What Are You Doing Here? Reflections on 1 Kings 19:1-4, (5-7), 8-15a, Pentecost 2, Year C
by John C. Holbert on Friday, May 2, 2025
1 Kings 19 may be among the more familiar passages from the Hebrew Bible, but perhaps not for the reason one may expect. It does provide the dramatic story of Elijah’s confrontation with YHWH on the sacred mountain of Horeb, known as Sinai in other traditions. Elijah is running for his life from an enraged Queen Jezebel, whose anger has been kindled by the prophet’s murder of 450 of her Baal prophets on Mount Carmel in the far northwest of Israel. His courageous stand against the Baal prophets, leading to his defeat of them in a kind of Super Bowl of prophecy—Baal’s absolute silence over against YHWH’s very dramatic bolt of fire from a blue sky—is not sustained, as the Queen announces that Elijah will soon suffer the same murderous fate as her prophets once she lays hands on him. In fact, he is so fearful of her threat that he runs all the way to Beersheba in the far south of Israel, some 100 miles from Carmel (1 Kings 19:1-3).
The terrified prophet of YHWH, after his arrival in Beersheba, leaves his servant behind and goes a day’s journey into the wilderness and sits alone under a “solitary broom tree” (1 Kings 19:4). This tree (Hebrew rotem) has been identified as a short tree, some 4 to 12 feet in height, growing in desert, hill, and rocky areas in Israel and neighboring lands. It often grows alone, rarely appearing in groups. Thus, not only is the prophet alone, he then sits beneath a tree that itself usually grows alone. Elijah is not only petrified with fear, but he is also profoundly depressed. “He asked that he might die (lit. “He asked his life to die”): ‘You are great, YHWH (the very familiar translation “it is enough” seems rather forced); take my life, because I am no better than my ancestors’” (1 Kings 19:4). Elijah’s extreme terror leads him to demand that YHWH kill him, because, though he is YHWH’s prophet, he avers that he is no more important than any who have preceded him, and thus hardly worthy of any further work for YHWH or anyone else.
He then twice falls asleep, and twice a messenger (“angel” NRSV) of God feeds him, the second time urging him to eat in order to fortify himself for a long trip he is about to make. Indeed! For the familiar biblical number of 40 days and nights, he journeys to the sacred mountain of Horeb, and finds a cave to spend the night. Immediately, the word of YHWH sounds in his ears, and the question YHWH asks may be heard in several ways. “What for you here, Elijah?” says YHWH in quite literal Hebrew. The meaning of the question depends largely on which word of the sentence finds emphasis: “what” or “you” or “here.” Elijah attempts an answer: “I have been extremely zealous for YHWH, God of the armies, for the people of Israel have abandoned your covenant, have wrecked your altars, have killed your prophets with the sword, while I alone remain, and they seek my life to snatch it away” (1 Kings 19:10). The focus of Elijah’s response to God’s question is on the “you;” I have remained steadfast, while “they” have done abominable things to you all the while trying to kill me.
YHWH’s response to this long-winded and generally self-serving reply is fascinating. There is no attempt to mollify Elijah or to make him feel better. Instead, YHWH demands the prophet to “go out and stand on the mountain before YHWH, and watch! YHWH is about to pass by” (1 Kings 19:11)! But YHWH does not pass by, or does not appear in any way that may easily be discerned to be YHWH. There is a “great wind, so powerful as to break mountains and shatter rocks in YHWH’s presence; but YHWH was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but YHWH was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but YHWH was not in the fire” (1 Kings 19: 11-12). It is of course fairly common in the Hebrew Bible to have theophanies of YHWH, appearances of the God of Israel, exactly to be seen in wind, earthquake, and fire! Was not YHWH just manifest in the fire on Mt. Carmel! But not here on Horeb. YHWH appears here in a unique way: “after the fire, there was the sound of sheer silence” (NRSV, which I find just right 1 Kings 19:12b). That very familiar reading of the phrase—“a still, small voice”—however poetic and memorable, is simply incorrect. I can see how translators read it so, since the next verse says, “When Elijah heard it,” the “it” plainly assuming some sort of sound. However, silence may surely be heard as anyone who has been alone in a wilderness can affirm.
After Elijah hears the “sheer silence,” he wraps his face in a mantle and stands at the entrance of the cave. And YHWH speaks again using the exact same words as before. YHWH clearly hopes for a different answer from the prophet, imagining that the wind, earthquake, fire, and silence will have altered him. But, no! Elijah replies in exactly the same way with identical words! His self-concern is unchanged, and YHWH, instead of another indirect reply, now becomes quite direct indeed. Now YHWH says, “Go! Return straight to the wilderness of Damascus; when you arrive, anoint Jael king over Aram,” (1 Kings 19:15) and then provides for Elijah several more quite politicized demands that the prophet will without fail perform. One way to drag a reluctant and depressed prophet from the dumps of self-concern is to ask him to do specific acts for YHWH. It works, since Elijah proceeds to do as YHWH asks.
Might we learn something here? Self-concern, depression, and extreme sadness may fall on us all, but a special task for others may be just the thing to take us out of our despair. The sheer silence of YHWH may soon be accompanied by the renewed call to service. Those who would be God’s prophets should have an ear cocked for such silence and then for such a call.