2 Kings 1:10

_AND ELIJAH ANSWERED AND SAID TO THE CAPTAIN OF FIFTY, IF I BE A MAN OF GOD, THEN LET FIRE COME DOWN FROM HEAVEN, AND CONSUME THEE AND THY FIFTY. AND THERE CAME DOWN FIRE FROM HEAVEN, AND CONSUMED HIM AND HIS FIFTY._ If I be a man of God, then let fire come down, х_ TEERED_ (H3381) _ 'EESH_ (H784), fire shall come down; and so the Septuagint, katabeesetai pur]. The "fire" was lighting (2 Kings 1:12). Not to avenge a personal insult of Elijah, but an insult upon God, in the person of His prophet; and the punishment was inflicted, not by the prophet, but by the direct hand of God....

9-18 Elijah called for fire from heaven, to consume the haughty, daring sinners; not to secure himself, but to prove his mission, and to reveal the wrath of God from heaven, against the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. Elijah did this by a Divine impulse, yet our Saviour would not allow the disciples to do the like, Luke 9:54. The dispensation of the Spirit and of grace by no means allowed it. Elijah was concerned for God's glory, those for their own reputation. The Lord judges men's practices by their principles, and his judgment is according to truth. The third captain humbled himself, and cast himself upon the mercy of God and Elijah. There is nothing to be got by contending with God; and those are wise for themselves, who learn submission from the fatal end of obstinacy in others. The courage of faith has often struck terror into the heart of the proudest sinner. So thunderst...

Verse 2 Kings 1:10. _AND THERE CAME DOWN FIRE_] Some have blamed the prophet for destroying these men, by bringing down fire from heaven upon them. But they do not consider that it was no more possible for _Elijah_ to bring down fire from heaven, than for _them_ to do it. _God alone_ could send the fire; and as he is _just_ and _good_, he would not have destroyed these men had there not been a _sufficient_ _cause_ to justify the act. It was not to _please Elijah_, or to _gratify any vindictive humour_ in him, that God thus acted; but to show his own _power_ and _justice_. No entreaty of Elijah could have induced God to have performed an act that was _wrong_ in itself. Elijah, personally, had no concern in the business. God led him simply to _announce_ on these occasions what he himself had determined _to do_. If I...

The charge of cruelty made against Elijah makes it needful to consider the question: What was Elijah’s motive? And the answer is: Sharply to make a signal example, to vindicate God’s honor in a striking way. Ahaziah had, as it were, challenged Yahweh to a trial of strength by sending a band of fifty to arrest one man. Elijah was not Jesus Christ, able to reconcile mercy with truth, the vindication of God’s honor with the utmost tenderness for erring men, and awe them merely by His presence (compare John 18:6). In Elijah the spirit of the Law was embodied in its full severity. His zeal was fierce; he was not shocked by blood; he had no softness and no relenting. He did not permanently profit by the warning at Horeb (1 Kings 19:12 note). He continued the uncompromising avenger of sin, the wi

EXPOSITION 2 KINGS 1:1 THE REVOLT OF MOAB. THE ILLNESS, IMPIETY, AND DEATH OF AHAZIAH The narrative of the Second Book of Kings follows on that of the First Book in the closest possible sequence. The history of Ahaziah's reign begins in 1 Kings 22:51, and is carried on, without any real break or pause in the sense, to 2 Kings 1:18. How the two books came to be divided at this point is quite inexplicable. The division is most unhappy. Not only does it, without apparent reason, draw a strong line of dem

AND ELIJAH ANSWERED AND SAID TO THE CAPTAIN OF FIFTY, IF I BE A MAN OF GOD,.... As I am, and thou shalt know it by the following token, though thou callest me so jeeringly: THEN LET FIRE COME DOWN FROM HEAVEN, AND CONSUME THEE AND THY FIFTY; this he said not in a passion, and from a private spirit of revenge, but for the vindication of the honour and glory of God, and under the impulse of his spirit, who was abused through the insult on him as his prophet: AND THERE CAME DOWN FIRE FROM HEAVEN, AND CONSUMED HIM AND HIS FIFTY; a flash of lightning, which destroyed them at once; the Lord hearkening to the voice of his prophet, in vindication of him in his office, and of his own glory....

ANALYSIS AND ANNOTATIONS I. ELIJAH's FINAL MINISTRY AND TRANSLATION 1. Elijah and Ahaziah CHAPTER 1 _ 1. Moab's rebellion (2 Kings 1:1)_ 2. The illness of Ahaziah (2 Kings 1:2) 3. Elijah's message (2 Kings 1:3) 4. Ahaziah's messengers and their fate (2 Kings 1:9) 5. Elijah before the king and Ahaziah's Death (2 Kings 1:16) 6. Jehoram becomes king (2 Kings 1:18) The rebellion of Moab is here briefly mentioned. B

2 KINGS 1:1 TO 2 KINGS 2:25. LAST DAYS AND ASCENSION OF ELIJAH: ELISHA ESTABLISHED AS HIS SUCCESSOR. Here we have perhaps a third Elijah narrative, in which the prophet is represented as playing a part scarcely worthy of the Elijah of 1 Kings 17-19 or 21, who in the first section represents Yahweh against the Tyrian Baal, whereas in the latter he stands for righteousness opposed to legalised violence. Here the king's offence is that he sent to a Philistine oracle instead of inquiring of Yahweh, and his soldiers are punished by fire for summoning the prophet to surrender. The spelling of the prophet's name in Hebrew differs from that in the rest of the OT. The story is mentioned in the Gospel (Luke 9:54)....

LET FIRE COME DOWN. Quoted in Luke 9:54....

_If I_be _a man of God_ The spirit of the Law differs from that of the Gospel, and our Lord forbad (Luke 9:55) his disciples the wish to imitate Elijah. But in the light which he had, Elijah felt that the majesty of Jehovah was outraged, when the name -man of God", which should have signified reverence, was used as a term of scorn. And in the spirit of the Law he calls on God to make manifest that His servants and His message may not lightly be despised. And God in His discipline of the world granted the prophet's prayer. Bp Hall says -There are few tracks of Elijah that are ordinary and fit for common feet. His actions are more for wonder than for precedent. Not in his own defence would the prophet have been the death of so many, if God had not, by a peculiar instinct, made him an instrument of this just vengeance"....