God and their generation

86 ELIJAH.
without a thought beyond this, that God might be honoured
and their generation helped ? Look at the shelves of a great
library. Read name after name of the authors crowded there,
and you shall find that of most of them you have never heard
Turn over page after page of their huge volumes and you shall
see that they relate to questions the very terms of which it is
now difficult to understand, that they are devoted to controver
sies which, though they once separated the world into opposing
camps, now sleep side by side as quietly as the combatants in
their graves. It will be the same in time to come. Future
generations may take into their hands most of the books
written now that shall have survived the storms of time, may
gaze at them for an instant, and may wonder who the writers
were. Some curious student may wish to know more of those
who thus denied themselves the pleasures of the world and
lived " laborious days and nights devoid of ease ; " and, with all
his searching, he may be able to discover nothing but the fact
that they lived — and died. Then we are apt to cry. What does
it all come to ? Why should we perplex ourselves ? Why trim
the midnight lamp ? Why tax the already wearied brain ? No
long period hence, and it will be all the same. There is an
unquestionable sadness in the thought that one generation goeth
and another generation cometh, and that the last is as rapidly
forgotten as the first.
But Elijah was not entitled to speak of the. past in the way
he did. Had he forgotten Abraham and Isaac and Jacob,
Moses and Aaron, Samuel and David? Had he completely
lost sight of men who had brightened the history of his people
with many a deed of patriotism and religious zeal ? He had
much better have asked whether he was as good as his fathers,
and whether he was now doing his work as well as they did
theirs. They met the demands of their own day. Not a few
of them found their place, if not in the perishable records of
human fame, yet in the imperishable records of Him who is
from everlasting to everlasting. Their names might have faded
from the memories of men, but many of them, at least, were
written in that book of life from which no name, once entered in
it, shall ever again be blotted out. Although what they did in
faith or suffered in patience might have found none to tell its
story, it was enough if it were preserved there where neither
rust corrupts nor moth consumes.

ELIJAH AT HOREB. Zy
Nor did their work perish when they themselves died and
were forgotten. Was it really good, it became a part of the
inheritance of the race. The seed they sowed sprang up into a
harvest, to be sown again over a wider area and with more
enlarged results. Being dead, they speak ; and the voices that
come to us, and most entwine themselves with all the fibres of
our being ; the voices that swell up in our hearts, impelling us
to action as no others do, have often their deepest hold over us
from this, that we know not whence they come. They have
glided down to us from bygone ages. We have breathed them
in the atmosphere. We have listened to them in the silence.
They have taken root within us, and have grown with our
growth and strengthened with our strength. They have become .
a part of ourselves, and when they now influence our conduct
they are 'no longer from without but from within. They are thus
a far more intimate part of our being than any lesson that may
be suddenly forced upon us by some solitary and exceptional
incident of our lives. Not less in this then was Elijah unjust to
the past than when his despondency led him to be unjust both
to God and to himself. Let us never think lightly of our fathers.
They did their work ; let us do ours. Well for us if we are only
as true, as honest, and as brave as they.
Such then were the evil consequences of that spirit of de
spondency which took possession of Elijah at this crisis of his
history. It is always so. Nothing throws a darker light over
both the present and the past, over both ourselves and others.
" Why art thou cast down, O my soul ? " is a question that we
may well ask whenever we feel despondency beginning to steal
upon us. If we are unable' to subdue it, it will take all the spirit
out of life, and will make us think that everything that has ever
been, as well as everything that is, is vanity.
We have seen that Elijah was despondent, and that the cause
of his despondency is to be found in his impression that, not
withstanding everything that had happened, his mission to
Israel had been a failure. It is not enough, however, to say
this. There must have been something else to account for his
present flight to Horeb. High as his expectations had been a
day or two before, even he must have known well that no time
had yet been given to show whether the effect produced by him
at Carmel was to be fleeting or permanent. We must look still
farther, therefore, into his feelings if we would comprehend his

88 ELIJAH.
State of mind as he lay under the juniper tree in the wilderness.
Why, then, we have to ask, was he here rather than in some
other place which he might have reached more easily ? Why
should he have fled in this particular direction to the south ? If
his sole object was to escape the wrath of Jezebel, he might have
fled to Phoenicia, which had already for three years afforded him
a secure shelter against the efforts of Ahab to discover him. Or.
if Phoenicia, for some reason or other unknown to us, gave no
promise of a safe retreat, he might have tried Gilead, with the
passes of which he was doubtless intimately acquainted. If we
attend to the spirit of the narrative, we shall have little difficulty
in accounting for the course which he actually took. Elijah fled
southward, notwithstanding the long tract of inhabited countr)'
through which he would have to pass before he reached the
wilderness, because southward lay the way to Horeb. It was to
Horeb, to Sinai, to the scene of the terrors amidst which the law
had been given to Israel that he naturally turned. He was him
self the embodiment of the law in its sternest aspects, and he
seems now to have been drawn by an irresistible impulse to the
spot where that sternness had been most strikingly revealed,
and where he might best hope to see the indignation of the
Almighty once more burn against the sinner. The savage
grandeur of the spot, together with the memories connected
with it, made it, of all other places, that most congenial to his
present state of mind. There he could most feel strengthened
by the thought that the God whom he served was still a God
of vengeance.
It would thus appear that the prophet had misunderstood God's
character. He imagined that a revelation by avenging fire was
the only way by which the Almighty could make Himself known
to men, the only way by which He could either begin a reforma
tion in Israel or confirm it after it had begun. The fire that
had come down on Carmel was to him the only symbol of the
Divine presence, the only instrument by which stubborn wills
could be subdued and hard hearts broken. In these circum
stances he needed other teaching than he had yet received.
That teaching shall not be wanting. However Elijah might
be mistaken, his heart was sound, and to the upright God
maketh light to arise in the darkness.
He did so now, for He saw the truth that was beneath Elijah's
gloomy view of his position ; and, as the prophet slept, an angel.

ELIJAH AT HOREB. 89
we are told, touched him, and said unto him, " Arise |;',>i eat"
He arose and found a cake baked on the coals and a cruse of
water ; and he ate and drank and laid him down again. The
irieaning of the provision made for his wants was not yet clear.
A second time he slept, and a second time an angel of the Lord
touched him, saying, " Arise and eat, because the journey is too
great for thee." That journey was a deeper plunge into the
wilderness, a wild and solitary way, until he should come to
those mountains at the extremity of the desert of the wanderings
which had been hallowed by the descent of the God of Israel
at the giving of the law.
Elijah arose, and ate ; and, comprehending now the meaning
of that supply of food which had been miraculously granted him,
" he went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights
unto Horeb, the mount of God." To a traveller in ordinary
circumstances the journey ought to have occupied a much shorter
time. It is therefore necessary to think either that the prophet
was to make a circuit until that number of days and nights was
fulfilled, or that the number forty is not to be literally under
stood. We have already seen that this is most probably the
case with the number three-and-a-half, and that these figures
may be intended to express not so much the actual number
which they indicate to us as a broken and trying time. A
similar remark may be made now. Israel had wandered forty
years in the wilderness, and to the Jewish mind the number
forty may thus have come to express the idea of want and
sorrow, of temptation and suffering. To travel forty days and
forty nights may therefore, when faithfully interpreted, mean no
more than to make amidst many privations the journey spoken
of. In this manner then Elijah travelled until he reached the
spot upon which his thoughts had all along been bent, and
found a cave in which to rest. Let us pause for a moment to
behold him there.
The probable spot is thus described by a competent traveller
who himself has visited it. " A pathway starting from the con
vent of St. Katherine conducts the traveller to the summits of
Jebel-Mousa, the southern-most peak of Sinai, and 7,000 feet
in height. About half way in the ascent the place is reached.
A few notes, made on the spot, may describe it as it now is.
The second of two archways constructed for levying toll on
pilgrims opens upon a secluded little plain, forming a singular

90 ELIJAH.
amphitheatre, in the very heart of Sinai, surrounded by mag
nificent peaks and walls of granite, in the centre of which is a
little enclosed garden, with a solitary cypress standing at its
entrance, and near it a spring and a little pool of water. A few
paces from the cypress is a chapel, said to be built over the
place of the prophet's abode in Horeb, one compartment of
which covers the so-called Cave of the Vision. It is a hole
only just large enough to contain the body of a man, and into
which he might creep. It is 'a temple not made with hands,'
into which, through a stupendous granite screen, which shuts
out even the Bedouin world,. God's priests may enter to com
mune with Him."'
The scenery of the spot, however, is comparatively of little
moment. It is of more consequence to remember that on some
one or other of those peaks which mark the solemn and awe-
inspiring surroundings of the neighbourhood the Almighty God
once before appeared at the first giving of the law ; and that
if not exactly to the same spot, at least to one in all respects
similar, Joshua and the elders had accompanied Moses at the
time when, in reply to the prayer of their great leader, " Show
me. Thy glory,'' the Lord said, " Behold there is a place by Me,
and thou shalt stand upon the rock ; and it shall come to pass,
while My glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a cleft of the
rock, and will cover thee with My hand until I have passed by ;
and I will take away Mine hand, and thou shalt see My back ;
but My face shall not be seen " (Exod. xxxiii. 31-33). Recol
lections of these great events could not fail to be present to the
prophet's mind on this occasion ; while, apart altogether from -
his feelings, it was a fitting thing that the lesson now to be
enforced, and which was to present so striking a contrast to
that of the first promulgation of the law, should be taught
amidst those very scenes where the peculiar glory of the law
had been so strikingly revealed.
Here, then, Elijah lodged in the cave ; and, as he did so,
" the Word of the Lord came to him, and He said unto him.
What doest thou here, Elijah ? " Often as it has been doubted,
it seems impossible to deny that there is censure in these words.
Nor does the fact that God had fed the prophet, and cared for
him, and strengthened him on his flight, make it improbable".
that He would now address him in the language of reproof. '
¦ Dr. Allon, Elijah in "Biblical Educator '' vol. iii. p. 155- •!

ELIJAH AT HOREB. 9I
Elijah was still His servant, and a servant full of earnestness
and zeal for the cause of God in Israeh His mission was not
yet accomplished. His work was not yet done. He has indeed
taken alarm too soon. He has failed to apprehend the real
nature and purposes of Him whom he served. But not for such
reasons only shall he be cast away ; and, although he needs
reproof, he is still a chosen instrument in the Almighty's hand
to execute His purposes, and to be the medium of another and
higher revelation of Himself than had yet been granted to the
world. We need have no hesitation, therefore, in taking the
words before us in the meaning which they naturally bear, and
in beholding in them the Divine censure of that spirit of de
spondency which had for the moment betrayed a prophet gene
rally so strong, and of that want of knowledge which, though
it might plead much in its behalf, did not, on that account, need
the less to be corrected. Yet, after all, it is not necessary to
think that reproof is the chief characteristic of the words.
They are rather a summons to reflection, a call to Elijah to
enter into his own heart and to make clear to himself the nature
of those feelings that had brought him there. We are never
ready for any higher and fuller revelation of God until we have
thoroughly appropriated the lower stage of revelation upon
which we stand. " What doest thou here, Elijah ? What is
that impression of My nature and aims that has led thee to this
spot ? What mistake is this that thou hast made in thinking
that then only I am with thee when I send down fire from
heaven on Mount Carmel, or when thou art in the midst of
scenes which once so blazed with My lightnings and echoed to
My thunders that the whole camp of Israel trembled? Search
thee, and know thy heart ; try thee, and know thy thoughts ;
and see if there be any way of wickedness [in margin of Revised
Version, ' grief,' Psa. cxxxix. 24] in thee, and I wiU lead thee
in the way everlasting."
To the words thus addressed to him Elijah rephed, " I have
been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts ; 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
appellation by which Elijah here addresses the Almighty
betrays, as on a former occasion, the feelings of his heart.
God is not so much the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and ot

92 EUJAH.
Jacob, not so much the God of Israel, as the "God of hosts."
But He has not been proving Himself to be so. He has per
mitted His people to forsake His covenant and to throw down
His altars, and to slay His prophets, till it would appear that
only one true prophet was left ; and even he was compelled t<r
flee for his life to these distant wilds. Was this to be " the God
of hosts ; " to be the God of whom it might be said in the
language of the psalmist that, when the cry of His people came
into His ears, " the earth shook and trembled ; . . . there went
up a smoke in His wrath ; and fire out of His mouth devoured ;
coals were kindled by it " (Psa. xviii. 7, 8. Revised Version,
margin) ? Where now were all His terrors ? Was He unable
to execute His purposes, or to fulfil His threatenings ?
This, however, was not all. Elijah's words show still further
that he identified the cause of God so completely with himself
and his own manner of proceeding as to believe that it was
lost, because he was no longer upon the scene to carry it for
ward as he had done. That cry of his, "I, even 1 only, am left,
and they seek my life to take it away," when taken in connection
with the answer of God properly translated — " Yet will 1 leave
Me seven thousand in Israel " '—is a proof that he not only
mourned over the past, but that he was hopeless as to the future.
There was but one way, it appeared to him, in which God could
work, the way to which he had been at first called, but which
had failed. He imagined not only that there was no better, but
that there was no other, method by which the Di,vine kingdom
could be established in the world, than that which had ended in
his flight from Samaria and in the prospect of an early and
violent death. And then, when he is gone, after him the deluge ;
altars again overthrown ; prophets, if any were left, killed by the
sword ; Ahab and Jezebel triumphantly spreading idolatry in
Israel ; and, it might be, a new assembly gathered upon Carmel
to shout "Baal, he is the god ; Baal, he is the god." To this state
of mind the answer of God is given.
"And He said. Go forth, and stand upon the mount before
the Lord." The manifestation of the Divine glory followed.
First, a great and strong wind rent the mountains and brake in
pieces the rocks, — but the Lord was not in the wind. After
the wind an earthquake followed, — but the Lord was not in the
earthquake and after the earthquake a fire, — but the Lord was
• Comp. p. 108.

ELIJAH AT HOREB. 93
not in the fire. The most tremendous powers of nature, the
whirlwind, [the earthquake, and the lightning had been sum
moned into play, and, under their operation, the rocks had been
rent from what had seemed to be their everlasting resting-places,
the solid mountains had reeled to and fro, and the gloom of the
dark cave in which Elijah stood (comp. i Kings xix. 13) had
been lightened with those fearful bursts of fire which make the
strongest quake, followed by the long and ever-renewed roar of
thunder as it reverberated from peak to peak and valley to
valley ;— all terrible, all far beyond human power to summon
into action, all calculated to leave upon the mind a profound
impression of the littleness of man and of the majesty of Him
who sitteth alike above the floods and the tumult of the people;
yet something told the prophet that not in any one of them was
the Lord. They ceased, and a deep silence followed. Then in
the silence was heard a still small voice, and something again
told the prophet that this was the Lord ; and he wrapped his
face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entering in of
the cave, awed, humbled, meek, ready to listen. He hears the
same words addressed to him'as before, "What doest thou here,
Elijah ? " And he answers in precisely the same language that
he had previously used. The fact is startling. Has he learned
nothing from all that he has seen and heard ? No intimation is
given us that he has. It has indeed been often imagined that,
although the words are the same as formerly, the tone in which
they were spoken must have been different. And, so long as
we apply this to the prophet's personal relation to the Almighty,
so long as we ascribe to him only deeper humility, awe, and
reverence, we may accept the statement. We know too that
he will learn as every true and honest heart will learn. Nay,
we know, from a more wonderful incident in his history than
any that occurred while he was upon earth, his appearance on
the Mount of Transfiguration, that he did learn. But there is
no evidence that he has as yet done so. The lesson was too
deep, too vast in its far-reaching influence, to be apprehended
in a moment. It includes in it the history of those principles
upon which God deals with a sinful world, and which thousands
of years were needed to unfold in the perfection in which we
know them now. The thought of this lesson gives its main
interest to the scene at Horeb ; and we may well endeavour to
understand it.

94 ELIJAH.
That lesson then is this, that not in the law, but in the Gospel,
not in the revelation of Divine wrath, but in that of Divine love
and mercy, we are to find the great instrument for renewing the
hearts of men, and for establishing in the world that kingdom
of righteousness for which it waits and longs. There is a sense,
indeed, in which the law precedes the Gospel, but the order in
which they follow one another arises less from the nature of
God than from the sinfulness of man. In the third chapter of
his Epistle to the Galatians, St. Paul has taught us, with a clear
ness leaving nothing to be desired, both that the Gospel is before
the law ; the covenant of promise, the covenant of God's grace
with Abraham, before the covenant at Sinai ; and that the latter
cannot disannul the former. There was no thought, indeed, of dis
annulling the covenant with Abraham when the law was given.
The law was simply an intermediate step on the part of God,
designed not to make void the earlier promise, but to shut men
up to the promise yet to be revealed in fulness. The deepest
foundation, the very essence, of the Divine character is not
wrath, but love. " God is love," and there is a breadth and
length and depth and height in His love as it is revealed to us
in Christ without the knowledge of which we cannot be filled
with all the fulness of God (Ephes. iii. i8, 19). Had man never
fallen we should have experienced nofhing but those communi
cations of Divine grace which would have filled our hearts with
constant rejoicing and our lips with uninterrupted song. But
the fall took place. We know that we have sinned, and by that
fact our whole relation to God is changed. We know that sin
deserves wrath ; and, as the inextinguishable voice of our own
nature testifies to what we ought to be, we feel that a revelation
of the Divine holiness is what is chiefly needed by us. A re
velation of mercy alone will never satisfy the thoughtfully
awakened soul. " A God all mercy were a God unjust" It is
not the fact that, when we are brought to a true sense of our
condition, mercy is what we chiefly long for. Our modern
theology, founded so much upon the personal experience of
Luther and the special requirements of the period of the
Reformation, has no doubt gone far to impress upon us a diffe
rent lesson. It has taught us that the cry for pardon is the
deepest cry of the human spirit, and that it is the great glory of
the Gospel to meet and still that cry by the proclamation, "Son,
daughter, be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee, go in

ELIJAH AT HOREB. 95
peace." The teaching is not correct. The deepest cry of the
human heart is the cry for holiness, for conformity to that
original type of our nature, the consciousness of which, amidst
all our sinfulness, has not been lost, and to the possession of
which we long to be restored. The holiness of God, therefore,
is that which first starts up before the mind of the awakened
sinner, and from the thought of holiness it is impossible to
separate the thought of wrath against sin. In so far, accord
ingly, as Christian teaching speaks of the wrath of God, keeping
it at the same time in it proper place, it speaks the truth. It
has no pleasure in cruel pictures. It would form no unduly
harsh estimate of man. It would only recognize that fact of sin
the existence of which in human nature the student of human
nature, however he may turn away from it, finds himself unable
to deny. The law, then, must precede the Gospel ; the tempest,
the earthquake, and the fire«must precede the still, small voice.
Such however is, after all, not the main lesson of the vision
which passed before Elijah at Horeb. There is a still deeper
and more important lesson connected with that scene, and one
which, we cannot doubt for a moment, it was especially de
signed to teach — that the Gospel not the law, that the proclama
tion of mercy not the denunciation of wrath, is at once the
final and the most effective means to which the Almighty trusts
for the establishing of His kingdom among men.
It is not to be denied that law can accomplish much. Apart
altogether from the well-deserved punishment which it inflicts
upon the transgressor who falls under its sentence, it can re
move temptation. It can make indulgence in vice less easy.
It can support the weak against the strong. It can place a
limit to the demands made by selfish power upon those who are
practically unable to resist its bidding. It can improve a vast
number of material relations which, though at first sight
connected only with the body, have the closest bearing
upon the moral and religious welfare of society. Nay more,
law has a direct educative and training influence upon many
who are not yet ready for higher things. A wise and good law
is like the hand of a grown up man laid upon the head of a
wayward child. The child is checked, calmed, awed, by the
thought of a power greater than itself : and, as it looks into the
countenance of the man the pressure of whose hand it feels, it
gains an impression of the dignity, of the majesty of something

96 ETIJAH.
which it ought to obey. The writer of these pages had once a
striking illustration of this, when complaining to a member of
the London School Board of what seemed to him the tendency
of the time to depend too much, in all circumstances, upon law
as an educational force. It could not be spoken of as a mis
take, he was answered, in the East-end of London, for the effect
of compulsion there had been to create a belief that there must
be value in what the law took pains to compel. The remark
was interesting in itself ; but it was doubly interesting as a fresh
illustration of the wisdom of Him who had of old prepared His
people by law for the higher dispensation of the Gospel. Yes,
law can do much. It is a noble thing for a statesman to have
his name associated with the passing of a wise law. It is a
blessing for a country to have judges who can administer wise
laws wisely.
Let us never undervalue law. Let us rather magnify it and
make it honourable. " Of law," said one whose words cannot
be too often quoted, " there can be no less acknowledged than
that her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony
of the world. All things in heaven and earth do her homage,
the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not ex
empted from her power ; both angels and men and creatures of
what condition soever, though each in different sort and manner,
admiring her as the mother of their peace and joy." ' Scrip
ture confirms such a view. Our Lord honoured the Mosaic law'
at the very time when He expanded and perfected it ; and, at
the moment when the apostle of the Gentiles proclaimed with
all his energy and zeal that " the righteousness of God without
the law is manifested," and that " we are saved by faith," he cries,
" Do we then make void law through faith ? God forbid. Yea,
we establish law" (Rom. iii. 31 : Revised Version, margin).
There is no worse sign of a community, of a corporation, of
an individual, than lawlessness. Let parents beware how they
allow their children to grow up without a due respect for law.
Let them teach their children to obey not for the sake of
pleasing only, or of obtaining a reward from those who love
them ; but because right is right and law is law. ,
All this is to be at once and cheerfully acknowledged. But I
it is not the less necessary to remember that law, with its
striking accompaniments, with its tempest, its earthquake, and
• Hooker's 'Works, vol. i. p. 240.

ELIJAH AT HOREB. 97
its fire, can never cure the world's ills. Such healing is to be
found in the Lord Jesus Christ alone, and in the Christian dis
pensation introduced by Him in all the brightness of its light
and in all the fulness of its power. "What the law could not
do," says the apostle, " in that it was weak through the flesh,
God, sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and as
an offering for sin, condemned sin in the flesh, that the ordi
nance of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the
flesh, but after the Spirit" (Rom. viii. 3, 4). By that one fact,
Jesus Christ come in the flesh, our whole relation alike to God
and to goodness is changed. We see that the Almighty is
reconciled to us. We hear His voice of pardon. We believe
in His eternal and unchanging love. Then it becomes a plea
sure to us to walk in His ways', to maintain communion with
Him, to behold Him in every department of nature, in every
arrangement of society, in the circle of the family, in the privacy
of our most secret and solitary hours. " Perfect love casteth
out fear." We have the confidence of children, the spirit of
adoption, the desire to do a Father's will, and to drink every
cup which a Father puts into our hands. Thus we feel that we
are reaching onward to the end of our being, and that we may
grow up into the holiness which shall be a reflection of the
holiness of God.
Nor is this all ; for in the Lord Jesus we obtain also con
stantly fresh supplies of strength for the life thus begun, but
difficult to pursue. He bestows His spirit upon us, He
strengthens us with all needful grace, so that we can overcome
the world, and be more than conquerors through Him that loved
us. This is true healing ; and it is due not so much to Christ
the Lawgiver as to Christ the Saviour. The secret of the
Redeemer's, power over men has not been so much the moral
precepts which He uttered, not even the Sermon on the Mount
interpreted as a system of practical morality, although it is
really far more than that, but words like these, " Come unto Me
all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me, for I am meek and
lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls." Under
the influence of such words morality lives, enlarges, deepens ;
but the words themselves, and the spirit which they awaken,
precede it, mould it, beautify it. To them the eye turns amidst
surrounding darkness ; the ear listens amidst the cries of

98 ELIJAH.
misery of which earth is full ; the heart clings when in the despe
ration of perplexity one is tempted to wish for death rather than
life. In them, and other words like them, rest has been found
for the weary, comfort for the sorrowful, a softening grace for the
hardened, and an attractive power which has made the publican
and the sinner draw near in awakened sensibility not only to
the thought of what Jesus is, but of what they themselves may
be. Take such words out of the New Testament, and out of the
mouths of Christian ministers, and experience says that you
have taken away what in every age has made the teaching of
the New Testament "the wisdom of God and the power ot
God unto salvation." This was the main lesson taught Elijah
at Horeb, and never was a time in the history of our own coun
try when the same lesson was more needed than it is now.

CHAPTER VI.
REVELATION AT HOREB {continued) (l KINGS XIX. 13-21).
Our right and responsibility to judge Elijah at Horeb— The prophet again
questioned — His answer— Further revelation of God to him— God still
a God of judgment— Hazael, Jehu, EUsha : each an instrument of
judgment— Mercy of God revealed — Meaning of the 7,000— The pro
mise contained in the words— The revelation of God thus made
continues : first, in judgment ; secondly, in the preservation of a faith
ful remnant — General teaching of Scripture upon this point — The
same truths always applicable to the Church — Elijah leaves Horeb —
Abel-Meholah — Call of Ehsha— Meaning of Elisha's. farewell saluta
tions and feast — Spirit in which Elisha enters on his work — Close of
Elijah's special mission.
The vision to Elijah at Horeb considered in the last chapter
contained a revelation of the Almighty for which the prophet
had been entirely unprepared. After the wonderful events at
Carmel, in which he had borne so prominent a part, the signal
manifestation of God's presence which had been granted to him
there, the complete revolution in the feelings of the people
which he. had been the instrument of producing, and the
slaughter of the prophets of Baal at the brook Kishon, by
which the land had been thoroughly cleansed from those who
were leading it astray, Elijah had looked for nothing but the
immediate and complete triumph of his cause. It is possible
even that earthly elements may have mingled with his devotion
to the service of God, and his zeal for the restoration of His
worship. He may have been unable altogether to avoid thinking
of himself and of his own glory. He may have forgotten that
weakness of the earthly instrument which the Apostle Paul so

100 ELIJAH.
vividly remembered, when, in the very midst of all the success
of his mission to the Gentiles, he exclaimed, " By the grace of
God I am what I am ; and His grace which was bestowed upon
me was not found vain ; but I laboured more abundantly than
they all ; yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me"
(i Cor. XV. lo). He may have counted upon a continued pour
ing out of the Divine wrath, until not only the prophets of Baal
but all his worshippers had been rooted out of Israel. When,
accordingly, instead of this, Jezebel at once rose against him
with all the authority of the kingdom at her command ; and
when, instead of taking the lives of others, he was compelled
to flee for his own life, he was overwhelmed with disappoint
ment, and with despondency even approaching to despaii-. Nay,
more. Afeehng of indignation and doubt took possession of his
mind, and he hastened all the way to Horeb, that, amidst those
awful peaks upon which the fires of God once burned, and in
those wild valleys which once re-echoed with the sound of God's
thunders and with the voice of the trumpet " exceeding loud,"
he might hold communion with the God of hosts, and learn
whether He had ceased to be what He had formerly been.
The spirit in which Elijah thus fled to Horeb was undoubtedly
wrong, and we need have no hesitation in condemning it. We
are not called upon to defend all the thoughts and words and
actions recorded of even the most famous prophets. Elevated
above us as they may seem to be, we must judge them, not
indeed precisely as we would judge men now, for their age and
circumstances were different from ours, but in the main by the
application of the same great principles, modified only by the
remembrance of the historical position which they occupied..
When St. James tells us that Elijah was " a man of like pas
sions with us " (chap. v. 17), he must be understood to say this,
not only as the result of general reasoning, but because he saw,
in what was told of the prophet in the Old Testament, tokens
of ordinary human frailty and human sin. Nothing has done
more harm in the past, or does more harm still, than to look
upon the saints of God whose lives are recorded in Scripture
as beyond the range of our judgment or our criticism. God has
not left us, in our estimate of right and wrong, to be guided only
by what, notwithstanding the power of Divine grace in its sub
jects, must always be the varying standard of human excel
lence. He has taught us that "the saints shall judge the

REVELATION AT HOREB. lb.I
world," and that "we shall judge angels" (i Cor. vi. 2, 3) ; and
we cannot be fitted for the exercise of such judgment if we do
not learn both to distinguish and to pronounce upon the dis
tinction between the true and the false in religious character.
It is even with a special view to the drawing of such distinc
tions that St. Paul reminds Timothy that God has not given us
a spirit of fearfulness, but " of power and love and soberness "
(2 Tim. i. 7, Revised Version, margin). We may err in our judg
ments, but we can only be corrected by further enlightenment, or
by. those to whom, through the operation of the same spirit by
which we judge, such further enlightenment has already come.
The work of the Spirit in our maturer age must supply what is
wanting, and correct what is defective in our reception of the
same Spirit in our earlier years. In the fact that it should be
so lies one of the greatest elements of our responsibihty ; and
of that responsibility we cannot rid ourselves without injury to
our Christian manhood. As, therefore, the narrative now before
us cannot be rightly understood without our judging Elijah, we
must judge him ; and when we do so we cannot fail to see how
much there was of earth to mar the purity of his zeal, and to
dim the singleness of his vision when he fled to Horeb.
Nor was it otherwise even after God had revealed Himself to
him there, not in the stormwind or the thunder or the fire, but
in the " still, small voice " which told him that it, and not the
manifestations which preceded it, was the voice of God. For
no sooner was that vision over than " there came a voice unto
him, and said. What doest thou here, Elijah ? " The very same
question had been asked before, though it is not introduced in
exactly the same way by the sacred writer. In the ninth verse
of the chapter it is said, " Behold, the word of the Lord came
to him, and He said to him." Here we read, " There came a
voice unto him and said." Perhaps there is no difference between
the two expressions. Yet, when we consider the general careful
ness of the sacred writers in their choice of words, and the fact
that the mention of " a voice " instead of " the Word of the Lord ''
in the latter passage follows immediately the mention of the "still
small voice," it does not seem altogether improbable that there
was at least a difference of tone in the way in which the ques
tion was asked upon the two occasions spoken of. In the first
instance, there may have been more of the terrible, in the second,
of the tender. If it were so it illustrates still more strikingly

102 ELIIAH.
the degree to which the prophet had misunderstood or declined
the teaching of the vision, for his reply was in the same words
as before : " I have been very jealous, for the Lord, the God of
hosts, 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."
Yet let us not blame him more than the circumstances of his
position absolutely demand. He could not enter in- a moment
into those merciful purposes of God which had just been re
vealed to him. All his own previous experiences had led him to
an opposite conclusion. The long- continued drought and the
tajchecked slaughter of Baal's prophets had made him familiar
With the thought of wrath rather than of love. His sense of
the sin of Israel, too, was as deep as ever ; and, with the excep
tion of what might perhaps yet prove to have been a mere
momentary outburst of rage at the foot of Carmel, he had had
no time to see any reformation among his people. Even the
very sadness of his cry, " I, even I only, am left," is not un
natural. It is the cry which comes down from not a few of
God's most faithful and zealous servants in every age of Chris
tian history, and that alike from the crowded city, and the
desert or the mountain solitude. Because everything does not
fall out exactly as we had planned ; because religious institu
tions are not arranged precisely as we would have them ; be
cause piety does not assume the garb, and appear in the forms,
most pleasing to us, we are ever ready to think that things are
in a far more hopeless condition than they are. We limit the
extent of the Divine goodness, and the operation of the Divine
Spirit in the hearts of men. We forget that the freedom of the
God of nature is only equalled by the freedom of the God of
grace. - Hence, like Elijah, -we are ever ready to complain that
there are none serving God truly but ourselves. The mistake
needs correction, and it was corrected here by a further revela
tion to Elijah. This revelation may be most naturally divided
into two parts.
I. The manifestation of Divine mercy is not inconsistent with
the manifestation of Divine judgment. Such is the explanation
of the first part of the reply given to the prophet, " And the
Lord said unto him. Go, return on thy way by the wilderness to
Damascus (Revised Version, margin) ; and, when thou comest,

REVELATION AT HOREB. I03
thou shalt 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. And it shall come to pass, that him that
escapeth from the sword of Hazael shall Jehu slay ; and him
that escapeth from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay." The
general meaning of these words cannot be misunderstood, and
it is with the general meaning alone that we have to do. No
where is the great rule of interpretation more necessary than
here, that not only the words themselves, but all the circum
stances connected with them must be taken into account when
we would determine the idea in the speaker's mind ; and that
that idea, and not simply the literal rendering of the words, is
the meaning of which we are in search. For, in the first place,
it is to be noticed that Hazael does not appear to have been
anointed at all to the kingship that is here spoken of. The
record of the Old Testament rather seems distinctly to exclude
that thought. In the second place, it was not Elijah but Elisha
who carried out the command of God now given with regard to
both Hazael and Jehu. In 2 Kings viii. 7-15, we have an
account of the one transaction, and in the same book, chap. ix.
i-io, an account of the other. From the first of these accounts
we learn that Benhadad, king of Syria, at a time when he was
sick, heard that Elisha had come to Damascus, and sent Hazael,
an officer in high position at his court, to inquire of the prophet
whether he should recover from his sickness. Elisha answered
the question, and then settled his countenance steadfastly upon
Hazael until the latter was ashamed, and " the man of God
wept." Whereupon, in reply to Hazael's question why he wept,
he told him of all the evil that he would do to the children of
Israel, and that he would himself be king over Syria. The
communication recorded here did not take place between
Hazael and Elijah, but between that officer of Benhadad and
Elisha. A similar remark applies, though still more strongly,
to the case of Jehu. Neither Elijah nor Elisha anointed Jehu.
One of the sons of the prophets was sent by the latter for the
purpose. In the third place, in no literal sense of the words
could it be said that Elisha slew any of the Israelites. No
doubt he seems to be the instrument of destroying the forty-
two children at Bethel mentioned in 2 Kings ii. 24. But this
incident can no more be regarded as a fulfilment of the words

I04 ELIJAH.
here spoken to Elijah than any of the other acts of Elisha's life.
That prophet used no sword like Hazael or like Jehu against
the idolatrous worshippers ot Baal ; and the writer of this
history, whoever he was, could not but have known the fact.
It follows that, in the interpretation of the words before us, two
principles must be kept in view ; first, that Elijah may be justly
considered as responsible for acts done by any of his disciples
in the spirit which they had imbibed from their master ; and
secondly, that the words are not intended to be understood in
their most literal sense, but rather as expressive of the general
truth, that He from whom they came, marked as He may be by
mercy rather than wrath, by the still, small voice rather than the
tempest, the earthquake, and the fire, is still a God of judg
ment. The execution of such judgment against sinful Israel may
be clearly traced in the case of each of the three persons
named. For after Hazael succeeded to the throne of Syria he was a
constant thorn in the side of Israel. We read that in these
days "the Lord began to cut Israel short," and that " Hazael
smote them in all the coasts of Israel " (2 Kings x. 32) ; that a
little later " the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel,
and he delivered them into the hand of Hazael, king of Syria,
and into the hand of Benhadad, son of Hazael, all their days ;"
while it is even said in yet stronger language, that the king of
Syria had " made them like the dust by threshing " (2 Kings
xiii. 3, 7).
If Hazael thus scourged Israel as a people, still more did
Jehu scourge Ahab and Jezebel and all their house. So terrible
was the work of extermination upon which he entered when he
took possession of the throne, that it has been justly described
as one " hitherto unparalleled in the history of the Jewish mon
archy. " ' He slew Jehoram the reigning king, one of the sons
of Ahab, with his own hand on that day when he drove furiously
to Jezreel ; and, remembering the word of the Lord which he
had heard when he accompanied Ahab to the vineyard of
Naboth, he ordered the body of the king to be cast into the
plat of ground that his father had so cruelly acquired (i Kings
xxi. 19 ; 2 Kings ix. 26). He was the chief instrument also in
the death of Jezebel ; for, when he hastened to Jezreel after the
' Stanley in Smith's " Dictionary of the Wble," Jehu.

REVELATION AT HOREB. loj
despatch of Jehoram, that fierce and haughty queen painted her
eyes and tired her head, and looked out at a window as he
passed, and cried to him, " Is it peace, thou Zimri, thy master's
murderer?" Then Jehu "lifted up his face to the windovif,
and said. Who is on my side ? Who ? and there looked out to
him two or three eunuchs. And he said. Throw her down. So
they threw her down, and some of her blood was sprinkled on
the wall, and on the horses ; and he trode her under foot"
Even this was not all, for, touched in some degree by the
thought that, whatever she had been, she was a king's daughter,
he afterwards sent to bury her. But the messengers " found
no more of her than the skull and the feet and the palms of
her hands. Wherefore they came again, and told him. And he
said. This is the word of the Lord, which he spake by His
servant Elijah the Tishbite, saying. In the portion of Jezreel
shall the dogs eat the flesh of Jezebel : and the carcase of
Jezebel shall be as dung upon the face of the field in the portion
of Jezreel ; so that they shall not say, This is Jezebel " (2 Kings
ix. 30-37)-
. Nor was even this all. By still more terrible measures did
Jehu prove himself to be the scourge of Ahab and of his house ;
for.-he did not rest until he had secured the destruction of all
the surviving members of the old royal family. He terrified
the rulers and elders of Samaria into slaying seventy of the sons
of Ahab who had fled to them for refuge ; and, when their
heads were sent to him, he piled them in two heaps at the
entering in of the gate of Jezreel, and said, " Know now that
there shall fall unto the earth nothing of the word of the Lord,
which the Lord spake concerning the house of Ahab ; for the
Lord hath done that which He spake by His servant Elijah"
(2 Kings X. 10). Even the more distant relatives of Ahab did
not escape his vengeance ; for, as he travelled on one occasion
from Jezreel to Samaria, he met, at the binding house of the
shepherds, forty and two princes of the house of Ahaziah, king
of Judah, who had married a daughter of Ahab, and slew them
there (2 Kings x. 14). Thus the house of Ahab was flnally ex
tinguished. Of all his great men and his kinsfolks and his
priests Jehu left him none remaining (2 Kings x. 11).
Not only, however, did Jehu prove himself the scourge of
Ahab, he was not less the scourge of those worshippers of Baal
with whom that house had been so closely identified. Uniting

106 ELIJAH.
fierceness, hypocrisy, and cunning to a degree which, but for
the recorded facts, it would have been almost impossible for us
to conceive, he plotted and accomplished their extinction at a
single blow. " Ahab," he said, " served Baal a little, but Jehu
shall serve him much." He proclaimed a solemn assembly for
Baal in the great temple which Ahab had built in Samaria to
that false divinity. Thither he summoned, under the penalty
of death to any who should absent themselves, all Baal's
prophets and servants and priests ; and all the worshippers of
Baal came, so that there was not a man left that came not ; and
the house of Baal was filled from one end to another. The
gorgeous vestments were brought out, the worshippers were
clothed with them, and went into the temple to offer sacrifices
and burnt offerings. Then the fatal moment arrived. As soon
as the offerings were over Jehu gave the command, to those
whom he had provided for the purpose, to fall upon them,
letting none of them escape. " And they smote them with the
edge of the sword, and the guard and the captains cast them
out, and went into the city of the house of Baal (or the inner
sanctuary of the temple). And they brought forth the obelisks
that were in the house of Baal, and burned them. And they
brake down the pillar of Baal, and made it a draught-ho'Ose
unto this day. Thus Jehu destroyed Baal out of Israel " (2
Kings X. 18-27).
Finally, Elisha was also in like manner a warning and a
scourge to the idolaters of his time. An entirely different idea
has indeed been entertained with regard both to the work of
Elisha and to the relation in which he stands to Elijah. It has
been supposed that between the two prophets there was a con
trast rather than a similarity of character ; that, while the one
was the child of the desert, rough, impetuous, and harsh, the
other was the child of the family and the home, full of gentle
ness of disposition and kindness of heart Then, as to the
flight in which Elisha is presented to us in Elijah's vision, it
has been urged that, comparing it with that to Moses at Sinai,
Hazael and Jehu illustrate the fact that God " will by no means
clear the guilty," while Elisha illustrates the other aspect of the
Divine character in which God is " merciful and gracious, long-
suffering and slow to anger." It is most difficult to accept such
an interpretation. The words, " Him that escapeth from the
sword ot Hazael shall Jehu slay ; and him that escapeth from

REVELATION AT HOREB. I07
the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay," appear to describe all the
three men spoken of as if they were animated by the same
spirit and summoned to the same task. Besides which, the
acts recorded of Elisha reveal something wholly different from
the soft and gentle spirit thus ascribed to him. If he was less
severe than the prophet of the wilderness, if he moved more
among the abodes of men, and if he exhibited in a larger degree
human sympathy and pity, the difference arose from the fact
that he was less single and powerful in the essential elements of
his character, and that he less fully embodied the sternness of
the Law. But he belonged to the same school of prophecy.
The mantle of Elijah, and with his mantle his spirit in so far as
he was capable of receiving it, had descended upon him. He
had the same contest to maintain, and the same work to do.
" After Elijah's decease," says one of the most eloquent his
torians of Israel, Elisha was known as the one who "had poured
water on the hands of Elijah. And certainly Elijah could
scarcely have chosen a more powerful servant. Recognized
and honoured as the most intimate and trusted disciple of the
great prophet, he lived in the exercise of a constantly increasing
influence till the beginning of the reign of the grandson of
Jehu. . . . But, although he had inherited Elijah's mantle, and
many might esteem him equally great, yet it was always an
essential feature of the representation of him that he had only
received two-thirds of Elijah's spirit, and had with difficulty
obtained even that. . . . He is great only so far as he continues,
and carries out with more force than any other man of his time,
the work which Elijah had begun with new and wonderful
power, namely, of defending the ancient religion with a courage
which nothing could shake. . . . But he was still less capable
than Elijah of inaugurating a purely benign and constructive
mode of action, since at that time the whole spirit of the ancient
religion was still unprepared for it." ' Dean Stanley has indeed
taken an entirely different view of Elisha's character and work,"
but it may well be doubted if it is as true to the facts of the
case as that of his German predecessor. In Elisha there is
indeed a greater mingling of the gentle with the harsh, of the
tender with the severe, than there was in Elijah, but the lines
on which he wrought were in no wise different, and his prophetic
' Ewald, " History of Israel," edited by Carpenter, iv. 81, 82.
" " Lectures on the Jewish Church," lect. xxxi.

Io8 ELIJAH.
work was in the main a protest against the idolatrous tendencies
of Israel, and a condemnation of its sins. Looking, therefore,
at the words we have been examining in the light of Elisha's
life taken as a whole, it cannot surprise us that he should be
described, in language similar to that employed with regard to
Hazael and Jehu, as a scourge of Israel. The translation into
the future history of Elijah's people of the still, small voice
which at the entrance of his cave he had recognized as the
immediate emblem of the Divine presence has not yet been
given. Hazael, Jehu, Elisha — all the three were to be instruments
of the Divine wrath, and ministers of the Divine vengeance
upon degenerate Israel. They were to be the great and strong
"wind" which was to rend the mountains and break in pieces
the rocks before the Lord, the " earthquake," and the " fire."
They were to reveal the character and attributes of that God-
of Israel who was a God of judgment ; and who, whatever
might be the fortunes of His servants, would be the same in His
dealings with sin as He had been when He answered the prayer
of His prophet upon the heights of Carmel. The words
"before the Lord," used in connection with the great and strong
wind at Horeb, and belonging by analogy also to the earthquake
and the fire, are to be particularly marked. As he apprehended
the meaning of the thought which they express, Elijah would
see that these terrible visitations were directed by the same
Divine hand that had been so signally revealed to him a day or
two before, that he was still in the presence of the unchangeable
Jehovah, and that, whatever might be the manifestation of
Divine mercy which was given him, it was not inconsistent
with the manifestation of Divine judgment. Thus he was pre
pared for the second part of the words addressed to him.
2. These words immediately follow : " Yet will I leave me
seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed
unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him." The
words, it will be observed, as they are correctly given in the
Revised, though not in the Authorized Version, contain more
than an intimation that, though Elijah had thought himself
alone, there were seven thousand in Israel still faithful to the
truth. They are also a promise that, amidst all the judgments
that were to follow, seven thousand would be found worthy to
escape them, because they would refuse to yield to the general

REVELATION AT HOREB. I09
apostasy of the people. Nor are we again to understand the
number seven thousand literally. Seven is the number of the
covenant ; and, as may be seen more fully in the Apocalypse,
thousands were associated in the mind of a Jew with what was
heavenly and Divine, while hundreds belonged rather to what was
earthly and devilish. Seven thousand, therefore, is a sacred, a
rounded, a covenant, an ideal number ; and, while it might
perhaps indicate a smaller, it indicates in all probability a larger
number of persons than the figures naturally denote. These
figures are indeed obviously symbolical, expressive of steadfast
adherence to the covenant, and of the continued enjoyment of
its privileges. The promise, when correctly interpreted, thus
implies more than it is generally supposed to include — not
merely that at that moment there was a remnant according to
the election of grace, and that Elijah did not stand alone in his
allegiance to the Almighty, but that that election would be
preserved through all the judgments that were to follow. There
were times of heavy trial in store for the Church of God in
Israel, in the midst of which many would fall and be over
whelmed. Yet, whatever might happen to the merely outward
members of the body, the Lord knew them that were His, and
to them the promise long afterwards made to the Church of
Philadelphia would be fulfilled, " Because thou didst keep the
word of My patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of trial,
that hour which is to come upon the whole world, to try them
that dwell upon the earth " (Rev. iii. 10).
If the words formerly considered by us were a translation into
speech of the whirlwind, the earthquake, and 'Caefire, those of
which we now speak are thus a similar translation of the still,
small voice. In the three agents of the destructive powers of
nature we hear the utterance, " Him that escapeth the sword of
Hazael shall Jehu slay, and him that escapeth the sword of Jehu
shall Elisha slay." In the soft whisper which followed, and
which told of human sympathy, we hear the utterance, " Yet
will I leave me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which
have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not
kissed him." First in deed and then in word is the prophet
spoken to.
It ought to be hardly necessary to say that the revelation thus
made by the Almighty of Himself to Elijah has always been
continued, and is still continued, to His Church and people. For,

no ELIJAH.
I. The element of judgment never ceases to mark the course
of history, and never fails, as it is traced there by the eye of
faith, to elevate and sustain the heart. Neither vindictiveness
nor a spirit of vengeance, in the sense in which that word is
commonly understood, marks those who believe that, whatever
may be the appearances to the contrary, the Lord God omni
potent reigneth. Their feeling is simply one of joy that every
thing is under the control of Him who, as Judge of all the earth,
does right, who weighs the actions of men in the balances of
His own unswerving rectitude, and the course of whose provi
dence will sooner or later show that justice and judgment are
the habitation of His throne. We may at times be disposed to
exclaim, not so much " Hath God forgotten to be gracious, hath
He in anger shut up His tender mercies ? " as. Hath God for
gotten to be righteous, hath He in anger withheld the thunder
bolts of His wrath against transgression ? On the one hand,
we see the wicked in great power, the selfish schemers around
us attaining the ends of their ambition, the unscrupulous appa
rently prosperous and happy ; on the other hand, we see humble
piety trodden upon, overreached, and oppressed, its very good
ness, its weakness, its simplicity the temptation to the daring
and unprincipled.
And, when we see this, what can we do but cry for the
speedy coming of the time when God shall make bare His
holy arm in the sight of the nations, visit wrong-doing with the
punishment which it deserves, and bring forth the righteousness
of those who wait upon Him as the light and their judgment
as the noon-day ? Or with what other sentiments than those of
satisfaction and of triumph can we listen to the words, " Shall
not God avenge His elect which cry to Him day and night,
and He is long-suffering over them, I say unto you that
He will avenge them speedily" (Luke xviii. 7, 8). Throughout
the whole of Scripture the same thought runs, that we are in
the midst of a righteous order, and throughout the whole of
history that thought has lifted up the Church's head, as she
has felt that the hour of her redemption was drawing nigh. Not
only, however, does the Almighty constantly keep this hope
before His people, He assures them
2. That He will never fail to preserve His own elect amidst
the trials which encompass them. The consolation afforded
to Elijah is indeed the very consolation afforded to the

REVELATION AT HOREB. Ill
Church throughout the whole both of the Old Testament and
the New— not so much that the Church shall attain the com
pleteness of her victory before the end, as that the faithful
remnant within her shall be preserved for the end, not one of
those who compose that remnant being lost. We are too apt to
inoagine that it is the purpose of God to establish even in this
world a Church which shall be outwardly triumphant over the
world, which shall gradually spread from sea to sea, and which
shall by degrees leaven the whole world with its heavenly prin
ciples. We console ourselves with the reflection that, slow as
the progress of the Church was during the times of the Old
Testament dispensation, and slow as it has been during the
eighteen centuries of the Christian era, there has yet been per
ceptible advance. And we anticipate, it may be at no distant
period in the future, the sudden breaking up of winter before
the rushing in of spring, and nations "born in a day." It
may well be doubted whether Scripture gives countenance to
such ideas. Rather would it seem as if the purpose of God's
gracious dealings with men were to call outof the nations a people
for His name, to rescue from surrounding darkness those who
are there waiting for the light, and to bring to the knowledge of
Himse'f those who, more or less " of the truth," are ready to
hear His voice, and to come to that eternal Son of whom it is
said, " Neither doth any man know the Father save the Son, and
he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal Him " (Matt. xi. 27).
The conception, in short, of the Church of God which runs
throughout the Bible is more that of a remnant to be preserved
than of an army of the redeemed marching forward to new and
ever-extending conquests.
In this spirit it is that Isaiah cries, " Except the Lord of hosts
had left unto us a very srhall remnant, we should have been as
Sodom, we should have been like unto Gomorrah ; " and again,
,speakingof the daywhen "the glory of Jacob shall be made thiii,"
'-' Yet there shall be left therein gleanings, as the shaking of an
olive-tree, two or three berries in the top of the uttermost bough,
four or five in the outmost branches of a fruitful tree, saith the
Lord, the God of Israel;" and once more, "Thus saith the
Lord, As the new wine is found in the cluster, and one saith.
Destroy it not, for a blessing is in it : so will 1 do for My ser
vants' sakes, that I may not destroy them all. And I will bring
forth a seed out of Jacob, and out of Judah an inheritor of My

112 ELIJAH.
mountains : and My chosen shall inherit it, and My servants
shall dwell there '' (Isa. i. 9 ; xvii. 4 ; Ixv. 8, 9). In a similar
spirit our Lord Himself, referring in HiS great discourse upon
the Last Things to the fortunes of His Church throughout all
her pilgrimage, exclaims, " And except those days had been
shortened, no flesh should have been saved ; 'but for the elect's
sake those days shall be shortened " (Matt. xxiv. 22). It is not
otherwise with St. Paul when, in the midst of that unbelief and
hardness of heart by which the Jews of his time were charac
terized, he fell back upon this very revelation of the Almighty to
His prophet : " W'ot ye not what the Scripture saith of
Elijah ? how he pleadeth with God against Israel, Lord, they
have killed Thy prophets ; they have digged down Thine altars ;
and I am left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the
answer of God unto him ? I have left for Myself seven thousand
men, who have not bowed the knee to Baal. Even so, then, at
this present time also there is a remnant according to the elec
tion of grace '' (Rom. xi. 2-5). The same thought also lies at
the bottom of the representation given us by the Seer in the
Apocalypse when he Ijeheld an " angel ascend from the sunris-
ing, having the seal of the living God; and he cried with a great
voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth
and the sea, saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the
trees, till we shall have sealed the servants of our God on their
foreheads," and when there were sealed one hundred and forty-
four thousand out of the twelve tribes of God's spiritual Israel
(Rev. vii. 1-8). These hundred and forty-four thousand " were
purchased from among men to be the firstfruits unto God and
unto the Lamb " (Rev. xiv. 4). They are that faithful remnant
which in every age is kept safe amidst the revolutions of the
world and the trials of its pilgrimage until it is crowned with
glory. The two truths, then, thus spoken to Elijah in the last words
addressed to him before he left Horeb to go on his way to
Damascus, were not spoken to him alone, nor were they adapted
only to his peculiar circumstances. They are always applicable
and always of value to the Church of Christ. That Church
may often fear that she shall never be able to escape the malice
and hatred of her enemies. Her position in this world is
constantly presented to her as one of difficulty and trial and
persecution. Our Lord compared His disciples to sheep in

REVELATION AT HOREB. II3
the midst of wolves. He spoke of tribulation as their natural
and appropriate portion. He told them that without taking up
their cross and following Hini they could not be His disciples.
And He represented drinking of the cup that He drank of, and
being baptized with the baptism with which He was baptized,
as necessary to their being made ready for any honours in His
kingdom. The same lesson is taught, in passages far too
numerous to quote, by His apostles in their letters to the
Churches, and by St. John in the Apocalypse. We are parti
cularly to observe, too, that in all this teaching the main
reference is not to such suffering as might be produced by
poverty, sickness, or bereavement. It is opposition at the
hands of the world, opposition to the Church on the ground
that she is the Church, opposition to her doctrines and demands
as in themselves essentially distasteful to men, that is con
stantly in view. Hence also the permanency of this opposition.
It was not, as so many would fain persuade themselves, con
fined to the first ages of Christianity, because the world was so
evil, while it may be hoped that it has for ever vanished through
the growth of knowledge and civilization. Rather is the saying
of our Lord always true : " If ye were of the world the world
would love its own, but because ye are not of the world, but I
chose you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you'''
(John XV. 19). There is no prospect, so far as Scripture teaches,
of something like a millennial peace and rest for the Church
before the end. Down to the very close of this dispensation
the same enmity and opposition will continue on the one side,
and the same suffering from it on the other ; or, should it at
any time be otherwise, it will be found that the ease arises not
from the world's being less hostile to the Church, but from the
Church's having become more conformed to the world. The
Church of the Lord Jesus Christ, when faithful to her high
calling, can never fail to be in the position of the boat in which,
as described in the Fourth Gospel, the disciples were when they
were overtaken by the storm on the Sea of Galilee. It is dark;
the sea has risen by reason of a great wind : it would seem for
the moment that Jesus has not come to them ; yet all the while
the Saviour marks them from the mountain-top, where He has
remained to pray to His heavenly Father. He knows their
danger : He notices their alarm : He will come to them walking
upon the waters which arouse their fears : and when they take
9

114 ELIJAH.
Him into the boat it will be "straightway at the land whither
they were going" (John vi. 21) That is our encouragement
and our hope. The seven thousand shall be always found, and
not one of them shall be lost. Against them the gates of Hades
shall never prevail. They may prevail against the world. They
may prevail against the outward Church, the great community
calling itself by the name of Israel. Nay, they may even find
there the smoothest hinges upon which to turn. But there will
never be wanting those who listen to the words, " Come forth,
my people, out of her, that ye have no fellowship with her sins,
and that ye receive not of her plagues" (Rev. xviii. 4).; and
these at least will keep the lamp of truth burning until the
Bridegroom comes, and His whole redeemed Church enters in
with Him into the marriage feast.
In that hope, that confidence, let Elijah, let ourselves rejoice.
"Let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they
that dwell therein. Let the floods clap their hands ; let the
hills be joyful together before the Lord : for He cometh to
judge the earth ; with righteousness shall He judge the world,
and the people with His truth " (Psa. xcviii. 7-9).
The revelation to the prophet was over, and it reiliained
for him only to return by the wilderness to Damascus, that he
might execute the commission with which he had been charged.
He set out from Horeb northward, and pursued his way, ap
parently without interruption, towards the upper part of the
valley of the Jordan. There he reached a small place called
Abel-meholah, or the meadow of the dance. The name would
seem to indicate that it was a fertile plain near the river, well
adapted for the purposes either of pasture or of agriculture, and
at the present moment used for the latter. The fieV-d was under
the plough, and twelve meij, each with a yoke of oxeij before
him, were engaged in cultivating it The last of the twelve was
Elisha, the son of Shaphat ; and Elijah, whether he had kiiown
him before or not, at once recognized the man whom he wa:s to
anoint as prophet in his room. Obedient io the heavenly
vision, he did not hesitate an instant as to the course he was to
follow, but " passed over unto him, and cast his mantle upon
him." Not a word would appear to have been spoken. On
the part of the one actor in the scene the action was symbolical ;
on the part of the other it was understood. And no sooner had
it been performed than Elijah, in all probability resuming his

REVELATION AT HOREB. IIJ
mantle, strode on upon his way. The feelings of Elisha are
sufficiently indicated by the course which he pursued. His
first impression may well have been one of bewilderment
What was the precise nature of his call? Must he at that
very instant leave his plough standing in the furrow ? Must he
quit that field upon which he had often laboured, the oxen
which he had often guided, and the prospect of even a more
abundant crop, from the newly fallen rain, than he had often
gathered ? Must he leave father and mother, and relations and
home, to enter upon a hfe so different from that which he had
previously led ? And there before him is the gaunt figure of
Elijah already disappearing in the distance. Questions like
these could hardly fail to pass rapidly through his mind, but
they were as rapidly answered. There was no possibility of
mistaking the nature of the Divine commission. He must
leave all and follow him by whom it had been given. And so
he did. " He left the oxen," we are told, " and ran after Elijah,
and said, ' Let me, I pray thee, kiss my father and my mother,
and then I will follow thee.' "
There is difficulty in interpreting these words ; but, before
endeavouring to interpret them, it may be well to take the rest
of the narrative into account Elijah answered the request,
" Go back again ; for what have I done unto thee ? " The
permission was embraced. Elisha "returned from following
him, and took the yoke of oxen and slew them, and roasted
their flesh with the instruments of the oxen, and gave unto the
people, and they did eat Then he arose, and went after Elijah,
and ministered unto him."
In what light then are we to understand the events which are
fhus described ? Have we before us in Elisha a man of gentle
nature and family affections, who cannot bear to part suddenly
with those whom he has loved, who must give them a final
embrace before he goes, and who, in the exercise of a kind and
generous hospitality, must afford proof to his old friends and
neighbours that, even in the new' and important sphere upon
which he is entering, he will not forget the pleasant days they
had spent together in the village or in the fields ? Have we, in
short, here a sweet idyll of the country upon which the eye may
rest with fond delight, amidst those stern and rugged sights,
those sights even of bloodshed and of slaughter, with which the
rest of the narrative is filled ?

II 6 ELIJAH.
Such is the light in which the passage is generally regarded,
but it is not easy to think that it is correct
(i) There is a remarkable incident in the life of Christ, in
which the language of our Lord can scarcely be separated from
reniembrances of the scene before us. When Jesus was upon
His last journey from Galilee to Jerusalem, there came to Him
a man who said, " I will follow Thee, Lord ; but first suffer me
to bid farewell to them that are at my house. But Jesus said
unto him. No man, having put his hand to the plough, and
looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God " (Luke ix. 6i, 62).
Our Lord had immediately before been alluding to the history
of Elijah (ver. 54), and in the words now quoted it is hardly
possible to mistake an allusion to that of Elisha. But, if so, we
cannot imagine that Elisha is referred to as one who, by looking
back, had proved himself unfit for the kingdom of God. That
history, therefore, cannot be intended to describe looking back
in the ordinary sense. It was rather the history of one who
did not look back, but who obeyed the Divine call with single
ness and with earnest promptitude.
(2) It is by no means necessary to interpret the "kiss"
which Elisha proposed to give to his father and mother as a
mere kiss of affection, the giving of which may be supposed to
betray a heart still clinging to earthly relationships and ties.
It was probably no more than that kiss of farewell with which
Orientals are in the habit of saluting one another when they
part To give it was perfectly consistent with the most absolute
abandonment of earthly goods, and the most devoted submis
sion to the new life upon which the prophet was to enter. The
going back to say farewell may, when looked at in this light,
be the clearest proof of the strength of his determination to
enter at once upon the prophetic life, and to make every sacrifice
for its sake.
(3) The killing of the oxen and the mode in which they were
prepared for food indicate something altogether different from
an ordinary feast. The Hebrew word rendered killed means
properly to kill in sacrifice, and is constantly used in that sense
throughout the Old Testament Scriptures. Again, the " instru
ments of the oxen " would never have been thus used to prepare
an ordinary festive meal. It is impossible to think that there
could have been any necessity for such a course, or that fuel
could not easily have been obtained in some other way. Besides

REVELATION AT HOREB. II 7
which there is at least one other instance in the Bible in which
a similar course was resorted to, and by which, therefore, lighi
is shed upon the action now taken by Ehsha. When David
told Araunah that he was come to buy his threshing-floor of
him in order to build thereon an altar to the Lord, Araunah
at once offered to make a free gift of the spot to the king, and
added, " Let my lord the king take and offer up what seemeth
good unto him : behold, the oxen for the burnt-offering, and
the threshing instruments and the furniture of the oxen for the
wood " (2 Sam. xxiv. 22). Here was undoubtedly a sacrifice to
the valueiDf which it must have been thought that the consuming
of the oxen and of their harness contributed. And so now.
Not because other oxen and other firewood could not have been
obtained were these resorted to by Elisha, but because, in
surrendering them, he surrendered all that he esteemed most
useful and valuable to himself.
(4) Lastly, the peculiar character of the feast here partaken
of may be noticed. It was not an ordinary festival, but a feast
after a sacrifice ; and it had thus a sacred meaning. It was the
pledge that those who partook of it were in covenant with God,
that they had surrendered themselves to His service, and that
they were at peace with Him.
Looked at in this light, the whole transaction now recorded
assumes an aspect wholly different from that in which we
commonly regard it. Instead of supplying evidence of even
momentary hesitation upon Elisha's part, it supplies the clearest
evidence that there was nothing of the kind. Instead of indi
cating some remains of g,ttachment to the world, it indicates
that the future prophet not only renounced the world, but that
he was desirous to tell the world that he did so. And, if it
shows that he had tender affections and friendly feelings, it
shows also that he had learned from the moment when Elijah
cast his mantle upon him to count all things but loss for the
excellency of the service to which he had then been summoned.
The force and vigour of Ehsha's character appear as conspicu
ously in this scene as they do in every other action of his life.
The revelation of God to Elijah at Horeb was now over, and
with the calling of his successor the chief part of his activity
closed. He has, indeed, yet to come before us in one or two
striking scenes ; but his main work was done. Little more than
three years had passed since he first in the presence of Ahab

II8 ELIJAH.
announced the judgments coming upon the land. By far the
larger portion even of these years had been spent in the ob
scurity of a poor woman's house in a heathen land. Only for a
few weeks would it seem that he was in the field, and but two
or three days out of that time in presence of the foe. Yet
in that brief season he fought his fight and gained his victory

CHAPTER vn.
ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD (l KINGS XXL 1-39).
Elijah disappears for a time— Naboth the Jezreelite— Ahab desires posses
sion of his vineyard— Failure of his attempt to obtain it and the effec
upon him— Jezebel's plot— Its success— Naboth's trial and death— Ahab
takes possession of the vineyard — Elijah appears before him there —
Judgment pronounced on Ahab and Jezebel and their house — Execu
tion of the judgment by Jehu — Fulfihnent of woe uttered by Elijah —
Effect on Ahab of Elijah's words —Objects of the narrative: To
impress us with a deep sense of the wickedness of Ahab and Jezebel —
To show the righteous retributions of God upon the sinner — To reveal
God's readiness to pardon the penitent.
With the departure of Elijah from Abel-meholah at the time
when he cast his mantle upon Elisha, the pubhc career of the
prophet may be said to have come to an end. It had been
short, but decisive. Elijah had fulfilled the work which had
been given him to do. He had vindicated in the sight of
assembled Israel the honour of the only living and true God.
He had drawn from the people assembled at Mount Carmel the
loud acclaim of praise, " The Lord, He is the God ; the Lord,
He is the God." He had been the instrument of effecting the
destruction of the priests of Baal at the river Kishon. He had
received that revelation at Horeb of the nature of God's cha
racter and government, which was to lead Israel to higher
thoughts of the Divine Being, and to prepare the way for the
introduction of a better dispensation in the fulness of the times.
Finally, he had been guided to the selection of one who
was to succeed him in the prophetic office and to carry on his
work in Israel. His great task, therefore, was accomplished.

I20 ELIJAH.
But, as illustrated by numerous instances in the sacred narrative,
public work is not all that is demanded of the prophets of God.
They have to apply the principles of the Divine government to
private life ; and partly to bring out this truth, partly to throw
further light upon the characters of Ahab and Jezebel, so that
we may better understand all the particulars of the terrible
fate that was in store for them, we are made acquainted with
the tragical story of Naboth and his vineyard.
Of Naboth himself, apart from his connection with this vine
yard, we know almost nothing. He is called " Naboth the
Jezreelite," so that we may positively conclude that he was an
inhabitant of Jezreel. In that city we further know that Ahalx
had erected a royal palace to which he was particularly attached,
and which he had surrounded with terraces and gardens.
Naboth must thus have been a constant witness of the idolatry
and corruption of the Court. But his feelings and language in
reference to his vineyard entitle us to infer that, like Lot in
Sodom, he had remained unaffected by the profligacy around
him, and that he was one of that remnant in Israel which had
not bowed the knee to Baal. His possession of land in the
neighbourhood of the city must have lent him some importance ;
and this impression will be confirmed if, with Dean Stanley, we
adopt the idea of Josephus that, when an assembly was convened
to judge him, he was placed in virtue of his position, at its
head.' There is little, however, to warrant this conclusion.
And the probabihties are rather in favour; of the generally
received opinion that, with the exception of possessing a small
" plat of ground " (2 Kings ix. 26) near the city, he was poor.
This plat of ground was his own. He had inherited it from his
fathers, and he was attached to it by all the ties which
everywhere bind men to the land that has come down to them,
and which were even peculiarly strong amongst the Jews.
The vineyard thus spoken of was " hard by the palace of
Ahab, king of Samaria.'' It would seem even to have run like
a tongue into the rest of the ground which Ahab possessed in
the neighbourhood of his palace, and to have thus interfered
with his privacy and the full carrying out of the plans of
improvement that he had in view. He desired, accordingly, to
' obtain it ; and, unless it be that he already knew the sentiments
of Naboth, there was no unfairness in the steps taken by him to
» Smith's " Dictionary of the Bible," Naboth, note 6.

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 12
effect his end. He had been dwelling in Samaria at the time,'
but he came personally to Jezreel to see Naboth on the point,
and the fact that he did so could hardly fail to impress the
Jezreelite with a sense of the king's earnestness in the matter.
In Jezreel he found Naboth, "and he spake unto him saying.
Give me thy vineyard that I may have it for a garden of herbs,
because it is near unto my house : and I will give thee for it a
better vineyard than it : or, if it seems good to thee, I will give
thee the worth of it in money." In the mouth of an idolatrous
king, who had forsaken the God of Israel, it may be said that
there was nothing wrong in the proposal thus submitted to
Naboth. But there was a wrong, and it lay in this, that Ahab
was king of God's people Israel ; that he had been taught in the
most striking manner, and had probably in words at least
acknowledged, the sovereignty of Jehovah ; and that the Divine
law expressly forbade such a transaction as he now contem
plated. No Israelite was entitled thus to part with or to sell his
property. The land really belonged to God, and not to him.
Jehovah Himself was the proprietor of the whole soil of
Palestine, and He had originally divided it among the people
on the condition that it should always remain in the famiHes to
which it had been assigned. Even in the case of poverty it
could only be sold for a sum of money calculated by the number
of years that were to run between the time of sale and the date of
the next celebration of the jubilee. After being sold it might
at any moment, if the old owner could afford it, be redeemed :
and, if this could not be done, it returned in the year of jubilee
to the first possessor or his family (Lev. xxv. 13-28). Such was
the distinct provision of the Mosaic law — " The land shall not
be sold for ever, for the land is Mine " (Lev. xxv. 23). Ahab
must have known this. If he did not he ought to have known
it. In either case he was equally to blame. His proposal to
Naboth was one involving a direct infringement of the Divine
law ; and, when we take into account his character as it appears
in all the other actions of his life, we shall hardly be doing him
injustice if we suppose that his apparent fairness may have been
in some degree due to his knowledge that he was tempting
Naboth to be guilty of sin. It is no uncommon thing thus to
trick out in the fairest colours any temptation to wrong-doing
that we present to others. • Keil, in loc.

122 eLijah.
Whatever may have been the case with Ahab, there can be no
doubt as to the spirit that animated Naboth. " The Lord forbid
it me," he replied, " that I should give the inheritance of my
fathers unto thee." There is no reason to doubt that the scruple
thus expressed was thoroughly conscientious, or that, though
Naboth may at the same time have been influenced by other
motives, he was guided mainly by his conviction that to transfer
his inheritance to another, as he was now asked to do, was
directly contrary to the law of God. The bar, too, thus pre
sented to the accomplishment of the demands of Ahab was
insuperable. No promise of a larger piece of ground, or of more
money than he may at first have been willing to spend upon the
purchase, could be of the smallest use. Ahab had not to deal
with an avaricious proprietor, desirous to raise the price of his
commodity, but with a pious Israelite, who knew the Divine
law and was determined to obey it. All hope of accomplishing
his object had to be abandoned by the king.
The effect, accordingly, produced on him is next described.
" He came into his house heavy and displeased because of the
word which Naboth the Jezreelite had spoken to him. And he
laid him down upon his bed, and turned away his face, and
would eat no bread.'' It is difficult to think that the sacred
writer, in penning such a description, could have failed to be
alive to the almost ludicrous weakness of the man of whom he
speaks. A king acting like a spoilt child ; prevented from
accomplishing his purpose by causes the force of which he was
secretly compelled to own, yet not straightforward enough to
confess them openly ; standing before an iron gate, which he is
well aware cannot be opened, and yet injuring himself by kick
ing against it in an impotence as petulant as it was absurd —
such is the picture that is here presented to us. Ahab was not
only wicked ; he was weak. He was not only morally, but,
intellectually, a fool.
A stronger than he was not far off to solve the difficulty. We
have met her before as she displayed a marked contrast to her hus
band ; for, when, after the slaughter of the priests of Baal, the
latter drove home consenting to what had been done, and per
mitting Elijah, the instrument of effecting it, to run as one of his
company before his chariot, she, on the other hand, no sooner
heard of it than she was up in arms, bent upon immediate
vengeance. " So let the gods do to me, and more also," had

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 1 23
then been her instant message to the prophet, " if I make not
thy life as the life of one of them by to-morrow about this time."
We see the same spirit now, a spirit to be commended for its
strength had it not been at the same time marked by such
impious contempt of principle. As it was, she came to Ahab
and asked the cause of his sadness. The explanation given, she
was at no loss to make immediate reply, " Dost thou not govern
the kingdom of Israel? Arise, and eat bread, and let thine
heart be merry ; I will give thee the vineyard of Naboth the
Jezreehte." The wife, and not the husband, was after all the
monarch. Nor did Jezebel content herself with words. She took imme
diate steps to effect her purpose, and these were worthy of the
craft and cruelty which have ever since been associated with her
name. She wrote letters in the king's name, and sealed them
with his seal, and sent them to the elders and nobles of Jezreel.
In these letters she commanded them to proclaim a fast, that
the feelings of the people might be excited by the thought that
something of far more than ordinary importance had occurred,
and that the wicked deed which she proposed might be clothed
with all the solemnities of a religious act. In the midst of the
impression thus produced, an assembly of the people was to be
called ; Naboth was to be placed at the head of it, in order that
a deeper horror might be awakened by the charge of impiety
brought against one who occupied so exalted a position ; and
then, two false witnesses having been suborned for the purpose,
these v^itnesses were to testify that the unhappy owner of the
coveted vineyard had cursed God and the king. By the law of
Moses the two offences were essentially connected (Exod. xxii.
28) ; and, as the law further ordained that idolatry should be
punished with stoning (Deut xiii. 10), it was considered that
blasphemy should be visited with no lighter punishment.' In
bold confidence in her iniquity, Jezebel did not hesitate a
moment in her calculation as to what the result would be.
" Then carry him forth," were the words of her letter, " and
stone him that he die." Everything fell out according to her
plot The assembly was convened ; Naboth was placed at its
head ; the false witnesses appeared ; their testimony was given ;
no denial of the charge was hstened to ; Naboth was carried
forth out of the city, for no execution was permitted within the
' Michaelis.

124 ELIJAH.
walls, and there stoned with stones that he died, and the very
dogs of the city were permitted to lick up his blood that had
been shed. His sons, we elsewhere learn, shared his fate
(2 Kings ix. 26). It was a dreadful deed, having its only parallel
in the Bible in the false accusations brought against Jesus of
Nazareth, when He, too, was led forth out of the city, and cruci
fied on Calvary.
No compunction seems to have touched the heart of the fierce
Sidonian queen. In her palace at Samaria she received her
messengers when they returned, and, as we may well suppose,
without either pallor on her cheek or tear in her eye, she listened
to their words, " Naboth is stoned, and is dead." She went in
immediately to Ahab. The prize was gained, for the property
of any one condemned for treason came into the possessions of
the Crown. " Arise," she said, " take possession of the vineyard
of Naboth the Jezreelite, which he refused to give thee for
money ; for Naboth is not alive, but dead." No explanation is
given by her of the manner of his death. Ahab may have had
his own suspicions that there must have been foul play some
where. But, when men see that at last an object has been
reached upon which their hearts have been long bent, they have
a wonderful power of silencing their own doubts as to the means
by which it may have been attained. These hands, they say to
themselves, at all events are clean. If some crime has been
committed, we at least have had no part in it Thus it was
that Pilate washed his hands before the assembled multitude
when Jesus was at his bar, and said, " I am innocent of the
blood of this righteous man ; see ye to it " (Matt xxvii. 24).
He did not choose to own, what his very defence of himself
shows to have been the verdict of his own hardened and
hardening conscience, that he who permits, and reaps the fruit
of, crime that he could have prevented, is as guilty as the actual
criminal. Ahab, when he heard from the message of Jezebel
that Naboth was dead, asked no questions. He " rose up to go
down to the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite to take possession
of it."
The deed is accomplished, and Ahab possesses what he
has so long desired. As we behold him in that garden on
the slopes of Jezreel, we feel that we have passed through one
of those scenes of human life which have troubled the hearts ot
good men in every age. Man believes that righteousness is

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 1 25
right, and that iniquity is wrong. As a natural consequence he
believes that the one ought to be followed by reward, and the
other by punishment. If it be not so, are not the foundations of
the world out of course ? Must not wickedness prosper, and
virtue parish, and earth become the theatre, not of an order that
corresponds to all the best instincts of the heart, but of a dis
order by which we are dismayed and ruined ? When, further,
we persuade ourselves that there is a righteous Governor of the
world, does not the history of this, as of many another success
ful crime, contradict our faith, or rather mock our dream ? "But
as for me," cried the Psalmist, " my feet were almost gone ; my
steps had well-nigh slipped. For I was envious at the arrogant,
when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no
bands in their death ; but their strength is firm. They are not
in trouble as other men : neither are they plagued like other
men. Therefore pride is as a chain about their neck ; violence
covereth them as a garment. Their eyes stand out with fatness :
they have more than heart could wish. They scoff, and in
wickedness utter oppression ; they speak loftily, they have set
their mouth in the heavens, and their tongue walketh through
the earth. Therefore His people return hither, and waters of a
full cup are wrung out by them. And they say, How doth God
know, and is there knowledge in the Most High ? Behold, these
are the wicked ; and, being always at ease, they increase in
riches. Surely in vain have I cleansed my heart, and washed
my hands in innocency ; for all the day long have I been
plagued, and chastened every morning" (Psa. Ixxiii. 2-14).
Thus the Psalmist cried, and his cry has been echoed by good
men in every age, when they have seen the oppression of the
poor and the prosperity of the wicked. Yet in that very psalm
which has just been quoted, the cry of doubt and agony is
immediately followed by the language of triumphant faith.
'' Surely thou settest them in slippery places : thou castest them
down to destruction. How are they become a desolation in a
moment !¦ they are utterly consumed with terrors. As a dream
when one awaketh ; so, O Lord, when Thou awakest, Thou shalt
despise their image" (Psa. Ixxiii. 18-20).
No more striking illustration of this principle, or of the true
results of. the Almighty's government, could be afforded than
that contained in the narrative before us. We are not told
what length of time passed after the murder of Naboth before

126 ELIJAH.
the incident took place. It may have been a day or two. More
probably it was only a few hours. The point is of but little
moment'. Enough to dwell upon what is actually and distinctly
recorded. Ahab was walking in the garden which he had so
treacherously and cruelly acquired, and there seemed to be
nothing to disturb his dream. The sun may have been shining
on the slopes of Jezreel. The young plants may have been putting
forth their slender stems. The air may have been balmy or filled
with song ; and Ahab may have been congratulating himself on
the fact that he had gained his end, and that there was nothing
to interfere with his enjoyment.
That was the state of things, viewed from their human side,
in a world into which sin has penetrated, and which has been
brought into disorder by the curse inseparably attending sin.
But what a striking thing is it, when an opportunity is offered
us of doing so, to turn from the human things that we see to
the Divine arrangements that we do not see, and to find that
God, instead of waiting only to interpose when the evil hqs
been done, has rather been watching all along, has been mark
ing each step in the sinner's progress, and has been fixing that
moment for action which a knowledge of the end from the
beginning has determined to be the best It was so in the case
of the rich man in the parable. At one instant we hear his
voice, " What shall I do, because I have not where to bestow
my goods ? This will I do. I will pull down my barns, and
build greater ; and there will I bestow all my com and my
goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods
laid up for many years ; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be
merry." We turn from the human to the Divine side ; and, not
after his fate has overtaken him, but at the moment when he
speaks, and before his fall, " God said unto him, thou foolish
one, this night is thy soul required of thee ; and the things
which thou hast prepared, whose shall they be?" (Luke xii.
17-20). In like manner is it here. We look at the human
side, and Aliab is in his vineyard. We turn to the Divine side ;
and, undoubtedly before Ahab entered it, " the word of the Lord
came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, Arise, go down to mee»
Ahab, king of Israel, which dwelleth in Samaria ; behold, he is
in the vineyard of Naboth, whither he is gone down to take
possession of it. And thou shalt speak unto him, saying. Thus
saith the Lord, Hast 'thou killed, and also taken oossession ?

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 127
And thou shalt speak unto him, saying. Thus saith the Lord, In
the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs
lick thy blood, even thine."
Elijah obeyed the Divine csmmand, and went down to the
vineyard. We have already seen with what a wonderful power
the conscience of man can steel itself against conviction. There
is another point in the working of conscience not less wonderful
— the manner in which it awakes when the sinner finds himself
in the presence of others to whom his sin is known. For long
he may have hardened himself, and may have reaped the fruits
of his transgression without shame. At last his sin is alluded
to by others, or he knows that it has reached the public ear.
In an instant conscience is at work. The scorpion that seemed
dead springs to life and stings. The man cannot stand the
searching eye of others. The bold look departs. The delusion
of innocence disappears, and the cheek burns with the blush of
shame. Thus-was it in the case before us. ' Ahab was in his
garden. Suddenly the well-known figure of Elijah entered the
garden and was seen approaching. The moment of awakening
was come ; and Ahab started and cried, " Hast thou found me,
O mine enemy?" Elijah was not his enemy, and Ahab knew it
He was his own enemy, and Elijah had revealed to him that he
was so. He remembered now all that had passed before, the
bold and stern prophet, the reprover of unrighteousness, the
proclaimer of the Divine judgments. He called to mind the
manner in which the God of Israel had vindicated His own
glory, the fire that had descended at Carmel, the slaughter at
the river Kishon, and the abundant rain. Before him, with
stern countenance and judgment in his eye, was the man who
had been the chief actor in it all, as bold, as true, as faithful as
in the day when he met face to face the four hundred and fifty
prophets of Baal, and his voice penetrated to the heart ol
assembled Israel. That same voice shall now, he knows,
penetrate his heart, and he can only exclaim, " Hast thou found
me, O mine enemy ? " Verily, "the triurnphing of the wicked
is short, and the joy of the godless but for a moment ; " " I have
seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a
green tree in its native soil. But I passed by, and, lo he was
not : yea I sought him, but he could not be found " (Job xx. 5 ;
Psa. xxxvii. 35, 36). Ahab was a different man now from what
he would have seemed to us to be had we been cognizant of his

128 ELIJAH.
thoughts a few moments earlier. His own heart and conscience
anticipated what was coming, and not in vain.
Elijah answered him, " I have found thee ; because thou
hast sold thyself to do that which is evil in the sight of the
Lord. Behold, I will bring evil upon thee, and will utterly
sweep thee away, and will cut off from Ahab every man-child,
and him that is shut up, and him that is left at large in Israel ;
and I will make thine house like the house of Jeroboam the son
of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha, the son of Ahijah, for the
provocation wherewith thou hast provoked me to anger, and
made Israel to sin." Such was the woe denounced on Ahab
himself. It was suitable to the circumstances, and to the letter
it was fulfilled. Ahab had been counting not only on his own
life, but on that of his family, when he seized on Naboth's
garden. Not for his own pleasure only, but for the aggran
dizement of his house, had he made that httle plat of ground
his own. It was to go down from sire to son, from generation
to generation ; and, as each successive representative of the
royal line looked round upon his palace and gardens at Jezreel,
he would naturally commend his great ancestor who, by the
palaces he had built, and the gardens he had laid out, both here
and elsewhere, had done so much for the happiness of his
descendants. But Ahab had forgotten that, though the heart
of a man deviseth his way, the Lord directeth his steps. If he
had studied the history of the last half century in his own
kingdom, what would he have seen ? The house of Jeroboam,
the son of Nebat, brought to a sudden and bloody close, when
his son Nadab, along with the other members of his family, was
murdered by Baasha, who introduced a new dynasty in Israel.
If he had come a little further down he would have seen Elah,
the son of Baasha, slain by Zimri, one of his own captains, and
along with him every one of the kinsmen of Baasha, so that
not a man-child was left, and a new dynasty was again intro
duced. Doubtless he knew these facts, but he had not studied
them. He had not looked into the causes of these direful
histories. Least of all had Jezebel and he, as they went over
the events of these reigns (2 Kings ix. 31), laid to heart the
lessons which they taught. Now, therefore, the judgment is at
his own door, and he shall himself experience what he might
have escaped had he taken warning from the case of others.
' Nor is judgment to be confined to him. In a still more terrible

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 129
manner it is to extend to Jezebel ; for " of Jezebel also spake
the Lord, saying, The dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel.
Him that dieth of Ahab in the city the dogs shall eat ; and him
that dieth in the field shall the fowls of the air eat."
Such was the woe denounced on Ahab and his wife; and
the sacred writer appears to indicate how deeply he was im
pressed with the awful nature of the things which he had been
compelled to utter when he interposes the remark, " But there
was none like unto Ahab which did sell himself to work wicked
ness in the sight of the Lord, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up.
And he did very abominably in following idols, according to all
things as did the Amorites, whom the Lord cast out before
the children of Israel." The object of these words is not
to tell us that Ahab and Jezebel continued, even after they had
heard the prophet's woe, to go on as they had done. On the
contrary we are immediately informed of a certain measure of
repentance, at least on Ahab's part. The words appear to be
simply a reflection by the author on the reasons by which the
judgments of the Almighty were explained.
For these judgments took effect. In referring, in our last
chapter, to Jehu, we have already had occasion to speak of the
main parts of their fulfilment, and it is unnecessary to repeat
•what was then said. Yet two additional points come here before
us which it may be well to mention.
I. In exterminating as he did the house of Ahab, Jehu, how
ever swept along by human passion, never ceased at the same
time to be the instrument of the Divine judgments. He may,
indeed, himself have been fierce and cruel, and there is no reason
to doubt that he really was so. But it was not simply to gratify
his own wild passions that he became the murderer of Ahab's
son and successor to the throne, of Jezebel, and of so many
direct and indirect members of the royal line. One incident in
his history is in this respect peculiarly worthy of notice. On
that day when Ahab took possession of the vineyard of Naboth,
and when Elijah met him amidst its vines, it would appear that
the king and the prophet were not alone. Two of Ahab's officers,
Jehu and Bidkar, had accompanied him from Samaria, had gone
with him into the garden, and had been witnesses of what had
occurred between him and Elijah. Time passed away. Ahab
had been succeeded by his son Joram, and Joram had been put
to death by Jehu beyond the gate of Jezreel. Bidkar, Jehu's
ID

I30 ELIJAH.
old companion, had become captain under him, and both of them
stood by the body of the murdered Joram. Then Jehu said to
Bidkar, as he pointed to the corpse, " Take up, and cast him
into the portion of the field of Naboth the Jezreelite, for re
member how that, when I and thou rode together after Ahab his
father, the Lord lay this burden upon him. Surely I have seen
yesterday the blood of Naboth and the blood of his sons, saith
the Lord, and I will requite them in this plat, saith the Lord.
Now therefore take, and cast him into the plat of ground, ac
cording to the word of the Lord " (2 Kings ix. 25, ^6). For
many a day Jehu had probably thought nothing of what he had
overheard. But when in the providence of God the moment came
round for its fulfilment, the old scene returned upon him in all
the distinctness of its outline, and he seemed to hear again, with
the clearness of their first utterance undiminished by the lapse of
years, the words which in the vineyard at Jezreel had penetrated
his soul with horror. He felt that he had been executing the
wrath of God. The same feelings animated him in the case of
Jezebel. He had been the instrument of her death ; but, so far
as can be concluded from the narrative, only that he might rid
himself of a powerful and crafty obstacle to his own aggrandize
ment. After Jezebel was killed at his instigation, by being
thrown from an upper window into the street, Jehu yielded to a
momentary emotion of pity, and gave directions for her burial.
But, when his servants went to obey his commands, and found
almost nothing of the body remaining, Jehu said, " This is the
word of the Lord which He spake by His servant Elijah the
Tishbite, saying. In the portion of Jezreel shall dogs eat the
flesh of Jezebel" (2 Kings ix. 36). Nor was it otherwise when,
by his instructions, the elders of Samaria had slain seventy of
the sons of Ahab, and their heads, sent to Jehu at Jezreel, had
been piled up in two ghastly heaps at the city gate. " Know
now," he said, " that there shall fall to the earth nothing of the
word of the Lord, which the Lord spake concerning the house
of Ahab ; for the Lord hath done that which He spake by His
servant Elijah " (2 Kings x.'io). These words are not spoken
by him as any apology for his deeds. In his own view he
needed none. He felt no compunction. He was the child of
a barbarous and cruel age, in which blood was poured out as
easily as water. What the words show is this, that after his
deeds were done Jehu became alive to the fact that he had been

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 131
only an instrument in the hands of God in doing them ; that
there was a wider and a grander will than his which, without
disturbing the responsibilities of human agency, directed "every
thing to its own great ends. The lesson is a solemn one. We
cannot escape out of the hands of God, or cease to be execu
tioners of His purposes. We may rebel against Him, but we
can never get beyond His power. In one way or another we
must subserve the carrying out of His plans. Better surely that
we do this in such a way as will advance, not His glory only, but
our own everlasting happiness. We never can be our own
masters. If we do not love and obey as children, we must
serve as slaves.
2. The manner in which part of the woe proclaimed by Elijah
was fulfilled in the case of Ahab deserves attention. The part
of which we speak is contained in the words, " In the place
where dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick thy blood,
even thine " (i Kings xxi. 19). But, on the one hand, Ahab
died in battle, and vcas ' buried in Samaria ; and, on the other
hand, the sacred writer saw this prophecy fulfilled, not in his
fate, but in that of Jorain,' Ahab's son (2 Kings ix. 25). The ex
planation is not difficult, for when, as we shall immediately see,
Ahabj alarmed by the words of Elijah, did to a certain degree
repent, " The word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite,
saying, Seeth thou how Ahab humbleth himself before Me?
Because he humbleth himself before Me I will not bring the evil
in his days ; but in his son's days will I bring the evil upon his
house" (i Kings xxi. 28, 29). God Himself, therefore, had de
clared, that the judgftients pronounced in the first instance upon
Ahab should be transferred to his son ; and so it came to pass.
It is less easy to Solve what seems the much more trifling diffi
culty, that the author Of these chapters appears to see the fulfil
ment of Elijah's prophecy in what happened in Ahab's own
case rather than in that of his' son, for we read at chap. xxii.
38, " And one washed the chariot (that is, the chariot in which
Ahab received his' mortal wound) in the pool of Samaria, and
the dogs licked up his blood ; and they washed his armour ;
according unto the word 'of the Lord which He spake.'' The
woe of chap. xxi. 19, uttered of Jezreel, seems to be here trans
ferred to Samaria. The answer to this difficulty depends in part
on that correction of the'translaiibn which is giveii by the Old
Testament Revisers^not " And they washed his armour," but

132 ELIJAH.
" Now the hariots washed themselves there." The latter trans-
lation shows us that the writer has the lex talionis in his mind.
Ahab in encouraging the worship of Baal had encouraged pros
titution. Behold the recompence. The harlots washed them
selves in water stained with his blood. In like manner it is this
lex talionis that the writer has in view with reference to the
licking of Ahab's blood. The dogs had licked that blood of
Naboth which he had been the means of shedding ; in due time
they shall hck his own. That, and that alone, is the point which
the sacred writer has in view ; and for his immediate purpose it >
matters not where the licking took place. It might as well be
in Samaria as in Jezreel.
The threatenings of the prophet so awfully announced, so
powerfully brought home to Ahab on the very spot which had
been the scene of his wickedness, produced its effect. " It came
to pass, when Ahab heard those words, that he rent his clothes,
and put sackcloth upon his flesh, and fasted, and lay in sack
cloth, and went softly." All the outward signs of humiliation
and repentance are there, and there is no reason to doubt that,
for the time at least, the repentance was sincere. If false or
hypocritical, it will be difficult to explain the words immediately
following, in which we are told that " the word of the Lord came
to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, Seest thou how Ahab humbleth
himself before Me ? I will not bring the evil in his days, but in
his son's days will I bring the evil upon his house." After thi's
time the king of Israel was probably never so completely given
up to apostasy and idolatry as he had been before.
We have followed the tragic history of Naboth to its close, and
little more need be said regarding it. Yet it may be well to
gather together in a few remarks the impressions which the
sacred writer seems especially to have desired that story to
produce. I. He would impress us with a deep sense of the wickedness
of Ahab and Jezebel. Apart even from the share which Ahab
and Jezebel had had in the murder of Naboth, it may be thought
that such an impression had been sufficiently produced by what
we have been already told of them. Surely the apostasy of
Ahab, his faithlessness to every obligation imposed upon him as
Israel's covenant king, his weak submission to the revengeful
and bloodthirsty Jezebel, the encouragement which he had given
to the idolatrous worship of Baal, with all its attendant im-

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 1 33
moralities, his hardness of heart, and the miseries which, with
out compunction, he had been the means of inflicting upon his
people, were enough of themselves to justify the charge that
" there was none like unto Ahab which did sell himself to do that
which was evil in the sight of the Lord, whom Jezebel his wife
stirred up." What more could be needed to awaken a just sense
of horror at his deeds, or to vindicate the propriety of the Divine
judgments by which he himself, his wife, and his descendants
were to be overtaken ? But this wickedness, it will be observed,
had marked Ahab and Jezebel in their public actions, and in
their character as king and queen. Even with it all before our
eyes we have not yet seen them as they are in themselves ; and
it is a fact, of which there are only too numerous illustra
tions, both in Church and State, that the same individual may
be so different in public and in private life as hardly to be
recognized in the latter, by those who have known him only in
the former, sphere. Harsh and cruel in the one, he may be
gentle and tender in the other. Reckless as to the means by
which he accomplishes his ends in public, he may be the soul
of honour and good faith in private. We can never form a tme
estimate of one whom we judge only as he appears in the great
assemblies of his countrymen, or on the wide area of a nation's
civil or religious life. To become truly acquainted with him we
must follow him into the more private relations amidst which he
moves, into the circle of his friends, into the family, the home,
and the secret chamber. Then there may often be much to
balance the derelictions of duty which stain an official career, or
much to produce the melancholy conviction that the high-
sounding professions by which the multitude is deceived are
nothing better than the tricks of the hypocrite and the knave.
So might it have been with Ahab, perhaps even with Jezebel ;
and it was well, therefore, that we should have the opportunity
of following them to other places than the throne, and to other
deeds than those of debasing the worship of Israel or persecuting
the prophets of the Lord.
This the story of Naboth enables us to do ; and it is impos
sible not to admire the skill with which all its particulars are
selected, as well as the graphic power with which they are
arranged, so as to make the real character of the chief actors in
it appear. On the one hand our sympathy is awakened by the
poverty, the simplicity, and the piety of the original owner of the

134 ELIJAH.
vineyard, by the .fondness with which he clung to the inheritance
of his fathers, by his reverence for the law of God, and by his
indifference to mere worldly gain or royal favour. On the other
hand, our indignation is stirred by the covetousness of Ahab
who, with palaces and gardens at his command, could not leave
his poor subject in quiet possession of his plat of ground ; while
our contempt is roused by the sullen weakness with which, when
he fails to accomplish his design, he goes to his house heavy and
displeased, lays him down upon his bed, turns away his face,
and refuses to take food. Then Jezebel comes in ; and, without
a scruple of conscience, or the quivering of a nerve, does her part
in the dreadful tragedy. Her resolute determination, showing
itself in the words " I will give it thee," the detestable in
humanity of the plan which she proposes to herself in order to
secure the murder of her innocent victim, the impious daring
with which she writes letters in her husband's name and seals
them with his seal, the blasphemous spirit in which she employs
the name of Him whose worship she had done everything to
extirpate from the land, the manner in which she prostitutes
judicial forms to the obtaining of a verdict of the most flagrant
injustice, and, lastly, the cold-blooded indifference with which,
when she heard that her plot had been successful, she said to
Ahab, " Arise, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the
Jezreelite, which he refused to give thee for money, for Naboth
is not alive, but dead," — all these circumstances combine to
make up a picture of wickedness that may well overpower the
most callous heart, and kindle into flame the last lingering spark
of justice or mercy in any human breast And this is the effect
which, we cannot doubt, the sacred historian intended to pro
duce. In Ahab and Jezebel, he would show us, we behold not
merely an idolatrous king and queen, but a wicked man and a
still more wicked woman. The one weak and self-indulgent, his
better thoughts, when he had them, unable to withstand temp
tation or the gratification of his desires ; the other imperious,
false, unprincipled, cruel, and remorseless— the two together
present a picture of crime to which no painter can add a touch
of horror, and which prepares us for the full outpouring of the
vials of the Almighty's wrath.
2. The narrative exhibits the righteous retribution of God
upon the sinner. The terms in which that retribution was
pronounced have already been before us, and it is unnecessary

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 135
to repeat them. They are of almost unequalled severity, and
with a similar severity they were actually fulfilled. A great law
runs throughout the whole of Scripture, that iniquity shall not
only be punished, but punished in such a way as to show the
correspondence between sin and its consequences ; and no more
striking illustration could be afforded of the execution of this
law than that which we are called upon to trace in the history
of Ahab and Jezebel after the murder of Naboth. If Naboth
was brought to a bloody death, so also were the king and queen
by whom his murder had been instigated. If Naboth's sons
shared the fate of their father (2 Kings ix. 26) so also did the
doom which overtook the royal parents overtake all the members
of their house. If dogs licked the blood of Naboth (l Kings
xxi. 19), not only did the dogs lick, we mtty be sure, the blood
of Ahab's son to whom this part of the;;, prophecy had been
transferred (i Kings xxi. 29), but they did it "in the place"
where the murder had been consummated (i Kings xxi. 19 ;
2 Kings ix. 25). If Ahab had , encouraged harlotry in Israel,
harlots washed themselves in the pool of Samaria, the waters
of which his blood had stained (i Kings xxii. 38, Revised
Version). If Jezebel had been a main instrument in carrying
out the wicked deed at Jezreel, her blood was eventually sprinkled
upon the city- wall, and there the dogs of the city so devoured
her body that men were not able tp say " This is Jezebel "
(l Kings xxi. 23 ; 2 Kings ix. 34-37). -'Throughout all the history
the law of retribution runs in its most marked and terrible form
— that law of which David spoke,
" 'Yea, he loved cursing, and it came unto him ;
And he delighted not in blessing, and it was far from him.
He clothed himself also with cursing as with his garment,
And it came into his inward parts like water,
And like oil into his bones " — '
that law which contains the fundamental principle of all-retri
butive justice, both Divine and human.
Upon the unerring certainty, upon the sure accomplishment,
of this law our attention is here fixed. There is nothing arbi
trary in God's dealings with men. We may think of Him as of
one who gives no account of any of His matters, who surrounds
His throne with darkness, and who sends prosperity or adversity,
health or sickness, joy or sorrow, honour or disgrace, according
' Psa. oix. 17, 18.

136 ELIJAH.
to those inscrutable counsels in the presence of which the
creatures of yesterday can only wonder and adore. But it is
not so. More careful observation shows us that there is a
righteous order in the world, that all things " make for righteous
ness," and that many an individual misfortune and many a
national calamity, which men in their indolence would fain repre
sent as inscrutable events, are only features of that well-ordered •
government by which the Almighty has connected punishment
with folly or sin.
The penalties of transgression indeed may not unfrequently
be so long delayed that both the transgressor and those who wit
ness himmay begin to think that they may be altogether escaped.
It cannot be. Come they will, and that often with an increased
intensity proportioned to the length of time during which they
have been kept back. Or, if they do not always thus come
outwardly, let us remember that there are inward penalties
more hard to bear than outward ones. Altogether unnoticed
by the world many a man's sin meets him in that dread
chamber of an awakened conscience where so many sights and
sounds of terror congregate. In solitude, in secret, in dead
hours of night the sinner awakes, and the long train of his
transgressions passes by before him. They mock him ; they
reproach him ; they present themselves to him in all their
hideous features, with no modest reserve, no fair sentences, no
smooth names to name them by, that thus their wickedness
may be concealed, but bold, brazen-faced, true to what they are.
In such hours the sinner trembles. How bitterly does he re
proach himself, bite his lips in the anguish of his spirit, and
shut hio eyes only inai his sins, remembered now, may peer
more closely in through the closed eyelids ! It is Elijah meeting
Ahab in Naboth's vineyard. It Is the fulfilment of the words,
"What fruit had ye in those things whereof ye are now ashamed,
for the end of these things is death.''
The fact of this righteous judge and of this righteous judg
ment cannot be too deeply impressed upon us ; and it is in no
small degree for the sake of leaving that impression upon our
minds that the story of Naboth is dwelt upon as it is. Once
more —
3. The sacred writer would remind us that even He who
makes Himselfknown to us as a God of judgment is ready to
pardon. We have already more than once in the history of

--../

ELIJAH AND NABOTH'S VINEYARD. 137
Elijah had occasion to meet this great lesson, too often sup
posed to be the lesson of the New Testament alone, and not
also of the Old. We met it in Horeb when Elijah perceived
that, although the whirlwind, the earthquake, and the fire were
God's, for they executed their desolating march " before" Him,
it was yet in the still, small voice that He especially revealed
Himself. A second time we met it on the same occasion when,
in speaking of the slaughter of the rebellious sons of Israel to
be effected by Hazael and Jehu and Elisha, the Almighty
added, that He would leave for Himself seven thousand in
Israel who had not bowed the knee to Baal and had not
kissed him. Now we meet with this principle of Divine
government again when, upon evidence of Ahab's repentance,
our attention is called to the fact that the judgments denounced
against him shall be postponed, at least in all their fulness, to
the days of his son. Not that that son, though innocent himself,
shall be punished for nothing but his father's sins. We must
distinguish between the natural consequences of sin, and the
direct pouring out of God's indignation upon the wilful and
stubborn transgressor. The former may continue long after he
who had been the means of introducing them has passed away,
and we can see the wisdom of such an arrangement in this,
that it impresses us with a deeper sense of our responsibility, and
bids us beware lest we entail upon our children, or even upon
our children's children, evils of viihich we, and not they, have
been the cause. The latter does not continue unless provoked
by obstinate wilfulness and stubbornness on the sinner's part.
The law of Moses was express : " The fathers shall not be put
to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to
death for the fathers ; every man shall be put to death for
his own sin " (Deut. xxiv. 16) ; and, at a later period, prophecy
pointing forward to the future testified to the same truth, " In
these days they shall say no more. The fathers have eaten sour
grapes, and their children's teeth are set on edge. But every
one shall die for his own iniquity : every man that eateth the
sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge" (Jej. xxxi. 29, 30).
Jehoram, the son of Ahab alluded to, suffered for his own sins.
Though less wicked than his father "he cleaved unto the sins
of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, which made Israel to sin : he
departed not therefrom " (2 Kings iii. 3), and in due time he
was overtaken by the iudgments threatened to the house of

138 ELIJAH.
Ahab. He had served himself heirto his father's wickedness,and
it was a just thing, therefore, that he should meet his father's
doom. But Ahab himself repented at least in part before he
died, and the last impression left upon us by the sacred writer,
in bringing his terrible narrative regarding him to a close, is
that even He whose judgments had followed him all his days
has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that he
turn from his wickedness and live. His eye pitied the unhappy
king as he " rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his flesh,
and fasted, and lay in sackcloth, and went softly ;" and the final
motto of his melancholy story is, that, while he who dares to
meet the Almighty as a foe can only perish upon the thick
bosses of His buckler, he who repents and forsakes his sins
shall find mercy. •-

CHAPTER VIII.
ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH (2 KINGS t. I-16).
Elijah again retires from view — Importance of the interval to Ahab— To
Israel — Accession of Ahaziah— His character— His illness and recourse
to Baal-Zebub— Elijah appears to his messengers — His message to the
king— Ahaziah's rage — He sends first captain and his fifty ; thejf
fate — Second captain and his fifty sent ; their fate — Third captain and
his fifty — Elijah goes to Ahaziah — His message — General character of
the narrative examined — Comparison with other Scripture narratives
of a similar kind — Principles upon which such destruction of life to be
justified — Words of our Lord in Luke ix. 51-56- Methods of dealing
with nations in different ages must be different — Teaching of Matt. v.
considered — Application to state of Israel in days of Elijah— General
considerations on the subject.
We have already seen that with the recalling of Israel to the
worship of the one only living and true God, the work for which
the prophet Elijah had been specially raised up, and with
which his name is connected in the Bible, closed. It had been
sharp, sudden, and short ; but it had accomplished for the time
at least a great revolution in Israel, and had been accompanied
by revelations of the Almighty's character and ways which form
a distinct stage in the progress of His manifestations of Himself
to man. With it, accordingly, the public prophetic work of
Elijah ended, and Elisha was appointed by the Divine com
mand to take his place. In the incident, therefore, of Naboth's
vineyard, Elijah appears the prophet of the Lord, not so much
in his public as in his private capacity ; and God's dealings
are with the individual rather than the nation. In the same
character we are to meet him now when he comes into contact
with Ahaziah and his captains. Of the whole period of six

140 ELIJAH.
years between the calling of Elisha and the meeting of Elijah
and Ahab in the vineyard of Naboth, and again of the period
of four years between the latter date and the bringing down of
fire from heaven upon the companies of Ahaziah, we know, so
far as concerns Elijah, absolutely nothing. Where did he live?
How was he employed? In what relation did he stand to
Israel, in what to Elisha, in what to Ahab first and Ahaziah
afterwards ? No answer can be given to these questions. It
has been supposed that during this time he and his successor
may have been quietly though actively ministering to the cities
and villages of Samaria ; that the former in particular, taught
by the " still, small voice " of Horeb, may have been labouring
to instil into the minds of the people thoughts of God's goodness
and mercy ; that he may have been striving to win Israel to
a purer and more spiritual service of its heavenly" King ; or,
finally, that he may have been devoting himself to the organi
zation and instruction of the schools of the prophets now
established in the land.' There is no positive ground upon
which such conjectures can be rested ; and the sudden and
unexpected appearance and disappearance of the prophet, first
after meeting Ahab at Jezreel, and next after meeting Ahaziah
in Samaria, would seem rather to point to the conclusion that
before each of these occasions he had again withdrawn from
public life, and had sought retirement, none, it may be, knowing
where. But whatever these years were to Elijah, they had been
important years to Israel and to Ahab. For —
I. Ahab had at length been brought to humble himself
before God. The iniquity of which he had been guilty in
connection with the death of Naboth, suddenly forced home
upon him at the instant when he thought himself in possession
of his prize, had been more than his hardened conscience could
withstand. He felt how grievously every principle of justice,
truth, and honour had been violated in that deed. His own
heart answered to every word of the terrible threatenings de
nounced against him by the prophet, and it was because of this
that he rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his flesh, and
fasted, and lay in sackcloth, and went softly. His repentance,
there is no reason to doubt, was for the time at least sincere ;
and as such it was accepted by the Almighty when He declared
' Alton, in " Biblical Educator," iii. p. 159.

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. 141
that, because of it. He would not bring on the calamities of
which He had spoken in Ahab's days, but would reserve them
for the days of his son.
2. The consequence was that a certain measure of success
attended the struggles of Israel with its enemies. The insolence
and impiety of Benhadad, king of Syria, were rebuked, and
Ahab gained a triumphant victory over the great army which
had been brought against him. Peace and prosperity might
probably have followed his success had he not rebelled against
what he must have known to be the will of Him who had given
him the victory, and spared the life of the treacherous and cruel
king who for Israel's sake had been appointed to death. As it
was, peace lasted only three years, when Ahab proposed to
Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, then visiting him in Samaria, that
they should combine their forces for an attack on Ramoth-
Gilead, the most famous fortress of which even rocky and hilly
Gilead had to boast. The proposal was accepted, and, de
spising the warning given him by Micaiah of his approaching
fate, Ahab hastened to the field. The battle of Ramoth-Gilead
followed — that battle which afforded so. signal a display of the
vanity of all the efforts of men to defeat the counsels of the Most
High. Ahab had been so far impressed by the warning of the
prophet that he had disguised himself before beginning the
battle,, and at fii'st his scheme appeared likely to be attended
with success. The king of Syria had commanded the thirty
and two captains of his chariots, saying, " Fight, neither with
small nor great, save only with the king of Israel." The cap
tains beheld Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, in his royal robes, for
he had not laid them aside like Ahab, and they made for him ;
but Jehoshaphat cried out in time for them to discover their
mistake, and they turned back from pursuing him. Then a
certain man drew his bow at a venture, and smote the king of
Israel between the joints of his harness. That same evening
he died ; and they washed the chariot in which his blood had
been poured out in the pool of Samaria, and the dogs licked up
his blood. It was a fulfilment in part of the threatening spoken
years before by Elijah in the garden of Naboth, and the minute
ness with which all the particulars are detailed by the Chronicler
shows the impression made upon his mind.
3. Ahaziah, the son of Ahab, now succeeded to the throne
of Israel. He was a weak and guilty prince, insensible to the

142 ELIJAH.
wonderful dealings of God with His people during his father's
days, and untouched by the discipline through which his family
had been made to pass. " He did that which was evil in the
sight of the Lord, and walked in the way of his father, and in
the way of his mother, and in the way of Jeroboam, the son of
Nebat, wherein he made Israel to sin. And he served Baal,
and worshipped him, and provoked to anger the Lord, the God
of Israel, according to all that his father had done " (i Kings
xxii. 52, 53). The fulfilment of the curse of God upon the house
of Ahab was to begin -with him; and this is the king in con
nection with whom Elijah once more emerges for a moment
from his obscurity.
Ahaziah had been walking on the roof of his palace in
Samaria, and had leant against what seems to have been a
latticed fence running round the roof. The fence gave way.
The king fell either into the street or into the inner court of the
palace, and was so severely injured that he became alarmed for
his life. After the example of his father and mother he had
been a worshipper of Baal in one of the many aspects in which
that divinity claimed the homage of men. In particular,
Ahaziah had honoured him as Baal-Zebub, the god of flies,
the god by whom in that Eastern land such plagues of flies as
are well known to all travellers in the East were either sent or
prevented. This deity would appear also to have been held in
peculiar reverence at Ekron, the most northerly of the five great
cities of the Philistines, and, therefore, nearest to Samaria.
Thither, accordingly, Ahaziah sent his messengers, immediately
after his fall, with the inquiry whether or not he should recover
from its effects. It was a daring violation of the law of God,
which had expressly declared to Israel : " The soul that turneth
unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto the wizards, to go
a-whoring after them, I will even set My face against that man,
and will cut him off from among his people " (Lev. xx. 6). It
was a countenancing of idolatry in the worst form in which it
had been supported by Ahab and Jezebel. And the offence
was rendered still more heinous by the recent character of that
work of reformation which had been effected by Elijah.
Where the prophet was at the time we know not But it is
no sufficient objection to thie viewy commonly entertained, that he
was at Carmel, that that range of mountains lay in a direction
wholly different from that by which the messengers of Ahaziah

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. 143
would proceed on their way to Ekron. The distance even then
would not be great before he could intercept fhem on their way
and meet them face to face; while the expression "go up," in
ver. 3 corresponds to the idea that he was to travel by the road
leading to Jerusalem, still, in both God's eyes and his, the capi
tal of the theocratic people. Whatever we may think of this,
the commandment came to Elijah by " the angel of the Lord,"
not simply an angel, or any angel who might be employed to
communicate the Divine will, and surely not the Second Person
of the Trinity, supposed to have become by anticipation and
for the time incarnate, but some special angel by whom the
Almighty was wont to communicate His will to man in ways of
which no information has been given us. " Arise," was the
message, " go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria,
and say unto them. Is it because there is no God in Israel that
ye go to inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron ? Now,
therefore, thus saith the Lord, Thou shalt not come down
from the bed whither thou art gone up, but shalt surely die.''
The message at once shows the light in which the conduct of
Ahaziah is to be regarded. It was a denial of the God of Israel.
It was the worship of one who was no God : and the soul that
so sinned was to die.
Elijah instantly obeyed "the word of the Lord," met the
messengers of Ahaziah with the same startling suddenness as
that with which he had before met Ahab, delivered his message,
and with equal suddenness " departed." At no time was it his
part to argue. He was " a voice of one crying in the wilder
ness." The voice was to cry at the appointed moment ; and
when its cry was uttered to be silent Let men hear or let
them forbear : the work of the voice was done. The messengers
of the king instantly returned.
They do not seem to have known who it was that had spoken
to them, and the fact that they did not may be accepted as a
proof that, during the time that had elapsed since he wrought
his great reformation in Israel, Elijah had led a private, rather
than a public, life. Upon the return of his messengers Ahaziah
asked how it was that they had so soon come back. They
answered : " There came up a man to meet us, and said unto us,
Go, turn again unto the king that sent you ; " and then they
delivered the message that had been given them. The king
next inquired, " What manner of man was he that came up to

144 ELIJAH.
meet you, and told you these words?" And, when they replied that
he was a man with a garment of hair ("Revised Version, margin),
and a leathern girdle about his loins, he exclaimed, " It is Elijah
the Tishbite ." No doubt he suspected it before. The boldness,
the daring, the sudden appearance, and equally sudden dis
appearance of the man who could send him such a message,
were traits that could hardly belong to any but to one whom he
and his father's house had so much occasion to remember.
The message itself too touched his conscience ; and although
not the prophet himself, but his image, called up by his imagi
nation, stood before him, he could only repeat, as it were, the
exclamation of Ahab in the vineyard of Naboth, " Thou hast
found me, O mine enemy."
Unlike Ahab, however, Ahaziah did not repent. He took
rather the only other course which suggests itself to an awakened
and alarmed conscience. He burst forth in rage against the
man who had disturbed him in his false security ; and, as always
happens in such a case, the measure of the rage may be re
garded as the measure of the degree to which the conscience
has been pricked. In the present instance the rage was great,
and the steps taken were of the most determined kind.
The king sent a captain of fifty with his fifty to seize the
prophet at the place where he either dwelt or which he had
chosen as the spot to meet them. And the captain "spake unto
him, O man of God, the king hath said. Come down." The
whole narrative reveals the spirit in which the words were spoken.
The summons was unsympathizing, rude, and scornful, con
temptuous towards God as well as recklessly indifferent to the
prophet's fate. " O man of God," the captain cried, and there
must have been irony in the tone, for God is immediately placed
in contrast with the king, " the king hath said." It was as much
as to say, "Thou professest to be a'man of God, but there is one
to be feared in this matter more than the God thou honourest.
Thou mayest affect to dwell upon that mountain top, and there
hold communion with an invisible power, but I and my fifty men
will show thee that there is more in the material than the
spiritual, in the seen than the unseen world." Elijah took the
scorner at his word. " If I be a man of God," he said, " let
fire come down from heaven and consume thee and thy fifty."
The prophet had dealt with fire from heaven before. It may be
that near that very spot he had seen the heavens open at his

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. 145
prayer and the fire came down that '• consumed the burnt-offer
ing, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up
the water that was in the trench." Thus no doubt he prayed
again, and there rushed forth fire from heaven, and consumed
the captain and his fifty. Not that they were merely killed ;
that is not the language of the sacred writer. They were
"consumed," burned up by the devouring flames in the same
manner as the bullock, and everything connected with it, was
burned up when the Lord first answered the prophet by fire.
Undismayed by what had happened, the king now sent
another captain and his fifty upon the same errand : but there
is a difference in the message. It is even harsher and more
imperative than before. " Oman of God, thus hath the king
said, Come down quickly." There was no " quickly" in the first
demand. In the second there is. The message on the first
occasion had perhaps not been imperative enough. A greater
show of boldness may alarm the prophet. But Elijah answered
as he had already done. " If I be a man of God, let fire come
down '¦-om heaven, and consume thee and thy fifty." The
miracle of destruction was instantly repeated: "The fire of
God came down from heaven and consumed him and his fifty.'
A third company was now sent, and so far apparently with
out any change in the king's mind. But, whether this was so or
not, there was a change in the temper of the captain to whom
the charge had been committed. Insolence, scorn, impiety
have no ' place in his mind. He exhibits meekness and sub
mission rather than arrogance and defiance. He " came and
fell on his knees before Elijah, and besought him, and said unto
him, O man of God, I pray thee let my life and the life of these
fifty be precious in thy sight. Behold there came fire down
from heaven and consumed the two former captains of fifty
with their fifties : but now let my life be precious in thy sight"
There is no need to think of this as mere weakness or slavish
terror. That such feelings would have expressed themselves in
a similar way may at once be granted, and we have no positive
statement that the conduct of the third captain proceeded from
any nobler motive. Yet a motive of that kind is perfectly con
sistent with all that is recorded, and in the circumstances it is
the more natural of the two. This captain had been awed and
humbled by the fate of his predecessors. He acknowledged the
Divine hand in the judgments of which he had at least been
II

146 ELIJAH.
made aware, and he sought to gain by'entreaty what he could
not compel. Nor did he seek in vain. " The angel of the Lord
said unto Elijah, Go down with him, be not afraid of him.
And he arose, and went down with him unto the king."
But little remains to be told of this incident in Elijah's life.
As on every previous occasion he at once obeyed the intima
tion given him of the will of God. He went down and pre
sented himself to the king. Nothing is said of the scene
but that Ahaziah was still laid upon his bed. He may have
had his attendants around him. He may have been alone.
Any way, it must have been a striking and solemn sight as the
rugged prophet approached the couch of the royal sufferer,
without hesitation in his step, or fear in his eye, or quivering in
his voice, and delivered the message with which he had been
entrusted, " Forasmuch as thou hast sent messengers to inquire
of Baal-Zebub the god of Ekron, is it because there is no God
in Israel to inquire of His word ? Therefore, thou shalt not
come down from the bed whither thou art gone up, but shalt
surely die." The message delivered, Elijah would as usual
depart in a manner not less abrupt and startling than that in
which he came. But the message itself was the word of God,
and not one of His words falls ineffectual to the ground. '' So
Ahaziah died according to the word of the Lord which Elijah
had spoken," and the first part of the woe denounced upon the
house of Ahab was fulfilled.
It is impossible not to feel that the events thus presented to
us are of a very startling kind, and that it is not easy to
reconcile them either with the conception that we form of an
honoured servant of God, or with our ideas of eternal justice.
Elijah rather appears to us at first sight as a proud, arrogant,
and merciless wielder of the power committed to him : we
wonder that an answer should have been given to his prayer :
we are shocked at the destruction of so many men who
listened only to the command of their captain and their king :
and we cannot help contrasting Elijah's conduct as a whole
with the beneficent and loving tenderness of the New Testa
ment Dispensation.
No considerations connected with the character of the cap
tains and their fifties are of much use in attempting the
explanation. We may allow, as we have allowed, that there
are traces in the narrative of a wholly different spirit and

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. 147
conduct between the first two companies and the third. But
the men of the first two were in all probability ignorant and
prejudiced, and at any rate they were simply servants doing the
behests of a royal master. The men of the third again were,
there is little reason to doubt, more respectful simply because
they were more afraid. It was not faith in God or in any
Divine mission of Elijah, but only alarm at the thoughts of the
fate that might be awaiting ,them, which called forth their
more submissive spirit. We must turn to considerations of an
altogether different kind.
Before doing so it may be well, in the first place, to remember
that the spirit which appears in it does not stand alone either
in the history of Elijah or in the general history of the Old
Testament As to the former, we have to compare with it that
destruction of the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal at
the river Kishon, the details of which have already passed
under our view, though consideration of the principle upon
which it was effected was reserved till now. As regards the
latter, we have obvious analogies in the destruction of the
Cities of the Plain (Gen. xix. 24, 25) ; in the slaughter of the
idolaters at Sinai, when the command was given to Moses
that every man should put his sword by his side, and should
slay every man his brother, and when there fell of the people
about three thousand men (Exod. xxxii. 28) ; in the earth
opening her mouth to swallow up Korah, Dathan, and Abiram,
and all their houses, followed by the coming forth of that fire
from the Lord which consumed the two hundred and fifty men
that offered incense (Numb. xvi. 31-35) ; in the destruction of
all the inhabitants of Jericho, " both man and woman, young
and old, and ox and sheep and ass," Rahab and those that
were with her alone escaping (Josh. vi. 21, 25) ; in the nearly
total extermination of the Canaanites, in obedience to the
command of God, " Of the cities of these people which the
Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save
alive nothing that breatheth, but thou shalt utterly destroy them,"'
when we are told of the children of Israel that " all the spoil of
these cities, and the cattle they took for a prey unto them
selves, but every man they smote with the edge of the sword,
until they had destroyed them, neither left they any to breathe"
(Deut XX. 16, 17 ; Josh. xi. 14). To these examples may be
added that of the destruction of the Amalekites, when the com-

148 ELIJAH.
mand was given to Saul, " Now go, and smite Amalek, and
utterly destroy all that they have and spare them not, but slay
both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel
and ass" (i Sam. xv. 3). These instances of the destruction
of human life afford a parallel to that now before us ; and, if
they can be justified at all, they must be justified upon what are
essentially the same principles. Can, then, any justification be
offered of such wholesale slaughter ?
One thing it appears necessary to say, that it is impossible to
see how it can be justified upon the plea so often urged, that
God is the Giver of life and that He may therefore justly take
it away when He thinks fit. He is both the Giver and Main-
tainer of life, but He has given it upon certain conditions
implied, if not expressly stated, in the gift, and in that whole
system of moral government in the midst of which it is main
tained. To suppose Him to act in an arbitrary manner is to
deface those very attributes of His character which awaken
our reverence, and draw from us that willing obedience which
alone can be acceptable in His sight The thought of mere
power can never awaken those emotions in our hearts which
it will be worthy either of man to offer or of the Creator and
Preserver of our being to receive. We must understand His
course of action ; we must approve of it and honour it, before ,
we can think of Him in any other light than that of a fetish,
or a tyrant from whom we would willingly escape. It is not
enough therefore to say that God, in taking the lives of the
Canaanites, of the Amalekites, or of the companies of Ahaziah's
captains, for it was He who took them and not Joshua or
Samuel or Elijah, was only acting within His rights. It may
have been so ; but unless we can see that even under the Old
Testament Dispensation, these rights were exercised with a due
regard to His wisdom and love, we shall make the God of the
Old Testament a different Being from the God of the'New, and
the Christian Dispensation will perish as surely as the Dis
pensation which preceded it.
In turning our attention, then, further to this subject, our
Lord Himself must be our guide. " It came to pass," we are
told on one occasion, " When the days were being fulfilled that
He should be received up. He steadfastly set his face lo go to
Jerusalem, and sent messengers before his face : and they went
and entered into a village of the Samaritans to make ready for

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. I49
Him. And they did not receive Him, because His face was as
though He were going to Jerusalem. And when His disciples,
James and John, saw this, they said. Lord, wilt Thou that we
bid fire to come down from heaven and consume them ? But He
turned and rebuked them " (Luke ix. 51-55). In the words of
St. James and St. John there is a manifest allusion to Elijah
and the companies of Ahaziah, and that even although we
adopt the later reading, and find in them no express mention of
the prophet. The two disciples, who, from their eager and
impetuous disposition, had long before been designated by their
Master, "sons of thunder" (Mark iii. 17), and whose minds
were full at once of the spirit and of the facts of the Old Testa
ment, had recalled the incident we have now before us ; and,
provoked by the opposition of the Samaritans, had hastily pro
posed to inflict upon them a judgment similar to that with which
the companies of Ahaziah had been visited. Jesus, however,
it is added, turned and rebuked them. No word is spoken by
our Lord in regard to the conduct of Elijah. What he finds
fault with is simply the spirit of His own disciples, and the whole
tone of the narrative implies that all that He would say was
this, " Ye do not understand the nature of the Dispensation
which I am introducing, and ye err in thinking that my mission
is to be marked by the same judgments called down directly
upon sinners as those which were exhibited in the Dispensation
that is passing away." For anything contained in the passage,
therefore, our Lord accepted the conduct of Elijah as that of a
righteous servant of His Father in Heaven, and declared only
that He_ Himself had come to fulfil all righteousness in a
different way. Not, in other words, in any change in the
character of God, and certainly not in the conduct of the cap
tains and their companies, but in the outward circumstances of
men, in the nature of the Old and New Testament Dispensations,
as adapted to their different stages in the history of the world,
is the explanation for which we are now searching to be found.
Go4 is Himself unchangeable. The principles and aims of
His government are eternally the same. The covenant promises
involved in creating man in His own image and after His own
likeness have been as fixed as the stars of heaven from the
moment when our first parents were placed in Eden. But
although God Himself does not change, His methods of ad
ministration. His ways of dealing with mankind. His modes of

ISO ELIJAH.
training the human race for the accomplishment of its destiny,
may and must change with different ages ; nay, we might even
add, were it necessary to do so, they may be different with
different peoples in the same age. It does not follow, be
cause nations are contemporaneous, that the same truths
and the same methods of instruction -are equally adapted to
them. Different truths and different methods of presenting
them constitute an essential part of a wise discipline of the
individual during his progress from childhood to manhood, and
from, manhood to old age. Similar treatment must mark the
training of nations. Lessons fitted to be useful to one genera
tion might be hurtful to another at an earlier or later stage of
its progress. At an earlier they might overwhelm instead of
strengthening a plant yet weak ; at a later they might afford no
nourishment to a plant now strong. We are, therefore, not
entitled to expect that either the instruction, or the method of
communicating instruction, that may be best adapted to one era
shall be the same as that adapted to another. All that we may
reasonably require is that both of these shall, in any era, tend
towards the same result, or make for the same goal.
The point of which we now speak is so important that, before
applying the general principle to the difficulty immediately
under discussion, it may be -well to illustrate it still further by
the teaching of our Lord in His Sermon on the Mount. In that
sermon He explains in several particulars the true nature of
that relation of His to the past which he had expressed in the
words, " Think not that I came to destroy the law or the
prophets : I came not to destroy, but to fulfil " (Matt. v. 17).
His illustrations are taken both from the Ten Commandments
and from other precepts of the Mosaic Code. One of the latter
is to the following effect, " Ye have heard that it was said. An
eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth : but I say unto you.
Resist not him that is evil ; but whosoever smiteth thee on thy
right cheek, turn to him the other also " (Matt v. 38, 39). " An
eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth " — " Resist not him that
is evil." Are not the two precepts wholly inconsistent with one
another? If they come from the same fountain, do they not
indicate not only that the spring is intermittent, but that its
waters are at one time the very opposite of what they are at
another? A little reflection will enable us to answer that
question in the negative. There is neither opposition nor in-

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. I51
consistency. Why was the precept of the Mosaic Code what it
was ? And, How did it operate ? It was what it was in conse
quence of the state of men and morals at the time. A spirit, of
fierce personal revenge for every injury, knowing no limits to
the penalty it would inflict, and ever ready to exaggerate the
offence given, filled the hearts of men. For the loss of an eye
or of a tooth the injured, under a sudden and passionate impulse,
might have even slain the injurer. How did the precept operate ?
It restrained, it did not firomoie the spirit of revenge. It may
have enjoined a course of conduct falling far short of what is
required under the Christian Dispensation, but not, when we
consider the character of the age, inconsistent with it On the
contrary, it looked towards the higher standard that was to come.
It taught men to check and regulate their passions, and thus it
guided them onwards to a time when passion should yield wholly
to the power of meekness, forgiveness, and love. The Lawgiver
was the same ; and He had the same end in view, both in the
earlier and in the later age, but He accommodated Himself to
the actual conditions of human life at the different periods with
which He dealt He raised the moral code only to the point to
which it was at the time possible to raise it, in order that from
that point He might make a new departure and might raise it
still higher.
The principle thus laid down by our Lord may help to ex
plain much in the Old Testament, which, although it has there
the sanction of the Almighty, is yet opposed to our sense of
justice and right. More particularly, that we may not leave the
point immediately before us, it may help to'explain that seeming
recklessness in regard to the destruction of human life of which
so many examples are afforded us, in the history both of Elijah
and of Israel. Such deeds were far too numerous, and the
motives which led to them are far too plain, to permit us to rest
for a moment in the supposition that they are to be ascribed
only to the unbridled passions of men, and that they had no
connection with their sense of moral right and wrong. When
Saul failed to obey the commandment of God, through Samuel,
to exterminate the Amalekites, and afterwards met him with
the words, " Blessed be thou of the Lord, I have performed the
commandment of the Lord," Samuel replied, in language which
from that day has shone forth as the expression of a pure Chris
tian truth, " Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt-offerings

152 ELIJAH.
and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord ? Behold, to
obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams ;"
and then he added the woe, " Because thou hast rejected the
word of the Lord, He hath also rejected thee from being king "
(i Sam. XV. 10, &c.). Apart from all question as to the inspira
tion of the prophet, or his right to invoke the name of the
Almighty as he did, it is clear that there is no passion in his
words. He was not simply gratifying individual caprice or
vengeance. He was actuated by what he felt as a high and
solemn sense of religious duty, and his tone and temper thus
illustrate what, in these respects, was the tone and temper of his
age. There was no j/zV// of cruelty in such deeds. They were
done by men who felt themselves to be the executioners of a
Divine indignation against sin, which their own hearts approved.
That our moral sense would revolt against such deeds were
they done now is nothing to the purpose. The very point of the
explanation is that it is our moral sense that does so, and not
that of those among whom the incidents were transacted, and
that the very same Scriptures which demand our approval of
them at the time when they occurred have taught us that they
would now be inconsistent with the spirit of the Christian faith.
It is not we who, in our strength, have grown beyond them.
They have been superseded by a further and fuller revelation
of the God of Israel ; and still, in His manifestation of Him
self in His Son, we behold heights of loving mercy that we have
not scaled. Outward circumstances then, the condition of men,
the stage at which they stood, the training needed by them at
the time that, by means of it, they might be led onward to a
brighter and loftier conception of what the Divine righteous
ness means ; — these things supply the explanation of what it is
otherwise so difficult to understand.
Of this condition of Israel, both long before and long after
the days of Elijah, two particulars must, for our present pur
pose, be kept peculiarly in view.
In the first place, there was the light estimate placed on
human life. We have not even to go back to the time of
Elijah in order to see this principle in fiiU operation. We may
see it in the East at the present hour. Nothing is more incom
prehensible to us than the state of Eastern feeling upon this
point. Side by side with much that is both lofty in aim and
tender in affection, with the aspirations of patriotism, the

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. 1 53
Strength of friendship, and the love of wife and family, is a
disregard of human life which awakens at once our astonish
ment and our horror. The men of the East are neither savages
nor wild beasts, yet they too often look upon taking the hfe of
a fellow creature with more indifference than we should exhibit
when destroying a noxious insect. Individuals, families, com
munities, are slaughtered without hesitation in doing the deed,
or compunction when it is done. The value of human life is
estimated by a standard entirely different from that to which
we are trained, and it is simply vain for us to endeavour fully
to comprehend it The consequence is that in many a case in
which we should inflict a far lighter punishment justice is not
satisfied unless life is taken, and that upon a scale passing far
beyond the immediate oftender. Now this feeling existed to at
least a great extent in Israel, and it led to many acts in the Old
Testament history from which we not only recoil, but which
in us would indicate a general degeneracy of character that
by no means accompanied them then.
In the second place, there was in Israel a view of the relation
between the head and members of any organized body such as
a family or a nation, largely, if not wholly, different from what
prevails in Christian lands. The wife was attached to the hus
band, the children to the parent, the servants to the master, the
soldiers to the captain, the ruled to the rulers by very different
bonds from those which attach them to each other now. Canon
Mozley has sought to vindicate the exterminating wars of the
Old Testament almost wholly upon this ground ; and, although
by itself it is not enough, it must be allowed to be of great im
portance in the argument. " Man was regarded," he says, "as
an appendage to man, to some person or some body, and there
fore the idea of man being defective, the idea of justice was
defective too. Hence arose, then, those monstrous forms ov
civil justice in the East, in which the wife and the children were
included in the same punishment with the criminal himself, as
being part of him. The idea was not always acted upon, nor
did it form part, as far as one can judge, of the common routine
of justice ; indeed it would have caused the depopulation of
countries if it had ; but it was always at hand to be brought
into use if wanted. The punishment of children for the sins of
the fathers was, we may say, incorporated into the civil justice
of the East, and was part of its traditional civil code ; it was

154 ELIJAH.
not an every-day process in the courts, but the principle of it
existed in the law, and was resorted to on special occasions
when a great impression had to be made. Not that the offences
which were selected for the examples of this mode of retribu
tion were chosen upon any principle, foi they seem to have
followed the caprice of the monarch. But they were such as,
according to this irregular standard, heinous crimes, and the
application of this extreme penalty seems to have carried the
authority and weight of law, and to have been recognized by
custom and popular opinion, and not to have been a simply
arbitrary and tyrannical act of the monarch." Again, after
mentioning the sentence of Nebuchadnezzar upon blasphemers
of the true God, and of Darius, " a monarch who especially
respected law and legal tradition, and did not make his own
will his rule ; a monarch who had evidently a strong sense
of justice in his nature, a sympathy with the oppressed
and ill-used, a respect for holy men, a pious and devout
temper," the same writer adds, " These were the fruits of
the idea that one man belonged to another, was part of
another. The human appurtenances of the man were no
bodies in themselves, they had no individual existence of their
own, their punishment was a shadow as it affected them, h€-
cause their own nonentity neutralized it ; the person punished
was the hateful criminal himself, who was destroyed in his
children. The guarantee was given in this extended form of
justice that no part of him escaped. Justice got the whole of
him. The victim in himself, and in all his members, was
crushed and extinguished. In the age's blindness and confusion
of ideas, people did not really seem to know where the exact
personality of the criminal was, and where it was to be got
hold of; whether, in the locality of himself, was himself only,
or some other person or persons also as well. They could not
hit the exact mark to their own satisfaction, so they got into
their grasp both the man himself and every one connected with
him, to make sure. If they did this, if they collected about the
criminal everything that belonged to him — wives, children,
grandchildren, dependants, servants, household, the whole
growth of human life about him, and destroyed it all, they
were certain that they punished him, and the whole of him. The
total of the individual was there, and justice was consummated."'
« Mozley, " Lectures on the Old Testament," lect. iv.

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. 155
Even civilized India showed in our own day in the terrible
institution of Suttee to what, as we should say, extremity of
cruelty, to what depths of suffering this idea led ; yet it was a
religious idea, and powerful in proportion to the hold of religious
ideas over the mind. We cannot judge of these things correctly
without an effort : and it is difficult to persuade us that a par
ticular act which, committed by ourselves, would drag^us down '
to the lowest depths of degraded feeling, may often be committed
by another without such a result. If it be said that the argu
ment now led may be used to justify the horrors of the Inquisi
tion the reply is obvious. These horrors were perpetrated in
the name of a religion which demanded a spirit diametrically
opposed to that which they displayed. They were perpetrated
by men moving amidst scenes and influences expressly designed
to foster the highest principles of compassion, and tenderness,
and love. The more we explain what are to us the dreadful
deeds of Old Testament prophets by the nature of the Dispen
sation under which they lived and of their times, the more do
we condemn those who would have rolled back the course of
ages, and who stabbed to the heart the system they were bound
to foster and promote. Nor is there, in saying this, any mere
shifting of the difficulty, from the men who acted by a standard
which we would be wrong in adopting, to the Dispensation which
supplied that standard. Our argument is that that Dispensation
was adapted to its age. Without the severities of which we have
spoken men would not have received a sufficiently deep impres
sion of the heinousness of the sins which led to them, or of the
frightful immoralities and disorders which these sins must have
produced, if left unchecked by the only checks they could under
stand. Here it is that the immoralities of the time, that the re
laxed condition of all law, both Divine and human, necessary to
the welfare of sosiety, ought to be taken into account. The sins
of the original inhabitants of Canaan, or of the idolatrous wor
shippers of Baal in Ahab's days, are often appealed to as if, in
themselves, they justified the terrible punishments inflicted. It
may be doubted if we can really feel that they did so. But that
is not the point. What we have to deal with is, that such was
the general condition of things that those who were beginning to
awake both to the nature and the tendency of the iniquity sur
rounding them could not but acknowledge the justice of the
punishment, and could not but allow that nothing else could

156 ELIJAH.
have presented a barrier to its ruinous course. With the stirring
of incipient moral feeling, men were thus helped to rise
to higher stages. Beginning to recognize the importance of
law they beheld, in the severity with which transgression of
law was punished, what was fitted to deepen in the general
mind a sense of the magnitude of the sin of transgressing law.
Beginning to recognize the necessity of protecting the weak
against tyrannical power, they beheld in the idea that the wife,
the child, the slave was part of the husband, the father, the
master, a certain guarantee for their protection: he who
¦ attacked the property attacked its master, and the master was
the stronger of the two.
Dreadful as the system was according to the standard given
us in Christ, it yet helped to educate men ; and the want of
some such educating influence is often felt now in our dealings
with those who are as yet far beneath the elevation to which the
nations of Christendom have been raised. By not sufficiently
recognizing the fact that the power of conscience is as yet only
imperfectly developed among many whom we would instruct, it
may be feared that we not unfrequently destroy our influence
over subject tribes and deprive ourselves of anything in them to
which to appeal. Their ideas of justice are different from ours,
and they do not understand us. Of the rights which we allow -
to every fellow creature they have little or no conception. Our
motives are misinterpreted. Our aims find no answer in their
breasts. Kindness they think to be treachery ; mercy they
attribute to fear ; and we soon learn, to our disappointment and
dismay, that the very purity of the spirit in which we act,
because not regulated by a prudent consideration of circum
stances, becomes one main cause of the overthrow of our
hopes. Let us not blame that spirit in itself, or yield to the
discouraging impression that all labour must be vain. The
fault is not in our spirit, but in its too hasty and unreserved
application, at a time when those whom we would elevate are
unable to receive it. The history of England in dealing with
the less advanced portions of the empire, might afford many
illustrations of this truth.
The principles now spoken of must be borne in mind when
we would judge aright of the destruction brought through
Elijah upon the companies of Ahaziah as well as upon the four
hundred and fifty prophets of Baal at an earlier period. In

ELIJAH AND THE COMPANIES OF AHAZIAH. 1 57
neither case is there the least appearance of merely human
passion, or of a spirit of revenge that knew not where to pause.
In both the prophet acts as one who feels that he is the mes
senger of God, clothed with His commission, under an obliga
tion to execute His will — and that will was regulated by thought
if the condition of those who were then training for better
things. One remark more may be made before passing from this
scene in Elijah's life. What, it leads us to ask, is the direct
end of punishment ? It is often answered, to reform the
criminal, or, to deter others from being guilty of his sin.
Neither answer is completely satisfactory. No doubt both
these ends may properly be kept in view by the authority
which punishes, and both may be in part attained. But they
are the ultimate issue rather than the immediate aim of properly
regulated retribution. We can easily imagine cases in which
both effects might be secured, and yet neither the conscience of
the criminal, nor the public conscience be satisfied. The crime
may have been so great that the latter demands satisfaction to
violated law. It honours the majesty of law, and is well aware
that upon the vindication of the law the welfare of the commu
nity depends. It proceeds upon the feeling that there is an
eternal distinction between right and wrong, alike in themselves
and in the results to which they lead. This distinction must be
maintained for its own sake, and no reformation of the
criminal, no deterring others from following his example,
touches tiiat. The crime demands punishment, and the
criminal must suffer.
Only thus, too, is the reformation of the criminal or the
deterring of others from a similar crime really reached. No
criminal is reformed by the mere dread of punishment ; for, if
that be all that influences him, he will again be guilty of the
same transgression wlienever he hopes that he may commit
it with such secrecy that punishment may be escaped. That is
not reformation. There is no change in the heart out of which
are the issues of life. The outside of the cup or the platter may
have been cleansed, but within it may be as full as ever of ex
tortion or excess. Not the fear of punishment is the reforming
element, but the stirring up to the thought of righteousness, the
rousing within the breast of the conviction that there is a moral
order in the world, and that only in conforming to it shall we

IS» ELIJAH.
reach truth, and beauty, and happiness. Punishment of sin as
sin may awaken this ; and when it does so the foundation of
reformation is laid. But punishment can go no further ; and
unless we can bring other influences to bear upon the criminal
classes of any country we shall find that all that law can do for
us will end in disappointment and defeat.

CHAPTER IX.
THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH (2 KINGS II. I-I2).
Elijah drawing near the close of his life — Gilgal — Departure of Elijah from
Gilgal — Elisha persists in accompanying him — Bethel and the sons of
the prophets there — Jericho and the sons of the prophets there —
Jordan — Passage opened through the river — Converse of Elijah and
Elisha — The request of Elisha and its meaning — The translation of
Elijah — Difficulty of the passage — No merely "natural'' explanation
can suffice — But not on that account are we to be indifferent to the
amount of miracle involved — Modes of thought of the writer and of
his age to be kept in view — Application of these principles to the
narrative — The true meaning of its different parts — Elisha's cry — His
return to the Jordan — River again opened — 'Vain search for Elijah —
Concluding observations on the translation of Elijah.
The appointment of Elisha as his successor had brought to a
close Elijah's short public career as the prophet of God in
Israel. Like John the Baptist, however, in similar circum
stances, he had again been brought out from his retirement to
testify before a king to the cause of righteousness. After the
Baptist had withdrawn in the presence of Jesus he comes once
more upon the scene to rebuke Herod for his sin. After Elijah
had withdrawn to make way for Elisha, he, too, once more meets
us to pronounce judgment upon Ahaziah. Both prophets are the
same as they have all along been. At the close, as at the begin
ning of their course, they laid the axe to the root of the tree, and
then they passed away, faithful to the last.
It would seem from the narrative in the Second Book of Kings
that Elijah had a presentiment of what was before him. He may
not have known all the particulars, but this much at least he
knew, that the hour of his departure was at hand. He had been

l6o ELIJAH.
residing at Gilgal. The place thus mentioned is generally
allowed to have been different from that of the same name
associated with not a few of the memorable events in the
history of the children of Israel. That Gilgal was in the imme
diate neighbourhood of Jericho. It received its name from the
fact mentioned in the book of Joshua, that the Israelites were
there circumcised immediately after they had entered into the
promised land : "And the Lord said unto Joshua, This day have
I rolled away the reproach of Egypt from off you. Wherefore
the name of that place was called Gilgal (or rolling) unto this
day" (Josh. v. 9). Many other important incidents were con
nected with it, upon which we have no call to dwell. The
Gilgal mentioned in connection with the closing days of Elijah
lay to the north-west of the other and at a level higher than
Bethel, which was again twelve hundred feet higher than the level
of Jericho. Hence the expression of the narrative before us, in
which it is said that Elijah and Elisha "went down to Bethel,"
while in the books of Joshua and i Samuel, the nature of
the road from the other Gilgal to Bethel is described as an
ascent. Of this Gilgal nothing is positively known ; nor is any mention
made of a connection between it and Elijah. It may indeed b*
inferred, with no small degree of probability, from what is state''
in the verses before us compared with what is afterwards said
in chap. iv. 38, that Elisha had his residence here, and this
would harmonize well with the idea that, on the present occa
sion, Elijah had come forth from his own retirement, wherever
it was, to seek out his pupil and successor in the prophetic
office. With a vague notion at least of what was to happen he
knew also that Elisha was not less deeply interested in it than
himself. One other remark may be made on the second Gilgal
because it may throw light upon some of the circumstances
related in the following narrative. We may justly infer from
what is stated in 2 Kings iv. 38, that a school of the sons of the
prophets had been planted there — a school, that is, where an
education corresponding to the necessities of the time, but
probably extending to little more than music and the cere
monial observances of the law, was given.
To this Gilgal, then, Elijah now came, and there he found
EUsha. They left together, but had probably not gone far
when " Elijah said unto Elisha, Tarry here, I pray thee, for the

THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH. j6l
Lord hath sent me as far as Bethel," which lay further on his
way towards the Jordan and the city of Jericho. Elisha would
not listen to his voice. " As the Lord liveth," he said, " and as
thy soul liveth, I will not leave thee. So they went down to
Bethel." At Bethel was another school of the sons of the prophets, and
there we can hardly doubt Elijah and Elisha rested. The same
mysterious anticipations which had taken possession of Elijah,
and had certainly also passed from him to Elisha, now found
their way to the pupils of the prophetic school which they had
reached ; and, eager to gain further information as well as to
express their feelings, these pupils came forth to Elisha, and
said unto him, " Knowest thou that the Lord will take away thy
master from thy head to-day ? " And Elisha answered, " Yea,
I know it : hold ye your peace." The subject was far too
serious and weighty to be made a topic of curious conversation
or inquiry. The hand of God was to be visibly present in the
events about to happen whatever they might be ; and in such
circumstances the devout mind can only pause and wait. " Be
-still, and know that I am God," is the language in which the
Almighty addresses us on the eve of any special manifestation
of His glory ; and " silence in heaven " is the attitude of the
Church before the breaking of that seventh seal which is to set
before her the judgments about to be executed for her sake
upon a guilty world (Rev. viii. i). Elijah now renews his
request to his companion prophet He said to Elisha, " Tarry
here, I pray thee, for the Lord hath sent me to Jericho ; " but
the same earnest answer as before is given — "As the Lord
liveth, and as thy soul liveth, I will not leave thee. ... So they
came to Jericho."
At Jericho was another of the prophetic schools which we
have already found in existence at Gilgal and at Bethel ; and
there again Elijah and Elisha paused. Once more premonitions
of something wonderful about to happen occupied the minds of
the pupils ; and once more, like those at Bethel, they came to
Elisha and said unto him, " Knowest thou that the Lord
will take away thy master from thy head to-day?" Elisha
simply repeated his old reply, " Yea, I know it : hold ye your
peace." Even at Jericho, however, Elijah was not to rest. He turned
to Elisha and said, " Tarry here, I pray thee, for the Lord hath
12

1 62 ELIJAH.
sent me to Jordan." But, as to the sons of the prophets, so to
his master, the same reply as before was given — " As the Lord
liveth, and as thy soul liveth, I will not leave thee. . . . And
they two went on." There was silence in all probability
between them. They were solemnized by the consciousness
of a Divine presence, by the feeling that they were every
moment approaching nearer to an as yet unknown manifes
tation of the Divine counsels, by the persuasion that one of
them at least was standing on the threshold of the unseen
world. Under impressions such as these Elisha had already
declined conversation with the sons of the prophets at Bethel
and at Jericho. Under the same impressions he was silent
now. Nor would Elijah be inclined to speak. His departure
itself, and not the words with which, he might accompany it,
was to be the lesson to his companion and friend. When we
stand by the death-bed of the child of God our impulse is not
so much to speak as to learn the lessons that are taught us by
the scene. Thus Elijah and Elisha — " they two went on."
Others, however, were also witnesses of the hour. " Fifty
men," we are told, " of the sons of the prophets went, and stood
over against them afar off." The interest was natural, and it
exhibits itself in every age wherever the emotions of the heart
are allowed free play, especially, therefore, among the young
and the poor. These sons of the prophets were well aware that
they were taking the last look of their master, and that some
thing extraordinary was about to happen. No wonder that
they watched.
At length Elijah and Elisha stood by Jordan. Once before
in the history of Israel that river had flowed between Israel
and the promised land, and had seemed to bar the passage of
the people to their inheritance. But Joshua had commanded
the priests to bear the ark of God into the river, and had given
Israel the assurance that, when this was done, the host should
pass over upon dry land. The promise was fulfilled, and " all the
Israelites passed over upon dry ground, until all the people were
passed over Jordan " (Josh. iii. 14-17). In a similarly miraculous
manner did the Almighty now interpose on behalf of His servants.
The river was before them, an apparently insuperable obstacle ;
but Elijah took his mantle and wrapped it together, and smote
the waters, and they were divided hither and thither, so that
"they two went over on dry ground." As the rod of Moses

THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH. 163
had been the symbol of his prophetic power, and by his lifting
it up the waters of the Red Sea had been divided, so the mantle
was the symbol of the prophetic power of Elijah, and smitten
by it the Jordan was to yield a dry passage across its bed. The
use of the " mantle " had undoubtedly a meaning. It had been
the most characteristic token of the prophet's work. As a
garment of rough hair, it reminded both him and all who wit
nessed the use to which it was put, of his privations in the
wilderness, of his loneliness, of his toils, of his self-denials,
and of his sufferings, in the execution of his mission. It was
associated with the thought of a good fight fought, of a course
finished, of faith kept Why should it not be a source of
strength to him in a departing hour? It had covered him alike
in his struggles and in his triumphs, in his sorrows and his
joys. He rolled it together as his rod, struck the waters of the
river with it, and he and Elisha passed over dry-shod.
The Jordan was crossed, and Elijah was on the borders of
Gilead, that Gilead which he had left many years before at the
commandment of God to be His prophet in Israel. Even in an
outward sense, therefore, it may be said that he was returning
home. But such words may also be used with a far deepei
meaning, for the hour had arrived when the doors of his eternal
home were about to open to him. On the eastern side of the
Jordan the ground rises into the hills and rocky heights of
Gilead ; and to one, without a doubt to one of the nearest, of
these points Elijah and£lisha began to move. But the master,
well aware of what was immediately to be accomplished in him,
would not leave his disciple without a blessing. "And it came
to pass, when they were gone over, that Elijah said unto Elisha,
Ask what I shall do for thee before I be taken from thee." The
answer of the disciple illustrated the devotion of his heart, and
justified the selection made of him long before as the prophet
of Israel in Elijah's room. "And Elisha said. Let a double
portion of thy spirit be upon me."
These words of Elisha have been very variously interpreted ;
and we must endeavour, both for his sake and Elijah's, to
understand them. It is almost needless to say that the promise
related only to spiritual blessings. The tone of the whole
narrative distinctly shows that, as in the case of Solomon, when
the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, " Ask what I shall
give thee ? ", Elijah could neither have thought of offering, nor

1 64 ELIJAH.
Elisha of receiving, any temporal boon. Spiritual blessings alone
were in the minds of both.
Again, it is impossible to adopt the idea that Elisha, in
requesting a double portion of his master's spirit, has reference
to an evangelical spirit which, when compared with the spirit
of the Law, may be regarded as the doubly powerful spirit of
the two. Elisha knew little more of the spirit of the Gospel
than Elijah did. He belonged, not less than his master, to the
Dispensation of the Law ; and, even though it were possible to
prove that he was many steps nearer to the later Dispensation
than he really was, he could not have received as a gift from
Elijah what the latter did not possess.
The most curious supposition upon the point is that of
Menken who, in his homilies upon the history of Elijah,
understands that prophet to mean that in the eternal world
he will remember Elisha, and to ask what he can do for
him when he has been removed to heaven. " Beloved," he
supposes Elijah to say to Elisha, " we are about to be parted
from one another : I go to the Lord for whom I have lived and
laboured, and thou remainest still here below in His service, for
the hallowing of His name, and the spreading of His kingdom
upon earth. Hast thou in thy heart any request that thou wouldest
make of me, make it now before I am taken away from thee.
If to thee I can be anything with the Lord in that land to which
I go, believe me that I will be it. Hast thou anything pressing
upon thy mind discover it to me now, and ask for thyself what
I may do for thee when I return to our Lord.'' On the suppo
sition that this interpretation is correct, the meaning of the
prophet is that Elisha shall give him a commission for the
world beyond the grave, to the Lord whom he will there see
face to face, and who will doubtless deny him no spiritual bless
ing that he can ask for a servant so holy and so true." Such
is Menken's view ; and it possesses interest as , that of a man
both able and devout in deahng with a difficult passage of the
Bible. Nor is it open to the objection that it encourages the
Romish doctrine of prayers to the saints, for Menken distinctly
repudiates any such supposition. Elijah " speaks," he adds, " as
though after his departure there could be no further intercourse
between Elisha and him. Hence the words, ' Ask what I shall
do for thee, before I be taken away from thee.'"
'Menken, " Werke,'' ii, p. 236.

THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH. 16$
Yet it is impossible to accept the interpretation. The proba
bility is that Elijah, no more than Elisha, knew what was before
him, or what would be his precise relation to the God of Israel
in that new scene on which he was about to enter. Besides
which his whole language bears upon its face that what he
would now confer upon his disciple was the last gift it would
be in his power to bestow.
We turn from all these suppositions and look again at Elisha's
words, " Let a 4ouble portion of thy spirit be upon me." There
is nothing in them of selfishness or ambition on the part of the
younger prophet. The words have reference to that law of the
Mosaic Dispensation by which the eldest son in a family was en
titled, as compared with the other children, to a double portion
in the inheritance of his father. They are thus simply equivalent
to the request that, as the eldest son, as the most expressly
called, in the family of the sons of the prophets, Elisha may
receive such a measure of Elijah's spirit as to fit him for the
task to be performed by him when his spiritual father is gone
(comp. Deut xxi. 17). Even that was much ; and Elijah felt
that it was not his to grant. It could come only from the God
-who had bestowed upon him his own gift ; and to Him, there
fore, the petition was to be referred. And he said, " Thou hast
asked a hard thing, 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." Thus did he cast the whole matter upon Him who is
the sole fountain of strength, either to His prophets or His
people, and who gives or withholds according to the counsel of
His own unerring judgment.
Of the further conversation of the two prophets with one
another, as they went upon their way, no information is afforded
us. We are simply told that, " as they went on, they talked."
The sacred writer hastens on to the incident by which the
career of the prophet, whose history he is tracing, was closed :
" And it caine to pass, as they still went on and talked, that,
behold, there appeared a chariot of fire and horses of fire, and
parted them both asunder, and Elijah went up by a whirlwind
into heaven."
It can occasion no surprise that the incident thus related
should have been at once the scorn of unbelief and a stumbhng-
block to faith. Some brief considerations connected with it are
therefore imperatively required.

l66 ELIJAH.
I. No explanation supplied by the naturalist school of intei
preters can banish the miraculous element from the scene. No
calling in of lightning and tempest is sufficient to meet the
difficulties of the case, or to reduce the statement of what
happened to the level of an ordinary occurrence. Even
allowing for an instant that we have before us only the
description of an Eastern storm, and of a flash of lightning
which ended the career of the prophet of Israel, we have
gained nothing in the direction for which such an explanation is
supplied. We shall still have to account for the obviously
praeternatural expectation of Ehsha, that his removal from this
world by some extraordinary method was at hand ; for the
degree to which that expectation was shared, not only by Elisha,
to whom his master might have communicated it, but by the
sons of the prophets whose language shows that to them at
least no such intimation had been given ; for such an expression
as that which tells us that Elijah " went up into (or towards)
heaven ; " and for the fact that the sons of the prophets having,
despite the warning of Elisha, sought the body of Elijah for
three days returned without finding it. Such an explanation,
too, not merely defeats the clear intention of the narrator, but
substitutes for it one directly opposed to what all readers must ac
knowledge he had in view. To represent Elijah as struck down
by lightning or overwhelmed by a tempest, would have been to
make him share the fate of those of whom it is said, " Upon the
wicked God shall reign snares ; fire and brimstone and burning
wind shall be the portion of their cup " (Psa. xi. 6), or of those
idolatrous worshippers of Baal, the judgment prepared for
whom had been represented in this very narrative as the whirl
wind, the earthquake, and the fire (i Kings xix. ii, 12). Where
then would have been the honour bestowed upon the prophet,
or the crown of glory with which, at the end of his earthly
course, it is the unquestionable desire of the historian that we
should behold him crowned ? Or if, instead of the naturalistic,
the mythical interpretation be resorted to, the untenable suppo
sition is implied in it that, on the one hand, the whole history
is mythical, and that, on the other hand, a mode of departure is
here related which finds no parallel in Scripture accounts given
us of extraordinary departures of God's saints, either in earlier
or in later times.
2. It does not follow from this that we may be indifferent to

THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH. I67
the amount of miracle involved in any Scripture narrative, or
that the utmost extreme of miraculous interposition that can be
put into a passage is to be as readily welcomed as the smallest
introduction of the same element that is consistent with fairness
to the words with which we deal. If we may err in diminishing,
we may equally err in magnifying the degree in which such
interposition takes place. As God ordinarily works by common
means, we are not unnecessarily to push the miraculous ele
ment into quarters into which He Himself has not distinctly
introduced it.
3. The circumstances of a writer, his modes of thought and
the modes of thought of his day must be invariably kept in view
by the interpeter. Details, at first sight apparently miraculous,
may be little else than a mould of thought different from ours,
that mould being determined by the age or mental development
of those among whom the portents are said to have occurred.
The principle now laid down is, of course, attended with great
difficulty in its application — with not less difficulty, indeed, than
what is known as the doctrine of " accommodation," of which
it is a part Few, however, will deny that the doctrine oi
" accommodation," looked at in its most general light, is both
true and indispensable to the interpreter of any ancient work.
The difficulty of using it, therefore, can neither affect the validity
of the doctrine nor destroy our responsibility for its legitimate
use. 4. A fourth observation may still be made, but that of so
obvious a kind that almost nothing need be said on its behalf.
Our first duty, in considering such a passage as that which we
have here before us, is carefully to determine what it actually
says, without allowing ourselves to be carried away by tra
ditional interpretation, however long continued or widely
prevalent. Let us apply these principles to the translation of Elijah.
In doing so, the first thing that will strike the reader even of the
Authorized Version (and the Revised Version does not differ
from it, except in one small word having no effect upon the
sense) is, that Elijah is not said to have gone up into heaven in
a. chariot of fire with horses of fire. On the contrary, it is dis
tinctly stated that " Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven."
No doubt the chariots and horses of fire appeared, but they are
so spoken of as to show that they were rather the accompaniment

1 68 ELIJAH.
than the means of the translation. Again, in our effort to under
stand the " chariot of fire, and horses of fire,'' the analogy of
Scripture must be taken into account, and fortunately we have
in this respect more than usual to help us here. In this very
book we are told that when the king of Syria, then warring
against Israel, was informed that all his plans were discovered
by Elisha, he determined to seize the prophet. For this purpose
he sent to Dothan where EHsha was " horses and chariots and
a great host ; and they came by night, and compassed the city
about." In the morning, Elisha's servant was alarmed when he
saw " an host with horses and chariots round about the city,"
and he hastened to report the fact to his master. Elisha
answered, and his answer is to be particularly noted, "Fear
not ; for they that be with us are more than they that be with
them ; " and then, praying that the young man's eyes might be
opened, they were opened, and he saw : " And behold the
mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about
Elisha " (2 Kings vi. 8-17). It is hardly possible to doubt as
to the meaning, in the circumstances, of these horses and
chariots of fire. They are in direct contrast to the horses and
chariots of the Syrians twice spoken of before. We are not
compelled to think that the mountain was full of actual horses
and actual chariots of fire, but only that under appearances of
such a nature was represented that strength, higher than that
of the Syrian host, which had been commissioned by the
Almighty to be on the prophet's side. ,Let us take another pas
sage. When in the scene before us Elisha beheld his master
ascend towards heaven he cried out, " My father, my father, the
chariots of Israel and the horsemen thereof" (ver. 12). The
last words have occasioned no small perplexity to commenta
tors. We doubt if it is possible to explain them except on the
supposition that they are suggested by the horses and chariot
that Elisha had immediately before seen. He would express
the might that had always accompanied Elijah, the commanding
part that he had been enabled to play in Israel, the irresistible
power with which God had swept all his enemies before him ;
and for the figure by which he would express this he seizes upon
the appearance in which the Divine presence had so recently been
made known to him. Once more, let us recall such passages as
these, " He rode upon a cherub," " He walketh upon the wings
of the wind," "The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even

THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH. 169
thousands of angels," " The Lord encampeth round about them
that fear Him, and delivereth them " (Psa. xviii. 10 ; civ. 3,
Ixviii. 17 ; xxxiv. 7), and we shall see that statements are often
made with regard to God's opposition to His adversaries and
protection, to His friends to which no one would dream of giving
a literal interpretation.
In the light of all that has been said, we thus seem to be
perfectly justified in saying that the mention here made of a
chariot of fire and horses of fire does not require us to believe
that either the one or the other literally exists in the world
beyond the grave. What Elisha saw was a symbol of the
strength of Him of whom it is said, " The Lord is a man of
war " (Exod. xv. 3), presenting itself in that appearance of a
chariot and horses of fire which most strikingly represented at
once His own destroying judgments and the burning zeal of the
prophet whom he had been chosen to succeed. It was a
fulfilment of the promise, " He shall give His angels charge
concerning thee," those angels or ministers which, if at times
th6y appear in gentleness, are at other times " a flame of flre "
(Exod. iii. 2 ; Psa. civ. 4). Such appearances Elisha actually
beheld waiting, as it were, upon Elijah in the last moments of
his life upon earth ; and then, with that glory as his attendant
satellite, he saw him swept away by a whirlwind towards heaven.
Thus with all reverence for the Sacred Word may we be per
mitted to speak of the translation of Elijah. All we can say is
that, not in calm peacefulness like Enoch, but in a whirlwind,
and with attendant angels or messengers of heaven correspond
ing to the whole of his prophetic life, Elijah closed his earthly
career, and entered on his eternal reward.
The translation of Elijah was witnessed by Elisha. It was
not in vain that the servant had clung, as he had done, to his
master in these the closing hours of his life ; and now God
bestowed upon him his reward. He witnessed the sight with
held from the fifty sons of the prophets who stood afar off for
the very purpose of beholding what might happen — his master
translated bodily from earth to heaven.
" And," when he saw it, " he cried. My father, my father,
the chariots of Israel, and the horsemen thereof." Both clauses
are descriptive of the now departed prophet, though in different
aspects of his character. He had been a father to Elisha,
and the latter felt it now as probably never before. He could

I70 ELIJAH.
recall many a token of the loving care and tender bearing of
one whom the world had known only in his sterner moods :
and all these came back upon his memory at the moment when
he was separated from him. As Elijah, accordingly, went up
into heaven he cried after him, " My father, my father."
Nor was this all. Elijah had been more than a father. He
had been " the chariot of Israel, and the horseman thereof."
The words, as has been already said, were in all probability
suggested by the spectacle just witnessed of the chariot and
horses from heaven, combined with what Elisha could not fail
to regard as an appropriate accompaniment of the scene, that
this strength of God's true Israel should disappear, as he had
lived, in fire. Chariots and horsemen were then the bulwark
of a nation in its times of war. They were that arm of its
military force on which it placed most reliance, and of which
its enemies were most afraid. " Some," says the Psalmist,
" trust in chariots and some in horses " (Psa. xx. 7). Such a
bulwark of the truth, such a defence to the faithful among.
whom he lived, such a terror to the faithless, had Elijah been.
His whole life is summed up by his disciple in that parting cry
with which he followed him on his path to heaven — "My
father, my father, the chariots of Israel, and the horsemen
thereof : " and, as he saw him no more, he gave utterance to
his sorrow after the manner of the time, by taking hold of his
own clothes and rending them in two pieces, i.e., "from top
to bottom, as a sign of the greatest grief and of the deepest
sorrow." '
One earthly token, however, of the great prophet of Israel
remained, a symbol of the precious inheritance that he left,
and of the fact that, althc' -h he himself was gone, his work
was to be continued by his successor, and that Elijah was still
to speak through him. Pis "mantle," that rough, hairy cover
ing in which he had a peared before Ahab and assembled
Israel, and which had been the sign of his prophetic work, fell
from him as he ascended into heaven, and " Elisha took up the
mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and went back, and stood
by Jordan." He knew now that his request made but a little
before to his master had been granted, that he was called to
take his place as the first-bom in the family of the sons of the
prophet, and that he was summoned to carry on the work which
• Lange, "Commentary on the Old Testament," in loc.

THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH. 17I
his spiritual father had begun. With this inspiration upon him
he^stood by the banks of the Jordan, the waters of which again
filled its bed, " and he took the mantle of Elijah that fell from
him, and smote the waters, and said. Where is the Lord, the
God of Elijah ? " He was heard and answered, for " when he
had smitten the waters they were divided hither and thither ;
and Elisha went over." He might not linger on the spot where
he had been separated from Elijah. His life was still before
him, his work had to be done, and it was necessary that he
should return to them both.
A few closing particulars are now mentioned by the sacred
writer with the view not so much of establishing the truthfulness
of his narrative, as of showing that the arrangements of the
Almighty were accepted by men, and that the new order of
things was recognized. The sons of the prophets, who had gone
out to witness as far as possible the solemn events connected
with the departure of Elijah, beheld Elisha on his return ; and,
when the waters were again divided exactly as they had been
a little before, they exclaimed, " The spirit of Elijah doth rest on
Elisha; And thffj came to meet him, and bowed themselves to
the ground before him." To pay him reverence, however, was
not all their aim. They had not actually seen the translation
of Elijah ; and, under the impression that he might still be
found on earth, they desired to search for him. " Behold, now,"
they said, " there be with thy servants fifty strong men : let
them go we pray thee, and seek thy master ; lest peradventure
the spirit of the Lord hath taken him up, and cast him upon
some mountain, or into some valley." They believed that he
was gone ; and that he had not, in the manner of his past life,
simply returned to solitude after having shown himself for a
moment to men. Perhaps they thought that, as he had dis
appeared not far from Mount Pisgah, his fate might have been
similar to that of Moses, and that it was due to him therefore to
make immediate inquiry after his body. Elisha, whether he'
told them fully what had happened or not, declined to comply
with their request. He said, " Ye shall not send ; " and only
after they had urged him to such an extent that he was ashamed
to persist in his refusal did he say, " Send." The fifty men
were sent, and three days were spent in the search, but without
their finding that of which they were in quest. They therefore
returned to Jericho where Elisha had in the meanwhile tarried ;

172 ELIJAH.
and, when they reported to him the failure of their mission,
" he said unto them. Did I not say unto you, Go not ? " Thus
they were reproved, and the shame that a moment before was
spoken of as Elisha's passed to them.
In looking back upon the remarkable narrative before us
several considerations suggest themselves which it may be well
to notice with the utmost brevity.
I. The difficulties of the narrative are unquestionable, and
may be frankly acknowledged. But we have seen, on the one
hand, that the popular impression as to the manner of Elijah's
translation is not warranted by the text ; and that, on the other,
it is not necessary to interpret each expression of the narrative
with the utmost literalness. We can easily form to ourselves
a clear idea of what the statement was intended to convey and
would convey to those for whom it was originally written. It
would undoubtedly tell them that Elijah was translated from
this world to the next without having tasted death, and that his
translation took place in a manner corresponding to the course
of his previous life. .He had been the prophet of fire : in fire
he was removed from the scene of his labours ; and this fact is
clothed in a garb adapted to the Eastern mind, when it is said
that the angelic host which came to accompany him to his rest
appeared as " a chariot of fire and horses of fire." " Both fact
and figure," says a writer whose soundness in the faith and
reverence of spirit are unquestionable, " Both fact and figure
are here. The essential fact is that Elijah was translated with
out dying. Not only does the credibility of the history demand
this ; but the entire Biblical conception demands it also. If
the Gospels do not accept myths as veritable history, if the
transfiguration of our Lord be a fact, and not a mere vision or
legend, if there be any significance in the representation of
Moses and Elias appearing with Him in glory, we must literally
accept the representation that Elijah was translated without
tasting death. No doubt the manner of his translation is
figuratively represented ; all that the description necessarily
means is, that he was caught away as in a fiery storm-cloud,'
poetically God's ' chariot and horses of fire ; ' 'as a fire,'
Elijah 'broke forth;' in a fiery storm-cloud he was taken
' It will be remembered that our conception of what passed has shghtly
diff'ered from this.

THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH. 1 73
away ; the prophet of fire to the end." ' The miracle it is im
possible to remove, and those who reject miracles must reject
the narrative as a whole. But it is unnecessary to multiply ob
stacles to faith, and if an undoubted characteristic of Jewish
modes of thought helps to make easier our acceptance of details
we are entitled to resort to it.
No other difficulty meets us in connection with the passage.
It is true that at the instant of his translation Elijah was a man
not only in full possession of his mental powers, but clothed with
his bodily frame ; and the Apostle Paul, writing to the Corin
thians, has said that " flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom
of God ; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption." But the
same apostle immediately added, " Behold, I tell you a mystery ;
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment,
in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump ; for the trumpet
shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we
shall be changed" (i Cor. xv. 50-52). The translation of our
Lord.Himself from His earthly to His heavenly body must also
have been instantaneous, or nearly so. There was no time for a
gradual process either during the period that He lay in the tomb
or during the forty days that intervened between His resurrection
and His ascension. When He rose from the dead it must have
been with His natural body, for the grave was empty. When he
issued from the grave it must have been with His glorified body,
for immediately afterwards He said to Mary, " Touch Me not."
Thus also was it with Elijah. The same Divine power which
translated him from earth to heaven would make him instantly
ready for the change. The corruptible would put on incorrup
tion, the mortal immortality. Possessed at one moment of a
"natural body" he would the next moment acquire the "spiritual
body,'' with which alone he could enter the house not made with
hands, eternal in the heavens.
2. "The scene reminds us of the Ascension of our Lord. He,
too, returned to His Father in the presence of none but His
disciples. His miracles He had wrought before the multitude,
but His disciples alone He led out to Bethany on that day when
He returned to "His Father and their Father, to His God
and their God." It is remarkable that in each great divi
sion of Holy Scripture we should thus have the record of an
ascension, and only one. We are told, indeed, of Enoch that
" Dr. Allon, " Bible Educator," iii. p. 159.

174 £lijah.
" he walked with God ; and that he was not, for God took
him," but the words are too indefinite to permit us to think
of what is meant by an ascension, and at any rate no details
are given. The one ascension of the New Testament is the
ascension of our Lord ; the one of the Old Testament is the
translation of Elijah. In the one, the Christian scheme of
salvation culminates : in the other, especially when we call to
mind that closeness of connection between Elijah and the
Baptist of which we have yet to speak, we reach the highest
point of the preparatory dispensation. Both dispensations rise
from earth to heaven. The goal to which they lead us is the
same. Not only so. Each of the two, the translation and the
ascension, corresponded to the nature of the dispensation,
to which it belonged. In the whirlwind which swept Elijah
into the eternal world we see the fitting end of a work which
had been throughout a work of storm and judgment. In
the narrative of the evangelist we see the fitting enc^ of a
work which had been throughout one of mercy and grace and
blessing — " And Jesus led the disciples out until they were over
against Bethany : and He lifted up His hands and blessed
them : and it came to pass, vifhile He blessed them. He parted
from them, and was carried up into heaven, and a cloud "re
ceived Him out of their sight" (Luke xxiv. 50, 51 ; Acts i. 9).
In the one case, there is everything to awe if not even to
overwhelm with terror ; in the other, there is everything to
soothe and to console. In the one case, Elisha returned alone
to resume a work in many respects like his Master's ; in the
other, the disciples returned together that they might be mes
sengers of glad tidings to the utmost ends of the earth. In
. both cases, however, the animating power comes not from
the seen, but from the unseen world. It was the spirit of the
translated Elijah that rested upon Ehsha. It is the spirit of the
ascended Lord that is in every age the strength of His apostles
and ministers. The spiritual alone gives the victory over the
material, the unseen over the seen, the eternal over the temporal.
A ministry the strength of which is drawn from earth and not
from heaven is self-condemned, and will, as it must, be power
less. One other remark is so closely connected with the subject we
have been considering that it is impossible to omit it.

THE ASCENSION OF ELIJAH. I75
3. The translation of Elijah conveyed to the Old Testament
Church an intimation of immortality. It was at least a step in
the process of the education of the people of God for their
future destiny. No doubt life and immortality are brought
clearly to hght only in the Gospel of Christ. Of Him alone
who rose on the third morning from the grave can we say that
He hath abolished death, and hath given us the assurance that
an hour is coming when mortality shall be swallowed up of life.
But, as for all the other truths of the Christian dispensation, so
for this great truth there was a preparation made before Jesus
came. The Old Testament Church was not left so completely
without hope of a future inheritance as it is often represented to
have been. Enoch was translated that he should not see death;
and, whatever ideas they who read the brief narrative of his
removal might entertain as to the particulars connected with it,
they dbuld hardly fail to gather the general impression that he
-continued to live in some region beyond the present scene.
We are distinctly taught by the writer of the Epistle to the
Hebrews that those saints of old who received the promises,
and were led, in doing so, to confess that they were strangers
and pilgrims on the earth, thus plainly declared that they
sought a better country, even an heavenly (Heb. xi. 16) : and
throughout the prophets there are not a few passages which
show that the expectation of life in a world to come was rising
upon the mind of Israel with increasing clearness as time ran
on. Such views the translation of Elijah must have deepened
and confirmed. It must have helped to lift Israel above those
things of sense in which it was so prone to be immersed, until
at last He came by whom the great truth is taught that to the
believer, even during his life here below, death is past ; and
that, in this the vestibule of that life there has already been
bestowed upon him a complete and everlasting temple, which
he has only to make more and more worthy of the unclouded
glory and the uninterrupted happiness of its inner shrine.

CHAPTER X.
1.ETTER OF ELIJAH TO JEHORAM, KING OF JUDAH— CHARAC
TER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET (2 CHRON. XXI. I2-15).
Elijah's letter to Jehoram king of Judah— Difficulties connected with it —
Most probable solution— Contents of the letter — Character of Jehoram
— Fulfilment of Elijah's warnings — General considerations on Elijah's
character and work — The circumstances amidst which he appeared— The
school out of which he came — Prophecy in Judah and in Israel — The
particular work given Elijah to do — The leading features of his cha
racter — His simplicity of faith and singleness of aim — His fearlessness
of action — His sternness of spirit — Comparison with Elisha — Estimate
of the prophet in after times — Book of Ecclesiasticus — New Testament
references — His grandeur and uniqueness.
We have followed the prophet Elijah to the close of his career
on earth, and to the moment when he entered upon the eternal
world. One other incident, indeed, connected with the prophet
meets us, belonging, in the opinion of not a few .inquirers, to
the period after his translation, and thus attended with diffi
culties of its own. To this we may now direct our thoughts ;
after which, before proceeding further, it will be well to take a
general survey of the prophet's character and work.
The incident of which we speak is related in the Second
Book of Chronicles, where, in the account given us of Jehoram,
king of Judah, we read that " there came a writing to him from
Elijah the prophet, saying. Thus saith the Lord, the God of
David thy father. Because thou hast not walked in the ways of
Jehoshaphat thy father, nor in the ways of Asa king of Judah ; but
hast walked in the way of the kings of Israel, and hast made
Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to go a-whoring, like as
the house of Ahab did, and also hast slain thy brethren of thy

CHARACTER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET. I77
father's house, which were better than thyself : behold, the Lord
will smite with a great plague thy people, and thy children, and
thy wives, and all thy substance ; and thou shalt have great
sickness by disease of thy bowels, until thy bowels fall out, by
reason of the sickness, day by day " (2 Chron. xxi. 12-15).
No difficulty connected with this writing need arise from the
fact that it is not noticed in the Books of Kings, and that the
account of it is given only in the Books of Chronicles. Elijah
was the prophet of Israel in the limited sense of the northern
kingdom, and the Books of Chronicles are devoted to the
fortunes of Judah, the southern kingdom. So far, therefore,
because addressed to a king of Judah, the writing is entirely in
its place. Again, there is nothing to surprise us in the fact that
a prophet of Israel should address himself to a king of Judah.
Instead of recognizing the division of the twelve tribes into
their two portions as legitimate, Elijah saw in it one of the
strongest proofs of the apostasy of his people from the God of
their fathers. He believed in the national unity as an arrange
ment ordained of God, and destined to continue ; and, when
on Carmel he erected the altar on which to call down fire from
heaven, he built it of twelve, not ten, stones as a symbol that
in the Divine ideal all the sons of Jacob, however outwardly
separated, were one. It was no more than natural, then, that his
interest in the fortunes of Judah should be only second, if even
second, to his interest in those of Israel. Both kingdoms were
God's. At Jerusalem was their common temple. And both
were so related to each other by birth, by proximity of country,
by the traditions of the past, the duties of the present, and the
hopes of the future, that they could hardly fail powerfully to
influence one another whether for good or evil.
The difficulty connected with the writing to Jehoram is en
tirely different from those now spoken of. In the opinion of
many commentators Elijah was now dead, or rather translated
to heaven ; and the narrative has thus afforded great scope for
the ridicule of those whose deUght is to do everything possible
to bring Scripture into contempt. We are not called upon in
this work to enter into the elaborate and obscure chronological
inquiries by which alone a distinct conclusion as to the date
of Elijah's departure can be reached. Even were it allowed
that it had taken place before any date of which the writing to
Jehoram can be assigned, the difficulty connected with that
13

i;S ELIJAH.
writing may be easily surmounted. Nothing is more natural
than to think that Elijah, as a prophet, anticipated the character
of Jehoram and the nature of his reign ; that, as the future rose
before him in prophetic vision, he beheld the wickedness of
that king, and the evil that he would do ; and that thus he was
led to address to him a warning which, preserved in the mean
time amongst his prophetic writings, or amongst the other
writings in the schools of the prophets, might be handed to
him for whom it was intended when the fitting moment
came. Although, however, such a supposition is by no means un
natural, and although it is sufficient to meet the difficulty with
which we have to deal, it is not necessary to resort to it. The
probability is great, that at this period of Jehoram's reign, Elijah
was still alive. The following words of the " Speaker's Com
mentary," on 2 Kings ii. i, apparently by Rawlinson, are worthy
of quotation : " There are reasons for believing that the events
of this chapter are related out of their chronological order.
Elijah's translation did not take place till after the accession of
Jehoram in Judah (2 Chron. xxi. 12), which was not till the fifth
year of Jehoram of Israel (2 Kings viii. 16). It would seem
that the vvriter of Kings, having concluded his notice of the minis
try of Elijah in chap, i., and being about to pass in chap. ii. to the
ministry of Elisha, thought it best to insert at this point the
final scene of Elijah's life, though it did not occur till several
years later." The explanation is simple, and in harmony with
well-known principles of structure by which Jewish historians
were guided. Even in the New Testament parts of St. Mat
thew's Gospel are, it is generally admitted, arranged upon this
principle. Much more may we expect to meet it in the Old
Testament, at a time when the historical sense was much more
imperfectly developed than in the days of Christ Nor is any seri
ous difficulty created by the circumstance that, if this explanation
be correct, we must suppose that Elisha entered upon his public
work several years before the translation of his master. There
is no reason why he should not have done so. But in fact Elijah's
proper work terminated with the vision at Horeb, and the ap
pointment of Elisha in his room which immediately followed it
Any act performed by him after that was more of a private than
a public nature ; and we may be sure that, from the day when
Le cast his mantle upon Elisha at Abel-meholah, Elijah would

CHARACTER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET. 1 79
never fail to recognize in him a prophet of Israel raised above
himself. From the outward circumstances attending this writing of
Elijah's we may now turn to the contents. They are a warning
in the whole spirit of Elijah's life to a rebellious and apostate
king. Jehoram had succeeded Jehoshaphat upon the throne of
Judah, but was displaying a spirit very different from that of
either his father or his grandfather (2 Chron. xvii. 3-6; xiv. 2-4).
Notwithstanding the examples set before him, and the tradi
tions of his house, Jehoram, when he succeeded to the throne,
pursued a policy of the most reckless wickedness, and the most
daring impiety. His first act was to slay his six brethren lest
any of them should afterwards make pretensions to the crown,
together with others of the princes of Israel. Then he yielded,
like Ahab in Samaria, to the corrupting influence of an idola
trous wife (2 Chron. xxi. 6, 11). The threatenings of Elijah's
writing thus neglected were soon terribly fulfilled. Jehoram had
received them in the beginning of his reign. He refused to
listen to them, and the remainder of his life was spent in mis
fortune, defeat at the hands of his enemies, loss of all that he
valued, and the sufferings of a painful and incurable disease
(2 Chron. xxi. 10, 16, 17, 19). He even died unhonoured and
unlamented. " His people made no burning for him like the
burning of his fathers. He departed without being desired ;
and they -buried him in the city of David, but not in the
sepulchres of the kings " (2 Chron. xxi. 20).
The last act of Elijah is not the least striking of his life, and
it ought especially to interest and instruct us because the prophet
appears in it working beyond the boundaries of Israel. Neither
in His mercies nor in His judgments is the Almighty limited by
national boundaries. He has made of one blood all the families
of men that dwell upon the face of the earth. They are placed
under one government, have one responsibility, are capable of
being brought to own, if not always at the same moment, the
same truths, and are preparing here forthe same destiny hereafter.
The revelation of God therefore knows no limits to its possible
sway : the messenger of the cross no boundaries which he may
not pass : the Church of Christ no nation which, on the plea
that she is national, she is not to bring under her beneficent
sway. " The field is the world," and truth is as universal as it
is eternal.

I So ELIJAH.
In the previous chapters of this book we have considered in
detail the particular incidents recorded in the Old Testament
of the great prophet of Israel whose life we have been engaged
in tracing. If few in number, they are more than usually im
portant. Nor are they only important. They are encompassed'
with greater difficulties than commonly meet us even in those
narratives of Scripture which present the greatest obstacles
to faith. It can be no matter of surprise, and certainly it ought
to infer no reproach, if many a humble and devout reader of the
Bible pauses before such records as those of the feeding of
Elijah by the ravens, or his translation from this earth by
a whirlwind with the accompaniment of a chariot of fire
and with horses of fire, and asks himself whether he has
understood these passages aright. Upon the other hand, he
may equally wonder whether it is possible by any honest or
unsophisticated reasoning to justify the slaughter of the four
hundred and fifty priests of Baal at the river Kishon, or the
destruction by fire from heaven of the two captains of Ahaziah,
each with his fifty men. Doubts as to the literal meaning of
the passages recording the two miracles may well be excused
when we consider that the Bible itself has taught us that the
performance of miraculous acts in which we are to recognize
the working of God is dependent upon their occasion, their
design, and their moral character ; while hesitation as tot he
possibility of vindicating the two terrible instances of destruc
tion of human life may naturally enough be entertained when
we remember that the New Testament has been our guide
to a gentler spirit of dealing with our erring brethren. It may
not be without use, therefore, before we leave the prophet and
his work on earth, to endeavour to form some estimate of his
character and labours as a whole. Still further light than that
already s.poken of may thus be reflected upon the individual
parts of both. We begin with the prophet's work.
I. The circumstances amidst which he appeared first demand
our attention. It was a crisis in the history of Israel. The
time was altogether different from any that had preceded it
since the days of Jeroboam, when the ten tribes first constituted
themselves into a kingdom distinct from Judah. There had
been degeneracy, idolatry, forgetfulness of God, before. Now
there was complete apostasy. There was an attempt, only it
would seem too successful, to introduce among the chosen

CHARACTER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET. l8l
people the Baal worship of the ancient Canaanites, with all the
abominations that belonged to it — that very worship which was
so full of the foulest and most wicked rites that, in order to effect
an entire separation between it and the chosen people, the
children of Israel had been instructed to exterminate the. old
inhabitants of the land. The steps, too, taken to introduce it
had been conceived not so much in a religious, though falsely
religious, as in a worldly and secular spirit. Jezebel, it is true,
was a fanatic in her own faith. There is no reason to think the
same of Ahab. That king could hardly have blotted out from
his mind the past history of his people. His readiness to yield
to the application of the test suggested by Elijah at Carmel ;
his cowering before the prophet in the garden of Naboth ; his
subsequent repentance ; and his conduct at Ramoth-Gilead,
when he endeavoured to escape death in a manner so different
from that of the defiant Jezebel when her hour came, — all these
things show that Ahab had never completely shaken off the
conviction that there was a God in Israel, for whom it might not
be possible to substitute with impunity the objects of Tyrian
worship. But Ahab was of an irreligious spirit ; intent on
schemes of worldly aggrandizement ; more interested in the
outvi^ard than the inward glory of his kingdom. The laying
out of his gardens, the building of cities, the erection of his
ivory palace — these two last achievements commemorated
in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel (l Kings
xxii. 39), occupied his thoughts. In this spirit he had in all
probability formed his alliance with the house of Ethbaal king
of the Sidonians. Disregarding the danger to religion, it was
enough for him to hope that he might thus share in the com
mercial prosperity of Phoenicia, and might thereby enrich,
whatever else might be the consequence, both himself and
Israel. To act in such a way, however, was to ignore, and, as far as
man could do it, to defeat the end which the Almighty had in
view when He dealt with Israel as He dealt with no other nation.
Religion was the foundation of the Hebrew commonwealth, the
purpose of its existence, the end of its calling, and the secret
of its strength. " To Jehovah Israel owed, not only the bless
ings of life, but national existence and all the principles of
social order ; and through His priests, Jlis prophets, but above
all His anointed king. He was the source of all authority, and

1 82 ELIJAH.
the fountain of all law and judgment in the land." ' Substi
tute for religion either that exclusive pursuit of material ends
which is fatal to the religious spirit in every form, or that
idolatry which is incompatible with true rehgion ; much more
substitute for it both of these together, and Israel as a people
would not only have degenerated ; the end of its national
existence would have been destroyed, and the purpose of God's
providential dealings with it would have suffered disastrous and
permanent eclipse. The moment, therefore, when Elijah was
raised up was that of a great crisis in his nation's history, and
the man who should meet that crisis needed to possess more
than common force of character, singleness of aim, and readi
ness to hazard everything in the cause committed to him.
2. The school out of which Elijah sprang. In one sense it
is impossible in his case to speak of any school. There is
not the slightest reason to believe that he belonged even to
those schools of the prophets which Samuel had long before
instituted, and which, to say nothing of other parts of the land,
were still in existence in Elijah's day at Gilgal, at Bethel, and
at Jericho. That he took an interest in these institutions may
fairly enough be inferred from the fact that, upon his way to the
spot whence he was translated, he paused for a little at the three
places named, and that Elisha who accompanied him held
intercourse with the scholars in each place. But everything
recorded of Elijah leads to the belief that, like his great follower
the Baptist, he was the child of the desert, and that, though he
may have been educated to some extent at least as youths then
were, he was really trained by God Himself in the wilderness
for the task to which he was to be called.
We use the word "school'' in a wider sense. Elijah be
longed to Israel, not to Judah ; and it was in Israel, not in
Judah, that at this period of the nation's history the most
marked development of the prophetic spirit occurred. There
is much to account for this. Judah possessed Jerusalem, the
holy city ; the temple of Solomon ; the ordinances which the
Almighty had appointed for His people ; and the priesthood
without that corruption of its regular line which had been
introduced by Jeroboam, and had probably continued to the
days of Ahab. With these things . the desires of the pious >
Israelite were satisfied. He did not stand in need of the extra-
¦ '^V. Robertson i'mith, "The Prophets of Israel," p. .jS.

CHARACTER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET. 183
ordinary provision for his religious necessities with which he
was supplied by the prophet rather than the priest ; while, at
the same time, there may have already existed some degree of
that selfish interest in the preservation of the ancient order of
things which, in the days of our Lord, goes so far to account
for the difference between the stolid insensibility of Judaea to
the Redeemer's teaching and the more open mind of Galilee,
ever ready for religious as well as political revolution. In
addition to this the actual condition of the ten tribes in the
days of Elijah had a greater tendency to call forth the pro
phetic voice than that of the two tribes which had continued
faithful to the house of David. The prophet, it must be re
membered, was not a mere predicter of the future. Prediction,
considered in itself, was not even his main function. When he
did predict it was, if we may not say always, at least for the
most part, because he would unfold some principle of the
Divine government, or would point to something which, when
accomplished, might show that God had a plan that He was
steadily carrying out, notwithstanding all the obstacles that
might oppose it To correct moral and religious abuses, to
proclaim the great moral and religious truths which are con-
nected..with the character of God, and which lie at the founda
tion of His government, was the prophet's task. He had to
face the moral and religious corruptions of his age whether
among the mass of the people, in the sanctuaries of the priest
hood, or in the palaces of kings.
If so, we are prepared to find that, in Elijah's days there
should have been a deeper and more widespread manifestation
of the prophetic work in Israel than in Judah. It is not for
naught that the great Captain of salvation sends His armies
into the field. When He summons them there is a work to do.
When there is a work to do He summons them. But we have
already seen what the spiritual condition of Israel, as compared
with that of Judah, in the days of Elijah was ; and we have
seen this, alike in the wretched character of its kings, in its
impurely appointed priesthood, in its apostate prophets, and in
the corrupt state of its community as a whole. The very extent
of the corruption, then, helps to explain the thoroughness and
severity of the remedy provided.
Whether, however, these considerations account fully for
the fact or not, there seems no cause to doubt that about the

l84 ELIJAH.
days of Elijah prophecy had received a development in the
northern, which it had not yet received in the southern, king
dom. The great prophets of the latter belong to a later date.
About the time of Elijah we find them for the most part in the
former. In Samaria, indeed, with the exception of a few, they
had been either slaughtered by the cruelty of Jezebel, or had
apostatized to the service of Baal. Those that escaped per
secution, or remained true to the God of Israel, had been
silenced. Obadiah had hidden a hundred of them in caves,
but they were thus removed from public life, and Elijah be
lieved that he, and he alone, was left to vindicate the honour of
God. By circumstances such as these he could not fail to be
influenced. The prophetic atmosphere of his land would
penetrate even to his desert solitude. He would be stirred by
the darkness and corruption around him to a feeling of the
greatness of a prophet's work, and to the need for a larger than
ordinary degree of boldness, determination, unhesitating self-
sacrifice, and unflinching zeal, in the effort to discharge it.
3. The particular work given him to do. That work was
restoration; the bringing back of a state of things from which
Israel had fallen away ; not an inculcation of new views or
a call to new duties, but the re-awakening of the conscience of
the nation, the rousing it to an old rigidness of rule and strict
ness of discipline which had been weakened by the temptations
of worldly prosperity. Restoration, we have said, was Elijah's
work, and we have our Lord's distinct authority for saying so.
When asked by His disciples to explain how it was that the
scribes considered the coming of Elijah to .be a necessary
preliminary to His own coming. He replied, " Elijah cometh
first, and shall restore all things " (Matt xvii. 11). He refers
no doubt in this reply to John the Baptist, the second Elijah ;
but, in doing so. He clearly implies that the work of the first
Elijah was that of restoration.
What, therefore, we understand by the work of an ordinary
prophet was not that required at Elijah's hand. No Messianic
prophecies were to be put into his mouth. No new revelation
of the God of Israel was to be committed to his care, and we
have already seen that that part of the vision at Horeb, which
contained fresh principles of God's method of procedure, he
did not fully comprehend. He was not even commissioned

CHARACTER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET. 1 85
to enunciate new moral and religious truths. What was needed
in his day was to go back to the old foundations, to make a
stand upon the ancient paths, to proclaim anew the one self-
existent and absolute Jehovah who had originally constituted
the Jewish people as a nation, but who had now been placed on
a level with, or even inferior to, that of the gods of the heathen.
It was this that in the time of Ahab Israel particularly re
quired — that an old truth should be restored to its proper place,
that an old impression should be revivified, that the principle,
sinfully forgotten, upon which God was dealing with His people
at that stage of their history should be again held up to view,
so that the pious might once more rejoice at the proclamation
of the holiness of God, and the wicked be once more brought to
"tremble at His judgments. Elijah's work was thus in one sense
singularly simple and direct. One idea runs throughout it all.
At his first appearance before Ahab at Carmel, at Horeb, in the
vineyard of Naboth, in his dealings with the captains of
Ahaziah, and at his translation into heaven, he has one truth to
enunciate and one lesson to enforce. He is the embodiment of
law. He stands in a position wholly different from that of the
evangelical prophets of the Old Testament. He is a second
Moses. He is the prophet of judgment and of fire. All this
demanded a man of action more than a man of words. It
demanded more than ability either to reason or instruct No
one could fulfil such a function who was not stern, bold, and
unflinching even unto death.
ii. Id these circumstances Elijah was raised up to be the
prophet of God in Israel. Let us glance at one or two of the
leading features of his character. We cannot fail to be struck
. with —
I. His simplicity of faith and singleness of aim. He forms
no plans of his own. He places himself wholly in the hands of
God. He waits upon the Lord, that he ma/ be of good courage,
and that his heart may be strengthened. Almost every great
act of his life seems to be preceded by a special call addressed
to him to do it. No mention indeed is made of this in the case
of his first appearance before Ahab, though it is probably
involved in the words then addressed by him to the king, "The
Lord God of Israel, before whom I stand." But after that,
when he took refuge by the Cherith, it was because " the word
of the Lord came unto him." When he left the Cherith for

1 86 ELIJAH..
Zarephath ; when he a second time showed himself to Ahab ;
when he returned from Horeb by the wilderness to Damascus ;
when he went down to meet Ahab in the vineyard of Naboth ;
when he intercepted the messengers sent by King Ahaziah to
Ekron ; when he came forth from his solitude to visit that king
upon his sick bed ; when, preparing for his translation, he went
from Gilgal to Bethel ; when from Bethel to Jericho ; and when
from Jericho to Jordan — on every one of these occasions the
same or a similar formula is used (l Kings xvii. 2, 8, xviii. i,
XX. 13, xxi. 17 ; 2 Kings i. 3, 15, ii. 2, 4, 6). Once only does it '
fail. It is not found in connection with the prophet's fligli.
from Jezebel. Then we simply read, " And when he saw that
he arose and went for his life, and came to Beersheba, which
belongeth to Judah, andleft his servant there" (i Kings xix. 3).
This, however, was the moment of Elijah's weakness ; a moment
similar to that in the life of the Baptist when, as he " heard in
the prison the works of the Christ, he sent by his disciples,
and said unto Him, Art Thou He that cometh, or look we for
another?" (Matt. xi. 2, 3). But just as then Jesus not only
resolved the doubts of His forerunner, instead of reproving him
for want of faith, but did so by a revelation of mercy — " The
blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are
cleansed, and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and
the poor have good tidings preached to them " — so now God
had compassion on the weakness of His servant, sent His angel
to him, and granted him that manifestation of Himself at
Horeb in which He appeared, not in the tempest, the earth
quake, or the fire, but in the still small voice.
To return, however, to the point more immediately before us,
the simphcity of Elijah's faith. His dependence was wholly
upon God. In every event of his life he looked to Him, and to
Him alone, for guidance. He had neither wishes nor purposes
of his own. Like the Saviour Himself, he would have said to
any one calling him to action at an instant when, he had not
yet heard the voice of God speaking to his soul, " What have I
to do with thee ? Mine hour is not yet come." And, anxious
as he must have been that his work should be continued by
Ehsha, he could yet only reply to his disciple as he asked that
a double portion of his spirit might be granted him, " Thou
hast asked a hard thing • nevertheless, if thou see me when I
am taken from thee, it shall be so unto thee ; but if not, it shall

CHARACTER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET. 187
not be so " (2 Kings ii. 10). He cast the whole matter upon
God. Thus he was always ready for any service to which he
was summoned ; and, the moment he had accomplished it, we
hear no more of him till the next summons comes. In this
simplicity of faith lay the foundation of that strength so emi
nently displayed by him.
With this simplicity of faith, again, was closely connected his
singleness of aim. We can hardly imagine that he was in
sensible to the political condition of Israel in his time, or that
Sie had no concern for the temporal welfare of his people. He
must rather have been more concerned for such things than
other men, because more than other men he had entered into
the spirit of that dispensation the purity of which he was endea
vouring to restore, and because temporal prosperity was so
essentially associated with a faithful adherence to the covenant
Yet his one aim was the religious revival of the nation. Even
though the immediate result of his work might have been to
check that temporal prosperity which the schemes of Ahab
promised, he could not have helped himself. He had one thing
to do, to re-awaken the religious life of Israel, and to that he
directed all his efforts, assured that the final issue must be for
the common welfare, and that, if we seek first God's kingdom
and righteousness, all things will be added unto us. In this
respect, he embodied the essence of the true prophetic spirit ;
and his character thus possessed all the force which belongs
in every age to men who become so possessed by one great
cause that for its sake they are ready both to live and die.
2. His fearlessness of action. This characteristic of his
nature was closely connected with that last spoken of. Nothing
gives strength and fearlessness in action like simplicity of faith.
We have then the might of God upon our side. " Thou hast
given a banner to them that fear Thee ; " " In God have I put
my trust, I will not be afraid : what can man do unto me ? "
Psa. Ix. 4 ; Ivi. 11.) Three times Elijah appeared before Ahab,
despising danger, scorning the fear of death ; and on each
occasion there is a marvellous directness in his words, in re
freshing contrast to the honeyed phrases and the dexterous
circumlocutions of too many a modern prophet, who manages to
combine apparent faithfulness with soothing instead of alarming
the consciences of those to whom he speaks. On the first occa
sion he says to Ahab, " As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before

l88 ELIJAH.
whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but
according to my word." As if he would say, "Thou art king,
and all the authority of the kingdom appears to be at thy com
mand. But [there is a living God in Israel, and my word, as
His servant, shall show itself to be greater than thine." On the
second occasion Ahab addresses him with the angry question,
" Is it thou, thou troubler of Israel ? " and is immediately met
with the reply, "I have not troubled Israel, but thou and thy
father's house ; " and when, upon the third, the conscience-
stricken king exclaims, " Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?"
he at once, without hesitation, answered, " I have found thee ;
because thou hast sold thyself to do that which is evil in the
sight of the Lord." It is the bracing gale of the mountain,
quickening the pulse and imparting strength and vigour to
every limb. Of Elijah it may be truly said that he " never
feared the face of man."
3. His sternness of spirit. In this respect Elijah leaves upon
us the impression of a man of still sterner mould than either of
the other prophets of the Old Testament or John the Baptist.
The latter, indeed, we meet even less among the softer scenes
of life than his great predecessor in the prophetic line. But
that dying swan-like song of his, when he felt that he was
passing away in the presence of One mightier than himself,
reveals a depth of tenderness in his heart to which we find no
parallel in any language ascribed to Elijah : " Ye yourselves
bear me witness that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am
sent before Him. He that hath the bride is the bridegroom ;
but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth
him, rejoiceth greatly because of the bridegroom's voice : this
my joy therefore is fulfilled. He must increase but I must
decrease " (John iii. 28-30). Not indeed that Elijah can have
been without tenderness. His conduct towards the widow of
Zarephath when her child died ; his language to Elisha when
the latter begged that, before finally departing upon that
mission to which his life was thenceforward to be devoted, he
might be allowed to kiss his father and mother ; his considera
tion for the same prophet, and the gentle solemnity with which
he speaks when Elisha insists on accompanying him to that
close of his life which was shrouded in such mysterious dark
ness ; above all, perhaps the attachment of Elisha to him, and
the devotion which will not permit him to quit his side even for

CHARACTER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET. 1 89
an instant before the end — all these things show that there
must have been veins full of the life-blood of pity and sympathy
in Elijah's nature.
Yet such is not the impression that he makes upon us. We
see in him rather little else than sternness, ruggedness, severity
unsoftened by any melting mood. From this point of view he
has been often contrasted with Elisha, his successor ; and we are
invited to mark in the one a type of the Baptist, in the other
of the tender and loving Saviour. The miracles of the two
prophets have been set over against each other, as if those of
Elijah were illustrations of a Dispensation of judgment, those
of Elisha of a Dispensation of mercy. Instead of the slaughter
of the priests of Baal, or the destruction of the captains and
their fifties, we are asked to think of the deliverance of the
kings of Israel and Judah and Edom from the sweeping
scourge of the Moabites ; of the increasing of the widow's
oil ; of the procuring the gift of a son for the Shunammite
woman ; and at a later period, when the child had died, of its
restoration to life ; of the healing of the poisoned food at Gilgal ;
of the multiplying of the loaves of barley so that the large com
pany ate and left thereof; of the cure of the leprosy of Namaan ;
of the recovery of the axe-head from the river Jordan; and,
finally, of life restored by the touch of his body to the corpse
which had been buried hastily beside him ; and then we are
further asked whether these miracles do not bear upon them
the marks of visitations of mercy, whether they are not " the
very opposite of those judicial inflictions with which, through
Elijah, the power of God broke forth to punish evil and to over
awe the guilty.'" The contrast, however, has been overdrawn.
That there was a wide difference between the two prophets may
be at once allowed. The difference appears even in their
names ; and the great importance attached in Scripture to
names as expressive of the realities of things must be borne in
mind in order that the full force of the difference may be felt.
" Elijah " means " Jehovah is my God," " EHsha " means " My
God is salvation " — the one name leading us to the thought of
the power and the majesty, the other to the compassion and
grace, of the Most High. Yet with the mantle of Elijah, Elisha
inherited his master's spirit. Apart even from the thought of
the destruction of the children by bears out of the wood near
• Wilberforce, " Heroes of Hebrew History," p. 349.

190 ELIJAH.
Bethel, which is obviously represented as an effect of the curse
then pronounced by him (2 Kings ii. 24), we have the words
spoken to Elijah at Horeb, "Him that escapeth from the sword
of Hazael shall Jehu slay, and him that escapeth from the sword
of Jehu shall Elisha slay " (i Kings xix. 17) ; and these words,
whatever we understand by the " sword " of Elisha, can only
mean that the pupil was to walk in the same steps and to
exhibit the same spirit as his teacher. The fact that he was to
do so makes it also clear that the time for a revelation of the
Divine mercy was not yet come, and that in the severity of
Elijah we meet no more than was needed by, and adapted to,
the requirements of his day.
Why, indeed, should we judge otherwise ? We can look back
to the sternness, even the' violence, of leading actors in the
German and Scottish Reformations with the feeling that the
spirit displayed by them on many an occasion was justified by
the circumstances of the case. Because we could not defend it it
exhibited now, it does not follow that we cannot defend it as it
was exhibited then. We owe to it in no small degree all that is
most precious in the inheritance of religious and civil liberty
transmitted to us by our fathers. We justly recognize in it, not
the coarse outbreaks of human passion alone, but a stern, un
compromising severity demanded by a condition of things of
which we have no experience.
Thus, then, it was with Elijah. The state of things around
him was such that gentleness of dealing with the sins and
errors of the people would either have produced no impression,
or have been completely misunderstood. With nothing short
of the most unbounding sternness and severity could he effect
the object of his mission. And this must have been allowed by
all. There is not the slightest trace in any part of the sacred
narrative that he was thought to have been too severe. He
lived in the memories of men as a noble example of that zeal
for the glory of God which secures the Divine approval ; and
it was the very narratives at which so many now stumble that
transmitted this estimate of his character to future ages. What
that estimate was we learn from the striking description of the
prophet in the apocryphal Book of Ecclesiasticus : " Then stood
up Elias the prophet as fire, and his word burned like a lamp.
He brought a sore famine upon them, and by his zeal diminished
their number. By the Word of the Lord he shut up the heaven

CHARACTER AND WORK OF THE PROPHET. 191
and also three times brought down fire. O Elias ! how wast
thou honoured in thy wondrous deeds ! And who may glory
like unto thee ! who didst raise up a dead man from death,
and his soul from the place of the dead, by the Word of the
Most High ; who broughtest kings to destruction, and honour
able men from their bed ; who heardest the rebuke of the Lord
in Sinai, and in Horeb the judgment of vengeance; who
anointedst kings to take revenge, and prophets to succeed after
him ; who wast taken up in a whirlwind of fire and in a chariot
of fiery horses ; who wast ordained for reproofs in their times
to pacify the wrath of thet Lord's judgment, before it brake forth
into fury, and to turn the heart of the father unto the son, and
to restore the tribes of Jacob. Blessed are they that saw thee "
(chap, xlviii. i-i i).
Later even than the apocryphal books, however, a similar esti
mate of him continued to exist in Israel. It has been remarked
that no one of the old prophets is so frequently mentioned in the
New Testament ; and his name never occurs except in a con
nection which testifies to the deep impression that he had made.
His memory was cherished with admiration and reverence. The
priests and Levites could not comprehend the Baptist's right to
Ijaptize unless he was either the Christ, or the great prophet
that was to come, or Elijah (John i. 25). St Paul refers to an
incident in his history to give force to his argument that Israel
was not wholly cast away (Rom. xi. 2). St. James sees in him
the most striking illustration of the power of prayer (James v.
17) ; and our Lord's disciples quote him as one whose deeds
afforded a justification of what they were anxious to do to the
inhabitants of the village that .would not receive their Master
(Luke ix. 54). It was the rugged sternness and severity of his
character which most of all left this impression upon men's
minds. 'They had an instinctive feeling that it had been
needed, and that there was no one by whom it had been so
strikingly and consistently displayed.
Possessed of elements of character like these, Elijah stands
out on the page of Old Testament history the grandest and
most unique of all its figures except the great law-giver Moses.
He was the prophet of fire, and it was most of all, by being so,
that he prepared the way for Him who was the Hope at once of
Israel and of the world.

CHAPTER XL
THE SECOND ELIJAH.
Passages in the New Testament in which we read of a second Elijah— An
integral part of Messianic hope — John i. 19-21 ; Luke ix. 7, 8 ; Matt
xvi. 14, xvii. 10, xi. 13, 14 ; Mark xv. 34, 35 — Rabbinical testimonies
to same belief — Founded on Malachi iv. s, 6 — Inquiry whether
such passages are fulfilled in the coming of the Baptist — Alford,
Moberly — Examination ot Luke i. 17 ; Matt. xvii. 11, la — Character of
the Baptist's work — Conclusion that in the Baptist we have the second
Elijah — Reference of the words in Malachi, "The great and dreadful
day of the Lord " — Applicable to the beginning as well as the close of
the Christian era— Jewish mode of looking at the Messianic age —
Christian mode of doing so — Character oJ the age, not historical de
velopment, at first thought of— Judgment not less than mercy connected
with it— Objection from 2 Thess. ii. 1-3 — Objection answered — General
conclusion that no second appearance of Elijah to be looked for.
A REMARKABLE class of passages occurs in the New Testament
in which we read of a second Elijah ; and our view of the great
prophet who bore that name in the Old Testament would be '
incomplete were we to leave these passages without notice. A
consideration of them ought also to open up questions both of
variety and interest in connection with the mission and the pur
poses of our Lord Himself.
It seems to have been an integral part of that Messianic hope
by which, immediately before the coming of Jesus, the Jews
were animated, that the approach of the coming Deliverer would
be heralded by the re-appearance of Elijah. When John the
Baptist appeared, and so shook Jerusalem by his preaching as
to lead men to suppose that the great religious crisis so long
¦waited for was at hand, a vague idea took possession of the

THE SECOND ELIJAH. 1 93
minds of many that, if not the Messiah, he might be that
prophet of the Old Testament for whom they had been waiting.
"They asked him. What then? art thou Elijah ?" (John i. 21).
When Herod the Tetrarch heard of the wonderful works
of Jesus and His disciples, we are told that " he was much
perplexed, because that it was said by some that John was
risen from the dead, and by some that Elijah had appeared"
(Luke ix. 7, 8). When, a few days before the transfiguration,
Jesus asked His disciples, " Who do men say that the Son of
Man is ? " they answered, " Some say John the Baptist, and
some Elijah" (Matt xvi. 14). And when, after that event,
the men who had witnessed upon the mount the glory of their
Lord, were unable to account for the fact that He should thus
manifest the brightness of His kingdom, without having been
preceded by the return of the ancient prophet whom they ex
pected, they came to Jesus with the question, " Why then say
the scribes that Elijah must first come ?" (Matt. xvii. 10). The
strength of the popular impression was recognized indeed by
Jesus Himself, when, addressing the multitudes who had gone
out to hear the Baptist in the wilderness. He said to them,
" For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John. And
if ye are willing to receive it, this is Elijah which is to come "
(Matt. xi. 13, 14) ; while, finally, a striking illustration is afforded
of the hold which the idea had of the minds of the people by
their interpretation of the Saviour's words upon the cross, " Eli,
Eli, lama sabackihani," " This man calleth Elijah " (Mark xv.
34, 35)-
These passages leave no doubt as to the widely-spread and
deeply-rooted expectation in the days of Christ that, before the
coming of the Messiah, Elijah was to return to the world in
order to proclaim His approach, and to bring Him forth from
the obscurity in which He was to remain until thus pointed out
and consecrated to His work ; and the inference is confirmed
by quotations carefully collected from the surviving literature
of the time by those who have written on the Messianic age
(comp. Drummond, "The Jewish Messiah," pp. 222-224). Nor
can there be any doubt that, in cherishing such expecta
tions, the Jews thought of Elijah himself, not of one who
should possess the spirit and power of the prophet, but of the
prophet in flesh and blood ; of the same prophet who, in the
days of their fathers, had played so important a part in the
14.

194 ELIJAH.
history of Israel. At the hands of the scribes, too, the idea had
even further degenerated, and had been surrounded with m.any
of those trifling puerilities with which the formalists of the
time corrupted all that was fairest and best in God's revelation
of Himself to His ancient people.
Such then was the state of feeling in Israel with regard to the
return in person of Elijah, and it rested on the words of the
prophet Malachi, the very last words spoken before the voice
of ancient prophecy was silent, " Behold, I will send you Elijah
the prophet before the great and terrible day of the Lord
come. And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the
children, and the heart of the children to their fathers ; lest I
come and smite the earth with a curse " (chap. iv. J, 6).
Two questions of importance meet us in connection with these
words, and with that expectation of the return of Elijah to which
they gave rise.
I. Was the expectation as to the return of Elijah in person
just, or was it fulfilled in the coming of John the Baptist, and
are we no more to look for him ?
II. If this question in its latter form be answered in the
affirmative, how are we to explain the prophecy of Malachi ?
I. It is at once admitted by all that in a certain sense at
least, John the Baptist is to be regarded as the second Elijah.
The words of our Lord upon different occasions are too precise
to admit of any other conclusion. When He spoke t6 the mul
titudes of the greatness of the Baptist He said, " Verily, I say
unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath not
arisen a greater than John the Baptist. And if ye are willing to
receive it, this is Elijah which is to come " (Matt xi. ii, 14).
And again, when His disciples asked Him, " Why then say the
scribes that Elijah must first come?" He answered, "Elijah
indeed cometh, and shall restore all things : but I say unto you
that Elijah is come already " (Matt xvii. 10-12). Of these
passages it is said that " they cannot be understood to mean
that the prophecy in Malachi iv. 5 received its full completion in
John " ; but that, " as in other prophecies, so in this, we have a
partial fulfilment both of the coming of the Lord and, of His
forerunner, while the great and complete fulfilment is yet future
—at the great day of the Lord " (Mai. iv. i) ; that the expression
in the original " Elijah which is to come " is not used from the
Old Testament point of view, but, as proved more especially

THE SECOND ELIJAH. 195
by the words, " shall restore all things " in chap. xvii. 1 1, is
" strictly future " ; and that the " double allusion (to Elijah and
the Baptist) is only the assertion that the Elias (in spirit and
power) who foreran our Lord's first coming was a partial fulfil
ment of the great prophecy which announces the real Elias [the
words of Malachi will bear no other than a personal meaning],
who is to forerun His greater and second coming." " The same
view is expressed by the late Bishop Moberly, in a posthumous
sermon recently published, in which that able and excellent
prelate speaks as follows : " Are we then to look forward to the
actual and literal fulfilment (of the prophecy of Malachi) ? Are
we to expect that Elijah himself ... is to come back with his
glorified body upon the earth, and turn the hearts of the fathers
to the children, and the children to the fathers, before the
coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord? Brethren,
I would not speak with any positiveness on a matter of this
kind ; but I will own that I so read the prophecy. I believe
that it will have a literal fulfilment. ... In some sort he may
be said, and maybe understood, to have come already ; iox John
is come in his spirit and power, and has proclaimed repentance
before the First Advent He had been a likeness, a shadow, of
the real messenger, the real herald ; just as the first humble and
peaceful Advent is a likeness, a shadow, an assurance of the
great and dreadful Advent which is yet to come." '
The passages now quoted clearly indicate the nature of the
question with which we have to deal. Was the prophecy of
Malachi fulfilled in the person of the Baptist, or was the Baptist
no more than a partial fulfilment, a shadow and a likeness of
the real and personal Elijah who is to reappear before the
second Advent of the Lord ?
I. We turn to the words addressed by the angel to Zacharias,
when announcing to him the birth of a son, " And he shall go
before his face in the spirit and power of Elijah, and turn the
hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to
» Alford on Matt xi. 14, xvii. 12 ; comp. Schaff' in Commentary, pub
lished by Clark ; Olshausen in loc. See the names of many ancient
expositors who took this view in Wordsworth's Commentary on Mai. iv. 5.
Wordsworth not unnaturally supposes that the Greek fathers may have been
led to a similar conclusion because the LXX. read, not " Elijah the
prophet," but " Elijah the Tishbite,'' thus individualizing the prophet still
more. ° " Parochial Sermons," p. 16.

196 ELIJAH.
walk in the wisdom of the just ; to make ready for the Lord a
people prepared y&r him" (Luke i. 17). No meaning can be
assigned to these words but one — that John should be the fore
runner announced in the prophecy of Malachi, and that in him
the mission of the forerunner, with the exact meaning of which
we have at this moment no immediate concern, should be
fulfilled. The words of the Old Testament prophecy are quoted
with almost literal exactness, and it is declared that the
prophetic function which they express shall be accomplished
in John. Omitting for the present the difficulty arising out ot
the mention by Malachi of "the great and dreadful day of the
Lord," it is clear that the mission of Elijah is transferred in its
fulness to the Baptist, that, with his birth, the Elijah spoken
of in the Old Testament will have come, and that no other is
to be looked for at a later day.
2. More distinct, however, than the language of the angel to
Zacharias is that of our Lord Himself to His disciples, when
they asked Him why it was said by the scribes that Elijah must
first come — " Elijah indeed cometh, and shall restore all things ;
but I say unto you that Elijah is come already, and they knew
him not, but did unto him whatsoever they listed " (Matt. xvii.
II, 12) — while His language to the multitudes is to the same
effect, " And if ye are willing to receive it, this [viz., the Baptist]
is Elijah which is to come " (a /I'eWuv ipxtadou, Matt. xi. 14).
Looking first at the latter of these two passages it seems almost
unnecessary to say that the word " if" with which it begins does
not make the meaning of the assertion with which it closes
dependent upon its reception or rejection by the hearers, as if
our Lord would assert that, only in the event of their acknow
ledging the truth of His remark, was the Baptist to be regarded
in the light in which He was presenting him. His assertion
could be affected neither by their faith nor by their unbelief.
The Baptist was, and must have been, what he was, indepen
dent of any views of theirs. Our Lord can only mean, " I have
a statement to make which it is of importance for you to hear
and understand. Ye may not be willing to receive it Under
the influence of your prepossessions, ye may harden your hearts
against it ; nevertheless, it is true, and is fraught with momen
tous consequences, that the John whom you have hastened to
the wilderness to see is far more even than you have supposed.
He is the very ' Elijah, which is to come.' "

THE SECOND ELIJAH. 197
Nor can it be urged that the expression " which is to come "
leads us to the thought of an Elijah who was to appear at
some future time. In such a case our Lord could only have
spoken of a shadow or type of Elijah. He could not have said,
" This is Elijah," or led His hearers to understand that Elijah
was already come. The words " which is to come " are ob
viously spoken from the point of view of the Old Testament,
and from the fact that the language in which Elijah had been
long anticipated had become a technical designation for the
man. The same thing is to be observed in that mention of the
" age " or the " world to come," which often meets us in the
New Testament (Matt. xii. 32 ; Luke xviii. 30 ; Heb. ii. 5, vi. 5,
X. l), and which marks out, not the future world, as distin
guished from the present, but a period already come, the Chris
tian age as distinguished from the age of preparation that went
. before. If now we turn to the first of the two passages quoted above
(Matt. xvii. 1 1), it will be seen that some of these remarks apply
equally to it. Our Lord there speaks of Elijah as of one who
"cometh," not who "shall come," and that expression, like the
words of chap. xi. 14, " Elijah which is to come," is the designa
tion by which His hearers were wont to describe the prophet.
It is true that our Lord immediately adds, " and shall restore
all things," words which, taken up by themselves, would
unquestionably lead us to the thought of the future. Yet in
the light of the words immediately following, such an interpre
tation is impossible : " But I say unto you that Elijah is come
already, and they knew him not, but did unto him whatsoever
they liked." Here all the verbs used point to a distinct and
definite past, and nothing can be plainer than the statement,
that the expectation entertained by the scribes, that Elijah
was still to come, was false. He " was come already." The
disciples immediately recognized the meaning of what was
said (ver. 13). The words of ver. ii, therefore, can have
only one meaning. Our Lord puts Himself into the posi
tion of Old Testament expectation. He says as it were, " I
allow the truth of the expectation of Elijah from the point of
view occupied by those who do not, and will not, see that
already in My person the new order of things has been intro
duced. It is a part of Old Testament revelation that Elijah
cometh and shall restore all things. But that promise has been

igS ELIJAH.
fulfilled, and men ought to admit that, in its fulfilment, lies not
only the coming of the forerunner, but of Me of whom he spoke."
While the teaching of Scripture upon the point before us is
thus clear, it is confirmed by —
3. The character of the Baptist's work. The later prophet
corresponded so closely to the earlier that he might well be
looked upon as his double, and be styled a second of that
name. Even outwardly it was so — the same connection with a
wild and wilderness country ; the same long retirement in the
desert ; the same sudden startling entrance upon his work
(i Kings xvii. i ; Luke iii. 2) ; even the same dress, a hairy
garment, and a leathern girdle about the loins (2 Kings i. 8 ;
Matt iii. 4).
If the two thus corresponded in the outward, they equally
corresponded in the inward aspects of their mission. We have
already seen that the work of Elijah was not a new revelation
of God ; it was a restoration of the old, of the old theocracy,
of the old worship instituted, and of the old law given through
Moses. Such also was the work of the Baptist The angel indeed
who announced his birth to Zacharias applied to him the very
language in which the prophet Malachi had described the
Elijah that was to come. He was " to turn the hearts of the
fathers to the children, and the disobedient to walk in the
wisdom of the just " ; while Malachi had said of the Elijah of
whom he speaks, that he would come "to turn the heart of the
fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their
fathers." The 'exact meaning of these latter words is indeed
difficult to determine; but there can be little doubt that in a
general sense they express a work of reformation and restora
tion. The " children," in short, should be to such an extent the
worthy descendants of a worthy ancestry ; the " fathers " should
have such satisfaction in their children, that the later age of
the nation would exhibit the accomplishment of what the
earlier had aimed at, and that both fathers and children would
thus be knit together in similar bonds of submission to the will
of God.
We have, however, more to guide us than this general de
scription of what John's work was to be in comparison with
Elijah's ; we have the work itself. It is essentially an Elijah-
work. Like his great predecessor, the Baptist was a prophet of

THE SECOND ELIJAH. I99
the law. The chief note of all his preaching was " Repent, for
the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Making no distinction of
persons, with a boldness that knew no fear, with a plainness of
speech that went directly home to the heart, he addressed
himself to every class of the community from the lowest to the
highest urging upon them the great lessons of righteousness
which had been the constant theme of those Old Testament
prophets whose line culminated in him (Luke iii. 10-14). With
holy indignation against sin even in the most exalted circles of
the land he met Herod face to face as Elijah had met Ahab, and
Herodias as the same prophet of the Old Testament had met
Jezebel. Nothing daunted him in the execution of his task until
he paid the penalty of his faithfulness with his life. His whole
career was that of one separated from the world, pierced to the
heart by the irreligion that prevailed around him, burning with
zeal for the honour of God and for the memories of the theocratic
kingdom. It is true that John witnessed to the coming and
presence of the Redeemer in a way that Elijah did not, and in
his circumstances could not do. But this arose from the neces
sities of his position, as that of one who terminated the series of
the prophets of Israel, and who announced that a moment had
arrived when He of whom all the prophets spake had actually
come and was even standing among the people, though they
knew Him not John's main work, however, was to preach re
pentance, and to baptize with a baptism of repentance, " unto,"
to prepare for, to lead to, " a remission," a putting away, " of
sins," so that all flesh might see that " salvation of God," which
consists not only in pardon and acceptance with Him whose
wrath we have provoked, but in a righteous and holy life led in
Him to His glory and the fulfilHng of His designs for the per
fection and happiness of His creatures.
The clear and definite conclusion to which the whole of this
discussion leads is that in the Baptist we have the second
Elijah, and that we are not to look for a future appearance of
that prophet.
But if so, the second question spoken of in connection with
this subject demands our attention.
II. How are we, on the supposition now advocated, to explain
the prophecy of Malachi ? The Elijah of whom the Old Testa
ment prophet speaks is to come before " the great and dreadful
day of the Lord." Is not this the day of judgment, the close

200 ELIJAH.
of the present dispensation ? In that case, another appearance
either of Elijah or of John is still to be expected, and all that
has been just said has been beside the mark. The point is one
of no small moment for the interpretation of numerous passages
both of the prophets and of the New Testament, and an effort
must be made to understand it.
(i) It is to be observed that the passage before us is not the
only one in the prophecy of Malachi in which we read of a
" day " which shall be peculiarly marked by judgment, which
" burneth as a furnace," in which " all the proud and all that
work wickedness shall be as stubble," which shall " burn them
up," and they shall be "ashes under the soles of the feet " of
God's people, and they shall " be trodden down" (Mai. iv. 1-3).
In an earlier part of the prophecy we read of a " day " that
comes with such a penetrating and searching power that the
prophet says of it, " But who may abide the day of His coming ?
And who shall stand when He appeareth ? for He is like a re
finer's fire, and like fullers' soap : and He shall sit as a refiner
and purifier of silver, and He shall purify the sons of Levi, and
purge them as gold and silver. . . . And I will come near to
you in judgment " (chap. iii. 2, 3, 5). But this latter " day " is
introduced by the words, "Behold I send My messenger, and
he shall prepare the way before Me ; and the Lord whom ye
seek, shall suddenly come to His temple, even the angel of the
covenant, whom ye delight in, behold, he cometh, saith the
Lord of Hosts " (ver i). These words, again, are distinctly
applied by our Lord to the Baptist who preceded His own com
ing in the flesh (Matt. xi. 10 ; comp. Mark i. 2 ; Luke i. 76).
The " day " therefore spoken of in Malachi iv. 5 as " the great
and dreadful day of the Lord " refers as much to the first as to .
the second advent, and we are not entitled to confine it to the
latter. Even Bishop Wordsworth, commenting on Malachi iii. i,
says, " The day of the Lord began, in a certain sense, with our
Lord's first appearance upon earth ; and it will have its climax
and consummation in His second advent." There is no ground,
however, for speaking of " a certain sense." The teaching of
the passage is precise that, not with the day of final judgment,
but with the first manifestation of the Father in the Son, the
" day " of the Lord began. To a similar effect is the language
of Heb. i. I, 2. Finally, we may refer upon this point to the
language of the prophet Joel, with the comment upon it by the

THE SECOND ELIJAH. 201
apostle Peter in his first sermon at Jerusalem. After a glowing
description of the Messianic age Joel. thus speaks, "And it shall
come to pass afterward that I will pour out my spirit upon all
flesh ; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your
old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions ;
and also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those
days will I pour out my spirit And I will show wonders in
the heavens and in the earth, blood and fire and pillars of
smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon
into blood, before the great und terrible day of the Lord come.
And it shall come to pass that whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord shall- be delivered : for in mount Zion and
in Jerusalem there shall be those that escape, as the Lord hath
said, and in the remnant whom the Lord shall call " (chap. iL
28-32). These words are declared by St Peter to have been
fulfilled in the outpouring of the Spirit upon the day of Pente
cost ; for, explaining what had just taken place upon that day
the apostle, " standing forth with the eleven, lifted up his voice,
and spake forth unto the multitude, saying. This is that which
hath been spoken by the prophet Joel" (Acts ii. 14, 16), and
then he quotes the prophecy which we have given. With the
day of Pentecost, therefore, " the great and terrible day of the
Lord," the same expression as that used in the prophecy of
Malachi (chap. iv. 5), had dawned, and these words cannot be
restricted to a day only to dawn at the close of the present
dispensation. The truth is that we lose the force of all such passages as
these by not placing ourselves with sufficient clearness in the
position of the Jews at the beginning of the Christian era.
With eighteen centuries of Christian history behind us it is,
difficult for us to regard the Christian age in any other light
than as a long course of historical events ; and, so regarding it,
we imagine that the Jews also must have regarded it, and the
voice of prophecy described it, in a similar light. But this was
exactly what the Jews and prophecy did not do. By them the
• period to follow the first appearance of the Messiah was not
looked at in the light of what we would style a course of his
torical development. They dwelt upon the character, not the
extension, of the crisis, or aon, or age, which should then be
introduced. They gathered together all its particulars into
one. It was a season separated by a broad line of demarcation

202 ELIJAH.
from the season going immediately before, the termination of
which had now been reached. To have spoken therefore to
a Jew of a first and second advent of the Lord would have been
to use language which to him would have been unintelligible.
His hope was fixed upon one coming of the Great Deliverer,
and the kingdom and the glory which he expected were asso
ciated with it alone.
The question may be asked. Was it not otherwise in the
early Christian Church ? And, when that Church learned by
hard experience that, instead of being admitted to the outward
rest and splendour of the Messianic kingdom, she was sum
moned to persecution and trial and death, was she not led to
think of two distinct "comings " of the Lord, the one past, in
humiliation, the other still to come, with a brightness that should
realize every hope she had learned to entertain ? To this ques
tion in its strictest sense an answer must be given in the nega
tive. The ideas of the early Christian Church were at least in
this respect essentially the same as those of the Church of the
older covenant. To the former as well as to the latter the
Christian age did not present itself as a long historical develop
ment such as the age preceding it had been. To the Christian
as well as to the Jew it presented itself as a crisis, or ason, or
age, the nature rather than the exte?tsion of which was to be
the subject of his thoughts. No doubt the idea of historical
development gradually forced itself upon the minds of men as
time ran on and the fulness of their first expectations was not
realized ; while the struggling together of the expectation and
the experience led to that slight wavering in the meaning of such
words as " day of the Lord " that we find in the New Testa
ment Yet in the main the whole Christian era was to the first
disciples one. It began with the first advent of Christ, and that
advent introduced it in its reality and essence. Christ was not
"to come." He was come already. Acccording to His promise,
" Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the consummation of the
age," He was present in His Church. The word Parousia,.
so often used in this connection, cannot mean "future coming."
It can mean only " presence," although that particular presence
may have associated with it the thought of a degree of glory only
to he manifested at a future day ; and it is to be regretted that the
New Testament Revisers were not bold enough to transfer this
rendering from their margin to their text. That, accordingly,

THE SECOND ELIJAH. 203
for which the first Christians looked was not so much Christ's
coming as the "manifestation*' of His coming. Amidst their
many and sore troubles they felt that though Christ was come,
the idea of His coming was not exhausted. As yet He was
hidden with the Father. But a day would break when His
glory would be manifested, and when He who for a time had
made Himselfknown only in the lowly condition of the "flesh,"
and was now concealed from view, would be revealed in all the
brightness that belonged to Him. This, however, was not
strictly speaking a Second Advent. It was simply the com
pletion of the First Advent It was not a "day of the Lord"
wholly new. It was only a filling out of the idea of that day
in all its completeness.
One difficulty must still be noticed. It may be asked how it
comes to pass that, if the prophets of the Old Testament thus
looked upon the whole gospel age as the day of the Lord, they
should associate with it ideas of terribleness and of judgment,
instead of ideas of mercy and grace alone. Is it possible that
Christian times should be regarded in any other light than as
times of the revelation of the love of God ? And, when we find
so many images of terror connected with the "day" of the
Lord, is it not a proof that we are wrong in thus embracing the
" day of salvation " not less than the day of the final judgment
under the idea of one coming of the Lord?
To this it may be answered in part, that there is often in pro
phetic language what may at first sight appear to be not only
a singular, but even an inexplicable, mingling of the gentle and
severe, of the encouraging and the terrible, in reference to
the same event. The clauses of such a passage as that of
Isaiah Ixiii. 4, "The day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the
year of My redeemed is come," may be a sufficient illustration
of this ; although the same principle lies at the bottom of those
words of the Epistle to the Hebrews, in which the sacred writer,
after having given what is perhaps the most glowing description
of the privileges of believers contained in the New Testament,
exclaims, "Wherefore, receiving a kingdom that cannot be
shaken, let us have grace whereby we may offer service well
pleasing to God with godly fear and awe ; for our God is a con
suming fire." It is plain from passages such as these that
according to the conception of Scripture two views of God and
of our relation to Him, generally deemed inconsistent, may well
accompany eich other.

204 ELIJAH.
But there is more to be said, for a little reflection may
show us that the annunciation of judgment must be one
of the deepest and most essential elements of the prophetic
spirit The prophets are false who " speak smooth things,
who prophesy deceits " (Isa. xxx. lo). It is the hatred
of all sin ; it is the profound sense of its evil as committed
against God, and as the source of all misery to man, combined
with the conviction that it ought to be and can be forsaken ; it is
a heart bursting with sorrow as it contemplates the burden of
human woe, and swelling with indignation at its cause, that
draws the true prophet forth. He sees the captive in his
chains ; he hears the groaning of the prisoner and the cry of
the oppressed ; his spirit is overwhelmed as he meditates on
the sufferings of God's saints who have no earthly comforter.
Then he knows that, in spite of all this, there is a just Governor
of the universe, that there is a reward for the righteous, that
verily there is a God who judgeth in the earth — and when these
considerations and others of a similar kind rush in upon him
like a flood, what can he do but cry for judgment ? Judgment
in such a case is not vindictiveness or vengeance. It is the
necessary preliminary to the restoration of order. It is the
vindication of truth. It is the punishment and the banishment
of sin. It is a step that must be taken before the foundations
of that kingdom can be laid which is " righteousness and peace
and joy in the Holy Ghost"
The true prophet therefore must look, and long, and cry for
judgment. So far from being inconsistent with the love of God
judgment is rather to him one of the forms in which the love
of God is manifested. The same Redeemer who on one occa
sion said, " I came not to judge the world, but to save the
world " (John xii. 47), said upon another, " For a judgment
came I into this world" (John ix. 39) ; and in a striking pas
sage in the Revelation of St. John the proclamation of judg
ment is even represented as a gospel — "And I saw another
angel flying in mid heaven, having an eternal gospel to pro
claim unto them that dwell on the earth, and unto every nation
and tribe and tongue and people ; and he saith with a great
voice. Fear God, and give Him glory ; for the hour of His
judgment is come ; and worship Him that made the heaven and
the earth and sea and fountains of waters " (chap. xiv. 6, 7).
To what has now been said it may, indeed, be still objected

THE SECOND ELIJAH. 20S
that, iri 2 Thess. ii. 1-3, St. Paul appears to teach that the "day
of the Lord " is not yet come, and that it will not come until an
important series of events, dwelt upon in the following verses of
the chapter, shall have taken place. It is not difficult, however,
to understand that the terms applied to the whole age which
was to be the final age of the present dispensation should have
been transferred to its closing period, when it was seen that the
events inseparably connected with the thought of it could be
expected only in the future. Such expressions as " the day of
the Lord," or the "coming" or "presence" of the Lord, though
originally applicable to the Christian era, at its beginning as
well as at its end, were pushed onward to the latter point be
cause then only would all the hopes associated with them be
fulfilled. In the light, therefore, of all that has been said, we can have
no hesitation in referring such words as those of Malachi when
he speaks of " the great and dreadful day of the Lord," to the
whole Christian Dispensation, and not merely to the particular
" day " at which the Lord comes to final judgment.
But, if so, the chief difficulty connected with Malachi iv. 5, 6,
disappears, and we at once see that there is nothing in the
words there used to make it necessary to think of an Elijah yet
to come. The Baptist was the only second Elijah promised to
the Church, and we do not look for another. Why, indeed,
should another come ? He would have no work to do. When
the day of final judgment arrives men will be divided into the two
great classes in which they have chosen their respective places —
the believing, waiting Church upon the one hand, the unbeliev
ing world that has steeled itself against Christ, upon the other.
The former need no Elijah-work. The latter would not profit
from it. No time of new probation then begins, but only the
full and perfect manifestation of a probation ended. Even now
the course of time is running on lines which do not change,
which only reach their terminal issues in the world's great
assize — " He that is unrighteous, let him do unrighteousness
still, and he that is filthy let him be filthy still ; and he that is
righteous let him do righteousness still, and he that is holy let
him be made holy still" (Rev. xxii. 11).

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