Sunday’s first reading tells the story of another widow and model believer. The gospel tells us nothing about the fate of the widow who gives money she needs to live on to the temple treasury. But the mother who uses her last bit of flour and oil to make cakes for the prophet Elijah, herself, and her son finds her jar of flour never goes empty and her jar of oil never runs dry.
A great drought has overtaken the northern kingdom of Israel, a drought Elijah has prophesied to King Ahab. Ahab wants to kill Elijah, so God sends Elijah to stay with a desperate single mother on the verge of starvation.
The brief seven verses of the widow of Zarephath’s story richly reveal her character and relationship with the prophet. The God of Israel is foreign to this Canaanite widow. By her oath, “as the Lord your God lives,” we see that the widow realizes that Elijah is a prophet of the God of Israel. She trusts Elijah, when he delivers the promise of his God to her. Her flour jar and oil jug, like St. Brigid of Ireland’s apron or Strega Nona’s spaghetti pot, will always hold enough for another guest and another day.
As one of the earliest prophets whose stories appear in the Hebrew scriptures, Elijah’s powerful word shows us an ancient theology of prophecy. The word spoken is dynamic. A word spoken is a word done, a performative word.
Elijah doesn’t fit most people’s stereotype of the Old Testament prophet—one who predicts doom and destruction in the distant future. In this story Elijah delivers God’s promise for the widow’s near future. She takes Elijah at his word; she believes he speaks a word of God’s power. The story holds up a foreign, single mother as a model of faith in God.
Elijah and the Widow
God sent the prophet Elijah to a widow in Zarephath during a drought. As he arrived at the gate of the city, Elijah saw a widow gathering sticks and called out to her, “Please bring me a small cupful of water to drink.” She left to get it. “And please bring along a bit of bread,” he asked.
“As the Lord, your God, lives,” she answered, “What do you expect? I have nothing to eat. There is only a handful of flour left in my jar and a little oil in my jug. I was just collecting a couple of sticks, so I could go in and prepare something for myself and my son; when we have eaten it, we shall die.”
“Do not be afraid,” Elijah said to her. “Go and do as you propose. But first make a little cake and bring it to me. Then you can prepare something for yourself and your son. For the Holy One, the God of Israel, says, ‘The jar of flour shall not go empty, nor the jug of oil run dry, until the day when the Holy One sends rain upon the earth.’”
She left and did as Elijah had said. She was able to eat for a year, and he and her son as well; the jar of flour did not go empty, nor the jug of oil run dry, as the Holy One had foretold through Elijah.
1 Kings 17.10-16
- What does it take for a single mother to share her last bit of food with a crazed prophet on the run from an angry king?
- Would you share your last food and drink in a famine? What difference would it make if the person needing food is a well-known neighbor? A stranger? A person from another country?
- What do the full jar and jug symbolize?
- What criteria do you use to decide whether a person speaks for God?