_ELISHA_
2 KINGS ii. 1-25
"He did wonders in his life, and at death even his works were
marvellous. For all this the people repented not."--ECCLUS.
xlviii. 14, 15.
At this point we enter into the cycle of supernatural stories, which
gathered round the name of Elisha in the prophetic communities. Some of
them are full of charm and tenderness; but in some cases it is difficult
to point out their intrinsic superiority over the ecclesiastical
miracles with which monkish historians have embellished the lives of the
saints. We can but narrate them as they stand, for we possess none of
the means for critical or historical analysis which might enable us to
discriminate between essential facts and accidental elements.
We see at once that the figure of Elisha[37] is far less impressive
than that of Elijah. He inspires less of awe and terror. He lives far
more in cities and amid the ordinary surroundings of civilised life.
The honour with which he was treated was the honour of respect and
admiration for his kindliness. He plays his part in no stupendous
scenes like those at Carmel and at Horeb, and nearly all his miracles
were miracles of mercy. Other remarkable differences are observable
in the records of Elijah and Elisha. In the case of the former his
main work was the opposition to Baal-worship; but although
Baal-worship still prevailed (2 Kings x. 18-27) we read of no protests
raised by Elisha against it. "With him"--perhaps it should be more
accurately said, in the narrative which tells us of him--"the miracles
are everything, the prophetic work nothing." The conception of a
prophet's mission in these stories of him differs widely from that
which dominates the splendid _midrash_ of Elijah.
His separate career began with an act of beneficence. He had stopped for
a time at Jericho. The curse of the rebuilding of the town upon a site
which Joshua had devoted to the ban had expended itself on Hiel, its
builder. It was now a flourishing city, and the home of a large school
of prophets. But though the situation was pleasant as "a garden of the
Lord,"[38] the water was bad, and the land "miscarried." In other words,
the deleterious spring caused diseases among the inhabitants, and caused
the trees to cast their fruit. So the men of the city came to Elisha,
and humbly addressing him as "my lord," implored his help. He told them
to bring him a new cruse full of salt, and going with it to the fountain
cast it into the springs, proclaiming in Jehovah's name that they were
healed, and that there should be no more death or miscarrying land. The
gushing waters of the Ain-es-Sultân, fed by the spring of Quarantania,
are to this day pointed out as the Fountains of Elisha, as they have
been since the days of Josephus.[39]
The anecdote of this beautiful interposition to help a troubled city is
followed by one of the stories which naturally repel us more than any
other in the Old Testament. Elisha, on leaving Jericho, returned to
Bethel, and as he climbed through the forest up the ascent leading to
the town through what is now called the Wady Suweinît, a number of young
lads--with the rudeness which in boys is often a venial characteristic
of their gay spirits or want of proper training, and which to this day
is common among boys in the East--laughed at him, and mocked him with
the cry "Go up, round-head! go up, round-head!"[40] What struck these
ill-bred and irreverent youngsters was the contrast between the rough
hair-skin garb and unkempt shaggy locks of Elijah, "the lord of hair,"
and the smooth civilised aspect and shorter hair of his disciple. If the
word _quereach_ means "bald"[41] we see an additional reason for their
ill-mannered jeers, since baldness was a cause of reproach and suspicion
in the East, where it is comparatively rare. No doubt, too, the conduct
of these young scoffers was the more offensive, and even the more
wicked, because of the deeper reverence for age which prevails in
Eastern countries, and above all because Elisha was known as a prophet.
Perhaps, too, if some other reading lies behind the ἐλίθαζον of one MS.
of the Septuagint, they pelted him with stones.[42] That Elisha should
have rebuked them, and that seriously--that he should even have
inflicted some punishment upon them to reform their manners--would have
been natural; but we cannot repress the shudder with which we read the
verse, "And he turned back and looked on them, and cursed them in the
name of the Lord. And there came forth two she-bears out of the wood,
and tare forty-and-two children of them." Surely the punishment was
disproportionate to the offence! Who could doom so much as a single rude
boy, not to speak of forty-two, to a horrible and agonising death for
shouting after any one? It is the chief exception to the general course
of Elisha's compassionate interpositions. Here, too, we must leave the
narrative where it is; but we hold it quite admissible to conjecture
that the incident, in some form or other, really occurred--that the boys
were insolent, and that some of them may have been killed by the wild
beasts which at that time abounded in Palestine--and yet that the
_nuances_ of the story which cause deepest offence to us may have
suffered from some corruption of the tradition in the original records,
and may admit of being represented in a slightly different form.
After this Elisha went for a time to the ancient haunts of his master
on Mount Carmel, and thence returned to Samaria, the capital of his
country, which he seems to have chosen for his most permanent
dwelling-place.
FOOTNOTES:
[37] The name Elisha means "My God is salvation."
[38] Gen. xiii. 10. "The city of palms" (Deut. xxxiv. 3).
[39] Jos., _B. J._, IV. viii. 3; Robinson, _Bibl. Researches_, i. 554.
[40] Abarbanel's notion that they meant "Ascend to heaven as Elijah
did" is absurd.
[41] קֵרֵהַ. This means bald at the back of the head, as נִבֵּהַ
(_gibbeach_), means "forehead-bald" (Ewald, iii. 512). Elisha could
not have been bald from old age, since he lived on for nearly sixty
years, and must have been a young man. Baldness involved a suspicion
of leprosy, and was disliked by Easterns (Lev. xxi. 5, xiii. 43; Isa.
iii. 17, 24, xv. 2), as much as by the Romans (Suet., _Jul. Cæs._, 45;
_Domit._, 18). Elisha's prophetic activity lasted through the reigns
of Joram, Jehu, Jehoahaz, and Joash (_i.e._, 12 + 28 + 17 + 2 years).
[42] The κατέπαιζον of the Vat. LXX. implies persistent and vehement
insult. The Post-Mishnic Rabbis, however, say that Elisha was punished
with sickness for this deed (_Bava-Metzia_, f. 87, 1).