1 Kings 18

¹And it came about after many days that the word of the Lord came to Elijah in the third year, saying, ‘Go, show yourself to Ahab, and I will give rain upon the face of the ground.’

²And Elijah went to show himself to Ahab; and the famine was severe in Samaria.

³And Ahab called to Obadiah, who was over the household. Now Obadiah feared the Lord greatly.

⁴And it came about, when Jezebel cut off the prophets of the Lord, that Obadiah took a hundred prophets and hid them, fifty men to a cave, and sustained them with bread and water.

⁵And Ahab said to Obadiah, ‘Go through the land, to all the springs of water and to all the wadis; perhaps we may find grass and keep horse and mule alive, and not cut off any of the animals.’

⁶And they divided the land between them to pass through it; Ahab went by one way by himself, and Obadiah went by another way by himself.

⁷And it came about, as Obadiah was on the way, that behold, Elijah was there to meet him; and he recognized him and fell on his face and said, ‘Is it you, my lord Elijah?’

⁸And he said to him, ‘It is I. Go, say to your lord, “Behold, Elijah is here.”’

⁹And he said, 'How have I sinned, that you are giving your servant into the hand of Ahab to put me to death?'

¹⁰As the Lord your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom where my lord has not sent to seek you; and when they said, ‘He is not here,’ he made the kingdom or the nation swear that they had not found you.

¹¹And now you are saying, 'Go, say to your master: Behold, Elijah!'

¹²And it will be, as soon as I leave you, that the Spirit of the Lord will carry you off to a place that I do not know; and when I come to tell Ahab and he cannot find you, he will kill me. But your servant has feared the Lord from my youth.

¹³Has it not been told to my lord what I did when Jezebel killed the prophets of the LORD, how I hid a hundred men of the prophets of the LORD, fifty by fifty in a cave, and sustained them with bread and water?

¹⁴And now you are saying, ‘Go, say to your lord, “Behold, Elijah is here”’; and he will kill me!

¹⁵And Elijah said, ‘As the Lord of hosts lives, before whom I stand, surely today I will present myself to him.’

¹⁶And Obadiah went to meet Ahab and told him, and Ahab went to meet Elijah.

¹⁷And it came about, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said to him, ‘Is it you, you troubler of Israel?’

¹⁸And he said, 'I have not troubled Israel, but you and the house of your father have, in your forsaking the commandments of the LORD; and you have gone after the Baals.'

¹⁹And now, send and gather to me all Israel at Mount Carmel, with the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal and the four hundred prophets of Asherah, who eat at Jezebel's table.

²⁰And Ahab sent to all the children of Israel, and gathered the prophets to Mount Carmel.

²¹And Elijah drew near to all the people and said, ‘How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, follow him.’ But the people did not answer him a word.

²²And Elijah said to the people, 'I alone am left a prophet of the LORD, but the prophets of Baal are four hundred and fifty men.

²³Now let them give us two bulls, and let them choose for themselves the one bull and cut it in pieces and lay it on the wood, but put no fire to it; and I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood, but put no fire to it.

²⁴And you shall call on the name of the God of you all, and I, I will call on the name of the Lord; and the God who answers by fire, he is God.' And all the people answered and said, 'The word is good.'

²⁵And Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, ‘Choose for yourselves the one bull and prepare it first, for you are the many; and call on the name of the God of you all, but put no fire to it.’

²⁶And they took the bull that he gave them and prepared it, and they called on the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, ‘O Baal, answer us!’ But there was no voice, and no one answered. And they limped about the altar that they had made.

²⁷And it came to pass at noon that Elijah mocked them and said, 'Cry out with a loud voice, for he is a god; for he is musing, or he has gone aside, or he is on a journey; perhaps he is asleep and must awake.'

²⁸And they cried out with a loud voice and cut themselves, according to their custom, with swords and lances until blood gushed out on them.

²⁹And it came to pass, when noon was past, that they prophesied until the offering up of the grain offering; but there was no voice, and there was no one answering, and there was no attention.

³⁰And Elijah said to all the people, 'Come near to me.' And all the people came near to him; and he repaired the altar of the LORD that was torn down.

³¹And Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying, ‘Israel shall be your name.’

³²And he built the stones into an altar in the name of the Lord, and he made a trench around the altar, large enough to hold two seahs of seed.

³³And he arranged the wood, and cut the bull in pieces, and laid it on the wood. And he said, 'Fill four jars with water, and pour it on the burnt offering and on the wood.'

³⁴And he said, ‘Do it a second time,’ and they did it a second time. And he said, ‘Do it a third time,’ and they did it a third time.

³⁵And the water ran round about the altar; and he also filled the trench with water.

³⁶And it came about, at the time of the offering up of the sacrifice, that Elijah the prophet drew near and said, ‘O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, today let it be known that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that by your word I have done all these things.

³⁷Answer me, O Lord, answer me, that this people may know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you have turned their heart back again.

³⁸Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood and the stones and the dust, and it licked up the water that was in the trench.

³⁹And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces; and they said, 'The Lord, he is God! The Lord, he is God!'

⁴⁰And Elijah said to them, ‘Seize the prophets of Baal; let not one of them escape.’ And they seized them, and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon and slaughtered them there.

⁴¹And Elijah said to Ahab, ‘Go up, eat and drink, for there is the sound of the roar of rain.’

⁴²And Ahab went up to eat and to drink. And Elijah went up to the top of Carmel; and he bowed himself down to the earth, and put his face between his knees.

⁴³And he said to his servant, ‘Go up now, look toward the sea.’ And he went up and looked and said, ‘There is nothing.’ And he said, ‘Go back seven times.’

⁴⁴And it came to pass at the seventh time that he said, 'Behold, a little cloud, like a man's hand, is rising out of the sea.' And he said, 'Go up, say to Ahab: Harness your chariot and go down, that the rain not stop you.'

⁴⁵And it came about in a little while that the heavens grew black with clouds and wind, and there was a great rain. And Ahab rode and went to Jezreel.

⁴⁶And the hand of the LORD was on Elijah; and he girded up his loins, and ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel.