Prophet Elisha

No fixed feast day in the calendar

Prophet Elisha: the back of the card, with its short story, lesson and a QR code that opens it in the Catholic Information app. The full text is below.

Flip the card and scan the QR code on the back to open it in the app

Elisha, the disciple who received the prophet Elijah’s cloak and worked many miracles of mercy.

Who is he?

Elisha is a prophet of Israel, a disciple of the prophet Elijah. His name means “God saves”. The Bible often calls him “the man of God”, because through him God showed his mercy to many people.

Life story

He was plowing a field with twelve pairs of oxen when the prophet Elijah passed by and threw his cloak over him (cf. 1 Kgs 19:19). That was the sign of God’s call. He said goodbye to his parents and then followed his master to serve him (cf. 1 Kgs 19:20-21).

When he knew his master was about to be taken away, he would not leave his side for a moment. His master told him to ask for something, and he said: “May I receive a double portion of your spirit” (2 Kgs 2:9). Then he saw his master go up to heaven in a whirlwind. He picked up the cloak that had fallen from his master and went back to the bank of the Jordan River (cf. 2 Kgs 2:11-13).

Through him, God did many good things. A poor widow was about to have her two sons taken as slaves by a man she owed money to, and she had only one jar of oil left in the house. Elisha told her to borrow as many empty jars as she could; the oil kept flowing until every borrowed jar was full, and she sold the oil to pay her debt (cf. 2 Kgs 4:1-7). He prayed, and the son of a family who often welcomed him was brought back to life (cf. 2 Kgs 4:32-37). Twenty barley loaves fed a hundred people, with some left over (cf. 2 Kgs 4:42-44).

Naaman, a foreign general who had leprosy (a disease that causes sores on the skin), came to ask Elisha to heal him. Elisha told him to go down and plunge into the Jordan River seven times. He obeyed, and “his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child” (2 Kgs 5:14). Naaman wanted to give him gifts, but Elisha accepted nothing (cf. 2 Kgs 5:16). Jesus himself recalled this story (cf. Lk 4:27).

Why does the Church honor him?

He was a humble disciple, faithful to his master to the very end, and he used the gifts God gave him to serve others, not for his own gain. The Church honors the patriarchs and the prophets as saints (cf. CCC 61). The Roman Martyrology remembers him on June 14.

A lesson for you

Learn humbly from your parents, your teachers and those older than you, as Elisha learned from his master Elijah.
When you are given a task, do it with all your heart, without asking for a reward.
Pray for the sick and the poor, and trust that God always takes care of them in his own way.

Identifying marks

His master Elijah’s cloak: when his master was taken up to heaven, Elisha picked up the cloak that fell and carried on his mission (cf. 2 Kgs 2:13).
A staff: the staff of the “man of God”; he once sent his servant ahead with the staff to the house of a mother whose child had died (cf. 2 Kgs 4:29).
A bald head: the Bible tells how a group of children mocked him, calling him “baldhead” (cf. 2 Kgs 2:23).
The Jordan River: he struck the water with the cloak and it parted, and he healed Naaman of leprosy when Naaman plunged into the river (cf. 2 Kgs 2:14; 5:14).

The text on this page is the card in the Catholic Information app, word for word.