20 myths
The prophet Elisha, heir to Elijah's mantle, who parted rivers, raised the dead, and performed miracles throughout Israel.
20 myths on JewishMythology.com retell how Jewish tradition imagines elisha, drawn from the Hebrew Bible, Midrash, Talmud, Kabbalah, and later Jewish literature. Each story below synthesizes primary sources into a single narrative; follow any myth to read it, and from there into the source passages behind it.
Elisha refused every farewell Elijah offered. At the Jordan he asked for a double spirit, then watched fire take his master.
A woman who built a room for a prophet so he could rest, who had asked for nothing, now rode hard toward him with her dead son lying upstairs.
Elisha ben Abuya entered heaven and saw an angel seated on a throne. In heaven, no one sits. His mind drew one conclusion, and it cost him everything.
The chariot of fire was harnessed and the whirlwind was ready. The angel came down, found two men arguing over a teaching, and could not make either look up.
The word of God would not come to an angry prophet. Elisha called for a harpist, and when the strings played, heaven found a way in.
Elisha carried divine fire so concentrated his face burned lethal to look at. He traveled mountain to mountain, and one woman saw him coming.
Elijah worked eight wonders in his life. Elisha asked for a double share and worked sixteen, while his servant Gehazi chased silver and caught leprosy.
Elisha asked for a double portion of Elijah's spirit. Elijah called it a hard thing. Elisha watched and received it, and the count came out exactly right.
Elisha's most gifted disciple inscribed the Divine Name on golden calves and made them utter the words of Sinai. Nothing after that could be undone.
An officer heard Elisha promise cheap flour the next day and asked if heaven had windows. Elisha said he would see it and not eat it. The crowd trampled him.
Elisha sent his servant ahead with his staff to revive a dead child. The boy did not move. The rabbis knew exactly why the wood failed.
Elisha was plowing behind oxen when Elijah threw a cloak over his shoulders and said nothing. He performed sixteen miracles, twice Elijah's eight.
She stripped the prophet's bed herself and never found a stain on the linen. Her husband said the man was only a prophet. She said he was holy.
Babylon's general found blood moving on the floor of the ruined Temple. The priests told him it was cattle blood, so he had cattle killed on top of it.
Moses hid his face at the bush and was refused at the cave. Israel broke the covenant and earned a second chance. Gehazi just walked away.
Elisha threw a stick and a borrowed ax head rose from the river. The Mekhilta says if iron floated for Elijah's disciple, how much more for Moses.
The king of Israel wanted them dead and asked the prophet for permission. Elisha said no and set out bread and water for the men sent to bind him.
Three kings ran out of water and found Elisha. He promised a dry valley full of pools, then told them to fell every good tree in Moab without mercy.
A calf may not climb the altar until Shabbat has passed over it. The king will not see a newcomer before the queen does, and the future is already planted.
Rebekah sent food first so Isaac's heart would lift. The Presence rests on joy, she knew, and only then would the blessing hold.
