Attributed commentary excerpt
Keil & Delitzsch on 1 Kings 18:1
A historical reference excerpt for this verse. Read it alongside the biblical text and other available sources.
Commentary on the Old Testament
C. F. Keil & F. Delitzsch · 19th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.
As the judgment of drought and famine did not bring king Ahab to his senses and lead him to turn from his ungodly ways, but only filled him with exasperation towards the prophet who had announced to him the coming judgment; there was no other course left than to lay before the people with mighty and convincing force the proof that Jehovah was the only true God, and to execute judgment upon the priests of Baal as the seducers of the nation. Kg1 18:1-6 Elijah's meeting with Ahab. - Kg1 18:1, Kg1 18:2. In the third year of his sojourn at Zarephath the word of the Lord came to Elijah to show himself to Ahab; since God was about to send rain upon the land again. The time given, "the third year," is not to be reckoned, as the Rabbins, Clericus, Thenius, and others assume, from the commencement of the drought, but from the event last mentioned, namely, the sojourn of Elijah at Zarephath. This view merits the preference as the simplest and most natural one, and is shown to be the oldest by Luk 4:25 and Jam 5:17, where Christ and James both say, that in the time of Ahab it did not rain for three years and six months. And this length of time can only be obtained by allowing more than two years for Elijah's stay at Zarephath. - From Kg1 18:2 to Kg1 18:6 we have parenthetical remarks introduced, to explain the circumstances which led to Elijah's meeting with Ahab. The verbs ויּקרא, ויהי, ויּאמר ,ויהי , and ויחלּקוּ ( Kg1 18:3, Kg1 18:4, Kg1 18:5, Kg1 18:6) carry on the circumstantial clauses: "and the famine was..." ( Kg1 18:2), and "Obadiah feared..." ( Kg1 18:3), and are therefore to be expressed by the pluperfect. When the famine had become very severe in Samaria (the capital), Ahab, with Obadiah the governor of his castle (הבּית על אשׁר, see at Kg1 4:6), who was a God-fearing man, and on the persecution of the prophets of Jehovah by Jezebel had hidden a hundred prophets in caves and supplied them with food, had arranged for an expedition through the whole land to seek for hay for his horses and mules. And for this purpose they had divided the land between them, so that the one explored one district and the other another. We see from Oba 1:4 that Jezebel had resolved upon exterminating the worship of Jehovah, and sought to carry out this intention by destroying the prophets of the true God. The hundred prophets whom Obadiah concealed were probably for the most part pupils ("sons") of the prophets. אישׁ חמשּׁים must signify, according to the context and also according to Oba 1:13, "fifty each," so that חמשּׁים must have fallen out through a copyist's error. מן נכרית ולוא, that we may not be obliged to kill (a portion) of the cattle (מן partitive). The Keri מהבּהמה is no doubt actually correct, but it is not absolutely necessary, as the Chethb בּהמה מן may be taken as an indefinite phrase: "any head of cattle." Kg1 18:7-8 Elijah met Obadiah on this expedition, and told him to announce his coming to the king. Kg1 18:9-11 Obadiah was afraid that the execution of this command might cost him his life, inasmuch as Ahab had sent in search of Elijah "to every kingdom and every nation," - a hyperbole suggested by inward excitement and fear. אין ואמרוּ is to be connected with what follows in spite of the accents: "and if they said he is not here, he took an oath," etc. Kg1 18:12-14 "And if it comes to pass (that) I go away from thee, and the Spirit of Jehovah carries thee away whither I know not, and I come to tell Ahab (sc., that thou art here) and he…
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