Why does the man of God first refuse food in Bethel, then return to eat?

Atlas of Saints · Chapter summary

He refuses because the Lord has forbidden him to eat bread, drink water there or return by the same route. An old prophet later claims an angel has ordered him to bring the man home to eat and drink. That claim deceives him, and he returns and eats.

Chapter breakdown

A man of God comes from Juda to Bethel by the Lord’s word while Jeroboam stands on the altar burning incense. He speaks against the altar: the Lord says a child named Josias will be born to David’s house, sacrifice on it the high-place priests who now burn incense there, and burn human bones on it. He gives a sign that day that the Lord has spoken: the altar will split and its ashes pour out. Hearing him, Jeroboam stretches his hand from the altar and orders him seized. His hand withers so he cannot draw it back. The altar splits and the ashes pour out as the man of God’s sign said.

Jeroboam asks the man of God to entreat the Lord his God and pray for his hand’s restoration. He does, and the hand is restored as before. The king invites him home to dine and receive presents. The man refuses: even half the king’s house would not make him go, eat bread or drink water there. He explains the Lord’s command against eating bread, drinking water or returning by his original route. He leaves by another way.

An old prophet lives in Bethel. His sons tell him all the man of God did that day and what he said to the king. He asks which way he went, and they show him. He orders his ass saddled, rides after him and finds him seated under a turpentine tree. He asks whether he is the man of God from Juda; the man says he is. The old prophet invites him home for bread. The man repeats that he must not return or go with him, eat bread or drink water there, because of the Lord’s command, including not returning by the same route. The old man claims to be a prophet like him and says an angel told him in the Lord’s word to bring him home for bread and water. The account says he deceives him.

Challoner’s separate note says the old man really was a prophet, but sinned by deceiving the man of God, especially because he pretended a revelation for his action.

The old prophet brings the man back, and he eats bread and drinks water in his house. At the table the Lord’s word comes to the prophet who brought him back. He declares to the man from Juda that because he has disobeyed the Lord’s command, returned and eaten and drunk in the forbidden place, his body will not be brought into his fathers’ tomb.

After the meal, an ass is saddled for the prophet brought back. On his way a lion finds and kills him. His body lies in the road, with the ass and lion standing beside it.

Challoner’s separate note says the Lord often punishes his servants here so he may spare them hereafter. It says most theologians are of the opinion that this prophet’s sin, considered with all its circumstances, was not mortal.

Passersby see the body in the road and the lion beside it and report it in the old prophet’s city. Hearing this, the prophet says it is the disobedient man of God, delivered by the Lord to the lion, torn and killed according to the word spoken to him. He has his sons saddle an ass and goes out. He finds the body, ass and lion together; the lion has not eaten the body or hurt the ass. He lays the man’s body on the ass and brings it back to his city for mourning.

The old prophet places the body in his own tomb, and they mourn the man as their brother. After mourning he tells his sons to bury him in the same tomb when he dies, laying his bones beside the man of God’s bones. He says the word foretold against Bethel’s altar and all the high-place temples in Samaria’s cities will surely come to pass.

After these words Jeroboam does not turn back from his wicked way. He continues making priests of the high places from the meanest people: whoever wishes has his hand filled and is made a priest. The chapter says that for this cause Jeroboam’s house sins and is cut off and destroyed from the earth.

The story inside

The man’s word against the altar is accompanied by a stated sign, Jeroboam’s withered hand and its restoration through prayer. He refuses the king’s invitation because of the Lord’s command and leaves by another route. The old prophet hears through his sons, follows him and overcomes the same refusal with a false claim about an angel. At their meal the Lord’s word names the disobedience and exclusion from the fathers’ tomb. The lion kills the traveler but neither eats him nor harms the ass. The old prophet recovers and buries him, requests a future burial beside him and affirms the word against the altars. Jeroboam’s continued priestmaking and the causal statement about his house close the chapter. The two notes separately address the deceiver’s sin and a qualified theological opinion about the dead man’s sin.

Lessons worth keeping

1
The man of God repeats the same prohibition to both hosts. He rejects the king’s invitation even at the proposed value of half his house, then repeats the command to the old prophet. The old prophet’s claimed angelic message is explicitly called deception, after which the man returns to eat and drink.
2
The lion account distinguishes killing from eating. The man is killed and the old prophet says he was torn, but the body is not eaten and the ass is not hurt. Calling the body unharmed or uncorrupted would erase that distinction. Challoner’s opinion about the sin remains an attributed opinion.
3
The old prophet’s burial request follows his mourning and affirmation that the word will come to pass. He asks for his bones to lie beside the man’s when he dies; this is not described as a deathbed scene. The chapter then says Jeroboam continues his wicked way and connects his priestmaking to his house’s destruction.

Test your recall

What false claim leads the man of God to return for bread and water, and what disobedience does the later word at the table identify?

Source edition and notes

Douay–Rheims, revised by Richard Challoner (1749–1752). Project Gutenberg no. 1581. Locators refer to lines in the admitted pg1581.txt edition. Source notes may include Challoner commentary.

Lines 36462–36491
3 Kings Chapter 13 A prophet sent from Juda to Bethel foretelleth the birth of Josias, and the destruction of Jeroboam’s altar. Jeroboam’s hand offering violence to the prophet withereth, but is restored by the prophet’s prayer: the same prophet is deceived by another prophet, and slain by a lion. 13:1. And behold there came a man of God out of Juda, by the word of the Lord, to Bethel, when Jeroboam was standing upon the altar, and burning incense. 13:2. And he cried out against the altar in the word of the Lord, and said: O altar, altar, thus saith the Lord: Behold a child shall be born to the house of David, Josias by name, and he shall immolate upon thee the priests of the high places, who now burn incense upon thee, and he shall burn men’s bones upon thee. 13:3. And he gave a sign the same day, saying: This shall be the sign, that the Lord hath spoken: Behold the altar shall be rent, and the ashes that are upon it, shall be poured out. 13:4. And when the king had heard the word of the man of God, which he had cried out against the altar in Bethel, he stretched forth his hand from the altar, saying: Lay hold on him. And his hand which he stretched forth against him, withered: and he was not able to draw it back again to him. 13:5. The altar also was rent, and the ashes were poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of God had given before in the word of the Lord.
Lines 36493–36510
13:6. And the king said to the man of God: Entreat the face of the Lord thy God, and pray for me, that my hand may be restored to me. And the man of God besought the face of the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored to him, and it became as it was before. 13:7. And the king said to the man of God: Come home with me to dine, and I will make thee presents. 13:8. And the man of God answered the king: If thou wouldst give me half thy house, I will not go with thee, nor eat bread, nor drink water in this place: 13:9. For so it was enjoined me by the word of the Lord commanding me: Thou shalt not eat bread, nor drink water, nor return by the same way that thou camest. 13:10. So he departed by another way, and returned not by the way that he came into Bethel.
Lines 36512–36539
13:11. Now a certain old prophet dwelt in Bethel, and his sons came to him, and told him all the works that the man of God had done that day in Bethel: and they told their father the words which he had spoken to the king. 13:12. And their father said to them: What way went he? His sons shewed him the way by which the man of God went, who came out of Juda. 13:13. And he said to his sons: Saddle me the ass. And when they had saddled it, he got up, 13:14. And went after the man of God, and found him sitting under a turpentine tree: and he said to him: Art thou the man of God who camest from Juda? He answered: I am. 13:15. And he said to him: Come home with me to eat bread. 13:16. But he said: I must not return, nor go with thee, neither will I eat bread, or drink water in this place: 13:17. Because the Lord spoke to me, in the word of the Lord, saying: Thou shalt not eat bread, and thou shalt not drink water there, nor return by the way thou wentest. 13:18. He said to him: I also am a prophet like unto thee: and an angel spoke to me, in the word of the Lord, saying: Bring him back with thee into thy house, that he may eat bread, and drink water. He deceived him,
Lines 36541–36543
An angel spoke to me, etc.... This old man of Bethel was indeed a prophet, but he sinned in thus deceiving the man of God; the more because he pretended a revelation for what he did.
Lines 36545–36559
13:19. And brought him back with him: so he ate bread, and drank water in his house. 13:20. And as they sat at table, the word of the Lord came to the prophet that brought him back: 13:21. And he cried out to the man of God who came out of Juda, saying: Thus saith the Lord: Because thou hast not been obedient to the Lord, and hast not kept the commandment which the Lord thy God commanded thee, 13:22. And hast returned, and eaten bread, and drunk water in the place wherein he commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat bread, nor drink water, thy dead body shall not be brought into the sepulchre of thy fathers.
Lines 36561–36566
13:23. And when he had eaten and drunk, he saddled his ass for the prophet, whom he had brought back. 13:24. And when he was gone, a lion found him in the way, and killed him, and his body was cast in the way: and the ass stood by him, and the lion stood by the dead body.
Lines 36568–36571
Killed him.... Thus the Lord often punishes his servants here, that he may spare them hereafter. For the generality of divines are of opinion, that the sin of this prophet, considered with all its circumstances, was not mortal.
Lines 36573–36592
13:25. And behold, men passing by, saw the dead body cast in the way, and the lion standing by the body. And they came and told it in the city, wherein that old prophet dwelt. 13:26. And when that prophet, who had brought him back out of the way, heard of it, he said: It is the man of God, that was disobedient to the mouth of the Lord, and the Lord hath delivered him to the lion, and he hath torn him, and killed him, according to the word of the Lord, which he spoke to him. 13:27. And he said to his sons: Saddle me an ass. And when they had saddled it, 13:28. And he was gone, he found the dead body cast in the way, and the ass and the lion standing by the carcass: the lion had not eaten of the dead body, nor hurt the ass. 13:29. And the prophet took up the body of the man of God, and laid it upon the ass, and going back brought it into the city of the old prophet, to mourn for him.
Lines 36594–36604
13:30. And he laid his dead body in his own sepulchre: and they mourned over him, saying: Alas! alas, my brother. 13:31. And when they had mourned over him, he said to his sons: When I am dead, bury me in the sepulchre wherein the man of God is buried: lay my bones beside his bones. 13:32. For assuredly the word shall come to pass which he hath foretold in the word of the Lord, against the altar that is in Bethel: and against all the temples of the high places, that are in the cities of Samaria.
Lines 36606–36612
13:33. After these words, Jeroboam came not back from his wicked way: but on the contrary, he made of the meanest of the people priests of the high places: whosoever would, he filled his hand, and he was made a priest of the high places. 13:34. And for this cause did the house of Jeroboam sin, and was cut off, and destroyed from the face of the earth.