After Elisha's death in old age and his burial near Samaria, raiding bands of Moabites came regularly into the land of Israel at the spring of the year. As a group of Israelites was burying one of their dead, they saw such a raiding band and quickly threw the body they were burying into the open tomb of Elisha — fleeing for their own lives. The body of the man touched the bones of Elisha; he revived and stood upon his feet.
This brief, almost throwaway closing notice to the Elisha cycle (2 Kings 13:20–21) is foundational for the scriptural theology of relics — a dead body touching the holy bones of a man of God is brought to life. The episode is among the most-cited Old Testament texts in the Catholic and Orthodox theology of the cult of relics.