124 myths · Page 2 of 5
Caleb read illness and awakening in her name. Two words in Chronicles carried the whole arc of Miriam's life into the house of David.
A chariot of fire took Elijah up alive, and he never got to rest. He writes down every deed any person does, and he walks the dead into paradise.
The drawn sword outside Jericho carried an old refusal. Moses had turned away the angel, but Joshua bowed low enough to receive him.
Shiphrah and Puah faced Pharaoh in the birth room, fed the children he wanted dead, and were repaid with priests, prophets, kings, and builders.
The meal is over and the cup of blessing goes around the table. Abraham will not take it, because of Ishmael. Isaac will not, because of Esau.
After seven years of famine, Joel told Israel to plant the last grain. The seed came from ant hills, and the covenant held.
Ahaziah sent soldiers to drag Elijah down from a hill. Fire took the first two companies, and the prophet left the world without a grave.
When David enters the fourth heaven, seven lightnings strike at once and angels cry out his own psalms back at him before he can speak.
Jacob wrestles through the night over a forgotten tithe, a stolen blessing, and an angel whose first song waited since creation.
David received a crown before the angels, then learned on earth that the Ark could not ride where shoulders were commanded.
Enoch stood before God and was handed a reed. For thirty days and nights, Pravuil dictated all of creation, every star and soul, and Enoch wrote it down.
An angel pulled Enoch from seclusion to rule the earth. He taught 130 kings for 243 years. When God called him back, eight hundred thousand men watched him go.
He asked the angel for a name he could call on in trouble. The angel gave him a job description instead, and a sword, and an address.
Gabriel led Moses through Gehinnom (afterlife of judgment) first, then to Paradise, where two angels at the gate said something no living visitor had ever.
David rode out with four hundred armed men to wipe out one household. A woman met the column in the dark holding a lamp and a legal question.
Jonah bought a whole ship at Joppa so no one could turn it around. Every other boat that day had calm weather. Only his hit a wall of wind.
Hegai gave her seven attendants and Esther gave them names. Nobody in the palace heard anything strange in them. She was counting to the Sabbath.
Elijah never died. He was taken to heaven in a whirlwind and has moved between worlds ever since, present at every seder, every circumcision, every crossing.
Moses shaved him bald as part of a purification rite. Korah walked back through the camp and his own neighbors asked him who he was.
David hid at Adullam and decided the anointing had been a cheat. Samuel had poured oil on his head for nothing, and Saul was still coming.
The woman at Endor had never heard of Samuel. She called him up anyway, and the thing that came out of the ground told her whose king was in her house.
Two frauds sentenced to burn in Babylon gave the king a third name, the high priest's, hoping his merit would put the fire out for all three of them.
A stranger told Joseph where his brothers had gone. That stranger was Gabriel. The same angel stood in Pharaoh's court when Joseph needed a voice.
When Joseph revealed himself to his brothers in Egypt, the rabbis say the matriarchs were watching from above. His rise from the pit had a celestial audience.
Moses asked his brother to step into a cave with him. Inside was a made bed, a burning lamp, a table set with food, and angels standing in attendance.
He was twenty, out with the flocks, when the sky opened and an angel told him to come in. On the road home he found the shield lying there.
If my Torah had been among the ten generations before this, God told Shem, I suppose I would not have drowned the world. Go and ask the nations.
Two sisters, two brothers, and everyone in Haran knew which went with which. Leah heard what her half of the bargain was like and started weeping.
The sun went backward for Hezekiah. The Assyrian army died overnight outside Jerusalem. God had arranged everything. Then Hezekiah failed to sing.
Saul spared Agag and lost the throne. Solomon multiplied wives and gold for forty years and kept it. The rabbis traced the difference to a single word.
