Holy Wr*t! is a collection of irreverent and funny short stories (this one’s what the British call “droll”), reimagining the world of the Bible. Email subscribers get each new story delivered free. If you haven’t already, please sign up below!

📢 I wrote this piece two months ago, and I still think it’s hilarious commentary. There’s lots of fun stuff ahead, including heartwarming sagas, tales of strange magical libraries, and even a Babylonian steampunk love story. Stay tuned!

And [Elisha] went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, ‘Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.’

And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them.

— 2 Kings 2:23-24

God had taken Elisha aside for a quiet word. “Elisha, can I speak to you a minute?” said God. “It’s about the bears.”

“I feel bad about the bears,” Elisha said.

“And those forty-two kids,” said God.

“I feel real bad about those kids. Real bad.”

God could tell from Elisha’s face that he really did feel bad about it. God didn’t want to make the poor guy suffer. Just look at him, standing there. All squirmy and sad. Aww, hell. God hated putting the screws on him like this.

“All those little kids died, Elisha.”

“Yeah.”

“Because you cursed them. With she-bears, Elisha.”

“Yeah.” Elisha was looking at his shoes.

“What did we say about the she-bear curse, Elisha?”

“We said not to use it.”

“That’s right. We said not to use it.”

God looked at him some more. The man’s robes—hand-me-downs from his predecessor Elijah—were too big for him, not to mention they were on backwards. His Adam's apple pressed out like a thumb from the inside of his scrawny neck and jumped nervously when he swallowed. It was true he didn’t look good bald. Some men looked good bald, God decided. Elisha wasn’t one of them. He didn’t look good any way you looked at him.

“Well?” said God. It wasn’t really a question—more of a prompt for contrition.

Elisha missed the cue. “Those kids were being little shits, honest.” There was a whine in his voice. He looked up, plaintively.

Those kids were being little shits, thought God. From what he’d heard, they were pulling faces and jeering like crazy. Could you blame a guy for losing it a little in a situation like that? Plus, thought God, he’d given him a double portion of Elijah’s power. Maybe that was overdoing it a touch.

“Look Elisha,” God said, “this was only, what—your fourth miracle?”

“Third,” said Elisha.

“Third,” said God. “You’re just getting started. You’ve got a lot of good miracles ahead of you, I’m sure.”

“Yes,” said Elisha.

“It’s just that this sort of thing creates a lot of problems for me. Not just right now, but also later on, when people are writing commentaries and sermons and so forth.”

“What?” said Elisha.

“So see if you can work in some family-friendly miracles. Save some kids from a lifetime of servitude by kick-starting an artisanal olive oil business. Bring the fertility rate up and the child mortality rate down. If it’s all in the same family, that’s a two-for-one miracle. Make a leper’s skin as smooth as a baby’s bottom. These are all by way of example.”

“Uh huh.”

“We’ll get things back on track. Just go easy with the she-bears. In fact, no she-bears. Or any kind of bears. Or curses in general, unless you check with me first.”

“I promise,” said Elisha. “I can’t tell you how terrible I feel. It won’t happen again.”

Just as long as he felt bad about it, God thought. That was probably enough. Why take it out on him any more than that?

“We all make mistakes, Elisha,” said God, pleased that the conversation was now over. And after all, thought God, what are forty-two kids, in the grand scheme of things?”

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