Elijah’s taunt is that Baal was acting in a merely human manner. He uses terms known to the people from the Ugaritic Baal myths. Was the god musing on the action to take (deep in thought)? Had he gone aside to answer the call of nature (so Targum; NEB ‘engaged’; NIV, after LXX, busy) or had he left on a journey with Phoenician merchants? Was Baal asleep as Yahweh was not (Ps. 121:3–4)? The practice of self-inflicted wounds to arouse a deity’s pity or response is attested in Ugarit when men ‘bathed in their own blood like an ecstatic prophet’.³⁰ In mourning this was forbidden to the Hebrews (Lev. 19:28; Deut. 14:1). Baal’s priests acted like ecstatic prophets (v. 29, NIV, frantic prophesying; better RSV ‘ranted and raved’). This rare form of the verb (Heb. hitnabbē’) is used of mad actions (cf. 2 Kgs 9:11; Jer. 29:26). The fact that there is no response indicates Baal’s impotence (Jer. 10:5).
Simon J. De Vries (Word Biblical Commentary):
MT adds the scurrilous gloss, “and perhaps he is defecating.”
“Elijah . . . ridicule[d]”: Heb. This is the sole biblical occurrence of the word, but its meaning is evident from the context (see the LXX). “Call in a loud voice”—the same as above, only more so. “He is musing (Heb . . . gone aside (Heb . . . gone on a journey.” The interpretation is somewhat conjectural. It is tempting to go along with some Jewish exegetes in taking this as a racy, sly sarcasm meaning “busy at the privy.” “He is asleep and needs to be awakened”: various ancient religions conceived of their gods going to sleep at night—but this is noonday!
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