Summary: <p>The prophet Elijah, whom we last encountered at our seders, poses a conundrum.</p> <p>Elijah has this favored slot in Jewish history: the harbinger of hope and redemption. At the <a href="https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/7b2c1bca-5fc3-4efd-9a72-140128687c10.pdf?rdr=true" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">seder,</a> we sing <em>Eliyahu ha’navi</em> as we move along the trajectory from darkness to light. At your son or grandson’s brit milah, the chair of Elijah invites the prophet into our lives at our choicest <a href="https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/ad009b2e-ff3e-496e-9fca-9ec4ce58cf35.pdf?rdr=true" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">family moments.</a> We bring Elijah into every Shabbat and Hag service in the blessings after the <a href="https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/0b6d15db-91c1-4fa6-92d4-3ccb523ecd99.pdf?rdr=true" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Haftarah</a> and <a href="https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/b8ee8d6f-38ca-4051-8764-2e081ed82bfa.pdf?rdr=true" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Havdalah.</a> We bring Elijah into <a href="https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/5fd8a317-fead-471f-8dc3-8ea3dbd1dc2f.pdf?rdr=true" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">grace after meals</a> every time we bench.</p> <p>Of all the protagonists in the Jewish canon, Elijah is by far the most recurrent presence in Jewish ritual: more than Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, Leah, Rachel, Moses, Aaron, Saul, David or Solomon.</p> <p><a href="https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/64b70f77-25ee-4669-a4c7-40aa9bd435ca.pdf?rdr=true" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Why so much Elijah?</a> If you read the biblical story, this role is not only unexpected. It is a shocker. Elijah would be the last figure to get this job as harbinger of redemption.</p> <p>Fact 1: Elijah’s last act as prophet is to be the Butcher of Mt. Carmel. He <a href="https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/b1816c55-63c3-4c36-bbc2-8e4cf0d8ed4b.pdf?rdr=true" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">slaughters</a> 450 prophets of Ba’al. A war crime. An atrocity. And that is not just a modern read. Leading to fact 2.</p> <p>Fact 2: <a href="https://files.constantcontact.com/d3875897501/1e37129d-d0c9-4a2b-9ed8-e70d0bd71b6e.pdf?rdr=true" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">God fires</a> Elijah for being only a zealot, and not being open to any other moves but hot zealotry. That is why God tells Elijah to appoint his successor, the gentler and more nuanced prophet Elisha.</p> <p>So why exactly do we invite the Butcher of Mt. Carmel, fired by God, to our seders, to our britot, to our Shabbat prayers, to our grace after meals, as the harbinger of redemption?</p> <p>We are going to be doing a four-part series to answer this question based upon a great new book that just came out, Daniel C. Matt, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09PMNHPRQ/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Becoming Elijah: Prophet of Transformation (Yale University Press, March, 2022).</a></p>
