A CASE OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY: JESUS AS ELIJAH

KEY VERSES: And many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. (Luke 1:16-17)

And they did not receive him, because his face was as though he would go to Jerusalem.  And when his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them (the Samaritans), even as Elias did? (Luke 9:53-54)

  When Jesus began his ministry, like John the Baptist before him, they thought that he was the prophet Elijah who had never died, but went up to heaven in a whirlwind (2 Kings 2:11). Jacob saw the ladder of God, and Elijah (Elias) had the whirlwind as his “ladder.” It would come to pass that Jesus’s “ladder” was the Holy Cross! A “ladder” as them all, was the way to heaven.
  Note that the translators failed to capitalize “heaven.” Elijah and Jacob viewed the spiritual “celestial pole” (aka the silver cord) to the unseen. As I have written before, the celestial pole, Jacobs Ladder, and Elijah’s whirlwind, were the access from the Earth unto the heaven, and the celestial sphere seems to be akin to the “firmament” through which they gained access from the visible realm into the invisible.
  Jesus’s “ladder” was the pole, tree, or cross on which he was crucified. Moses likened it to a “pole” as Jesus referred to the Way to rebirth with the Serpent dead on his pole of brass (John 3:14.) Of course, Genesis 1 infers that Jesus is the Tree of Life and Revelation 2 reinforces that notion.
  The true “celestial pole” would be Jesus. He freely crossed over from the Earth into the heavens, and at his death, his Ghost went directly into Heaven, but not before translating to the part of heaven referred to as “Hell.” That is where he carried-off all the sins of mankind.
  Now back to Elijah. He too carried-off the sins of a certain group of people. They were those who trusted the Lord God of Israel. Safety, then, is the same as safety now!  Elijah was the enunciator for “The Angel of God” just as John the Baptist was for Jesus (Mat 11:14). The Jews in Jesus’ day surely believed that Elijah was the Savior, and at first mistook John for Elijah, then Jesus! However, Elijah was both a type of John the Baptist and a type of Messiah.
  Elijah was certainly NOT the Messiah, although in the New Testament, both John and James believed him to be Elijah so strongly that they asked Jesus to consume the Samaritans with fire, just as Elijah had almost one thousand years before (from the second of the key verses above). At that point, it seems their faith was still in Elijah, and not The Angel of God who was Elijah’s Strength and Power.
  To prove that neither Elijah nor Moses were the Messiah, at the Mount of Transfiguration, both of them were with the Person and Spirit of God; with Jesus and the Father whose purpose was to validate the Spirit and the Flesh as One God!
  In the first of the key verses, an angel of the Lord, likened John unto Elijah in whom the faith of the Jews still lied. Elijah, in their minds, seemed to be the Power behind the destruction of the priests of Baal on Mount Carmel. It was not Elijah, as will be shown, but Jesus who destroyed Baal!
  The commentary which follows is about Elijah’s Victory at Mount Carmel, as the Jews still believe it was Elijah, and not Jesus, who destroyed Baal in the eyes of Israelites. The thread in this commentary is that there was no victory in Elijah but there is victory in Jesus! The Messiah is not Elijah but Jesus. The Jews seemed to be confused by that!
  Baal was considered to be the god of lightning, wind, rain, and fertility. Israel, cursed by God for worshiping Baal, turned the tables on Baal. Rather than a period of fertility and moisture, at this time in Israel it was arid and the entire country was scarce of food. Baal’s godhood was likely in question to all but those faithful to him. Jezebel was Baal’s most proliferent apostle.
  Asherah was the consort of El. Because of polytheism, El was associated with Yahweh, just as Allah is with Yahweh in later times. As a consequence, Asherah was considered to be Yahweh’s “wife” because of the Israelites’ syncretism. Ironically, Asherah is symbolized by trees and wooden images. She was part of the Phoenician pantheon of gods and goddesses.
  As a side note, it seems remarkable that Asherah was associated with trees, as the trees of the Garden of Eden were metaphors for living souls as well as real trees! Also, that Genesis 1:1 uses the transliteration from the Hebrew to be “create” but it is more primitively, “cutting wood.” Jeremiah the prophet called Asherah the “Queen of Heaven (Jer 17:17-18) to whom Jews made cakes, as did the Israelites before them in Samaria.
  That Yahweh “cut wood” to generate the earth is significant. It’s what Asherah was noted for! The reader can see why that Israelites accepted a female counterpart to God. Who was it who really “cut the wood” to tend to the “trees” of the Garden? He was called Jesus – the son of a carpenter and the son of God!
  Keep the concept of “wood” in mind as the commentary is continued. Now consider Elijah:

SUPPORT BOOK - 1 KINGS: (All sources listed without a book are from 1 Kings.)

SUPPORT VERSE 1: And as Obadiah was in the way, behold, Elijah met him: and he knew him, and fell on his face, and said, Art thou that my lord Elijah? And he answered him, I am: go, tell thy lord, Behold, Elijah is here. (18:7-8)

  Elijah is demonstrated in that passage to be a type of Jesus. First things first: Look at the etymology of the name. Obadiah means “servant of God” and Elijah “my God is Yahweh.” Obadiah identifies to whom he serves, and Elijah’s name identifies the specific God among a pantheon of them. The name “Elijah” and Jesus are both theophoric and mean the same thing!
  Both those men were prophets. Obadiah was an Edomite convert to Judaism who hid out one-hundred faithful prophets from King Ahab. He was a prophet of prophets.
Elijah was a prophet as well. Since Obadiah paid homage to him, Elijah was the prophet of prophet’s prophet! Obadiah called him “my lord.” No wonder the Jews confused both John the Baptist and Jesus with their most important prophet!
  Elijah never died but was caught up in a whirlwind:

 And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. (2 King 2:11)

  Elijah was translated from earth to heaven, from the seen to the unseen, by God’s Holy Spirit. This would be the first instance of the living arising to meet Jesus in the sky. That is what theologians refer to as “the rapture,” meaning to “snatch up.”
  Elijah was privy to the spiritual celestial pole. Of course, that “pole” was in Israel on the Jordon River. His “assumption” was prophesied earlier, and is a picture of Jesus’s “assumption” into Heaven.
  Compare Elijah’s assumption (acceptance) to Jesus’s reception in Jerusalem:

And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost. (Acts 2:2-4a)

  It seems that Elijah was ushered into Heaven much as Jesus’s Holy Ghost was ushered downward from Heaven. Then examine how Jesus went up:

Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. 9 And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. 10 And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; 11 Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. (Acts 1:8-11).

  It would seem that this passage was referring to Jesus’s appearance in the clouds to translate Christians. That will be a physical occurrence. Acts 1 is referring to Jesus’s Holy Ghost; “after that the Holy Ghost is come down upon you.” That happened when a whirlwind usher Jesus’s Holy Ghost down.
  Elijah, as Jesus, would come and go between the natural realm and the supernatural always in this manner and always in Israel. Surely, Elijah had the keys to Heaven (Mat 16:19) as he came back at the transfiguration of Jesus.  Therefore, don’t be amazed that they thought that Jesus might be Elijah and him translated back to Earth.

SUPPORT VERSE #2: And it shall come to pass, as soon as I (Obadiah) am gone from thee, that the Spirit of the Lord shall carry thee whither I know not; and so when I come and tell (King) Ahab, and he cannot find thee, he shall slay me: but I thy servant fear the Lord from my youth. (18:12)

  Obadiah prophesied Elijah’s assumption into the Kingdom of God. Usually prophets prophesized deaths and whether they would be catastrophic or rewarding. In this case, Obadiah prophesized no death at all! Elijah, unlike Jesus, never suffered death, therefore Elijah did not die for anyone, and was not the Messiah, albeit the Jews thought that the Messiah would apparently never need suffer death! Why would they reject Jesus as Savior? Because Elijah-type saviors never die!

SUPPORT VERSE #3: And Elijah said, As the Lord of hosts liveth, before whom I stand, I will surely shew myself unto him to day. (8:15)

  When Elijah said “to day” he would show himself to God, the Hebrew word is “yowm,” meaning “hot” and in this context it means Elijah’s “lifetime.” That is meant to be eternal life as Elijah never died! “Lifetime,” as proposed in my book, On the Origin of Man and the Universe, means “process.” Elijah’s physical life was a process, and in his case, a never-ending one!

SUPPORT VERSE #4: And it came to pass, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that troubleth Israel?  And he answered, I have not troubled Israel; but thou, and thy father's house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim. (18:17-18)

  As a type of Jesus, Elijah got the blame and was accused: Aren’t you the guy who causes trouble in Israel? In Acts 24:5, Paul was called “a troublemaker” because he belonged to the sect of the Nazarenes. That infers that Jesus was chief troublemaker! In Luke 9, it is seen that Jesus certainly did not come to cause trouble, but he was accused of being like Elijah (Luke 9:8) and they thought that Elijah had “risen again.”
  It seems that they had trouble believing that Elijah had went to heaven alive, but that he had risen from death. That’s what Jesus did! Elijah was not the Messiah and never professed to be.

SUPPORT VERSE #5: And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? if the Lord be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not a word. Then said Elijah unto the people, I, even I only, remain a prophet of the Lord; but Baal's prophets are four hundred and fifty men. (18:21-22)

  Elijah’s role was to turn the people from “two opinions.” They never abandoned Yahweh, but just added other gods. They even assigned Yahweh a wife – Asherah. Does that not seem to be the same heresy as the Gnostics who assigned Mary Magdalene as the bride of Christ when it was the Church along!
  Jesus answered the question that Elijah asked:

No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. (Mat 6:24). 

   Jesus was born to answer Elijah’s question! How did the Jews answer it? Yes, we can; we can both serve God and ourselves. They answered wrongly as they often did in ancient times! When Jesus said “Marvel not; ye must be born again!” (John 3:7), he also referred to which Master must be served. In John 3:14; “the Master” is the one who can overcome the Serpent. That Mighty Warrior is Jesus! The Israelites in the viper field were of two opinions: (1) I can heal myself from poison, and (2) Only Jesus heals from the Serpents’ poison. Of course, that “poison” is sin.
  John wasn’t the first to stage Jesus’s coming. Elijah did that centuries before! The Devil appeared first as the Serpent, but in the case of Elijah, the Serpent was in Ahab. Ahab was a “beast” and a foreshadowing of Judas Iscariot. Obviously, Jezebel was the type of the “harlot” of the Book of Revelation.

SUPPORT VERSE #6: Let them therefore give us two bullocks; and let them choose one bullock for themselves, and cut it in pieces, and lay it on wood, and put no fire under: and I will dress the other bullock, and lay it on wood, and put no fire under: And call ye on the name of your gods, and I will call on the name of the Lord: and the God that answereth by fire, let him be God. (18:23-24)

  Asherah was goddess of the wood and forests. According to her identity, Asherah would have been stronger than Yahweh. Again, from Genesis 1:1, God was the “Woodcutter” who built the heaven and the earth. Asherah was a false god. She built nothing! Do you not see why that belief in the creation and the Creator is imperative? False gods claim that power, but Asherah could not even burn the wood, let alone be the “craftsman” who built the fire pit!
  Whose God is stronger? was always the question and still is! The answer to that is Yahweh because He alone is God. The test God designed was to diminish the gods of Israel and elevate Himself. That’s what it takes to be born again! If the Israelites elevated Yahweh above Asherah and the phony god, “El” they would be safe.

SUPPORT VERSE #7: Call on the name of your gods, but put no fire under. called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, O Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, nor any that answered. (18:25b-26)

  Baal, representing a pantheon of false gods, has no voice! God does; His “Voice” is called the Word, and Yahweh spoke to mankind often commencing with His, “Let there be’s.” God thought, spoke, and things came “to be.” They did not exist before, but then they did! Baal could not even put the fire out! God could and did. They cried out to Baal, and he remained silent as false gods’ idols always do.
  I wrote in my aforementioned book that “day” meant “hot” in the Hebrew and night meant a twist on that, or cooling. A day is a process – of the Earth progressing around the Sun. Each process (called “day”) in Genesis 1 was the “fire of God” whose “fire” is known as the Holy Spirit (Acts 2)  and is the Power of God (Micah 3:8).
  “Burning the wood” was demonstration of a living God whose processes create and destroy, or heat and cool. Yahweh was able to Light the fire while Baal stood by, did nothing, nor said anything.
  Jesus is the ONE intermediary between God and man (1 Tim 2:5); Mary is not, nor was Asherah! For a change, a female remained speechless as the fire did not burn… and that was her “job” according to her worshipers!

SUPPORT VERSE #8: And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them. And it came to pass, when midday was past, and they prophesied until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that there was neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any that regarded. (18:28-29)

  Their gods could not light the fire, so the Israelites tried themselves. They cried out to their gods, and they were useless. Then, perhaps as a last sacrifice to their gods, they shed their own blood. Israelites to this day still endeavor to do what they perceive God cannot do; they don’t trust God so they over-value themselves. By works, they try to be saved!
  Jesus propitiated his own blood on behalf of everyone, but herein, it can be seen that the Israelites were propitiating their own blood to save their own lousy flesh from the True God’s Power and justice.
  They attempted to sacrifice their own flesh. It was as futile as male circumcision for they failed to circumcise their hearts as scripture directs: “Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked” (Deut 10:16). Their inability to, “halt ye between two opinions” (Support verse #6), made them “stiff-necked.”
  Time-out now for a short recess. In the situation comedy “Malcolm in the Middle,” the father had difficulty every morning making a decision on which cereal to eat for breakfast. His wife would always have to choose for him!
  Then, one day, he was designated the administrator of a neighbor’s living will. He was required to decide whether life support could be removed or not. It was his decision alone! The father became paralyzed with anxiety from the waste up. That is a fictional event that demonstrates how difficult it is for people to decide between God and mammon.
  Each offer something: Mammon offers decadent pleasure, superficial beauty, and prideful attitudes as sinners esteem themselves more highly than God. On the other hand – the right hand side of God – is Jesus who offers nourishment, safety, contentment, and eternal life. Stiff-necked people are paralyzed from the neck up, and are not able to choose one or the other, but think they can have it both ways!

SUPPORT VERSE #9: And Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, unto whom the word of the Lord came, saying, Israel shall be thy name: And with the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord: and he made a trench about the altar. (18-31-32a)

  “Israel” was meant to be the twelve tribes from Jacob’s (Israel’s) sons. The twelve stones meant unity under the Word (Jesus). Elijah made a bequest, that the twelve tribes must cease discord and be in one accord. Acts 2:1 makes that a pre-requisite to the appearance of the Holy Ghost. Elijah was most certainly previewing the advent of Jesus and his return as the Holy Ghost.
  Elijah built and altar “in the name of the Lord.” God is without name, but He is called Jesus (Mat 1:25). Elijah’s altar was for Jesus. At that time, it was built of rough stones, and the altar to God – the Church – is built of “lively stones” (1 Pet 2:5). Elijah was building a Church for Israel since they had none. The Temple belonged to the southern tribe of Judah, and the Israelites had only two temples for Baalim (plural false gods).
  The trench about the altar was a hedge of safety of sorts to keep the fire from spreading to where it was not intended. The Book of Job refers to that safety as a “hedge.” After Christ came, he put an invisible safety barrier inside those born again. It is a tempered soul, not filled with water as with Elijah’s altar, but living waters, meaning the Holy Spirit.

SUPPORT VERSE #10: And he put the wood in order, and cut the bullock in pieces, and laid him on the wood, and said, Fill four barrels with water, and pour it on the burnt sacrifice, and on the wood. And he said, Do it the second time. And they did it the second time. And he said, Do it the third time. And they did it the third time. And the water ran round about the altar; and he filled the trench also with water. (18:33-35)

  To be brief, perhaps Elijah “baptized” the invisible Temple represented by the altar for God. Perhaps the three times that water was poured, it represented the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost in whose Name Christians are baptized. Perhaps Elijah saw Jesus, along with the Father and Holy Spirit! It certainly seems so. 

  Then the “water ran round about the altar.” It seems that the Holy Trinity, the three in one aspect of God, was revealed. Whose God is the True God? The One with three substances: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. (Mat 28:19).

  Elijah was symbolically fulfilling the Great Commission. He was “baptizing” the Israelites in the same manner Jesus said to do centuries afterwards! 

SUPPORT VERSE #11: Hear me, O Lord, hear me, that this people may know that thou art the Lord God, and that thou hast turned their heart back again. Then the fire of the Lord fell, and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces: and they said, The Lord, he is the God; the Lord, he is the God. (18:37-39) 

  Elijah defined conversion with his worship. Conversion, or “born again” was defined: “That this people may know that thou art the Lord God, and that thou hast turned their heart back again.”
  Rebirth for the Israelites was two-fold: (1) Know the True God, and (2) have changed hearts; they have different “wills” -one doing their own will to another to do the Will of God! Those same two are still required to this day. Many people know God but their hearts remain unchanged. Those fully persuaded will say, “The Lord, he is the God; the Lord, he is the God.”

SUPPORT VERSE #12: And as he lay and slept under a juniper tree, behold, then an angel touched him, and said unto him, Arise and eat. And the angel of the Lord came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for thee. And he arose, and did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God. (19:5,7-8)

  The Angel of the Lord touched Elijah twice. That was not just an ordinary “angel” but THE Angel of the Lord. Throughout scripture, that description refers to God manifested who would be called “Jesus.” At that time, the Spiritual “Jesus” was called “The Angel of God” as he was God manifested and the intermediary between man and the Father. The Angel of God surely fed Elijah the Bread of Life, of course, in remembrance of him (Luke 22:19).
  Perhaps the TWO “awakenings” represent the Covenant of Abraham and the Covenant of Grace, both of which are now efficacious.

SUPPORT VERSE #13: Yet I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him. (19:18)

  It should be obvious that the seven-thousand left of the multitudes represent the narrow way to salvation. The altar, of course, would have represented the straight gate whose doctrine was narrow:

Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. (Mat 7:3-15).

  If one would recall the false prophets in Israel, they were the majority and they were everywhere. That remains unchanged. “Bowing down to Baal” is more than some other god; it is people who too highly esteem themselves who are the Baalim.
  The narrow Way in Israel was 7,000 out of nearly 700,000! The ratio of the saved” seems to be 7,000/700,000, or 1%! That truly is a broad path to destruction! How many will live? In Ahab’s Israel, 1/100. Perhaps today, 1/100 will be led unto life in Heaven.
  That may sound cruel but look around you! How many believe in God but are not new creatures with new attitudes in him?

  In summary, if you want to learn more about Jesus, then learn more about Elijah. He was not Jesus, but knew him thoroughly. So intense was their bond, that Elijah was brought to the Mount of Transfiguration for Jesus to show him in person who he saw in his mind long ago. As I write, I “see” Jesus in the Creation, in the Old Testament, in the burning bush and fiery furnace. I see Jesus even on Elijah’s altar!