1 Kings 18:22

_THEN SAID ELIJAH UNTO THE PEOPLE, I, EVEN I ONLY, REMAIN A PROPHET OF THE LORD; BUT BAAL'S PROPHETS ARE FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY MEN._ No JFB commentary on this verse....

21-40 Many of the people wavered in their judgment, and varied in their practice. Elijah called upon them to determine whether Jehovah or Baal was the self-existent, supreme God, the Creator, Governor, and Judge of the world, and to follow him alone. It is dangerous to halt between the service of God and the service of sin, the dominion of Christ and the dominion of our lusts. If Jesus be the only Saviour, let us cleave to him alone for every thing; if the Bible be the world of God, let us reverence and receive the whole of it, and submit our understanding to the Divine teaching it contains. Elijah proposed to bring the matter to a trial. Baal had all the outward advantages, but the event encourages all God's witnesses and advocates never to fear the face of man. The God that answers by fire, let him be God: the atonement was to be made by sacrifice, before the judgment could be removed...

Verse 1 Kings 18:22. _I ONLY, REMAIN A PROPHET OF THE LORD_] That is, I am the only prophet of God _present_, and can have but the influence of _an individual_; while the prophets of Baal are _four hundred and_ _fifty_ men! It appears that the queen's prophets, amounting to _four_ _hundred_, were not at this great assembly; and these are they whom we meet with 1 Kings 22:6, and whom the king consulted relative to the battle at Ramoth-gilead....

I, EVEN I, ONLY REMAIN - He means, “I only remain in the exercise of the office of a prophet.” The others (Compare 1 Kings 18:4) had been forced to fly and hide themselves in dens and caves of the earth; their voices were silenced; they had not ventured to come to Carmel. Elijah contrasts his solitary appearance on the side of Yahweh at the great gathering with the crowd of those opposed to him....

EXPOSITION ELIJAH'S RETURN AND THE ORDEAL OF MOUNT CARMEL.—The preceding chapter having been exclusively occupied with the fortunes of Elijah during his enforced absence of three and a half years from the land of Israel, we are left to conjecture what the course of events in the northern kingdom during this period of drought and suffering must have been. But it is not difficult to picture in our minds the steadily increasing alarm and distress which the solemn ban he had pronounced must have occasioned. At one time, it may be, especially if the prophet up to that period had been unknown, both king and people, under the malign influence of Jezebel, professed to regard his threatening with contempt, the more so as the priests of Baal would not fail to assure them of the protection and blessing of "the Lord" of nature. But as the

THEN SAID ELIJAH UNTO THE PEOPLE, I, EVEN I ONLY REMAIN A PROPHET OF THE LORD,.... At least as he thought, all the rest being slain, as he supposed; however there were none present but himself: BUT BAAL'S PROPHETS ARE FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY MEN; which were very great odds he had to contend with....

2. ELIJAH ON CARMEL: THE ANSWERED PRAYER CHAPTER 18 _ 1. The command to see Ahab (1 Kings 18:1)_ 2. Elijah's response (1 Kings 18:2) 3. Ahab and Obadiah (1 Kings 18:3) 4. Elijah and Obadiah (1 Kings 18:7) 5. Elijah meets Ahab (1 Kings 18:16) 6. Elijah's demand (1 Kings 18:19) 7. The events on Carmel (1 Kings 18:20

ELIJAH'S MEETING WITH AHAB AND HIS CONTEST WITH THE PRIESTS OF BAAL. The history of Ahab's reign must have been something like the following: On his marriage with Jezebel he must have allowed the worship of the Baal of Tyre and been met with the remonstrances of the prophets. Furious at their opposition, Jezebel had massacred a large number, but the king's steward had supported the cause of Yahweh (1 Kings 18:4); so Ahab cannot have been wholly ill-disposed to those who were faithful to the God of Israel. But he had no mercy for the leader of the whole movement, Elijah, who had prophesied the drought. He was sought in every neighbouring kingdom as the author of all the agitation, the troubler of Israel. In the meantime Jezebel had organised the worship of the Baal, and supported at her own. cost four hundred and fifty prophets ...

THE PEOPLE. Some codices read "all the people"....

_I, even I only, remain_ R.V. AM LEFT. As in 1 Kings 19:10 for the same word. Elijah means that he is the only one who now stands forward in Jehovah's name. No doubt there were others of those saved by Obadiah and in other ways, but in such dangerous days they kept out of sight. The scene on Carmel is full of sublimity. Elijah alone against the host of Baal-priests, and with the calm dignity befitting so solemn a time, in the midst of them all, proceeding to repair the broken altar of the Lord. The LXX. adds at the close of this verse -and the prophets of the grove four hundred....