John Wesley

The next morning Elkanah and Hannah got up early to bow in worship before the LORD, and then returned home to Ramah.

“For the peace-offerings typified Christ's mediation, as well as the sin-offerings: since by this not only atonement is made for sin, but an answer to our prayers obtained. Give him - That is, consecrate him to God's service in his temple.”

Once she had weaned him, Hannah took the boy with her, along with a three-year-old bull, an ephah of flour, and a skin of wine.

“Flour - For the meal-offerings belonging to the principal sacrifices, which to each bullock were three tenth-deals, or three tenth parts of an ephah, and so nine parts of the ephah were spent, and the tenth part was given to the priest.”

I now dedicate the boy to the LORD. For as long as he lives, he is dedicated to the LORD.” So they worshiped the LORD there.

“Whatever we give to God, may upon this account be said to be lent to him, that tho' we may not recall it, yet he will certainly repay it, to our unspeakable advantage.”

He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap. He seats them among princes and bestows on them a throne of honor.

“Throne - That is, a glorious throne or kingdom. Pillars - The foundations of the earth, which God created, and upholds, and wherewith he sustains the earth, and all its inhabitants, as a house is supported with pillars; and therefore it is not strange if…”

Now Samuel was ministering before the LORD—a boy wearing a linen ephod.

“Ministered - That is, performed his ministration carefully and faithfully. Before the Lord - In God's tabernacle.”

“Why are you doing these things?” Eli said to his sons. “I hear about your wicked deeds from all these people.

“He said, &c. - Eli's sin was not only that he reproved them too gently, but that he contented himself with a verbal rebuke, and did not restrain them, and inflict those punishments upon them which such high crimes deserved by God's law, and which…”

If a man sins against another man, God can intercede for him; but if a man sins against the LORD, who can intercede for him?”

“Who shall compound that difference? None can or dare do it, and therefore he must be left to the dreadful, but righteous judgment of God. They had now sinned away their day of grace.”

Behold, the days are coming when I will cut off your strength and the strength of your father’s house, so that no older man will be left in your house.

“Arm - That is, I will take away thy strength, or all that in which thou placest thy confidence, either, 1.”

Then I will raise up for Myself a faithful priest. He will do whatever is in My heart and mind.

“Raise a priest - Of another line, as it necessarily implied by the total removal of that office from Eli's line.”

Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, because the word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him.

“Did not know - He was not acquainted with God in that extraordinary or prophetical way. And this ignorance of Samuel's served God's design, that his simplicity might give Eli the better assurance of the truth of God's call, and message to Samuel.”

On that day I will carry out against Eli everything I have spoken about his family, from beginning to end.

“In that day - In that time which I have appointed for this work, which was about twenty or thirty years after this threatning. So long space of repentance God allows to this wicked generation.”

Therefore I have sworn to the house of Eli, ‘The iniquity of Eli’s house shall never be atoned for by sacrifice or offering.’”

“Have sworn - Or, I do swear: the past tense being commonly put for the present in the Hebrew tongue. Unto - Or, concerning it.”

Samuel lay down until the morning; then he opened the doors of the house of the LORD. He was afraid to tell Eli the vision,

“Doors - Altho' the tabernacle, whilst it was to be removed from place to place in the wilderness, had no doors, but consisted only of curtains, and had hangings before the entrance, instead of doors; yet when it was settled in one place, as now…”

And Samuel grew, and the LORD was with him, and He let none of Samuel’s words fall to the ground.

“Fail, &c. - That is, want its effect: God made good all his predictions. A metaphor from precious liquors, which when they are spilt upon the ground, are altogether useless.”

Woe to us! Who will deliver us from the hand of these mighty gods? These are the gods who struck the Egyptians with all kinds of plagues in the wilderness.

“Wilderness - They mention the wilderness, not as if all the plagues of the Egyptians came upon them in the wilderness, but because the last and sorest of all, which is therefore put for all, the destruction of Pharaoh and all his host, happened in…”

So the Philistines fought, and Israel was defeated, and each man fled to his tent. The slaughter was very great—thirty thousand foot soldiers of Israel fell.

“Tent - To his habitation, called by the ancient name of his tent. There fell - Before, they lost but four thousand, now in the presence of the ark, thirty thousand, to teach them that the ark and ordinances of God, were never designed as…”

The ark of God was captured, and Eli’s two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, died.

“Thus as God was no loser by this event, so the Philistines were no gainers by it; and Israel, all things considered, received more good than hurt by it.”

When he arrived, there was Eli, sitting on his chair beside the road and watching, because his heart trembled for the ark of God.

“And well they might, for beside that this was a calamity to all Israel, it was a particular loss to Shiloh; for the ark never returned thither. Their candlestick was removed out of its place, and the city sunk and came to nothing.”

As soon as the ark of God was mentioned, Eli fell backward from his chair by the city gate, and being old and heavy, he broke his neck and died.

“Thus was the wickedness of those sons of his, whom he had indulged, his ruin. Thus does God sometimes set marks of his displeasure on good men, that others may hear and fear.”

As she was dying, the women attending to her said, “Do not be afraid, for you have given birth to a son!”

“None but spiritual joy will stand us in stead then. Death admits not the relish of any earthly joy: it is then all flat and tasteless. What is it to one that is lamenting the loss of the ark?”

But when they got up early the next morning, there was Dagon, fallen on his face before the ark of the LORD, with his head and his hands broken off…

“Thus the priests by concealing Dagon's shame before, make it more evident and infamous. The stump - Hebrew. only dagon, that is, that part of it from which it was called Dagon, namely the fishy part, for Dag in Hebrew signifies a fish.”

“What guilt offering should we send back to Him?” asked the Philistines.

“Emerods - Figures representing the disease. These they offered not in contempt of God, for they fought to gain his favour hereby; but in testimony of their humiliation, that by leaving this monument of their own shame and misery, they might obtain pity from God.”

Make images of your tumors and of the rats that are ravaging the land.

“Give glory - The glory of his power in conquering you, who seemed to have conquered him; of his justice in punishing you, and of his goodness if he relieve you.”

Why harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened theirs? When He afflicted them, did they not send the people on their way as they departed?

“Wherefore, &c. - They express themselves thus, either because some opposed the sending home the ark, though most had consented to it; or because they thought they would hardly send it away in the manner prescribed, by giving glory to God, and taking shame to…”

Now, therefore, prepare one new cart with two milk cows that have never been yoked. Hitch the cows to the cart, but take their calves away and pen them up.

“Milch kine, &c. - In respect to the ark; and for the better discovery, because such untamed heifers are apt to wander, and keep no certain and constant paths, as oxen accustomed to the yoke do, and therefore were most unlikely to keep the direct…”