Discovery Box1 Kings 19:1-8 
Context19:1 Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, including a detailed account of how he killed all the prophets with the sword. 19:2 Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah with this warning, 1 “May the gods judge me severely 2 if by this time tomorrow I do not take your life as you did theirs!” 3
19:3 Elijah was afraid, 4 so he got up and fled for his life to Beer Sheba in Judah. He left his servant there, 19:4 while he went a day’s journey into the desert. He went and sat down under a shrub 5 and asked the Lord to take his life: 6 “I’ve had enough! Now, O Lord, take my life. After all, I’m no better than my ancestors.” 7 19:5 He stretched out 8 and fell asleep under the shrub. All of a sudden an angelic messenger 9 touched him and said, “Get up and eat.” 19:6 He looked and right there by his head was a cake baking on hot coals and a jug of water. He ate and drank and then slept some more. 10 19:7 The Lord’s angelic messenger came back again, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, for otherwise you won’t be able to make the journey.” 11 19:8 So he got up and ate and drank. That meal gave him the strength to travel forty days and forty nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God.
1 tn Heb “saying.”
2 tn Heb “So may the gods do to me, and so may they add.”
3 tn Heb “I do not make your life like the life of one of them.”
4 tc The MT has “and he saw,” but some medieval Hebrew
5 tn Or “broom tree” (also in v. 5).
6 tn Heb “and asked with respect to his life to die.”
7 tn Heb “fathers.”
8 tn Or “lay down.”
9 tn Heb “Look, a messenger.”
10 tn Heb “and again lay down”
11 tn Heb “for the journey is too great for you.”
