Replies

From: 1 Kings 19:4-8

Elijah flees to Horeb

[4] But he himself [Elijah] went a days journey into the wilderness, and came
and sat down under a broom tree; and he asked that he might die, saying. “It is
enough; now, O Lord, take away my life; for I am no better than my fathers.” [5]
And he lay down and slept under a broom tree; and behold, an angel touched
him, and said to him, “Arise and eat.” [6] And he looked, and behold, there was
at his head a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water. And he ate and drank,
and lay down again. [7] And the angel of the Lord came again a second time,
and touched him, and said, “Arise and eat, else the journey will be too great for
you.” [8] And he arose, and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food
forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.

*********************************************************************************************
Commentary:

19:1-8. Elijah in some way repeats the experience of the chosen people as they
fled from Egypt pursued by the pharaoh. The food that the angel gives him has
been seen in Christian tradition as a figure of the Eucharist, given that ‘’by the
grace of this Sacrament men enjoy the greatest peace and tranquility of con-
science during the present life; and, when the hour of departing from this world
shall have arrived, like Elijah, who in the strength of the bread baked on the
hearth, walked to Horeb, the mount of God, they, too, invigorated by the streng-
thening influence of this (heavenly food), will ascend to unfading glory and bliss
(”Roman Catechism”, 2, 4, 54).

19:5. Angels appear often in the course of biblical history to protect individuals
(Lot, in Gen 19; Hagar and Ishmael in Gen 21:17-19; etc.); to guide the people
in the desert (cf. Ex 23:20-23); or to inform people of God’s plans (cf. Judg 6:11-
24; 13:1-25). Now, an angel comes to the prophet’s help.

*********************************************************************************************
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.