Texts · 20 · Jonah
Why is there no Book of Elijah?
Kings is full of stories about Elijah and Elisha and their followers. Yet no prophetic book bears their names, unlike Isaiah or Jeremiah.
Catastrophe created the need for prophetic books.
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Elisha's followers lose an ax head and build a bigger house, but never collect oracles. Words spoken to a particular crisis weren't relevant to later generations, until national defeat gave scribes reason to repurpose oracles of doom.
Bible reference: 2 Kings 6:1–7
Source: Why the Bible Began, pp. 319–320
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