From: 1 Kings 17:7-16
Elijah foretells the drought (conclusion)
[7] And after a while the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.
Miracle of the flour and the oil
[8] Then the word of the Lord came to him, [9] Arise, go to Zarephath, which
belongs to Sidon, and dwell there. Behold, I have commanded a widow there
to feed you.” [10] So he arose and went to Zarephath; and when he came to
the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks; and he called
to her and said, “Bring me a little water in a vessel, that I may drink.” [11] And
as she was going to bring it, he called to her and said, “Bring me a morsel of
bread in your hand.” [12] And she said, “As the Lord your God lives, I have no-
thing baked, only a handful of meal in a jar, and a little oil in a cruse; and now,
I am gathering a couple of sticks, that I may go in and prepare it for myself and
my son, that we may eat it, and die.” [13] And Elijah said to her, “Fear not; go
and do as you have said; but first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me,
and afterward make for yourself and your son. [14] For thus says the Lord the
God of Israel, ‘The jar of meal shall not be spent, and the cruse of oil shall not
fail, until the day that the Lord sends rain upon the earth.’” [15] And she went
and did as Elijah said; and she, and he, and her household ate for many days.
[16] The jar of meal was not spent, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to
the word of the Lord which he spoke by Elijah.
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Commentary:
17:8-16. Zarephath was 15 km. (9 miles) to the south of Sidon, the area where Je-
zebel, Ahab’s wife, came from (cf. 16:31). There, Elijah was certainly outside the
jurisdiction of King Ahab who was persecuting him (cf. 1 Kings 18:10), but it is
interesting that it was a poor widow at death’s door whom God chose to give the
prophet nourishment. Jesus uses the fact that it was a widow and a foreigner who
was chosen, to show that God gives his gifts to whomever he pleases, not to
those who think they have a right to them (cf. Lk 4:25-26).
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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.