1And Hannah will pray and say, My heart rejoiced in Jehovah, my horn was lifted up in Jehovah; my mouth was enlarged over mine enemies; for I was glad in thy salvation. 2None holy as Jehovah, for none beside thee: and no rock as our God. 3Ye shall not enlarge; will ye sproud, proud? shall the impatient thing come forth from your mouth for Jehovah a God of knowledge, and doings were not made equal. 4The bows of the mighty being broken, and the weak were girded with strength. 5And those filled with bread hired themselves out; and they hungering, ceased till the barren shall bring forth seven; and she multiplying sons languished. 6Jehovah killing and giving life; bringing down to hades and bringing up. 7Jehovah dispossessing, and enriching: making low, but lifting up. 8Raising up the weak from the dust, he will raise up the needy from the dung-hill to sit with the noble, and he will cause them to inherit a throne of glory, for to Jehovah the castings of the earth, and he will put the habitable globe upon them. 9He will watch the feet of the merciful and the unjust shall be silent in darkness; for not by strength shall man prevail. 10Jehovah, they contending against him, shall be broken; in the heavens he will break them in pieces: Jehovah will judge the ends of the earth, and he will give strength to his king, and he will lift up the horn of his Messiah. 11And Elkanah will go to Ramah, to his house. And the boy was serving Jehovah in the face of Eli the priest. 12And the sons of Eli, sons of Beli-al; they knew not Jehovah. 13And the priests judging the people, every man sacrificing a sacrifice; and the boy of the priest came as the flesh boiled, and the fork of three teeth in his hand; 14And he struck into the fire-pan or into the boiler, or into the kettle, or into the pot; all which the fork will bring up the priest will take for himself. So they will do to all Israel coming there into Shiloh. 15Also before they will burn the fat and the boy of the priest came and said to the man sacrificing, Thou shalt give flesh to roast for the priest; and he will not take from thee flesh boiled but living. 16And the man will say to him, Burning, they shall burn the fat as the day, and take to thee as thy soul shall desire; and he said to him, But now thou shalt give, and if not I will take by force. 17And the sin of the boys will be exceedingly great before Jehovah, for the men despised the gifts of Jehovah. 18And Samuel serving before Jehovah, a boy girded with an ephod of linen. 19And his mother will make to him a little upper garment, and bring up to him from days to days, in her coming up with her husband to sacrifice the sacrifice of days. 20And Eli blessed Elkanah and his wife, and said, Jehovah will set up to thee seed of this woman for the loan which was lent to Jehovah. And they went to his place. 21For Jehovah reviewed Hannah, and she will conceive and bear three sons and two daughters. And the boy Samuel will be magnified with Jehovah. 22And Eli a very old man, and he heard all that his sons did to all Israel; and they will lie with the women going forth at the door of the tent of appointment 23And he will say to them, Wherefore will ye do according to these words? which I heard very evil words of all this people. 24Nay, sons, for not a good report which I heard: causing the people of Jehovah to pass by. 25If a man shall sin against a man, and God judged him; and if a man shall sin against Jehovah, who shall judge for him? and they will not hear to the voice of their father for Jehovah was willing to destroy them. 26And the boy Samuel going, will become great and good, also with Jehovah and with men. 27And a man of God will come to Eli and say to him, Thus said Jehovah, Revealing myself, I was revealed to the house of thy father in their being in Egypt to the house of Pharaoh. 28And choosing him from all the tribes of Israel to me for priest, to bring up upon mine altar to burn incense, to lift up the ephod before me; and I gave to the house of thy father all the fires of the sons of Israel. 29Wherefore will ye trample upon my sacrifice and upon my gifts which I commanded to my habitation? and thou wilt honor thy sons above me to fatten yourselves from the chief of all the gifts of Israel my people. 30For this Jehovah the God of Israel said, Saying, I said, Thy house and the house of thy father shall go before me even forever: and now Jehovah said, Far be it for me; for them honoring me I will honor, and they despising me shall be contemned. 31Behold, the days coming and I cut off thy seed and the seed of thy father's house from being old in thy house. 32And thou lookedst upon the straits of the habitation in all which shall seem good with Israel; and an old man shall not be in thy house all the days. 33And a man I will not cut off to thee from mine altar to finish thine eyes and to cause thy soul to pine away: and all the increase of thy house, the men, shall die. 34And this the sign to thee which shall come to thy two sons to Hophni and Phinehas: in one day they two shall die. 35And I raised up to me a faithful priest, as in my heart and in my soul he shall do: and I built to him a faithful house; and he went before my Messiah all the days. 36And it was all being left in thy house shall go to worship to him for a piece of silver and a round of bread; and he said, Add me to one of the priesthoods to eat a morsel of bread.
Jamieson Fausset Brown Bible Commentary 1 HANNAH'S SONG IN THANKFULNESS TO GOD. (
1Sam 2:1-11)
Hannah prayed, and said--Praise and prayer are inseparably conjoined in Scripture (
Col 4:2;
1Tim 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 (
Luke 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.
12 THE SIN OF ELl'S SONS. (
1Sam 2:12-17)
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 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 (
Exod 29:27;
Lev 7:31-
Lev 7:32), not only claimed part of the offerer's share, but rapaciously seized them previous to the sacred ceremony of heaving or waving (see on
Lev 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.
18 SAMUEL'S MINISTRY. (
1Sam 2:18-26)
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 by judges or eminent persons, and hence allowed to Samuel, who, though 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 (
1Sam 2:21), and the growing qualifications of Samuel for the service of the sanctuary.
22 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 (
Luke 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
Deut 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.
27 A PROPHECY AGAINST ELI'S HOUSE. (
1Sam 2:27-35)
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
1Sam 4:11;
1Sam 14:3;
1Sam 22:18-23;
1Kgs 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, [
Num 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 (
2Sam 15:35;
1Chr 24:3;
1Chr 29:22). But the marginal reading, "thou shalt see the affliction of the tabernacle," seems to be a preferable translation.
