Ronald Knox NINETEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME SUNDAY

Night Office - Monastic Lectionary of the Divine Office, 

 NINETEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

SUNDAY 2015

First Reading

2 Kings 4:38-44; 6:1-7

Responsorq     Sir 48:12-14

Throughout his life no ruler could make Elisha tremble, no one could lord it over him. t No task was too hard for him, and even in death his body prophesied.

V. In life he worked miracles; in death his deeds were marvelous. t No task ...

Second Reading

From A Retreat for Priests by Ronald Knox

Elisha asks for, and eventually obtains, a double portion of his master's spirit. It is in the power of that spirit that he returns to the sons of the prophets, clad with the mantle of Elijah, and is at once accepted by them as the successor of their master and his. Now, what made him ask for this double portion, for a higher measure of spiritual privileges than even Elijah himself had enjoyed? Surely because, in some way, he saw in front of him still more difficult work, a work which would need a higher degree of divine assistance if it was to be carried through successfully.

I think the difference you notice immediately between Elijah and Elisha, as you read their biographies one after the other in the books of Kings, is that Elijah is a free lance, a wandering prophet, appearing at one moment and disappearing the next, making his influence felt by sudden violent demonstrations; whereas Elisha lives a settled life, always at the disposal of anybody who wants to consult him, the habitual counselor of kings. In Elisha's time, the position of prophet seems to have become a fixed thing, an institution, a recognized feature of the national life. Elijah, when he is not being fed by ravens in the desert, is lodging with a poor widow at Sarepta, whereas Elisha lives in his own house, and sends his servant down to interview visitors at the door, instead of dealing with them himself. And when he goes on his travels, to Shunem, he is entertained by "a great woman" there, who persuades her husband to keep a guest room permanently at the prophet's disposal.

And, above all, these sons of the prophets whom we have already mentioned are continually recurring in Elisha's biogra­phy. Their houses, for they lived in community, seem to have been centers or seminaries of prophetic inspiration scattered up and down the country; and although they existed before his time, it is clear that Elisha was constantly in touch with them, a sort of Father Provincial whom they must forever be consulting. At one place they want to extend their premises; they ask Elisha about it; one of them drops an axe into the water - ask Elisha; there is net enough food to go round - ask Elisha; or if the food is suspected of being poisoned - ask Elisha. And I believe it is generally thought by scholars that we owe to these prophetic schools the transmission, in great part, of the sacred records which have come down to us. Prophecy, instead of being an occasional phenomenon of the desert, has become the occupa­tion of a caste and the center of a kind of community life; in a word, the thing has become an institution.

And I sometimes wonder whether Elisha did not ask for a double portion of the grace which had rested upon Elijah pre­cisely for that reason; precisely because he saw that it is a harder work, really, keeping an institution alive once it is founded, than providing the inspiration which originates it. The founders of the great religious orders have been, in the main, people who kept things going by the inspiration of a personal influence during their lifetime, and left to somebody else, when they were gone, the difficult task of preserving their tradition and organ­izing the institution to which they had given birth. And even where the great founders have been great legislators as well, it is inevitable that fresh situations should arise, that the tradition should need to be interpreted afresh, the rule accommodated to contemporary needs. Something of its rugged simplicity will disappear in the process. And it is then that every institute must pray for a double portion of its founder's spirit.

Responsory     2 Kgs 2:15; Eph 2:20

The sons of the prophets who were at Jericho said: The spirit of Elijah has come to rest on Elisha. t And they came to meet him, and bowed to the ground before him.

 

Second Friends: C.S. Lewis and Ronald Knox in Conversation

Jun 2008

by Walter Hooper and Milton T. Walsh