{"id":62756,"date":"2019-09-11T17:26:46","date_gmt":"2019-09-11T14:26:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=62756"},"modified":"2023-04-05T17:28:11","modified_gmt":"2023-04-05T14:28:11","slug":"elijah-the-reviver","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/elijah-the-reviver\/","title":{"rendered":"Elijah The Reviver"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[858,401,471,780],"acf":{"old_id":"62756","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":34243,"related_cahpter":"305","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"But what does CPR have to do with making it rain?","content":"

At the close of the previous chapter, Elijah performed an (apparent) miracle: He resuscitated the (ostensibly) dead child of the widow woman with whom he was residing.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The parentheses are due to the fact that there was an opinion among the medievals that the child had not actually died. To recall our comments on the previous chapter, there were those who believed Elijah was one and the same as Phineas the Priest. As a priest, he would have been forbidden to touch a corpse, ergo the child had not actually died but\u2014perhaps\u2014had suffered only respiratory arrest. Of course, an obvious alternative explanation\u2014utilizing the selfsame facts\u2014is to argue that the mitzvah of rescue (<\/span>piku`ah nefesh<\/span><\/em>) trumped that prohibition.<\/span><\/p>\n

Our chapter opens in the third year of the drought that Elijah had invoked with God instructing him to \u201cGo, appear before Ahab; then I will send rain upon the earth\u201d (1). Do you see a connection to the conclusion of the previous chapter? Malbim saw them as two related examples of revival:<\/span><\/p>\n

The opinion of the Sages is well-known: When [Elijah] required the keys of resurrection, he [first] needed to return the keys to the rain\u2026 At first, Elijah sealed all the conduits that provided rain and sustenance, so he no longer had the ability to restore life to anything because that necessitated the opening of a conduit. However, while attempting to revive the child, he needed to renege on his sealing of the flow and that reopened all the life-giving flows that had been sealed off together with the rain.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the interim, and unbeknownst to Elijah, Ahab had been scouring the earth for him. (Such, at least, is the literal meaning of v. 10.) Ahab had employed the services of the righteous Obadiah to secure a royal appearance by Elijah and to use his good offices to beseech the prophet to end the drought.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In this regard, we encounter a most curious exchange. Elijah said to Obadiah \u201cGo tell your lord, Elijah is here\u201d (8), to which Obadiah responded \u201cWhen I leave you, the spirit of the LORD will carry you off I don\u2019t know where; and when I come and tell Ahab and he does not find you, he will kill me\u201d (12). Granted that Elijah might have preferred to avoid Ahab\u2019s company, but once he had made an appointment to see him, why would he fail to keep it?<\/span><\/p>\n

As a member of Hatzoloh for more than thirty years, I think I have an insight into Elijah\u2019s seemingly rude behavior. He, too, was a first-responder (to wit: he arguably performed the first recorded act of CPR) and even if he were on his way to meet the king, if his emergency beeper went off\u2014he was duty-bound to go wherever it took him.<\/span><\/p>\n

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