ELIJAH. — The greatest among the prophets of action in Israel, whose name (*’Eliyyah* [“My God is Yahweh”]) constitutes an entire program of life and activity.
Originally from Tishbe (modern el-Istib) in Gilead, Transjordan, he is therefore called *tishbite*; the Vulgate renders this as *Thesbites*, as interpreted by the Septuagint (Θεσβίτης or ἐκ Θεσβῶν τῆς Παλακέ, 1 Kings 17:1). Roughly dressed (2 Kings 1:8), like later John the Baptist (Matt. 3:4), accustomed to the harsh life of the desert (1 Kings 17:5; 18:46; 19:3ff.), he carried out his mission during the reign of Ahab (873–854 BC) and Ahaziah.
The division from the kingdom of Judah, the religious schism created by Jeroboam with the erection of the golden calves at Bethel and Dan (1 Kings 12:25–32), then the alliance of Omri with Phoenicia through Ahab’s marriage to Jezebel, daughter of the king of Tyre, fostered syncretism and struck a deathblow to the religion of Yahweh. Jezebel officially introduced the cult of Baal-Melqart, seeking to impose it as the state religion; she killed prophets (members of the so-called “schools” or congregations of the pious, led by E. as true prophets), persecuted Yahwist faithful, destroyed their altars, while maintaining hundreds of prophets of the Phoenician deities at royal expense (1 Kings 16:23–34; 18:13, 19; 19:14; etc.). Monotheism was thus stifled, and much of the people became idolatrous (cf. 1 Kings 19:18).
The Lord intervenes through E., who suddenly appears before Ahab and announces divine punishment: a three-year drought (probably from 857 to 856 BC, with some months before and after, calculated in the manner of the Semites), which severely affected Samaria and Phoenicia (cf. Flavius Josephus, *Antiquitates Judaicae*, VIII, 13, 2). Elijah hid by the brook Cherith (Καρθί) in Transjordan; when it dried up, he went to Zarephath near Sidon, where he stayed with a widow, miraculously multiplying her scant provisions and raising her son to life. Toward the end of the punishment, he confronts Ahab, reproaches him for the state of Israel, and secures his agreement to assemble the people on Mount Carmel for a decisive confrontation between Yahwism and the cult of Baal.
Before the entire people, Elijah stands alone against 400 prophets of Baal. If Baal is the true God, let him send fire from heaven to consume the victim on the altar. Despite their rites, their lengthy prayers, they achieve nothing. At the time of the evening sacrifice, Elijah rebuilds an altar to Yahweh, places wood and the meat of an ox upon it, drenching it with water to heighten the miracle; then he briefly invokes Yahweh to demonstrate that He alone is God. Fire descends and consumes everything. It is the victory of Yahweh, acclaimed by the people (“Yahweh is the God!”); then, obeying Elijah, they kill the false prophets at the brook Kishon (cf. Deut. 13:2–6). Soon after, the life-giving rain falls (1 Kings 17–18). But Elijah must flee before the threats of the enraged Jezebel (1 Kings 19:2). Beyond Judah, where Queen Athaliah, Jezebel’s daughter, reigns, he crosses the desert to Mount Horeb, where in a vision Yahweh strengthens him for the struggle, teaching him to wait patiently for God’s hour, which will come without the violent blows that shatter.
God assigns Elijah the task of anointing Hazael as king of Damascus, Jehu as king of Israel, and Elisha as prophet; they will be instruments of God for the triumph of Yahwism: the first will devastate the kingdom of Samaria (cf. 2 Kings 8:28; 10:32–33; 12:3); the second will drench the dynasty of Ahab and the worshippers of Baal in blood (cf. 2 Kings 9–10); the third will cooperate through his oracles. To Elisha, Elijah entrusts the remaining two anointings (1 Kings 19). To Ahab, who goes to take possession of Naboth’s vineyard, murdered to make way for this usurpation, Elijah reproaches the crime and predicts the same end for the king (1 Kings 21). He briefly reappears to rebuke the ailing Ahaziah for seeking to consult Baalzebub and to foretell his death (2 Kings 1).
Elijah’s end is narrated as it appeared to Elisha’s eyes (cf. 1 Macc. 2:58): Elijah is taken up in a whirlwind. The same verb *laqah* (“to take”) (2 Kings 2:3ff.) elsewhere expresses God’s intervention in the peaceful death of the righteous: Gen. 5:24; Ps. 47 (Heb. 49):16; Isa. 53:8. Other elements are symbolic. In Mal. 3:1, 23–24 (Heb. 4:5–6), it is said that Elijah will come to prepare the way for the Messiah, preaching repentance. This is precisely the mission fulfilled by John the Baptist (Luke 1:17), who is the herald foretold (Matt. 11:10; 17:10–13) and who embodied Elijah’s strong character; Elijah was only its type. Ecclus. 48:1–12 in its eulogy summarizes the biblical data thus far. It is therefore clear that the expectation of Elijah’s return at the end of the world has no foundation in Sacred Scripture; though widespread among Christians, it was borrowed from the Jews. The Church celebrates Elijah’s solemnity on July 20. Legend, among Jews, Christians, and Arabs, delighted in elaborating upon Elijah’s figure, considering him still alive in expectation of his return to fight the Antichrist at the end of time.
For Judaism, Elijah is the tutelary genius of the race; Jews believe he participates every year in the celebration of the Passover meal, as in the rite of circumcision.
CONCORDANCE. — In early Christian antiquity, the prophet Elijah was depicted as taken up into heaven in the same way that classical art had represented the sun (Helios) on a racing quadriga. St. John Chrysostom explains to his audience how the very name of the prophet led poets and artists to liken him to Helios (Homil., 3, E., 27); Sedulius calls Elijah “shining in merit and name”: *De Heli*, I, 169. In funerary monuments, the scene of Elijah’s rapture appears in a fresco in the Domitilla catacomb of the 4th century (Wilpert, *Pitture*, pl. 230, 2); contemporary examples are found on sarcophagi in Rome and Milan (Wilpert, *Sarcofagi*, pl. 190, 3; pl. 189, 2). In the latter city, the scene is now represented in Sant’Ambrogio, accompanied by a distich (G. B. De Rossi, *Inscriptiones Christianae Urbis Romae*, II, Rome 1887, p. 161). The rapture of Elijah also appears on one of the wooden panels of Santa Sabina in Rome (5th century).
As for the symbolic meaning of the scene, in funerary art it refers to the resurrection, as already noted by St. Irenaeus (*Adversus Haereses*, I, 5): “in the *ordo commendationis animae*: ‘Deliver, O Lord, the soul... as You delivered Elijah from common death.’” St. Gregory the Great, however, sees it as a figure of the Lord’s Ascension (Homil. 20 in Evangelium: PL 76, 1247). Wilpert shared this view. In scenes of the rapture, Elisha also appears.
In a sarcophagus at Arles he divides the waters of the Jordan with his mantle.
The scene later appears in Byzantine miniature art, in the Catalan Bibles of the 11th century, in the stained glass of 13th-century French cathedrals, and in the Romanesque sculpture of the cathedrals of Modena, Cremona, and Borgo San Donnino, continuing to inspire, because of its inherent dramatic power, even the art of the 16th century and the Baroque period (Antonio Campi, fresco in the Cremona cathedral; R. Donner, relief in the cathedral of Gurk). The encounter with the widow of Zarephath also owes its original iconographic importance to its symbolic meaning, according to which Elijah prefigures Jesus: the woman gathering wood represents the Church of the Gentiles. See, for example, the stained glass windows of Bourges and Le Mans, where moreover the restoration of the widow’s son symbolizes the Resurrection of Christ. Just as the episode of Elijah in the desert became dear to painters of various times and places (Dirk Bouts, panel formerly in Berlin; Tiepolo, fresco in the Archbishop’s Palace in Udine; F. Preller, cartoon in the Goethean Museum in Weimar), so finally the Pre-Raphaelite school proves particularly devoted to the miraculous events surrounding the prophet Elijah.
APOCALYPSE OF ELIJAH — An apocryphal work cited in the Apostolic Constitutions VI, 16, by some Fathers of the Church, in the stichometric list of Nicephorus, and by the Ambrosiaster (Commentary on the Epistle to the Corinthians: PL 17, 205), St Jerome (Epistle 57: ibid., 22, 576), and the anonymous list of Montfaucon-Cotelier at no. 10, who all designate it as the Apocalypse. It was almost certainly of Jewish origin (Schürer, pp. 262 ff., 265).
According to Origen (Commentary on Matthew 27, 9: PG 13, 1769), St Paul is referring to this apocryphon in 1 Corinthians 2, 9; cf. Ambrosiaster, loc. cit.; and the Euthalian Scholia. St Jerome (loc. cit.) strongly opposed this assertion, arguing that the phrase “as it is written” always refers to inspired Scripture, and here the reference is to Isaiah 64, 3; 65, 16. St Epiphanius (Panarion 42) was the only one to hold that Ephesians 5, 14 refers to the Apocalypse of Elijah. It is uncertain whether certain fragments in Coptic from the 5th century, discovered at Ahriman and published in 1835, and a Latin fragment speaking of a vision of Elijah concerning the last events, contained in the Epistle to Titus (3rd–4th century AD), published by D. De Bruyne in 1925, belong to II.
The Coptic fragments were grouped into an anonymous Apocalypse, an Apocalypse of Zephaniah, and an Apocalypse of Elijah. The first probably forms part of the Apocalypse of Zephaniah. In the third, Elijah is commanded to preach repentance; he foretells the appearance of the Antichrist, his struggles against Elijah and Enoch, his defeat, the coming of the Messiah, and the millennial kingdom of the saints. In its present form it is certainly of Christian origin, but it seems to presuppose an ancient Jewish writing, which may underlie all these texts. — See pl. XVIII.