1 Kings 18.21-24:
| 18.21 ויגש אליהו אל כל העם | Eliyahuα comes down to all the people |
|---|---|
| ויאמר עד מתי | and says, “For how long |
| אתם פסחים על שתי הסעפים | must you dance on two crutches? |
| אם יהוה האלהים לכו אחריו | If Yahweh is God, walk with Him. |
| ואם הבעל לכו אחריו | If Ba’al, walk with him.” |
| ולא ענו העם אתו דבר׃ | The people didn’t respond to his message. |
| 18.22 ויאמר אליהו אל העם | Eliyahu says to the people, |
| אני נותרתי נביא ליהוה לבדי | “I’m the only prophet of Yahweh left.β |
| ונביאי הבעל ארבע מאות וחמשים איש׃ | Ba’al’s prophets are 450 men. |
| 18.23 ויתנו לנו שנים פרים | Give us two calves. |
| ויבחרו להם הפר האחד | They pick one calf. |
| וינתחהו וישימו על העצים | They butcher it and place it on the sticks. |
| ואש לא ישימו | They won’t place fire. |
| ואני אעשה את הפר האחד | I do likewise to one calf. |
| ונתתי על העצים | I give it on the sticks— |
| ואש לא אשים׃ | and I won’t place fire. |
| 18.24 וקראתם בשם אלהיכם | You call in your god’s name. |
| ואני אקרא בשם יהוה | I call in Yahweh’s name. |
| והיה האלהים אשר יענה באש | It will be that the god which responds with fire— |
| הוא האלהים | he is God.” |
| ויען כל העם ויאמרו טוב הדבר׃ | The people respond, “Good word.” |
The first thing Elijah said didn’t impress anyone. It’s the same lecture they’d heard a thousand times before by every prophet of Yahweh that came down the chute. “God doesn’t like idolatry. Stop worshipping other gods. Ba’al is nasty; stop worshipping him. Repent. Follow the Law.” Blah blah blah.
As far as the people were concerned, they had no reason or motivation to follow God. The king and queen were Ba’alists, so there was the political motivation to follow Ba’al. The common public perception was that Yahweh was a mountain god and desert god and Egypt-smiting god, but for weather and crops you needed to follow Ba’al. And Yahweh had all these strange rules to follow—wearing special clothes, eating special foods, following special rituals, some strange ideas about land management and economics that appeared to favor the poor—whereas Ba’al had little to no rules, and ritual sex with temple prostitutes. If you want a religion that definitely appeals to the selfish, Ba’alism does the job.
So when Elijah got up and gave the same speech as usual, it didn’t win him any converts. They’d been “dancing between two crutches” for years now, worshipping God plus the false gods. They’d celebrate Shavuotγ on Saturday, but celebrate the Ba’alist harvest festival on Sunday. They’re like the average pagans we have in the United States, who’ll listen to Jesus’s teachings one day and the Buddha’s the other. Not that the Buddha isn’t frequently right, but the reason they follow both has nothing to do with truth. It has to do with whatever makes them feel “spiritual”—and, because they think feeling spiritual makes them profound, underlying all of this is whatever makes them feel good about themselves. It’s selfishness. As usual.
Elijah reached the point where he realized the people weren’t gonna respond to a speech. They wanted action. So he proposed an action. Two calves (’cause good luck finding any adult cattle left when you’re in the middle of a drought), one for Ba’al, one for God. Both would be butchered for sacrifice, but left uncooked. The prophets—who spoke to their god all the time, right?—would call upon their god to do the cooking.
I don’t know too many Christians that would have the guts to put God to the test like this. In fact, most of them would probably misquote Jesus’s statement, “Don’t put the Lord your God to the test,” (Mt 4.7) as their way of weaseling out of considering such an idea. Elijah, by comparison, didn’t try to get out of such things. He pitched this idea, fully expecting God to come through for him, which He did.
Elijah-level faith is not an easy thing to come by. I suppose I have quite a lot of developing before I get to a point where I’d try to stop the rain or have God light the barbecue for me.
α. Elijah.
β. Lit. “I’m [the] remaining prophet to Yahweh, alone.”
γ. Also called Pentecost—the Hebrew harvest festival.
