Ahab of Israel [VI]

The final contest between Ahab and Elijah: A Tale of Two Chariots. Though Ahab had died at Ramoth-Gilead, his ongoing rivalry with Elijah (and the ongoing rivalry between Baal and Yahweh) had one more contest. Mount Carmel, as the penultimate contest, was second-to-last; the narrative we’re about to explore was the final contest. Both Ahab and Elijah’s stories end in a chariot: the worshiper of Baal met his damnation bleeding out in his royal chariot whereas the prophet of Yahweh was vindicated and rescued by God and carried to heaven in a divine chariot.

the ruins of biblical Jericho

Elijah’s ‘translation into heaven’ took place sometime around 848 BC during the reign of Jehoram (though Ahab was succeeded by his son Ahaziah, his successor wouldn’t last long and would be succeeded by Jehoram, another of Ahab’s sons) and is recorded in 2 Kings 2.1-14. Elijah and his protégé Elisha were traveling from Gilgal, likely in the vicinity of Geba and Micmash just a few miles south of Bethel. Elijah ordered Elisha to stay in Gilgal, as Yahweh had instructed him to go to Bethel; Elisha, as Elijah’s constant companion and padawan, refused. Upon reaching Bethel, a group of prophets belonging to one of the prophetic schools Elijah had established cornered Elisha and asked the apprentice if he knew God was going to ‘take’ Elijah that day. Elisha replied that he did and they needed to stop yammering about it, thank you very much. Elijah then told Elisha that Yahweh instructed him to go to Jericho, and again Elisha refused to stay behind. They made the rugged, twenty-mile journey down from the mountainous region of Ephraim to the newly-fortified city of Jericho in the Jordan Valley. A group of prophets from Jericho’s prophetic school asked Elisha if he knew what was afoot. Elisha replied that he did. Elijah told Elisha that God gave him more instructions: he was to go down to the Jordan River. He wanted to go alone, but Elisha refused. The two of them began the five-mile journey to Jericho with fifty of Jericho’s prophets following them. It’s likely, given the track they followed, that they reached the part of the Jordan that Joshua had crossed during the Conquest.

Elijah and Elisha cross the Jordan River on dry ground

Upon reaching the muddied waters of the Jordan, Elijah folded his infamous cloak and struck the Jordan River with it. The river divided (an echo of both the Exodus and the Conquest), and he and Elisha crossed to the other side on dry ground. Clambering onto the opposite bank, Elijah cornered his apprentice and asked if there was anything he could do for the young prophet before he was taken away. Elisha was bold in his response: ‘Let me inherit a double share of your spirit and become your successor.’ Elisha wasn’t asking for twice Elijah’s power; he was simply asking to be identified as Elijah’s successor with the same powers (a firstborn son, as primary heir, inherited a ‘double share’ of his father’s estate and was considered his equal). Elijah made no promises but added, “If you see me when I’m taken, you’ll get your request; if you don’t see it, you won’t.” In other words, if Yahweh enabled Elisha to see what was going on ‘behind the scenes,’ that’d be a sign that his request to ‘carry the torch’ on equal footing with his master would be granted. 

They walked away from the river in the direction of Mount Nebo where Moses had died (a subtle comparison between Elijah and Moses, a comparison picked up again in the New Testament at the Mount of Transfiguration when Elijah and Moses appeared alongside Jesus). Suddenly a ‘chariot of fire’ drawn by ‘horses of fire’ appeared, and it drove between the two of them, separating them, and Elijah was carried away by a ‘whirlwind’ into heaven. ‘Fire’ here may be an earthly description of celestial glory, and the ‘whirlwind’ is typically connected to God’s activity and presence in prophetic materials. Elisha’s eyes were ‘opened’ to what was transpiring: the curtain separating the physical world from the spiritual world (the division between what human eyes can detect and that which remains invisible to us) was drawn back, and Elisha was granted a vision of what was happening – truly happening! – beyond the scope of mere mortal irises and cortexes. It’s interesting to ponder if Elisha witnessed an ‘everyday’ occurrence for God’s people; in other words, when God’s people die, does God sweep them up in his divine chariot? It’s likely this was a demonstration of reality rather than the nuts-and-bolts of it (after all, chariots were the main military vehicles of the day; perhaps, in a similar vision in the modern world, Elijah may have been carried up in tanks or Apache helicopters!); besides, Elijah’s ‘translation’ was a quasi-unique event – the only person in the Bible who preceded him in such a matter of going to be with God without dying was Enoch in Genesis 5.4 (interestingly, some believe that Enoch and Elijah are the apocalyptic prophets, the ‘two witnesses,’ of Revelation 11.1-13 who will be slain but resurrected). By carrying Elijah away in a chariot, Yahweh is echoing ancient Near Eastern imagery with which Elisha and the prophets would be familiar: major deities often used charioteers, and chariots were weapons of war. Elijah’s ministry had been an ongoing military conflict between Yahweh and the Baals, and what better way to showcase God’s might by ‘rescuing’ his prophet in a weapon of war?

This display of God’s power rocked Elisha’s world. He shouted, ‘My father! My father! I see the chariots and the charioteer of Israel!’ He may be identifying Elijah as the ‘charioteer’ of Israel; this title would fit Elijah, for the aged prophet had been a close companion of Yahweh and had been the one who ‘brought’ Yahweh into battle against the Baals. As the chariot and its fiery horses disappeared, a stunned and grief-stricken Elisha tore his clothes (a common form of mourning in the ancient Near East), bent down, and picked up Elijah’s discarded cloak. He returned to the bank of the Jordan River; striking the river’s currents with the cloak as his master had done, he cried out, ‘Where is Yahweh, the God of Elijah?’ Perhaps he was wondering if God’s power on Elijah was with him, too. The Jordan River divided, yet another sign that Elisha was Elijah’s successor and that God was still present, and so Elisha crossed the river. Crossing back over the Jordan at the same place and in the same direction as Joshua centuries earlier, Elisha was reenacting the Conquest of the Promised Land. Just as Joshua had led the Israelites to seize the Promised Land from the Canaanites, so Elisha would be leading Yahweh’s conquest of the pagan gods (the Baal-Melqart cult) that had infected the land. 

Elijah’s ministry had been the ‘opening shot’ of this new Conquest. Elisha’s ministry, however, would see the bulk of the activity. Whereas Elijah’s ministry was filled with glitz and glamour and contests between Yahweh and Baal, Elisha’s ministry would be more ‘underground’ and subtle; he would carry on Elijah’s commission, anointing both Hazael of Damascus and Jehu of Israel to execute God’s judgment. He would raise a ‘school of prophets’ who would be instrumental in turning the peoples’ hearts back to the Living God.

When the fifty prophets from Jericho witnessed Elisha’s miraculous crossing and saw that Elisha was wearing Elijah’s mantle, they exclaimed, ‘Elijah’s spirit rests on Elisha!’ They went to meet him and bowed before him. They offered to send out scouting parties to locate the missing prophet; perhaps Yahweh had dropped him off on a mountaintop or in some remote valley? Elisha knew better and told them not to waste their time. But they badgered him about it, and he eventually acquiesced. For three days the Jericho prophets searched high and low among the ravines and rocky ridges of the Jordan Valley but without success. Elisha, who had remained in Jericho, retorted upon their return, ‘Didn’t I tell you not to go?’ Then Elisha drew a breath, put oomph into his step, and left Jericho: it was time to let people know that Elijah had been taken to heaven and there was a new prophet in town.