1 Samuel 2

1Sa 2:1-11.

HANNAH'S

SONG IN

THANKFULNESS TO

GOD.

1. Hannah prayed, and said--Praise and prayer are inseparably

conjoined in Scripture

(Col 4:2;

1Ti 2:1).

This beautiful song was her tribute of thanks for the divine goodness

in answering her petition.

mine horn is exalted in the Lord--Allusion is here made to a

peculiarity in the dress of Eastern women about Lebanon, which seems to

have obtained anciently among the Israelite women, that of wearing a

tin or silver horn on the forehead, on which their veil is suspended.

Wives, who have no children, wear it projecting in an oblique

direction, while those who become mothers forthwith raise it a few

inches higher, inclining towards the perpendicular, and by this slight

but observable change in their headdress, make known, wherever they go,

the maternal character which they now bear.

5. they that were hungry ceased--that is, to hunger.

the barren hath born seven--that is, many children.

6. he bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up--that is, He

reduces to the lowest state of degradation and misery, and restores to

prosperity and happiness.

8. He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar

from the dunghill--The dunghill, a pile of horse, cow, or camel offal,

heaped up to dry in the sun, and used as fuel, was, and is, one of the

common haunts of the poorest mendicants; and the change that had been

made in the social position of Hannah, appeared to her grateful heart

as auspicious and as great as the elevation of a poor despised beggar

to the highest and most dignified rank.

inherit the throne of glory--that is, possesses seats of honor.

10. the Lord shall judge the ends of the earth . . . exalt the horn of

his anointed--This is the first place in Scripture where the word

"anointed," or Messiah, occurs; and as there was no king in Israel at

the time, it seems the best interpretation to refer it to Christ. There

is, indeed, a remarkable resemblance between the song of Hannah and

that of Mary

(Lu 1:46).

11. the child did minister unto the Lord before Eli the priest--He

must have been engaged in some occupation suited to his tender age, as

in playing upon the cymbals, or other instruments of music; in lighting

the lamps, or similar easy and interesting services.

1Sa 2:12-17.

THE

SIN OF

ELl'S

SONS.

12. Now the sons of Eli were sons of Belial--not only careless and

irreligious, but men loose in their actions, and vicious and scandalous

in their habits. Though professionally engaged in sacred duties, they

were not only strangers to the power of religion in the heart, but they

had thrown off its restraints, and even ran, as is sometimes done in

similar cases by the sons of eminent ministers, to the opposite extreme

of reckless and open profligacy.

13-17. the priests' custom with the people--When persons wished to

present a sacrifice of peace offering on the altar, the offering was

brought in the first instance to the priest, and as the Lord's part was

burnt, the parts appropriated respectively to the priests and offerers

were to be sodden. But Eli's sons, unsatisfied with the breast and

shoulder, which were the perquisites appointed to them by the divine

law

(Ex 29:27;

Le 7:31, 32),

not only claimed part of the offerer's share, but rapaciously seized

them previous to the sacred ceremony of heaving or waving (see on

Le 7:29);

and moreover they committed the additional injustice of taking up with

their fork those portions which they preferred, while still raw. Pious

people revolted at such rapacious and profane encroachments on the dues

of the altar, as well as what should have gone to constitute the family

and social feast of the offerer. The truth is, the priests having

become haughty and unwilling in many instances to accept invitations to

those feasts, presents of meat were sent to them; and this, though done

in courtesy at first, being, in course of time, established into a

right, gave rise to all the rapacious keenness of Eli's sons.

1Sa 2:18-26.

SAMUEL'S

MINISTRY.

18. But Samuel ministered before the Lord, being a child--This

notice of his early services in the outer courts of the tabernacle was

made to pave the way for the remarkable prophecy regarding the high

priest's family.

girded with a linen ephod--A small shoulder-garment or apron, used in

the sacred service by the inferior priests and Levites; sometimes also

not a Levite, was devoted to God from his birth.

19. his mother made him a little coat, and brought it to him from year

to year--Aware that he could not yet render any useful service to the

tabernacle, she undertook the expense of supplying him with wearing

apparel. All weaving stuffs, manufacture of cloth, and making of suits

were anciently the employment of women.

20. Eli blessed Elkanah and his wife--This blessing, like that which

he had formerly pronounced, had a prophetic virtue; which, before long,

appeared in the increase of Hannah's family

(1Sa 2:21),

and the growing qualifications of Samuel for the service of the

sanctuary.

22-24. the women that assembled at the door of the tabernacle--This

was an institution of holy women of a strictly ascetic order, who had

relinquished worldly cares and devoted themselves to the Lord; an

institution which continued down to the time of Christ

(Lu 2:37).

Eli was, on the whole, a good man, but lacking in the moral and

religious training of his family. He erred on the side of parental

indulgence; and though he reprimanded them (see on

De 21:18),

yet, from fear or indolence, he shrank from laying on them the

restraints, or subjecting them to the discipline, their gross

delinquencies called for. In his judicial capacity, he winked at their

flagrant acts of maladministration and suffered them to make reckless

encroachments on the constitution, by which the most serious injuries

were inflicted both on the rights of the people and the laws of

God.

25. they hearkened not unto the voice of their father, because--it

should be therefore.

the Lord would slay them--It was not God's preordination, but their

own wilful and impenitent disobedience which was the cause of their

destruction.

1Sa 2:27-35.

A

PROPHECY AGAINST

ELI'S

HOUSE.

27. there came a man of God unto Eli, and said . . . that there shall not

be an old man in thine house--So much importance has always, in the

East, been attached to old age, that it would be felt to be a great

calamity, and sensibly to lower the respectability of any family which

could boast of few or no old men. The prediction of this prophet was

fully confirmed by the afflictions, degradation, poverty, and many

untimely deaths with which the house of Eli was visited after its

announcement (see

1Sa 4:11;

14:3; 22:18-23;

1Ki 2:27).

31. I will cut off thine arm, and the arm of thy father's house--By

the withdrawal of the high priesthood from Eleazar, the elder of

Aaron's two sons (after Nadab and Abihu were destroyed,

[Nu 3:4]),

that dignity had been conferred on the family of Ithamar, to which Eli

belonged, and now that his descendants had forfeited the honor, it was

to be taken from them and restored to the elder branch.

32. thou shalt see an enemy in my habitation--A successful rival for

the office of high priest shall rise out of another family

(2Sa 15:35;

1Ch 24:3; 29:22).

But the marginal reading, "thou shalt see the affliction of the

tabernacle," seems to be a preferable translation.