Elijah on Mount Carmel
After three years of drought Elijah summons Ahab and the prophets of Baal to Carmel and puts the question to the crowd: how long will you waver between two opinions? Two bulls are prepared, and the god who answers by fire is God.
Baal's prophets call from morning to noon and dance around their altar, and Elijah heckles — shout louder, perhaps he is asleep. Elijah then soaks his own altar with twelve jars of water, prays briefly, and fire falls. The prophets of Baal are seized and killed at the Kishon, and rain returns.
What follows is the more human half. Jezebel's death threat sends Elijah a day's journey into the desert asking to die. He is fed, allowed to sleep, and brought to Horeb — where God is not in the wind, the earthquake or the fire, but in a low whisper.
Where in scripture
[1] Elijah the Tishbite, who was one of the settlers of Gilead, said to Ahab, “As Yahweh, the God of Israel, lives, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word.” [2] Then Yahweh’s word came to him, saying, [3] “Go away from here, turn eastward, and hide yourself by the brook Cherith, that is before the Jordan. [4] You shall drink from the brook. I have commanded the ravens to feed you there.” [5] So he went and did according to Yahweh’s word; for he went and lived by the brook Cherith that is before the Jordan. [6] The ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening; and he drank from the brook. [7] After a while, the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land. …
1 Kings 17:1–24 — opening verses
[1] After many days, Yahweh’s word came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, “Go, show yourself to Ahab; and I will send rain on the earth.” [2] Elijah went to show himself to Ahab. The famine was severe in Samaria. [3] Ahab called Obadiah, who was over the household. (Now Obadiah feared Yahweh greatly; [4] for when Jezebel cut off Yahweh’s prophets, Obadiah took one hundred prophets, and hid them by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water.) [5] Ahab said to Obadiah, “Go through the land, to all the springs of water, and to all the brooks. Perhaps we may find grass and save the horses and mules alive, that we not lose all the animals.” [6] So they divided the land between them to pass throughout it. Ahab went one way by himself, and Obadiah went another way by himself. …
1 Kings 18:1–46 — opening verses
[1] Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. [2] Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I don’t make your life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time!” [3] When he saw that, he arose, and ran for his life, and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there. [4] But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree. Then he requested for himself that he might die, and said, “It is enough. Now, O Yahweh, take away my life; for I am not better than my fathers.” [5] He lay down and slept under a juniper tree; and behold, an angel touched him, and said to him, “Arise and eat!” …
1 Kings 19:1–18 — opening verses
Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, a public-domain translation.
