THE PROPHET'S FLIGHT FROM JEZEBEL
FRIDAY, TENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME
1 Kings 19:9,11-16; Ps 27:7-9,13-14;
Mt 5:27-32
The Flight of the Prophet to the Mountain
of God
After
the prophet Elijah had executed the 450 prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, he
had to deal with the wrath of Jezebel, the queen of Israel. Because those
prophets were servants of the queen, whose father was the priest of Baal and
king of Tyre, she vowed to avenge their death on the prophet Elijah. Her threat
made Elijah run for his dear life to the mountain of God in search of God.
Though the prophet Elijah had just performed a mighty feat by calling down fire
from heaven before all the people of Israel, won back the allegiance of the
people who were vacillating between God and Baal, and slaughtered the 450
prophets of Baal, he was weak before the threat of Jezebel, the wife of Ahab.
Knowing her to be ruthless and determined, he fled to the mountain of God. His
flight before the sworn threat of Jezebel teaches us a lot; there are battles
we win by flight rather than by open confrontation. Our Lord throws more light
on such battles in the gospel. “You have learnt how it was said: You must not
commit adultery. But I say this to you: if a man looks at a woman lustfully, he
has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Our Lord seemingly
extended the definition of adultery to include a lustful look at a woman or a
man, as the case may be, to safeguard us from the destructive force of
immorality.
The
purpose is to help us fight better and win the battle against impurity and
unchastity of every form. We refer back to the flight of the prophet Elijah
from Jezebel. The prophet understood that Jezebel had a home advantage of being
the queen. As such, she had charge of the home-based force that Elijah could
not overcome, given the religious condition of the people and their idolatrous
allegiance to Baal, a religion propagated by Jezebel, the queen herself. Though
Elijah had defeated and slaughtered the 450 prophets of Baal, the people of
Israel were still emotionally, politically, and socially attached to Baal.
Hence, Jezebel still had the upper hand everywhere in Israel. The prophet
Elijah made the right decision to flee from her to the mountain of God. This
analysis applies well to the case of various forms of immorality, represented
by fornication. Our fallen nature retains the weakness inflicted by the
original sin on us. Because sexual energy is one of the most basic natural
forces corrupted by the fall of Adam and Eve, the best tactic to combat the sin
of immorality or impurity is never confrontational. The only advantage we have
in fighting these sexual sins is early detection and avoidance of
confrontation. The Lord teaches in the gospel that it is sinful to expose
ourselves to occasions of sins of immorality. It is difficult to overcome the
forces of lust when they erupt. They push reason aside and destroy virtues long
cultivated. These destructive forces are mighty wind, earthquake, and fire from
which Elijah hid on the holy mountain.
These
are symbolic representations of different forms of devastation immorality can
cause in a soul. The Lord understood the seriousness of these consequences and
advised us strictly. “If your right eye should cause you to sin, tear it out
and throw it away; for it will do you less harm to lose one part of you than to
have your whole body thrown into hell. And if your right hand should cause you
to sin, cut it off and throw it away; for it will do you less harm to lose one
part of you than to have your whole body go to hell.” These are serious
warnings considering the usefulness of an eye and a hand. Joined to the Lord's
redefinition of fornication, we understand that we must spare nothing in our
flight from the sin of immorality; we are to suffer every earthly inconvenience
that will help us win the fierce battle for purity. The fight is about our
entrance into the kingdom of heaven because purity is the key to holiness,
without which no eye shall see God. Recall that the pure of heart are blessed
because they shall see God, as proclaimed by the Lord earlier in his sermon on
the mountain. The advance of lust in a soul blight the flowers of devotion
supported by holy purity with its hellish fire and uproot the straight trees of
uprightness and holy virtues by its wind and quake. Because these trees of
virtues and the flowers of holy devotions take a lot of heavenly graces and
spiritual care to grow, the Lord advised we plug our right eye and cut our
right hand to safeguard them. We recommend no better weapon against Jezebel and
her home-based forces than imitation of the holy prophet’s flight to the
mountain of God, that is, the humanity of Jesus Christ. No prayer works better
than the holy Rosary and the holy sacrifice of Mass. The Virgin Mary is a sure
refuge for her children against Jezebel, the woman of immorality who rules the
world.
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