The Staff That Did Nothing Because the Servant Doubted

The Staff on the Boy's Face

Gehazi arrived at the house before Elisha did. He had the prophet's staff in his hands and his instructions: go, lay it on the boy's face. The Shunamite woman had built Elisha a room on her roof and fed him whenever he came through. Her son had been born from a blessing the prophet had spoken over her, a son she had not asked for and had not expected. Now the son was dead, and she had ridden hard to find Elisha and bring him back, and Elisha had sent his servant ahead with the instrument of his authority.

Gehazi laid the staff on the boy's face.

Nothing happened. The boy's chest did not move. His eyes did not open. He was as dead as he had been when his mother laid him on Elisha's bed.

Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, the early medieval narrative midrash from Palestine, does not leave the staff's failure unexplained. Gehazi had gone through the streets asking people whether they thought a staff could raise the dead. The mission was laughable in his eyes. He was carrying the prophet's instrument without the prophet's faith, and the staff in the hands of someone who did not believe in what it was for was a piece of wood.

What the Staff Was and What It Required

Moses had a staff. Elijah had a mantle. These were not magical objects in the sense of objects that operated independently of the person holding them. They were extensions of the prophet himself, channels for divine energy flowing through a human agent who was aligned with the source of that energy. The channel had to be clear. The person holding the instrument had to be the kind of person through whom the instrument could work.

Gehazi was not that person at that moment. He held the staff and walked through the streets undermining his own mission. By the time the staff touched the boy, there was nothing moving through it from above because the one carrying it was actively cutting off the current with his skepticism. Elisha had to come himself.

What Elisha Did When He Arrived

He went into the room and closed the door. He prayed. Then he lay on the child, his mouth on the child's mouth, his eyes on the child's eyes, his hands on the child's hands, and the child's flesh grew warm. Elisha got up and walked around in the room and lay on the child again, and the child sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.

The contrast between Gehazi's performance and Elisha's is total. Gehazi sent the instrument and kept himself separate. Elisha gave his body to the work, made himself the medium of contact, and repeated the effort. Legends of the Jews notes that Elisha performed sixteen miracles in his lifetime, doubling the eight of Elijah. The doubling was the fulfillment of the double portion of spirit he had asked for at the Jordan. But double portions carry double obligations: the more power, the less margin for the detachment that Gehazi embodied.

What the Tradition Says About Gehazi

Gehazi's story does not end well. After the healing of the Shunamite's son, Naaman the Aramean commander came to Elisha for healing from his skin disease and was healed. Elisha refused any payment. Gehazi ran after Naaman secretly and claimed gifts in Elisha's name and hid them. When Elisha asked where he had been and Gehazi denied it, the disease of Naaman came upon Gehazi and upon his descendants forever.

Legends of the Jews records that Elisha's severity with Gehazi was part of a pattern of severity that shortened his own life. The rabbinic tradition holds that Elisha fell ill three times, that his illnesses were connected to the harshness he showed his disciples, and that the man who had raised a dead child eventually died of his third illness. The tradition also preserves the most remarkable fact of his burial: another body, thrown into Elisha's tomb, revived on contact with his bones. The prophet who had lain on a dead child to raise him was still raising the dead from his grave.