Lebanon

Zarephath

Meaning
Zarephath, also called Sarepta in some translations of the Old Testament, has a name linked to the Hebrew verb for smelting or refining metals, likely because of a Phoenician foundry located there. It is remembered in the Bible as the place where Elijah was sustained by a foreign widow during the great drought in Israel.
About the place

Zarephath was a small Phoenician coastal city between Tyre and Sidon. In the Bible, it appears mainly as the place where God sent the prophet Elijah during a great drought in Israel.

There, a poor foreign widow took the prophet in, and God multiplied the little flour and oil she had left. Later, when her son died, Elijah prayed and the boy came back to life.

Centuries later, Jesus cited this episode in a synagogue in Nazareth, recalling that Elijah was sent to a foreign widow, and not to any widow in Israel. The event became an ancient sign that God’s grace also reaches those outside the covenant people.

Key verses

“Go at once to Zarephath in the region of Sidon and stay there. I have directed a widow there to supply you with food.”

1 Kings 17:9

For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘The jar of flour will not be used up and the jug of oil will not run dry until the day the Lord sends rain on the land.’”

1 Kings 17:14

Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon.

Luke 4:26

What happened here

The flour and oil that did not run out

Elijah asks a widow in Zarephath for food during the famine. She obeys, and the household’s flour and oil do not run out for as long as the drought lasts.

1 Kings 17:8-16

The widow’s son is raised to life

The widow’s son becomes ill and dies. Elijah prays over the boy, and the Lord restores his life, confirming that Elijah was a man of God.

1 Kings 17:17-24
People linked to this place
E

Elijah

Stayed with the widow during the drought

T

The widow of Zarephath

Welcomed Elijah and received multiplied flour and oil

T

The widow’s son

Died and was raised to life by Elijah

Books where it appears

1 Kings

Recounts Elijah’s stay in the widow’s home

Luke

Jesus cites the account of the widow of Zarephath in Nazareth

Obadiah

Mentions Zarephath as a boundary of the territory to be resettled by the exiles

The place today
The place today

Zarephath is identified with modern Sarafand in southern Lebanon, on the coast between the cities of Sidon and Tyre. Twentieth-century archaeological excavations confirmed the site, with inscriptions bearing the name of the ancient Phoenician city itself.

Lebanon today is a largely Muslim country, with a historic Christian minority and a small evangelical presence. Pray for this nation, that the same God who sustained the foreign widow of Zarephath may continue opening doors for the gospel there.

Pray for this nation today: Líbano

Other places

Biblical place

Cana