So Ah’ab sent among all the Yisra’elites and gathered the prophets to Mount Carmel. Eliyyahu came up to the entire people and said, ‘How long are you going to dither between two positions? If Yahweh is God, follow him. If it’s the Master, follow him.’ The people didn’t answer him a word. Then Eliyyahu said to the people, ‘I alone am left as a prophet of Yahweh. The Master’s prophets are 450 individuals. They’re to give us two bulls, and they’re to choose one bull for themselves, divide it up and put it on the wood, but not set fire. I shall prepare the other bull and put it on the wood, but not set fire. You will call in your god’s name; I’ll call in Yahweh’s name. The God who answers by fire – he is God.’ The entire people answered, ‘What you say is good.
So Eliyyahu said to the Master’s prophets, ‘Choose one bull for yourselves and prepare it first, because you’re the majority. Call on your god’s name but don’t set fire.’ They took the bull that someone gave them, prepared it and called on the Master’s name from morning until midday, saying ‘Master, answer us’, but there was no sound, no one answering. They jumped round the altar that people had made.
At midday Eliyyahu played about with them: ‘Call in a loud voice, because he’s a god, but it’s because he’s talking or he’s moving or he’s on a journey. Perhaps he’s asleep and he’ll wake up.’ So they called in a loud voice and slashed themselves in accordance with their ruling with swords and with spears until blood flowed over them. After midday passed they prophesied until the time for presenting the offering, but there was no sound, no one answering, no heeding.
Then Eliyyahu said to the entire people, ‘Come up to me.’ The entire people came up to him and he mended Yahweh’s altar that was torn down. Eliyyahu got twelve stones, in accordance with the number of the twelve clans of the sons of Ya’aqob [Jacob] (to whom Yahweh’s word had come, ‘Yisra’el will be your name’). He built the stones into an altar in Yahweh’s name and made a trench, like a receptacle for a two-measure barrel of seed, round the altar. He laid out the wood and divided the bull and put it on the wood. He said, ‘Fill four jars with water and pour it over the burnt offering and over the wood.’ He said, ‘Do it a second time.’ They did it a second time. He said, ‘Do it a third time.’ They did it a third time. The water went round the altar and he also filled the trench with water. At the time for presenting the offering, Eliyyahu the prophet came up and said, ‘Yahweh, God of Abraham, Yitshaq [Isaac] and Yisra’el, today may it be acknowledged that you are God in Yisra’el and that I am your servant, and that by your word I have done all these things. Answer me, Yahweh, answer me, so that this people may acknowledge that you Yahweh are God and that you yourself have turned their mind round.’
Yahweh’s fire fell and consumed the burnt offering, the wood, the stones and the earth, and the water that was in the trench it licked up. The entire people saw and fell on their faces and said, ‘Yahweh, he is God; Yahweh, he is God.’ Eliyyahu said to them, ‘Capture the Master’s prophets. None of them must escape.’ They captured them, and Eliyyahu took them down to Wadi Qishon and slaughtered them there.
Goldingay, John. The Bible for Everyone . SPCK. Kindle Edition.
Lord, you have given me so much,
I ask for one more thing –
a grateful heart.
George Herbert