2
Then Izevel sent a messenger to say to Eliyahu, "May the gods do terrible things to me and worse ones besides if by this time tomorrow I haven't taken your life, just as you took theirs!"
3
On seeing that, he got up and fled for his life. When he arrived in Be'er-Sheva, in Y'hudah, he left his servant there;
4
but he himself went a day farther into the desert, until he came to a broom tree. He sat down under it and prayed for his own death. "Enough!" he said. "Now, ADONAI, take my life. I'm no better than my ancestors."
5
Then he lay down under the broom tree and went to sleep. Suddenly, an angel touched him and said to him, "Get up and eat!"
6
He looked, and there by his head was a cake baked on the hot stones and a jug of water. He ate and drank, then lay down again.
7
The angel came again, a second time, touched him and said, "Get up and eat, or the journey will be too much for you."
8
He got up, ate and drank, and, on the strength of that meal, traveled forty days and nights until he reached Horev the mountain of God.
9
There he went into a cave and spent the night. Then the word of ADONAI came to him; he said to him, "What are you doing here, Eliyahu?"
10
He answered, "I have been very zealous for ADONAI the God of armies, because the people of Isra'el have abandoned your covenant, broken down your altars and killed your prophets with the sword. Now I'm the only one left, and they're coming after me to kill me too."
11
He said, "Go outside, and stand on the mountain before ADONAI"; and right then and there, ADONAI went past. A mighty blast of wind tore the mountains apart and broke the rocks in pieces before ADONAI, but ADONAI was not in the wind. After the wind came an earthquake, but ADONAI was not in the earthquake.
12
After the earthquake, fire broke out; but ADONAI was not in the fire. And after the fire came a quiet, subdued voice.