Strange Stories of the Bible: Elisha

The Double Portion and The Two Bears

When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me, what can I do for you before I am taken from you?”

“Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit,” Elisha replied.

“You have asked a difficult thing,” Elijah said, “yet if you see me when I am taken from you, it will be yours—otherwise, it will not.”

As they were walking along and talking together, suddenly a chariot of fire and horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind. Elisha saw this and cried out, “My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Israel!” And Elisha saw him no more. Then he took hold of his garment and tore it in two.

From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 

He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys. And he went on to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria.

2 Kings 2:9-12,23-25

Elisha Arouses a Dead Boy

When Elisha reached the house, there was the boy lying dead on his couch. He went in, shut the door on the two of them and prayed to the Lord. Then he got on the bed and lay on the boy, mouth to mouth, eyes to eyes, hands to hands. As he stretched himself out on him, the boy’s body grew warm. Elisha turned away and walked back and forth in the room and then got on the bed and stretched out on him once more. The boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.

Elisha summoned Gehazi and said, “Call the Shunammite.” And he did. When she came, he said, “Take your son.” She came in, fell at his feet and bowed to the ground. Then she took her son and went out.

2 Kings 4:32-37 

Elisha's Potent Bones

Elisha died and was buried.
Now Moabite raiders used to enter the country every spring. Once while some Israelites were burying a man, suddenly they saw a band of raiders; so they threw the man’s body into Elisha’s tomb. When the body touched Elisha’s bones, the man came to life and stood up on his feet.

2 Kings 13:20 

Wisdom is the Principal Thing

“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened...

To the woman [God] said,
“I will make your pains in childbearing very severe;
with painful labor you will give birth to children.
Your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you.”

To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat food from it
all the days of your life.
It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.”

Genesis 3:4-7, 16-19

...the Lord appeared to Solomon during the night in a dream, and God said, “Ask for whatever you want me to give you.”

Solomon answered, “...You have made your servant king in place of my father David. But I am only a little child and do not know how to carry out my duties.... So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people of yours?”

The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for this. So God said to him, “Since you have asked for this and not for long life or wealth for yourself, nor have asked for the death of your enemies but for discernment in administering justice, I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be. Moreover, I will give you what you have not asked for—both wealth and honor—so that in your lifetime you will have no equal among kings."

I Kings 3:5-13

Wisdom is the most important thing; so get wisdom.
If it costs everything you have, get understanding.

Proverbs 4:7

Deconversion

This Tuesday, allow me to introduce Kenneth Daniels, a former missionary with Wycliffe Bible Translators.

Ken was born in Africa to missionary parents. I could so relate to his story of praying to receive Jesus into his young heart during a frightening thunderstorm. (I prayed through every thunderstorm I experienced between the ages of about 5 and 12.) When Ken was a teenager, the movie Peace Child inspired him to prepare for missionary work himself and after years of preparation, he ended up in Niger as a linguist and Bible translator.

But Ken had lots of questions. And kept looking for the answers. He documents his struggles with the Bible's reliability in this chapter and with the whole issue of Biblical prophecy here. The account(s) of David and Goliath gave him particular difficulty. Needless to say, his wavering belief in the Bible did not make him a model member of WBT. In his marvelously honest and detailed book Why I Believed, Ken records some of his poignant prayers from that period when he still believed in God but had serious doubts about the accuracy of the Bible. 

Ken and his family returned to the U.S. so he could spend time in counseling. His faith was temporarily restored, but he ended up resigning from Wycliffe and later embracing his atheism. 

"It's so sad." This is the most common response I have heard from family, friends, and other interested believers upon learning of my loss of faith on the mission field.

I have been told that if I had embraced a slightly different brand of Christianity, I could have avoided coming down this path....

Ken's experience feels so familiar to me. I, too, wanted to believe for many years. Like Ken, I was able to sustain it for a long time. I hear "It's so sad", as well. 

But while losing faith in God is associated with some painful adjustments, the freedom to think honestly and to make choices fearlessly is an earth-shaking relief. I imagine slaves traveling north on the Underground Railroad. When they arrived on free ground, who would say to them, "It's so sad"? Indeed, they may have left loved ones behind and suffered on the journey, but the destination--a new life to be lived in freedom--was worth the price. 

Where Do Bibles Come From?

A collection from our bookshelves

• The evolution of Yahweh-worship from polytheism. 
• Worship of Yahweh and Asherah in ancient Palestine. 
• The Samaritan Torah. 
• The Masoretic text. 
• Babylonian influence on Jewish theology and culture during the Captivity. 
• The full emergence of monotheism and the philosophical difficulties it presented. 
• The Septuagint. 
• The development of Jewish tradition and scholarship following the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans.
• Rivalry between the early Christian and Pharisee sects. 
• The size limitations of papyrus manuscripts.
• The Council of Trent.

Each of these factors, and so many others, is bound up in the history of what we know as the Holy Bible. 

Children ask, "Where do babies come from?" and young Christians ask, "Where did the Bible come from?" Some teachers, and some parents, are more squeamish than others. But if one is to commit one's life to the words of the Bible, one may need more information than, "It came from God."

The books below are some that have helped me tease out the history of the Jewish/Christian scriptures. It became a sort of scavenger hunt, finding a piece here, matching it with a piece from there, until a clearer picture began to emerge. 

Most, if not all, of the authors referenced are Christian scholars. They handle the texts with respect without compromising their scholarship and I recommend them all to Christians and skeptics alike.

What Jesus Meant by Garry Wills

Wills is a historian, and a critical Catholic. In his quest to distill Jesus' meaning from the text, Wills treats each of the Gospels individually, commenting on its historical setting and intended audience chronologically, geographically, and politically. 

What Paul Meant by Garry Wills

This one gets intense. In a nutshell, Paul's letters are the oldest Christian documents, predating the organized "church", even predating the word "Christian". In his defense of Paul against charges of misogyny and anti-Semitism, Wills ends up telling us a lot about the controversial history of the New Testament, including  debate over the pseudo-Pauline epistles, later edits that changed the gender of Junia, and some interesting observations about Acts and Luke.

Whose Bible Is It? A History of the Scriptures Through the Ages by Jaroslav Pelikan

Pelikan was a professor, historian, author, and Lutheran pastor (who joined the Orthodox church late in life). His respect for the Bible and its Jewish heritage is evident throughout the work. Pelikan focuses mostly on the Old Testament here, and I found the parts about Genesis 1-3 especially illuminating. I only wished he had gone into even more detail.

The Birth of Satan: Tracing the Devil's Biblical Roots by T. J. Wray

Took this one along on a plane trip two years ago and couldn't put it down! Besides being chock full of interesting archaeological tidbits from the greater Palestine area, it made sense of several Old Testament passages that had puzzled me for years. The parts about King David and Job were of particular interest, and the bibliographical notes were very helpful.

From Brandon Withrow's excellent book review:

The rise of monotheism, which occurred between the 8th and 6th centuries B.C.E., presented a problem, according to Wray and Mobley. If God is good and the only real power, where do we lay the blame for evil? “Could it be that along with the development of monotheism is a growing existential frustration that makes it difficult for God’s people to accept a deity who is responsible for both good and evil?”

The solution to the problem of evil is Satan.

Initially, the word for Satan was “a function, rather than being a proper name,” argues Wray and Mobley. During the Diaspora, the Jews were exposed to other cultures, notably the dualism of the Persian religion. “Jewish communities were exposed to Ahriman [a Zoroastrian demon] during the Persian period, from 530 to 330 B.C.E.,” they write. “Satan as a divine opponent of the LORD and as author of evil does not appear until the second century B.C.E., by which time Jews in Babylon and Persia had been exposed to the dualism of Zoroastrianism and to its evil deity Ahriman for generations.”

The Bible: A Biography by Karen Armstrong

Armstrong's weakness is detailing her sources; I had a lot more questions after reading this book. But it is a good place to start and full of information, especially about Judaic history.

Besides describing the sometimes surprising historical context of the various Biblical texts, Armstrong spends a lot of time explaining how the interpretation of and meaning ascribed to those texts changed throughout history. Bible study methods, for both Jews and Christians, have continually evolved to meet the needs of the time. Armstrong looks at how early rabbis and the Church fathers taught students to meditate on the text and draw multiple layers of meaning out: moral, metaphorical, literal, typological, mystical, and more.

The Book: A History of the Bible by Christopher De Hamel

De Hamel traces the physical history of the Bible, from individual manuscripts to multi-volume library, to single-bound volume. He writes as a historian, and this book is not quite as readable as the rest. I learned the most from the chapter about the St. Jerome's translation of the Vulgate and how he handled the Apocryphal books. 

Like biologists following DNA mutations, history scholars can trace the family tree of a particular manuscript Bible by noting minute errors made by scribes and faithfully transmitted by later copyists.

If the Bible is God's infallible gift to man containing all the answers we ever need to know, it will stand up to scrutiny. Don't be afraid to ask where your Bible came from. You may be as surprised and fascinated as when you discovered where you came from. 

What Happened on the Damascus Road?

I used to believe the Bible was God's letter to mankind. That it was truth itself and could never be contradicted. I accepted that the stories contained therein actually happened in the manner described. I was sure the books were recorded (and translated) accurately through the centuries. Any appearance of error or confusion was merely a faulty interpretation. 

This approach worked for me the first 15 times I read the Bible in its entirety. Until one day I reread the story of Saul's Damascus Road experience. And I was flummoxed. 

The story of Paul's "conversion" from Judaism to Christianity appears three times in the book of Acts. None of these agrees with the others, or with Paul's own account of his calling by Jesus in his Epistle to the Galatians. Let's compare the stories.


Acts 9, told by narrator:

First, Saul gets letters from the high priest authorizing him to go to Damascus and drag male or female Jewish Christ-followers back to Jerusalem for prosecution and imprisonment. (No word on how this was going to be accomplished. Were the Roman authorities in Syria in the habit of letting the Sanhedrin make kidnapping raids from Judea? The writer doesn't explain the political and legal details he so relished in The Gospel of Luke. We know the Sanhedrin there lacked the authority to put anyone to death.)

Anyway, "a light from the sky suddenly blazed around him, and he fell to the ground. Then he heard a voice speaking to him”. His companions “stood there speechless, for they had heard the voice but could see no one." Saul got up, but was blinded so they led him into Damascus where he remained sightless for three days until a disciple named Ananias came, at Jesus' request, so that Paul could see again and "be filled with the Holy Spirit."

Afterward, “Saul stayed with the disciples in Damascus for some time. Without delay he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues. . .proving beyond doubt that this man is Christ.” But “the Jews made a plot to kill Saul”, so the Christians helped him escape and sent him back to Jerusalem.  “When Saul reached Jerusalem he tried to join the disciples. But they were all afraid of him" until Barnabas properly introduced him and explained the situation.  

“After that Saul joined with them in all their activities in Jerusalem” until again there were “several attempts on his life”. At that point the brothers gave him a ride to Caesarea and "sent him off to Tarsus.”


Acts 22, told by Paul to a Jerusalem mob:

At the beginning of Paul's account, “a light from the sky suddenly blazed around me. I fell to the ground, and I heard a voice. . . My companions naturally saw the light, but they did not hear the voice." 

Saul ends up in the city: “I was blinded by the light. . . my companions had to take me by the hand and so I came to Damascus." A devout Jew named Ananias comes to visit and has a fuller message. "Get up and be baptized! Be clean from your sins as you call on His name.” No word on healing here. 

Paul doesn't say any more about Damascus: “. . . after my return to Jerusalem. . . I fell into a trance and saw Jesus. . . He said to me, ‘Make haste and leave Jerusalem at once. . . Go, for I will send you far away to the gentiles.”


Acts 26, Paul to Governor Festus and King Agrippa:

"I saw a light from the sky, blazing all about me and my fellow-travellers. We all fell to the ground and I heard a voice”. No remarks on blindness at all in this version. "... First in Damascus and then in Jerusalem, through the whole of Judea, and to the gentiles, I preached”.


Galatians 1, Paul's own account:

In this letter, Paul describes how he received the gospel “as a direct revelation from Jesus”. 
It “pleased God. . . that I might proclaim [Jesus]” to the Gentiles. “I did not even go to Jerusalem to meet” the apostles but “went away to Arabia and later came back to Damascus.” Not until three years later did Paul go “to Jerusalem to see Cephas” and met no one else save “James, the Lord’s brother”.

“All this I am telling you is, I assure you before God, the plain truth. Later I visited districts in Syria and Cilicia, but I was still unknown by sight to the churches of Judaea. All they knew. . . was the saying: ‘The man who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.'"


So. . . what actually happened? 

Was there a voice? Who heard it? Was there a light? Who saw it? Was Paul near Damascus, or somewhere else? Was he alone or with companions? Did he go to Jerusalem next, or Arabia? Did the apostles in Jerusalem know him before as a zealous hatchet man for the Sanhedrin, or did they only hear of him as a Jew-turned-preacher up north? Did Barnabas introduce him to all the brothers in Jerusalem, or did he quietly meet with just Peter and James? 

If Paul was an actual person, then there are actual answers to these questions. The Bible does not give the facts, instead offering something more like "choose-your-own-adventure". If Paul was the author of Galatians, and if he wrote the truth, then the author of Acts wrote fiction. (And vice versa.) If Acts is a historical "novel", what can we conclude of the Gospel of Luke, penned by the same writer and the only book to bring up Mary's virginity? Paul's letters, after all, are the oldest documents of Christianity, and he never mentions Mary, much less makes a claim that Jesus was conceived without human sperm. Nor does Paul mention Christ's ascension into the clouds, a story only told in--you guessed it--Acts and Luke (and added later in a postscript to the Gospel of Mark).

What do you think actually happened on the Damascus Road?

The Truth Project

The Bible stands though the hills may tumble,

It will firmly stand when the earth shall crumble;

I will plant my feet on its firm foundation,

For the Bible stands. (Haldor Lillenas, 1917)

My dad and mom were baptized the year before I was born and took their faith very seriously. Having rejected their own religious upbringing as insufficient, my parents were young idealists with a passion for the Bible, which they regarded as the only authoritative Truth. In their quest for Bible truth, however, my parents were soon exposed to Bill Gothard and became enthusiastic alumni of his cult-like “Institute in Basic Life Principles” (aka as IBLP, and before that, I.B.Y.C.). Gothard’s program aims to prevent teen rebellion by promoting parents and other authority figures as God’s mouthpieces for their children and other subordinates. Despite being unmarried, he dispenses a lot of marriage and parenting and homeschooling advice, as well as formulas for business success, all ostensibly lifted from the pages of Scripture.

  

The Bible stands like a rock undaunted

’Mid the raging storms of time;

Its pages burn with the truth eternal,

And they glow with a light sublime.

From asking Jesus into my heart at the ripe age of 3 to memorizing verses in Sunday School, my own childish faith grew easily.  I always loved learning, so the Bible was a treasury of knowledge to me. Church interested me. I enjoyed watching other adults express their faith, enjoyed listening to my parents discuss their religious beliefs with their friends. However, each time my parents attended one of Gothard’s seminars, they brought back stricter rules for our home. For years I resisted these changes, while my parents used the Institute’s literature to invoke the Bible’s support for each restrictive new policy.

The Bible stands like a mountain towering

Far above the works of men;

Its truth by none ever was refuted,

And destroy it they never can.

When I turned 15, Mom confiscated my new birthday Walkman. To get it back, I had to listen, with my parents, to an IBLP cassette series on choosing Godly music. The producers criticized all the popular Christian artists I enjoyed, and I thought the reasoning offered was ridiculous, but I did want my Walkman. Besides, I really did want to be on God’s side, the side of my parental authorities. I signed my name on the commitment page at the end of the companion booklet.

From then on, I drank the kool-aid, too. I learned to deftly use the scriptures to defend my beliefs and those of my parents. Though I still balked at some of the more unreasonable teachings that came down from IBLP, I enjoyed being part of an elitist force for the kingdom of God. We went further than ordinary Christians, made sacrifices they wouldn’t dream of. It may have been an oppressive lifestyle, but the Bible alone was our authority and no historical or scientific “fact” could contradict its God-preserved veracity.

By age 25, I’d read both testaments through fifteen times, in multiple versions. Like a good lawyer, I could defend almost any Christian belief from scripture, and could anticipate opposing arguments from a Christian with a differing perspective. The Bible came to look more like a prism than a window.

The Bible stands and it will forever,

When the world has passed away;

By inspiration it has been given,

All its precepts I will obey.

I met my husband while we were both working for IBLP. We each left the “ministry” with mixed feelings. As our friendship got more serious, we both began to sort out our core beliefs and let go of legalistic baggage. We were desperate to know what was essential Christianity and what had merely been added on. We found a church that held belief in Jesus as its vital doctrine. As our children were born, I diligently taught them psalms and hymns, prayers and Bible stories. The scriptures would be their foundation, as they were mine. Knowing Bible truth would be their defense against manipulation, extremism and spiritual abuse.

The Bible stands every test we give it,

For its Author is divine;

By grace alone I expect to live it,

And to prove and to make it mine.

Then one year, our church decided to go through The Truth Project, a DVD mini-seminar from Focus on the Family. As Del Tackett made his presentation on the screen, we were jarred back in time. Tackett was promoting his “worldview” and insisting that the Bible, properly interpreted, would only endorse his perspective of marriage, of government, of economics, of science, of philosophy, of doctrine. Everything else was untrue or phony. We looked at each other and realized we’d seen this show before. Having learned how to justify anything from the pages of the Old and New Testaments, we simply weren’t convinced the Bible was as absolute or all-encompassing as these men wanted it to be.

Since then we’ve learned a lot about how other Christian groups interpret and engage with the Bible. We’ve studied how it came to us via oral tradition and manuscript and printing press, the history of translation and its challenges, its influence on literature and Western civilization. I view the Bible a lot differently these days. It is no longer my “sword” to use on opponents. It is not my talisman against evil, not an unbiased record of historical events. I no longer imagine God whispering words into the ears of attentive prophets anxiously taking notes.

I still want my children to be familiar with the Bible's teachings and its imagery. But, whereas I used to see the Bible as a book that told me about God, I now see it as a book that tells me about myself. A story, woven over many centuries, about the needs, desires, imaginations, fears, griefs, dreams, hopes, and aspirations that have shaped humanity’s destiny. Its pages chronicle mankind's evolving attempts to make sense of the world we inhabit, and to make it better. Humanity's struggle forward is the truth of the Bible.