Commentaria in III Regum
Moreover all these things were done by Angels, as ministers of God, as the Apostle says, Hebrews 1:14. Whence the Chaldee translates: Behold the glory of the Lord is revealed, and before it was an army of Angels of winds breaking the mountains, and shattering the rocks before the Lord: the majesty of the Lord was not in the army of the Angels of the wind, and after the army of the Angels of the wind was an army of Angels of commotion (raising the earthquake): the majesty of the Lord was not in the army of the Angels of commotion: and after the army of commotion, an army of Angels of fire: the majesty of the Lord was not in the army of the Angels of fire: and after the army of the Angels of fire, the voice of those singing in silence, as though soothing the grieving and troubled mind of Elias.
Symbolically, this vision signified the nature and majesty of God, which is not wind, nor earth, nor fire, nor any other body, but a most subtle, most gentle and most pure spirit. This appearance of God was therefore as it were a “scintillation of divinity,” as Tertullian says, which extorts reverence for itself from us. Again, the disposition of God is here signified, to which gentleness and clemency are proper. God thunders, lightens, flashes, shakes the mountains, but He does this in a manner unwillingly and “touched with sorrow of heart within,” because it is His property to have mercy and to spare; and therefore He is said not to dwell in the whirlwind and fire, because these sound something horrible and importunate to human interests, but in the gentle air, which recreates and refreshes the labouring spirit, says Sanchez from Theodoret, etc. So also St. Gregory, book 5 of the Morals, chapter 26, whose words I shall presently recite.
Allegorically, it was represented that the spirit of Christ the Saviour coming into the world would be different from, and opposed to, the spirit of Moses, Elias and the old law. For God on Horeb, or Sinai, giving the law to Moses, caused thunders to be heard, lightnings to flash, fires to gleam, the mountain to tremble, Exodus 19 and 20, to strike the hard Jews with fear of Himself and of His law. The same did Elias here, when through him he wished to restore the violated law and His worship. But when the Son of God came down into flesh, He came in the spirit of gentleness and meekness, according to that of Isaias 42:2, which St. Matthew cites, chapter 12:19: “He shall not contend, nor cry out, neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets. The bruised reed he shall not break, and smoking flax he shall not extinguish.” Whence, when John and James wished Christ, like Elias, to hurl fires and thunderbolts from heaven on the Samaritans who would not receive Him, He restrained them, and said: “You know not of what spirit you are. The Son of man came not to destroy souls, but to save,” Luke 9:55. So St. Irenaeus, book 4, chapter 37: “The coming of the Lord,” he says, “after the law which was given by Moses, was signified as mild and tranquil, and the mild and gentle rest of His kingdom.” And Rupert: “The end was not in the various captivities of the Jews, the Messias had not yet come; but in the spirit of the gentle air, that is hidden and secret, was His coming, whom the Virgin Mary conceived as it were of the gentle air, that is of the Holy Spirit.” This spirit of gentleness Christ commended and impressed upon St. Peter, Paul and the other Apostles and the faithful. Whence this is the spirit of the law of grace and of the New Testament, which is far more powerful and efficacious than the spirit of fear and terror of the Old Testament. To this tends the fable of the strongest wind, the East wind, contending with the sun which of the two was more powerful, namely which could strip a traveller of his cloak. The East wind did not strip him; nay, the traveller, the wind blowing, wrapped himself the more in his cloak, to resist the wind; but the sun, by its ardour and heat, drawing sweat from him, wrested it from him: in like manner gentleness is stronger, can do more than violence; love than fear, ardour than terror. Blessed Peter Damian relates this fable more fully, book 1, epistle 16, to Pope Alexander II, and adds: “If Roboam, yielding to the counsels of the old men, had answered the people mildly, he would have subjected all Israel to his lawful rule; but because he trusted the pride of his contemporaries, ten tribes being divided from him, he made the lofty power of the kingdom lowly. The rhinoceros also, which with swift agility despises the raging mouths of pursuing dogs, is not afraid to be taken in the lap of a gentle virgin.”
Moreover St. Gregory, book 5 of the Morals, chapter 25, explaining that of Job 4: “And I heard the voice as of a gentle air:” “What,” he says, “is designated by the voice of a gentle air but the knowledge of the Holy Spirit. Who nevertheless, coming upon the Apostles, is shown by an outward sound as by a vehement one, when it is said: There came suddenly a sound from heaven, as of a mighty wind coming. For the Holy Spirit, when He imparts Himself to the knowledge of human weakness, is expressed both by the sound of a vehement wind and by the voice of a gentle air, because in coming He is both vehement and gentle; gentle, because He tempers His knowledge to our senses so far as it can in any way be known; vehement, because, however much He tempers it, by His coming He disturbs by enlightening the blindness of our weakness.”
Tropologically there is signified here, first, the manner in which God exercises and disposes penitents and those zealous for perfection, to bring them to perfection and to His familiarity. For first He terrifies them with the terror of death, judgment and hell, as with a very strong wind, with earthquake and fire, pricks them, draws tears, and then as a gentle air soothes them, adopts them, refreshes them, and lifts them to the high summit of contemplation. Hear St. Gregory, Morals 5, chapter 26: “The wind before the Lord overthrows the mountains and breaks the rocks, because the fear which rushes in at His coming both casts down the height of our heart and melts its hardness; but the Lord is said not to be in the wind of commotion, and in the fire; yet it is not denied that He is in the whistling of a gentle air. Because, namely, when the mind is suspended in the sublimity of contemplation, whatever it is able to see perfectly is not God. But when it sees something subtle, this is what belongs to the incomprehensible substance of eternity. For we perceive as it were the whistling of a gentle air when by sudden contemplation of the unbounded truth we taste its savour.”
God did the same for Elias, when, after the terrors, struggles and fights with the Baalites, He took him up in a fiery chariot into heaven, where he enjoys the gentle air, that is full peace of mind and body. In like manner, therefore, let him who is agitated by temptations not lose heart; but let him know that “the spirit of a gentle air” will follow, that is consolation, quiet and joy.
Second, there is handed down here, says Sanchez, a form for apostolic men and Prelates, to be observed in correcting or punishing transgressors of the divine law; namely that they imitate those things which are most violent in nature, the wind, that shakes and overthrows mountains, and fire, that consumes and scatters all things, and that with incredible swiftness, and not assume the sweetness of the gentle and cooling air until they see God arrive, whom they precede as it were road-makers and forerunners to prepare lodging, wind, commotion, fire.
13. AND WHEN ELIAS HEARD IT.—For he heard the wind roaring mightily, the earthquake shaking the place, the gentle air whistling; the fire he partly heard, as crackling, and partly saw, as shining.
HE COVERED HIS FACE WITH HIS MANTLE,—to show reverence to God showing Himself by these signs, as though unworthy to look upon Him and behold Him.
14. THEY HAVE SLAIN THY PROPHETS WITH THE SWORD (because they opposed the worship of Baal), I ALONE AM LEFT (a prophet and zealot of true religion, who strongly oppose it), AND THEY SEEK MY LIFE,—to kill me; I being slain, therefore, no prophet will remain, no zealot to defend Thy worship and oppose the Baalites. It is done, therefore, with true religion, with Thy worship, with the whole Synagogue; the impious Jezabel seizes all things; Baal is worshipped everywhere; everywhere perfidy and idolatry overflow. This is the cause of my grief and sorrow, of my flight and exile, so that I desire to die rather than live, and to see such great evils of my nation and the people of God. So spoke Elias, worn out with sorrow, anger and zeal.