John Lightfoot on Luke 4:25

[When the heavens were shut up three years and six months.] This number of three years and six months is much used both in the Holy Scriptures and in Jewish writings; concerning which we have more largely discoursed in another place. And although both in the one and the other it is not seldom used allusively only, yet in this place I can see no reason why it should not be taken according to the letter in its proper number, however indeed there will be no small difficulty to reduce it to its just account. That there was no rain for three years together, is evident enough from 1 Kings 17, &c.: but whence comes this addition of six months?

"Elijah said to Ahab, As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word; If there shall be these years." These words include three years at the least, because he saith, years in the plural, and not years in the dual.

And chapter 18, "The word of the Lord came to Elijah in the third year, saying, Go shew thyself unto Ahab, and I will send rain upon the earth." In the third year; where then shall we find the six months?

I. Doubtless both our Saviour and his apostle St. James, chapter 5 verse 17, in adding six months do speak according to the known and received opinion of that nation; which is also done elsewhere sometimes in historical matters in the New Testament.

St. Stephen tells us, Acts 7:16, that the bones of the twelve patriarchs were carried over from Egypt and buried in Sychem, when holy writ mentions only the bones and burial of Joseph: wherein he speaks according to the vulgar opinion of the nation.

Again, verse 30, he tells us that Moses was forty years old when he fled into the land of Midian, and that he tarried there forty years more, when Moses himself mentions nothing of the circumstance: this he speaks agreeably to the opinion of the people.

II. Neither our Saviour nor St. James says that Elijah shut up the heavens three years and six months; but Christ tells us, "That the heaven was shut up in the days of Elias three years and six months": and St. James, "That Elias prayed that it might not rain, and it rained not upon the earth by the space of three years and six months."

May I therefore have leave to distinguish in this manner? Elijah shut up the heaven for three years, that there might be no rain, as in the Book of Kings: and there was no rain for three years and a half, as our Saviour and St. James relate.

III. The words of Menander in Josephus may help a little towards the untying this knot: Menander also makes mention of this drought in the acts of Ithobalus, king of Tyre, saying, There was no rain from the month of October to the month of October the year following.

It is true he shortens the space of this drought by making it continue but one year; but however, having placed the beginning of it in the month of October, he gives us a key that opens us a way into things more inward and secret.

IV. Consider the distinction of the former and the latter rain, Deuteronomy 11:14; Jeremiah 5:24; Joel 2:23.

"The Rabbins deliver: the former is in the month Marchesvan; the latter in the month Nisan."

The Targumist in Joel 2:23: "Who hath given you the first rain in season and the latter in the month Nisan." See also our note upon chapter 2:8.

R. Solomon, upon Deuteronomy 11, differs a little; but we are not solicitous about the order, which should be the first, either that in the month Marchesvan, or that in the month Nisan: that which makes to our purpose is, that rains were at those stated times; and for the rest of the year generally there was no rain.

V. Those six months mentioned by our Saviour and St. James must be accounted before the beginning of the three years, and not tacked to the end of them, as is very evident from this, that it is said, "The third year Elijah shewed himself to Ahab," &c.

In the beginning therefore of those three years we believe Elijah shut up heaven upon the approach of that time wherein the rains were wont to fall in the month of Marchesvan, and opened heaven again the same month at the end of three years. Nor is it nothing that Menander speaks of the drought, taking its beginning in the month October, which in part answers to the Jews' Marchesvan: for consult that passage, chapter 18; "Ahab said unto Obadiah, Go into the land unto all the fountains of water, and unto all brooks: peradventure we may find grass to save the horses and mules alive." No one will say this search was made in the winter, but in the summer: not before or in the month Nisan, wherein the rains were wont to fall; for what hay or grass could be expected at that time? But when the year grew on to the summer, then was it a seasonable time to inquire after hay and grass. Reckon therefore the time of Ahab's and Obadiah's progress in this search: the time wherein Elijah and Obadiah meeting together, Ahab fell in with them: the time wherein the Israelites and the prophets of Baal were gathered together at mount Carmel; when Elijah sacrificed there, and the followers of Baal were killed: and certainly it will be more probable that the unlocking of the heavens and the fall of the rains happened in that usual and ordinary season, the month Marchesvan, than any other part of the year. Three years agone, in that month when the rains were expected, according to the common season of the year, Elijah shut heaven up that it should not rain; and now at the close of three years, when the season for those rains recurred, he unlocks the heavens and the rains fall abundantly.

VI. Now, go back from Marchesvan, the month wherein the prophet locked up heaven, to the month Nisan preceding, and those six months between, they were also without rain, according to the ordinary course of the year and climate. In the month Nisan it rained; the rest of the year to Marchesvan it was fair and held up: when that month came the rains were expected; but Elijah had shut the heavens up, and they remained shut up for the space of three years ensuing. So that though he did not shut up heaven above the space of three years, yet there was no rain for three years and six months.