Elisha and the mean kids from Bethel - Proving that God is the most badass of badasses

This one is more like a Sunday School lesson than normal

Elijah was this super badass Old Testament prophet. He worked in Israel in a time when most of the Hebrews had stopped worshiping Jehovah and were chillin’ with the Phoenician gods instead. He did cool stuff like making the calling down fire from heaven (flame strike, anyone? http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Flame_Strike) and making the rain stop for three and a half years to prove how much cooler Jehovah was than some dumb Phoenician god, that can’t kill people with fire from heaven or cause a draught that kills tons of unbelievers. The Mormon prophet Joseph Smith made sure the Mormons would forever think Elijah was cool by teaching that he was the last prophet to hold the Melchizedek priesthood before the time of Jesus Christ. He and Moses (also a murderer) gave the Melchizedek priesthood to Peter, James, and John, and then later to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery (another early Mormon leader).

After Elijah got old he went for a walk with his buddy Elisha. He turned over the mantle of prophet-hood to Elisha and climbed into a burning chariot that rode up a whirlwind into heaven. You know, like you do. In fact, I’m a little surprised that Joseph Smith didn’t ride a flaming chariot into heaven before they shot him. This whole flaming chariot thing reminds me of Helios a little http://www.theoi.com/Titan/Helios.html. It’s a good thing we know the OT is factual or I might be tempted to think they were just borrowing stuff from other mythologies.

Anyway, after Elisha became the new prophet he showed off a little by parting a river so he could walk across on dry land and throwing salt into a dried-up spring to make the water flow again. Then one day he was out walking and a bunch of kids saw him. They got really excited by how funny he looked and literally dozens of them ran out of their city (Bethel) to make fun of him for being bald. They said mean, hurtful things like “go up, thou bald head” and stuff. Well, Elisha wasn’t going to let people make fun of the prophet so he called upon the almighty and cursed those kids. Then two bears ran out of the woods and ripped 42 of the kids into pieces.

Elisha is also famous for telling the Israelites to cut down all the trees in Moab. That will teach those damn trees to mess with Israel.

Ref: 2 Kings 2:23-25