1“For behold, the day comes, burning like a furnace, when all the proud and all who work wickedness will be stubble. The day that comes will burn them up,” says Yahweh of Armies, “so that it will leave them neither root nor branch. 2But to you who fear my name shall the sun of righteousness arise with healing in its wings. You will go out and leap like calves of the stall. 3You shall tread down the wicked; for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I make,” says Yahweh of Armies.
4“Remember the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded to him in Horeb for all Israel, even statutes and ordinances.
5Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and terrible day of Yahweh comes. 6He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.”
Elijah was a prophet, from Tishbe in Gilead, an opponent of Ahab and Jezebel. Elijah began his public ministry, as recorded in the books of Kings, with a forecast of a long drought and famine, to show the ineffectuality of Baal, who was held by his worshippers to control the rain. The drought was ended in spectacular fashion by Elijah's contest with the priests of the Canaanite fertility god: to see whether Baal or the Lord would demonstrate his power by setting fire to the wood on which a bull had been laid for a burnt offering. The contest ended with the followers of Jahweh victorious, and the priests of Baal being slaughtered. Rain then fell, ending the drought, but Elijah was obliged to go into temporary hiding to avoid persecution at the hands of Jezebel, Ahab's wife. It was about this time that Elijah called Elisha to work with him. Following the affair of Naboth's vineyard, Elijah foretold the bloody end of Ahab's house and the violent death of Jezebel, who was to be eaten by dogs.
Many stories of miracles are associated with Elijah It is recorded that during the famine he was fed first by ravens, then from the small supply of food belonging to a widow of Zarephath which (in reward for her charity to Elijah) never diminished in quantity. The son of this woman, having died, was miraculously restored to life by the prophet's intercession. In the contest with Baal the issue was decided by Elijah's calling down fire from heaven, which consumed the sacrifice, laid on the altar of Yahweh. The final miracle recorded of Elijah concerns his departure from the world: not dying, in the normal fashion, he was carried up into heaven by a whirlwind. He had first told his disciple, Elisha, that such a departure would be a sign that God had blessed him (Elisha) with the same prophetic gifts as had been exercised by Elijah. 1 Kings 17.1-2 Kings 2.12; 9.36, 37; 2 Chronicles 21.12-15; Malachi 4.5; Matthew 11.14; 16.14; 17.3, 4, 10-12; 27.47-49; Mark 6.15; 8.28; 9.4, 5, 11-13; 1-5.35, 36; Luke 4.25, 26; 9.8, 19, 30-33; John 1.21, 25; Romans 11.2-4; James 5.17,18