The child Samuel ministered to Yahweh before Eli. Yahweh’s word was rare in those days. There were not many visions, then.
Parallel Translations
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The child Samuel ministered to Yahweh before Eli. Yahweh’s word was rare in those days. There were not many visions, then.
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And the child Samuel ministered unto the LORD before Eli. And the word of the LORD was precious in those days; there was no open vision.
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And the child Samuel ministered unto the LORD before Eli. And the word of the LORD was precious in those days; there was no frequent vision.
Cross-references (6)
Passages linked to 1 Samuel 3:1 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Amos 8:11-12 Behold, the days come,” says the Lord Yahweh, “that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing Yahweh’s words. They will wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east; they will run back and forth to seek Yahweh’s word, and will not find it.
- Psalms 74:9 We see no miraculous signs. There is no longer any prophet, neither is there among us anyone who knows how long.
- 1 Samuel 3:21 Yahweh appeared again in Shiloh; for Yahweh revealed himself to Samuel in Shiloh by Yahweh’s word.
- 1 Samuel 2:11 Elkanah went to Ramah to his house. The child served Yahweh before Eli the priest.
- 1 Samuel 2:18 But Samuel ministered before Yahweh, being a child, clothed with a linen ephod.
- 1 Samuel 3:15 Samuel lay until the morning, and opened the doors of Yahweh’s house. Samuel was afraid to show Eli the vision.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain The Chaldea text readeth, while Eli lived.
The Chaldea text readeth, while Eli lived.
Because there were very few Prophets to declare it.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 1Sa 3:1 And the child Samuel ministered unto the…
1Sa 3:1 And the child Samuel ministered unto the LORD before Eli. And the word of the LORD was precious in those days; [there was] no open vision.
Ver. 1. And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before Eli.] Praemonstrante et instruente eum Eli. Eli being his tutor and teacher, he was tractable and officious, faithful in a little, and therefore intrusted with more, being the next famous prophet to Moses, and called the first. {Act 3:24 2Ch 35:18}
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The word of the Lord was precious in those days.] Heb., Rare. The Hebrews put rarum pro charo: as Pro 25:17, "Let thy feet be precious in thy neighbour’s house," that is, let them seldom come there. See Psa 74:9 Isa 13:12. A prophet was a rare bird; so was once a preacher in this land, and then much more set by. Diaconos paucitas honorabiles fecit. {a}
There was no open vision.] Heb., Broken. See Jdg 7:15, with the note. Prophecy was very scarce.
{a} Jer., Epist.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Before Eli, i.e. under his inspection and direction, which,…
Before Eli, i.e. under his inspection and direction, which, being so young, he needed.
The word of the Lord, to wit, the word of prophecy, or the revelation of God’s will to and by the prophets.
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Was precious, i, e. rare or scarce, such things being most precious in men’s esteem, whereas common things are generally despised.
There was no open vision; God did not impart his mind by way of vision or revelation openly, or to any public person. to whom others might resort for satisfaction, though he might or did privately reveal himself to some pious persons for their particular direction. This is here premised as a reason why Samuel understood not, when God called him once or twice.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain To make way for the account of God's revealing…
To make way for the account of God's revealing himself first to Samuel, we are here told, 1. How industrious Samuel was in serving God, according as his place and capacity were (Sa1 3:1): The child Samuel, though but a child, ministered unto the Lord before Eli. It was an aggravation of the wickedness of Eli's sons that the child Samuel shamed them. They rebelled against the Lord, but Samuel ministered to him; they slighted their father's admonitions, but Samuel was observant of them; he ministered before Eli, under his eye and direction. It was the praise of Samuel that he was so far from being influenced by their bad example that he did not in the least fall off, but improved and went on. And it was a preparative for the honours God intended him; he that was thus faithful in a little was soon after entrusted with much more. Let those that are young be humble and diligent, which they will find the surest way to preferment. Those are fittest to rule who have learnt to obey. 2. How scarce a thing prophecy then was, which made the call of Samuel to be the greater surprise to himself and the greater favour to Israel: The word of the Lord was precious in those days. Now and then a man of God was employed as a messenger upon an extraordinary occasion (as Sa1 2:27), but there were no settled prophets, to whom the people might have recourse for counsel, nor from whom they might expect the discoveries of the divine will. And the rarity of prophecy made it the more precious in the account of all those that knew how to put a right value upon it. It was precious, for what there was (it seems) was private: There was no open vision, that is, there were none that were publicly known to have visions. Perhaps the impiety and impurity that prevailed in the tabernacle, and no doubt corrupted the whole nation, had provoked God, as a token of his displeasure, to withdraw the Spirit of prophecy, till the decree had gone forth for the raising up of a more faithful priest, and then, as an earnest of that, this faithful prophet was raised up.
The manner of God's revealing himself to Samuel is here related very particularly, for it was uncommon.
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I. Eli had retired. Samuel had waited on him to his bed, and the rest that attended the service of the sanctuary had gone, we may suppose, to their several apartments (Sa1 3:2): Eli had laid down in his place; he went to bed betimes, being unfit for business and soon weary of it, and perhaps loving his ease too well. Probably he kept his chamber much, which gave his sons the greater liberty. And he sought retirement the more because his eyes began to wax dim, an affliction which came justly upon him for winking at his sons' faults.
II. Samuel had laid down to sleep, in some closet near to Eli's room, as his page of the back-stairs, ready within call if the old man should want any thing in the night, perhaps to read to him if he could not sleep. He chose to take Samuel into this office rather than any of his own family, because of the towardly disposition he observed in him. When his own sons were a grief to him, his little servitor was his joy. Let those that are afflicted in their children thank God if they have any about them in whom they are comforted. Samuel had laid down ere the lamp of God went out, Sa1 3:3. It should seem he lay somewhere so near the holy place that he went to bed by that light, before any of the lamps in the branches of the candlestick went out (for the main lamp never went out), which probably was towards midnight. Till that time Samuel had been employing himself in some good exercise or other, reading and prayer, or perhaps cleaning or making ready the holy place; and then went softly to his bed. Then we may expect God's gracious visits, when we are constant and diligent in our duty.
III. God called him by name, and he took it for Eli's call, and ran to him, Sa1 3:4, Sa1 3:5. Samuel lay awake in his bed, his thoughts, no doubt, well employed (as David's Psa 63:6), when the Lord called to him, bishop Patrick thinks out of the most holy place, and so the Chaldee paraphrase reads it, A voice was heard out of the temple of the Lord; but Eli, though it is likely he lay nearer, heard it not; yet possibly it might come some other way. Hereupon we have an instance, 1. Of Samuel's industry, and readiness to wait on Eli; supposing it was he that called him, he hastened out of his warm bed and ran to him, to see if he wanted any thing, and perhaps fearing he was not well. "Here am I," said he - a good example to servants, to come when they are called; and to the younger, not only to submit to the elder, but to be careful and tender of them. 2. Of his infirmity, and unacquaintedness with the visions of the Almighty, that he took that to be only Eli's call which was really the call of God. Such mistakes as these we make oftener than we think of. God calls to us by his word, and we take it to be only the call of the minister, and answer it accordingly; he calls to us by his providences, and we look only at the instruments. His voice cries, and it is but here and there a man of wisdom that understands it to be his voice. Eli assured him he did not call him, yet did not chide him for disturbing him with being over-officious, did not call him a fool, and tell him he dreamed, but mildly bade him lie down again, he had nothing for him to do. If servants must be ready at their masters' call, masters also must be tender of their servants' comfort: that thy man-servant and thy maid-servant may rest as well as thou. So Samuel went and lay down. God calls many by the ministry of the word, and they say, as Samuel did, "Here am I;" but not looking at God, nor discerning his voice in the call, the impressions of it are soon lost; they lie down again, and their convictions come to nothing.
IV. The same call was repeated, and the same mistake made, a second and third time, Sa1 3:6-9. 1. God continued to call the child yet again (Sa1 3:6), and again the third time, Sa1 3:8. Note, The call which divine grace designs to make effectual shall be repeated till it is so, that is, till we come at the call; for the purpose of God, according to which we are called, shall certainly stand. 2. Samuel was still ignorant that it was the Lord that called him (Sa1 3:7): Samuel did not yet know the Lord. He knew the written word, and was acquainted with the mind of God in that, but he did not yet apprehend the way in which God reveals himself to his servants the prophets, especially by a still small voice; this was altogether new and strange to him. Perhaps he would have been sooner aware of a divine revelation had it come in a dream or a vision; but this was a way he had not only not known himself, but not heard of. Those that have the greatest knowledge of divine things must remember the time when they were as babes, unskilful in the word of righteousness. When I was a child I understood as a child. Yet let us not despise the day of small things. Thus did Samuel (so the margin reads it) before he knew the Lord, and before the word of the Lord was revealed unto him; thus he blundered one time after another, but afterwards he understood his duty better. The witness of the Spirit in the hearts of the faithful is often thus mistaken, by which means they lose the comfort of it; and the strivings of the Spirit with the consciences of sinners are likewise often mistaken, and so the benefit of their convictions is lost. God speaketh once, yea, twice, but man perceiveth it not, Job 33:14. 3. Samuel went to Eli this second and third time, the voice perhaps resembling his, and the child being very near to him; and he tells Eli, with great assurance, "Thou didst call me (Sa1 3:6-8), it could be no one else." Samuel's disposition to come when he was called, though but by Eli, proving him dutiful and active, qualified him for the favour now to be shown him; God chooses to employ such. But there was a special providence in it, that he should go thus often to Eli; for hereby, at length, Eli perceived that the Lord had called the child, Sa1 3:8. And, (1.) This would be a mortification to him, and he would apprehend it to be a step towards his family's being degraded, that when God had something to say he should choose to say it to the child Samuel, his servant that waited on him, and not to him. And it would humble him the more when afterwards he found it was a message to himself, and yet sent to him by a child. He had reason to look upon this as a further token of God's displeasure. (2.) This would put him upon enquiring what it was that God said to Samuel, and would abundantly satisfy him of the truth and certainty of what should be delivered, and no room would be left for him to suggest that it was but a fancy of Samuel's; for before the message was delivered he himself perceived that God was about to speak to him, and yet must not know what it was till he had it from Samuel himself. Thus even the infirmities and mistakes of those whom God employs are overruled by infinite Wisdom, and made serviceable to his purposes.
V. At length Samuel was put into a posture to receive a message from God, not to be lodged with himself and go no further, but, that he might be a complete prophet, to be published and made an open vision. 1. Eli, perceiving that it was the voice of God that Samuel heard, gave him instructions what to say, Sa1 3:9. This was honestly done, that though it was a disgrace to him for God's call to pass him by, and be directed to Samuel, yet he put him in the way how to entertain it. Had he been envious of this honour done to Samuel, he would have done what he could to deprive him of it, and, since he did not perceive it himself, would have bidden him lie down and sleep, and never heed it, it was but a dream; but he was of a better spirit than to act so; he gave him the best advice he could, for the forwarding of his advancement. Thus the elder should, without grudging, do their utmost to assist and improve the younger that are rising up, though they see themselves likely to be darkened and eclipsed by them. Let us never be wanting to inform and instruct those that are coming after us, even such as will soon be preferred before us, Joh 1:30. The instruction Eli gave him was, when God called the next time, to say, Speak, Lord, for they servant heareth. He must call himself God's servant, must desire to know the mind of God. "Speak, Lord, speak to me, speak now:" and he must prepare to hear, and promise to attend: Thy servant heareth. Note, Then we may expect that God will speak to us, when we set ourselves to hearken to what he says, Psa 85:8; Hab 2:1. When we come to read the word of God, and to attend on the preaching of it, we should come thus disposed, submitting ourselves to the commanding light and power of it: Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth. 2. It should seem that God spoke the fourth time in a way somewhat different from the other; though the call was, as at other times, a call to him by name, yet now he stood and called, which intimates that there was now some visible appearance of the divine glory to Samuel, a vision that stood before him, like that before Eliphaz, though he could not discern the form thereof, Job 4:16. This satisfied him that it was not Eli that called; for he now saw the voice that spoke with him, as it is expressed, Rev 1:12. Now also the call was doubled - Samuel, Samuel, as if God delighted in the mention of his name, or to intimate that now he should be made to understand who spoke to him. God hath spoken once, twice have I heard this, Psa 62:11. It was an honour to him that God was pleased to know him by name (Exo 33:12), and then his call was powerful and effectual when he called him by name, and so brought it particularly to him, as Saul, Saul. Thus God called to Abraham by name, Gen 22:1. 3. Samuel said, as he was taught, Speak, for thy servant heareth. Note, Good words should be put into children's mouths betimes, and apt expressions of pious and devout affections, by which they may be prepared for a better acquaintance with divine things, and trained up to a holy converse with them. Teach young people what they shall say, for they cannot order their speech by reason of darkness. Samuel did not now rise and run as before when he thought Eli called, but lay still and listened. The more sedate and composed our spirits are the better prepared they are for divine discoveries. Let all tumultuous thoughts and passions be kept under, and every thing be quiet and serene in the soul, and then we are fit to hear from God. All must be silent when he speaks. But observe, Samuel left out one word; he did not say, Speak, Lord, but only, Speak, for thy servant heareth, way was made for the message he was now to receive, and Samuel was brought acquainted with the words of God and visions of the Almighty, and this ere the lamp of God went out (Sa1 3:3) in the temple of the Lord, which some of the Jewish writers put a mystical sense upon; before the fall of Eli, and the eclipsing of the Urim and Thummim for some time thereby, God called Samuel, and made him an oracle, whence they have an observation among their doctors, That the sun riseth, and the sun goeth down (Ecc 1:5), that is, say they, Ere God maketh the sun of one righteous man to set, he makes the sun of another righteous man to rise. Smith ex Kimchi.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before…
And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before Eli,.... Under his direction and instruction; the Targum is, in the life of Eli, and in such parts of service, relating to the tabernacle of the Lord, as he was capable of, such as opening and shutting the doors of it, lighting the lamps, singing the praises of God, &c. according to Josephus (n), and others, he was now about twelve years of age:
and the word of the Lord was precious in those days; that is, a word from the Lord in a dream or vision, directing, informing, instructing, or reproving, this was very rarely had; of late there had been but very few instances; and which accounts for it why not only the child Samuel knew not that it was the voice of the Lord that called to him, but Eli himself thought nothing of it until he had called a third time, so rare and scarce was any instance of this kind; for which reason these words are premised in the following narration: and as everything that is scarce and rare is generally precious, so the word of God in this way also was; and so it is as considered in every view of it; as the written word of God; when there was but little of it penned, as at this time, and few or none to teach and instruct in it, Eli being old, and his sons so vile; or when it is forbidden to be read, and the copies of it destroyed, and become scarce, as in the times of Dioclesian; or when there are but very few faithful evangelical ministers of the word; which, though it is always precious to them that have precious faith in it, the promises of it being exceeding great and precious, and the truths of it more precious than fine gold, and the grand subject of it a precious Saviour, who is so in his person, offices, blood, righteousness, and sacrifice; yet is generally more precious when there is a scarcity of it, when God makes a man, a Gospel minister, more precious than fine gold, even than the golden wedge of Ophir, see Isa 13:12 where the word is used in the same sense as here:
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there was no open vision; or prophecy, as the Targum; no publicly known prophet raised up, to whom the people could apply for counsel, direction, and instruction in divine things; in all the times of the judges we read only of Deborah the prophetess, and one prophet more, Jdg 4:14, excepting the man of God lately sent to Eli, Sa1 2:27, and this want of prophecy served to set off with greater foil the glory of Samuel as a prophet of the Lord, when he was an established one; there having been none of that character in the memory of man, and therefore he is spoken of as at the head of the prophets, Act 3:24, for though there might be some private visions to particular persons, or God might appear in vision to private persons for their own special use and instruction; yet there was no public vision, or what was for public good and general use: some render it, "no broken up vision" (o); it lay hid, concealed out of sight, as if it was immured and shut up within walls, or like water pent up, that cannot break through its fences, and spread itself; or "not multiplied", as R. Isaiah, not frequent and repeated, the instances of it few and rare; the sense of this clause is much the same as the former.
(n) Antiqu. l. 5. c. 10. sect. 4. (o) "perrupta", Piscator; "fracta vel rupta", Drusius.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain God's first manifestation of himself to Samuel, ver. 1-10.…
God's first manifestation of himself to Samuel, ver. 1-10. God's message to Eli, ver. 11-14. His faithful delivery of that message, and Eli's submission to God, ver. 15-18. The establishment of Samuel to be a prophet, ver. 19-21
Before Eli - That is, under his inspection and direction. Word - The word of prophecy, or the Revelation of God's will to and by the prophets. Precious - Rare or scarce, such things being most precious in mens' esteem, whereas common things are generally despised. Open vision - God did not impart his Mind by way of vision or Revelation openly, or to any public person, to whom others might resort for satisfaction, though he might privately reveal himself to some pious persons for their particular direction. This is premised, as a reason why Samuel understood not, when God called him once or twice.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Samuel ministers to the Lord before Eli, 1.
CHAPTER III
Samuel ministers to the Lord before Eli, 1.
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He is thrice called by the Lord; who informs him of the evils
which shall be brought on the house of Eli, 2-15.
Eli inquires of Samuel what the Lord had said, 16, 17.
He gives a faithful reunion of the whole, which Eli receives
with great submission, 18.
Samuel prospers; is established as a prophet in Israel; and the
Lord reveals himself to him to Shiloh, 19-21.
NOTES ON CHAP. III
Verse 1. Samuel ministered unto the Lord] He performed minor services in the tabernacle, under the direction of Eli, such as opening the doors, c. See 1Sa 3:15.
The word of the Lord was precious] There were but few revelations from God and because the word was scarce, therefore it was valuable. The author of this book probably lived at a time when prophecy was frequent, See the preface.
There was no open vision.] There was no public accredited prophet; one with whom the secret of the Lord was known to dwell, and to whom all might have recourse in cases of doubt or public emergency.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain 1Sa 3:1. The child Samuel ministered before Eli —…
1Sa 3:1. The child Samuel ministered before Eli — That is, under his inspection and direction. The word of the Lord was precious — That is, the word of prophecy, or the revelation of God’s will to and by the prophets, was rare or scarce, such things being most precious in men’s esteem, whereas common things are generally despised. In other words, God did very rarely in those days reveal his mind to any person. There was no open vision — Here vision includes all the ways whereby God revealed himself to men. And the declaration implies that though God might privately reveal himself and his will, to some pious persons for their particular direction, he did not impart his mind by way of revelation openly, or to any public person, to whom others might resort for satisfaction. In the whole book of Judges, we find only two prophets mentioned. This is premised as a reason why Samuel understood not when God called him once or twice.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain See the margin reference note. Josephus says that Samuel’s…
See the margin reference note. Josephus says that Samuel’s call to the prophetic office happened when he had just completed his twelfth year (compare Luk 2:42).
Was precious - (or rare) The song of Hannah, and the prophecy of the “man of God” (1Sa 2:27 note), are the only instances of prophecy since Deborah. Samuel is mentioned as the first of the series of prophets Act 3:24.
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No open vision - Better rendered, “There was no vision promulgated or published.” (Compare 2Ch 31:5.)
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Before. Chaldean, "in the days of Heli." The young…
Before. Chaldean, "in the days of Heli." The young Levite slept in an adjoining chamber, to wait on the high priest, not far from the sanctuary. --- Precious; that is, rare: (Challoner) as such things are generally more esteemed, (Haydock) which are granted to few. (Worthington) --- Some prophets had appeared under the former judges: but they were not so common as they were from the days of Samuel, till a little after the captivity. St. Peter ranks Samuel in the first place, Acts iii. 24. (Calmet) --- Vision. No prophet was publicly recognized, to whom the people might have recourse. (Menochius)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain Samuel’s Call
SECOND SECTION
Samuel’s Call
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1Sa_3:1 to 1Sa_4:1 a
1And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord [Jehovah] before Eli. And the word of the Lord [Jehovah] was precious1 in those days; there was no open 2vision [vision spread abroad2]. And it came to pass at that time, when [that3]. Eli was laid down [lying down4] in his place, and his eyes began to wax dim that he could 3not see. And ere [om. ere5] the lamp of God went out [was not yet gone out] in the temple of the Lord, where the ark of God was [om. in the temple……was6] and Samuel was laid down [lying down4] to sleep [om. to sleep, ins. in 4the temple of Jehovah where the ark of God7 was], That [And] the Lord [Jehovah] 5called [ins. to] Samuel, and he answered [said], Here am I. And he ran unto Eli, and said, Here am I, for thou calledst me. And he said, I called not; 6[ins. go back and] lie down again [om. again]. And he went and lay down. And the Lord [Jehovah] called yet again, Samuel. And Samuel arose and went to Eli, and said, Here am I, for thou didst call [calledst] me. And he answered [said], I 7called not, my son, [ins. go back and] lie down again [om. again]. Now Samuel did not yet know8 the Lord [Jehovah], neither was the word of the Lord yet [and 8the word of Jehovah was not yet] revealed unto him. And the Lord [Jehovah] called Samuel again the third time. And he arose and went to Eli, and said, Here am I, for thou didst9 call [calledst] me. And Eli perceived that the Lord [Jehovah] 9had called [was calling] the child. Therefore, [And] Eli said unto Samuel, Go, lie down, and it shall be, if he [one10] call thee, that thou shalt say, Speak, Lord [Jehovah], for thy servant heareth. So [And] Samuel went and lay down 10in his place. And the Lord [Jehovah] came, and stood,11 and called as at other times [as before], Samuel, Samuel. Then [And] Samuel answered [said], Speak, 11for thy servant heareth. And the Lord [Jehovah] said to Samuel, Behold, I will [om, will] do a thing in Israel, at which both the ears of every one that heareth it 12shall tingle [the which whosoever heareth, both his ears shall tingle]. In that day I will perform against Eli all things [om. things] which [that] I have spoken concerning his house, when I begin, I will also make an end [from beginning to end]. 13For [And] I have told [I announced to] him that I will [would] judge his house for ever for the iniquity12 [sin] which he knoweth, because [that he knew that] his sons made themselves vile [brought a curse on themselves13], and he restrained them 14not. And therefore I have sworn unto the house of Eli, that the iniquity of Eli’s house shall not be purged [expiated] with sacrifice [ins. of blood] nor [ins. unbloody14] 15offering forever. And Samuel lay until the morning,15 and opened the doors of the house of the Lord [Jehovah]. And Samuel feared to show Eli the 16vision. Then [And] Eli called Samuel, and said, Samuel, my son. And he answered 17[said], Here am I. And he said, What is the thing that the Lord [om. the Lord, ins. he] hath [om. hath] said unto thee? I pray thee [om. I pray thee16] hide it not from me. God do so to thee and more also, if thou hide anything from 18me of all the things [om. the things] that he said unto thee. And Samuel told him every whit, and hid nothing from him. And he said, It is the Lord [He is Jehovah]; let him do what seemeth him good.
19And Samuel grew; And the Lord [Jehovah] was with him, and did let none of 20his words fall to the ground. And all Israel from Dan even to Beersheba knew 21that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord [Jehovah]. And the Lord [Jehovah] appeared again [continued to appear] in Shiloh; for the Lord [Jehovah] revealed himself to Samuel in Shiloh by [in] the word of the Lord [Jehovah].17
1Sa_4:1 a And the word of Samuel came to all Israel.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1Sa_3:1. The history of Samuel’s call to be prophet is introduced (1Sa_3:1) by a brief statement of what it presupposed, and what led to it in Samuel himself and in the condition of the Israelitish theocratic life. As to the first point, the connection shows that the “boy” Samuel had grown to be a youth, and was therefore intellectually capable of receiving the revelation of the Lord; his character as servant of the Lord in the Sanctuary is again stated (comp. 1Sa_2:11; 1Sa_2:18), and his relation to Eli as his guardian and guide is anew affirmed by the words “before Eli.” (1Sa_2:11). The call which Samuel receives supposes the fact that he belongs to the Lord as a gift from his parents, and, as servant in the Sanctuary, is, in this priestly life under the guidance of the High-priest, prepared to be a special instrument of God’s for His people.—As to the second point, the condition of the theocratical life, the religious character of the times is marked by a twofold expression: 1) the word of the Lord was “precious” (יָקָר), that is, the word was rare that came directly from the Lord by prophetic announcement to the people; the proper organs were lacking, persons who were filled with the Spirit of the Lord, that they might be witnesses of His word; there was lacking also in the people the living desire for the direct revelations of God in His word, and receptivity in religious feeling for the living declaration,—and this was true even in the highest planes of theocratical life; 2) “There was no vision spread abroad.” פָרַץ “break through,” thence “spread out from within,” “become known outwards, become public,” Ps. 3:10; 2Ch_31:5.—Hazon (חזוֹן) [vision] is the feeling or perception which corresponds to a direct real divine revelation made to the imagination of the prophet.18 This “vision” is the means of the reception of the word to be announced. Little was heard of such revelations of the Lord by visions, they were not spread abroad. Therefore the word of the Lord was precious. The second fact had its ground in the first. In the theocratical life there was lacking both a truly God-fearing, living priesthood, and a proclamation of God’s word that should extricate the people from their religious-moral depravation, the vitalizing power of the divine Spirit through prophetic organs.
1Sa_3:2-10. The circumstances and individual elements of the calling. In 1Sa_3:2 the “and it came to pass” and the statement of time are so connected with 1Sa_3:4 that all the intermediate from “and Eli” to the end of 1Sa_3:3 is explanatory parenthesis.19
Samuel might have supposed, when he was awaked by hearing his name called, that he had to render some service to the half-blind Eli; and so it is expressly mentioned at the beginning of these descriptive sentences that Eli was growing blind. The word “began” shows that the statement afterwards made, “he could not see,” is by no means to be understood as meaning complete blindness.20—To the chronological datum in the beginning of 1Sa_3:2 is added in 1Sa_3:3 an exacter and more definite statement in the words: And the lamp of God was not yet gone out;—no doubt this indicates night-time, near the morning, since the seven-lamped candelabrum in the Sanctuary before the curtain, which (Exo_27:20-21; Exo_30:7-8) was furnished with oil every morning and evening, after having burnt throughout the night and consumed its oil, usually, no doubt, got feebler or went out towards morning (comp. Lev_24:2-3). The words “and S. was sleeping” are not to be regarded, as the Athnach under the last requires, as a parenthesis separated from “in the temple” (as is usually done), if the latter expression is understood to mean sanctuary in distinction from the most holy place; for we cannot suppose that Samuel slept in this Sanctuary. But hekal (חֵיבָל) is here, as in 1Sa_1:9; Psa_11:4, the whole sanctuary, the entire space of the tabernacle, as the palace of God, the King of His people, who has His throne there. This throne is the “ark of God,” for above the ark was the symbol of the presence, yea, of the royal dwelling and enthronement of God in the midst of His people (1Sa_4:4). Samuel’s sleeping-place was in one of the rooms, which were built in the court for the priests and Levites on service (Keil). The name Jehovah stands after “temple,” because it is the Covenant-God, who descends to His people and dwells with them, that is brought before us. On the other hand, in connection with the lamp and the ark “Elohim” is used “in the sense of the divine in general,” (Then.), that is, God is viewed in His loftiness and power over the whole world, as He who is to be feared and venerated, as lofty majesty (which conception is made clear by the plural).
In 1Sa_3:2-3, is described the situation in which Samuel received the call of the Lord,—it is night, the High-priest lies in his place in the sanctuary, the lamps of the candelabrum are still burning,21 the morning is near, it is the time when dream-life rises to its height; near Samuel was the ark of God, whence the revelations of God came.
1Sa_3:4-10 give the whole history of the call, with the attendant circumstances, in its individual elements.—Samuel hears the call of a voice, which has awakened him from sleep, but takes it to be not the call of a divine voice, as it was, but a call from Eli. Eli, to whom he hastens, sends him back to his couch with the answer: “I did not call thee.” This is repeated in 1Sa_3:6.
1Sa_3:7 gives the reason why Samuel thought he heard not God’s voice, but Eli’s.22 Knowing God means here not the general knowledge of God which every Israelite of necessity had, but the special knowledge of God, which was given by extraordinary revelation of God. The experience which now comes to Samuel is marked as the first of the sort. The word of God had not yet been revealed to him. He had not yet received such a special revelation of God through His word; therefore he did not yet know the God who revealed Himself in this way.—“It was a gloomy time, poor in revelation, as in exemplary religious life. For Eli, the High-priest, was weak, his sons defiled the sanctuary, the people served idols (1Sa_7:3 sq.), and the Philistines ruled oppressively. Hence it came that Samuel did not yet know how the Lord was used to reveal Himself to the prophets, the announcer of His word to men (1Sa_3:1; 1Sa_3:7)” (Nägelsbach, Herz. R.-E. XIII. 395 sq.). After the third repetition of the call (1Sa_3:8), Eli observed the divine origin of the call, and showed Samuel (1Sa_3:9) how he should deport himself towards the divine voice. His answer was to be: “Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth.”—Up to this point the medium of the divine revelation was the thrice repeated call of a voice, which so strongly impressed Samuel’s hearing, that he was awakened out of sleep. This is the meaning of the narrative; it does not mean a voice, which he thought he heard in a dream merely. In 1Sa_3:10 a new factor is introduced: the divine revelation by means of a voice becomes a vision: Jehovah came and stood, that is, before Samuel. That an objective real appearance is here meant is clear from 1Sa_3:15, “the vision” (מַרְאָה). Three factors are to be combined: the dream-state of Samuel’s soul (the internal sense), the hearing a voice on awakening, the seeing an appearance.
1Sa_3:11-14. Here follows the divine announcement of the judgment on Israel and the house of Eli. The Pres. (עשֶֹׁה partcp.) brings the act, though still in the future, before us as near, immediately and surely impending.23 The tingling of both ears is the mark of dread and horror, which comes suddenly on a man, so that he well nigh loses his senses. Clericus’ reference to the Lat. attonitus is excellent, comp. Jer_19:3. The unheard of horror which was to make both ears tingle was (chap. 4) the frightful defeat of Israel in battle with the Philistines, and the loss of the ark to this heathen people.—As in 1Sa_3:11 the horror, which is to come upon Israel, is announced, so in 1Sa_3:12-14 is declared the judgment of the house of Eli. In 1Sa_3:12 the Infs. Abs. (הָחֵל וְכַלֵּה) serve to explain and define the verb fin., “beginning and ending,” that is, from beginning to end, fully, entirely. Not one word of the minatory prophecy (1Sa_2:27 sq.) is to remain unfulfilled. (See Ew. § 280, 3 a).—In 1Sa_3:13 this announcement is recapitulated. The declaration was a threat, no longer a warning. Judging is in sense (comp. Gen_15:14) identical with punishing. This punishment will be inflicted on Eli’s house “for ever;” the judgment will never again be removed from it. In what did Eli’s sin consist? In the neglect of the duty which he ought to have performed to his sons as father, high-priest and judge, by the employment of severe chastisement and punishment.He knew their crimes, but let them go unpunished. מְקַלְלִים לָהֶם “cursed themselves” is very hard to explain, unless with Sept. and Then., we read אֱלֹהִים for לָהֶם, and translate “they brought God into contempt,” the Pi. being taken as causative, and Qal=“to come into contempt.” Certainly this rendering would agree with 1Sa_2:17; but—aside from the untrustworthiness of the Sept. in relation to the Heb. text, which also may here have been arbitrarily treated on account of this difficulty—against this reading is the fact that God Himself here speaks. The conjecture adduced by Grotius, לִי (“the Hebrews wrote that for לָהֶם ‘themselves’ formerly stood לִי ‘me,’ ”) must be rejected on account of the difference in the letters. There remains no other course than to translate “cursing, bringing a curse on, themselves,” according to the usual explanation.24 Luther gives the correct sense: “that his sons behaved shamefully.” [So Eng. A. V. “made themselves vile,” but this is not exactly correct. See translation and textual note.—Tr.]
1Sa_3:14. The announcement that the punishment is imposed for ever (1Sa_3:13) is here marked by the divine oath as irrevocable. (אִם, in view of the ellipsis, with negative force, Ges. § 155, 2 sq.). The transgression of Eli’s house is here spoken of because not only did Eli’s sins of omission and his sons’ sins of commission prove them personally worthy of punishment before God, but the religious depravation that issued from them affected the whole family, even their posterity. (יִתְכַפֵּר Pass. for the usual כֻּפַּר). Because the guilt can never be expiated, therefore the sentence will never be recalled, but, agreeably to the Lord’s true word, will be carried out on Eli’s house. The double “for ever” at the end of the two declarations (1Sa_3:13-14) expresses the terrible earnestness of the divine justice. [As to the relation between this announcement (1Sa_3:11-14) and the other (1Sa_2:27-36), the latter is founded on and supposes the earlier, but does not exactly repeat it. The first message seems (strangely enough) not to have produced the desired effect, namely to rouse Eli and save his house; for, though it is expressed absolutely, we have to suppose that the doom might be averted by repentance and obedience, as in the case of Nineveh. But the old man was too weak, and his sons (who must have heard of the prophet’s threatened punishment) too far gone in sin. No moral change occurs to remove the implied moral condition of the doom, and the sentence is to be executed. Still God will not leave His old servant without another appeal; He sends another message by Samuel. The first prophecy (chap. 2) reviewed, the history of the sacerdotal house of Eli, exposed its unfaithfulness, announced its deposition, and looked beyond to the glory of a new and faithful priestly house. The second prophecy, given through Samuel, reaffirms the punishment, emphasizes Eli’s personal guilt, and declares the sentence on the priestly house to be irrevocable. Its object, then, would seem to be two-fold: 1) to rouse Eli and his sons to repentance and quickening into spiritual life, (see Eli’s response in verse 18, whereas no answer of his to the first threat is recorded); 2) to accredit Samuel as a prophet by making him the bearer of a message that the whole nation would hear of, and to develop his spiritual-prophetic earnestness and faithfulness by bringing him into personal contact with the most serious events. It is hardly to be supposed that the conduct of Eli and his sons had been unobserved by Samuel. Rather they must have occasioned him (in connection with the man of God’s announcement) much serious thought, so that his message to Eli was not something apart from his own intellectual and spiritual life. We must notice, also, the difference in breadth and maturity between the declaration committed to the (doubtless) full-grown man of God, and that delivered through the youth Samuel.—Tr.].
1Sa_3:15-18. Samuel before Eli as called prophet of the Lord in his first prophetic function. Although Eli had already received from the “man of God” (1Sa_2:27) the prediction of punishment, yet his conduct gives occasion to the repetition (through Samuel who had a direct call from the Lord) of the prophetic announcement of judgment on his house as a word of immediate revelation from the Lord.
1Sa_3:15 sq. describe with such psychological and historical minuteness, such clearness and truth to life Samuel’s external situation and tone of mind after the revelation and appearance, and the conduct of Eli who was roused to earnest interest25 by the thrice-occurring call to Samuel, that neither here nor in the preceding description (1Sa_3:1-14) is there any ground for Ewald’s opinion that this is not an original tradition. After this revelation Samuel sleeps in his bed till morning. Opening “the doors of God’s house” was a part of his duty in the sanctuary. By the doors we are not to understand the curtains, but real doors, which belonged, however, not to the cells which were perhaps built around, but “to the house of God” itself. Originally, indeed, the Tabernacle, being a tent, had no doors, but, after it was fixed in Shiloh with a solid enclosure, it might somehow have been provided with them. “Perhaps it stood within a larger frame, or a solid temple-space of stone built for its protection" (Leyrer in Herzog’s R.-E. XV. 116.)—Samuel is afraid to tell Eli the vision, the appearance (מַרְאָה) which had presented itself to his internal sense, in which God’s revelation concerning the house of Eli had been set forth before him—partly from awe at the divine word which formed the content of the revelation, partly on account of the dreadful significance it had for Eli, partly by reason of the sorrow of which, in his reverence and filial piety towards Eli, he could not rid himself. But Eli compels him to tell what he had so wondrously learned.—On “my son,” 1Sa_3:16, Thenius admirably remarks: “How much is expressed by this one word!” In 1Sa_3:17 observe the climax in the words with which, in three sentences, Eli demands information from Samuel; it expresses the excitement of Eli’s soul. He asks for the word of the Lord; he demands an exact and complete statement; he adjures Samuel to conceal nothing from him. God do so to thee and more also, if, etc., is a frequent form of adjuration,26 which threatens punishment from God, if the request is not complied with, comp. 1Sa_14:44; 1Sa_20:18.
1Sa_3:18. And Samuel told him every whit. His fear was overpowered by Eli’s demand. In obeying Eli he was at the same time obeying the Lord, whose command to enter on his prophetic calling before Eli he must have recognized in the latter’s demand. And he (Eli) said. Two things Eli says: It is the Lord! This is the utterance of submission to the Lord. He sees confirmed what the man of God announced to him, and recognizes the indubitable revelation of the Lord. Let Him do what seemeth Him good. This is the expression of resignation to the unchangeable will of the Lord. To the overwhelming declaration of God Eli shows a complete resignation, giving himself and his house into God’s hands, without trying to excuse or justify himself, but also, it is true, without exhibiting thorough penitence.
1Sa_3:19-21. The result of Samuel’s call to the prophetic office, and, at the same time, transition to the description of his prophetical work in Israel. 1) In 1Sa_3:19 a the divine principle in his development into a man of God in his prophetic office is expressly emphasized, his growth from youth to manhood (וַיִּגְדַּל) being set forth under the highest theocratic point of view, which is marked by the words: And the Lord was with him.—To him were imparted God’s revelations for Israel, because he was a man after God’s heart, who, amid the temptations to evil that surrounded him in Shiloh, was now as a youth mature and tried in true fear of God and sincere fellowship with God; and his growth rested on a childhood consecrated to the Lord. “The Lord was with him.” This refers not merely to the general proofs of God’s goodness and mercy, to the blessing which he received from the Lord throughout his life, but also to the special revelations and gifts of the Spirit which the Lord imparted to him as His chosen instrument. For 2) in 1Sa_3:19 b in the words And he let none of his words fall to the ground is emphasized the divine demonstration of Samuel’s prophetic character by God’s fulfilment of what he prophetically announced as the word revealed to him. The expression “did not let fall” indicates that the word was not spoken in vain, but was fulfilled,27 comp. Jos_21:45; Jos_23:14; 1Ki_8:56; 2Ki_10:10. 3) 1Sa_3:20 exhibits his general recognition in Israel as a tried instrument for the Lord in the prophetic office. The geographical indication of the extent of this recognition supposes that Samuel was made known to the whole people from Dan on the north to Beersheba on the south (Jdg_20:1) as a prophet of the Lord by his declaration of the word of God. (נֶאֱמָן, “found trustworthy,” “tried,” Num_12:7). From this it is evident that the people of Israel, in spite of their disruption, yet formed religiously a unit. In spite of the general lack of the declaration of God’s word, there was still altogether a receptivity for it; notwithstanding the decline of the religious-moral life there was not lacking a sense for the self-revelation of the living God through His chosen instrument, the prophet Samuel. It is no doubt intimated in 1Sa_3:20 “that Samuel, in contrast with the hitherto isolated appearances of prophets, was known as a man called to a permanent prophetic work” (Nägelsbach, Herz. R.-E. XIII. 26). For the factual ground of 1Sa_3:20 is given in the closely connected v. 21, where 4) are stated the continued direct revelations of God to Samuel in Shiloh. “Jehovah continued to appear in Shiloh.” This points to visions as the form of revelation for the internal sense, and as the continuation of the mode of appearance which is set forth in 1Sa_3:10; 1Sa_3:15 as “vision.” The words “for the Lord revealed Himself to Samuel in Shiloh by the word of the Lord” leave no doubt that that revelation in visions also was made to Samuel, and that the word was the heart and the guiding star of these revelations of the Lord made to him that they might be imparted to the people. As the people had hitherto had its centre in Shiloh in the Tabernacle with the ark as the symbol of God’s indwelling and presence, so now it found in the same place a new centre in the continued revelations of the Lord to Samuel through His word. From now on God made known His will to the people by the revelation of His word to Samuel, the first representative of the permanent prophetic order.28 Thus, then, the beginning of the fourth chapter: And the word of Samuel came to all Israel—is closely connected with the preceding. The word of Samuel is in content, “the word of the Lord,” which was directly revealed to him, he being from now on favored with this revelation (1Sa_3:21) in the form of the vision (מַרְאָה); thus the declaration “God revealed Himself to Samuel” is by no means superfluous (Then.); for it is not “the revelation mentioned above" which is here meant, but that which was constantly repeated in vision, by virtue of which Samuel was the Roeh (רֹאֶה), seer. In form the word of Samuel was prophetic announcement, as organ of which he was Nabi (נָבִיא), God’s spokesman, interpreter.29 His word came “to all Israel.” In these words is comprised 5) his prophetic work in all Israel, and the permanent effect of his call to the prophetic office (made by the first revelation) is indicated. The word which came to him from God went by him to the whole people. This close connection of these words with the preceding context, and their closing and comprehensive character shows plainly how incorrect is the ordinary view which connects them with the following, and regards them as a call by Samuel to battle with the Philistines. They are the summary description of his prophetic work, on which his judicial labors rested, the transition to these latter being made in the following narration of Israel’s public national calamity.
HISTORICAL AND THEOLOGICAL
1. Samuel’s person and labors as prophet. “So the Lord’s training had borne its fruits. Samuel had been preserved amid the temptations of Shiloh. He had grown up to be a consecrated man and faithful prophet of the Lord—a man of God in the midst of an apostate race—a light in the darkness, and much was gained when God’s word was once more to be found in the land.” (Schlier, Die Könige in Isr., 1865, 2 ed., p. 5.)
“The vigorous and connected ministry of the prophets begins with Samuel, who is therefore to be regarded as the true founder of the Old Testament prophetic order (comp. Act_3:24). It was that extraordinary time when, with the removal of the ark, the Tabernacle had lost its significance as centre, the high-priest’s functions were suspended, and now the mediatorship between God and the people rested altogether in the inspired prophet. While the limits of the old ordinances of worship are broken through, Israel learns that Jehovah has not restricted His saving presence to the ancient symbol of His indwelling among the people, rather is to be found everywhere, where He is earnestly sought, as God of salvation.” Oehler in Herz. R.-E. s. v. Prophet-enthum des A. T. XII. 214.
2. The time of Samuel’s appearance in Israel as prophet was the time of an internal judgment of God, which consisted in the preciousness of God’s word, that is, in the lack of intercourse of God with His people by revelation. It was a theocratic interdict30 incurred by the continued apostasy of the people from their God, and inflicted by God’s justice. It had the disciplinary aim to lead their hearts back to the Lord, who had long kept silence, had long suspended His revelations. Such a judgment of the cessation of all revelation-intercourse of God with man came upon Saul, 1Sa_28:6; 1Sa_28:15; comp. the complaint in Psa_74:9, “there is no longer any prophet,” and the wail in Amo_7:11 sq. over the famine of God’s word. The same law presents itself in all periods of the kingdom of God; men lose the source of life, God’s revealed word, by a divine judgment, when they withdraw from intercourse with the living God, and will not accept His holy word as the truth which controls their whole life.
3. The form of God’s revelation in prophecy is, as we see in Samuel, internal sight, the vision, to which the original appellation Roeh (רֹאֶה or חֹזֶה)31 (according to 1Sa_9:9, the earlier usual designation of the prophet) points. “Vision and word of God are in 1Sa_3:1 parallel expressions for prophecy.” “The vision is nothing but the inner incorporation, and therefore also symbolizatioii of what is felt in the mind—whether it be in visible shape for the inner eye, or vocally for the inner ear.” (Tholuck, Die Propheten und ihre Weissa-gungen, 1861, p. 54.) The internal sight, by means of which the prophet knows that the content of the prophecy, the matter of the announcement to be made, has been imparted to him by God directly, altogether independently of his own activity, is the vision in the wider sense. For this reason Samuel, like all other prophets, is called a Seer. After his soul, detached from the outer world of sense through the medium of the dream, has thus been brought into a state of more concentrated receptivity for the revelation of God, he sees with the internal sense the matter of the prophetic declaration directly imparted to him by God. “But when the revelation presents its content in visible shape before the prophet’s soul, there results the vision in the stricter sense.” (Oehler, Herz. R.-E. XVII. 637.)
4. In the history of Samuel’s call to the prophetic office are united prototypically all essential momenta32 of theocratic prophecy: 1) the ethical condition of the absolute consecration of the person and the whole life to God’s service on the basis of sincere life-communion with Him, and of mutual intercourse between God and the prophet—(“Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth;” comp. Jer_33:2 sq.: “call unto me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not”); 2) the definite, direct, clearly recognized and irresistible call of God to be the instrument of His revelation, the declarer of His word which is to be imparted to him, connected with the gift of inspiration and capacity therefor by the controlling power of the Spirit of God; 3) the reception of God’s special revelation by word independently of human teaching and instruction and his own investigation and meditation, together with the consciousness of having been favored with a disclosure of God’s objective thoughts; 4) the internal sight as the subjective medium of the reception of the revelation of God, the psychical form of prophecy; 5) the declaration of the revelation received, with the certainty and confidence (produced by the Spirit) that the announced word will be confirmed by the corresponding divine deed. Comp. Oehler, Weissagung, Herz. R.-E. XVII. 627 sqq.33
5. The triple repetition of the divine call to Samuel betokens God’s holy arrangement for preparing His inner life, that he might become an exclusive organ of divine revelation (comp. 1Sa_3:7-8), freed from human authority, his soul open only to the utterances of the living God, as is shown by Samuel’s answer to the divine voice: “Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth” (1Sa_3:9-10); for by this answer Samuel assumes the position of one who has direct converse with the Lord, that he may, as his servant, hear what the Lord will say to him by His revelations, and thereby the end of the threefold preparative call is fulfilled.
6. That the light of the divine word may illuminate the inner life, the latter must be open to this light, as it is given by divine revelation. The humble readiness to hear and accept God’s counsels with the ear of faith is called forth by the awakening call of God’s voice, and leads to the clear knowledge of His word. The way to fellowship with the living God and service in His kingdom is opened and prepared only by God’s act of grace in calling men by the voice of His word; and so living and abiding continually in fellowship with the Lord is conditioned on the word of revelation, in which the Lord speaks to the soul that stands fast in the obedience of faith. Thus the individual elements of this history of Samuel’s call present a picture of the grace of God that calls us, as all they learn or experience, who, like Samuel, occupy such a position towards God’s word, that to God’s call they answer with him: “Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth.”
7. Pardoning grace34 (1Sa_3:14) is open to every sinner, and is denied by God for no sin, if there be, on the man’s part, honest, hearty repentance for sin as enmity against God and violation of His holy will, and confident trust in His grace and mercy, that is, if there be a thorough conversion to the Lord. In Eli’s house, in spite of the preceding divine warnings and threatenings, there was continued, persistent sin, and Eli did not summon the resolution to make an energetic cleansing of his house and thoroughly to remove his sons’ wickedness, which he ought to have felt especially bound to do as high-priest; such sin makes it impossible that God’s grace should be shown in the forgiveness of sin, puts a limit to God’s patience and long-suffering, and draws down on itself His punitive judgments as necessary proofs of His holiness and justice. [The Mosaic Law had no offering for presumptuous sins; but underneath the Law (which was civil-political in its outward form) lay the fundamental principle of the forgiveness of the penitent sinner, developed, for example, in Psalms 51 and others. This principle, however, though doubtless part of the spiritual thought of ancient Israel, did not find full expression till it was announced that the blood of Christ cleanses from all sin. But in the New Testament, as in the Old Testament, there is no pardon without repentance.—Tr.]
8. The true permanent unity of Israel, dismembered, as the nation was, during the Period of the Judges, was established by Samuel by means of the word of God which, in his prophetic proclamation, embraced all Israel. Even in times when the national, political and religious-ecclesiastical life is most sadly shattered and disrupted, the divine word, if it is only preached lovingly by preachers that live in it, shows its purifying and unifying power, the receptivity for it being present, and only needing to be called forth.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
1Sa_3:1. Cramer: That is the greatest and most perilous scarcity, when God causes a dearth, not of bread but of His word.—Wuert. Bible: God does not give His holy word to every one and at every time in great abundance, but causes at certain times also a scarcity therein to be suffered, Eze_3:26; Amo_8:11-12.
[1Sa_3:3-14. Stanley: The stillness of the night—the sudden voice—the childlike misconception—the venerable Eli—the contrast between the terrible doom and the gentle creature who has to announce it—give to this portion of the narrative a universal interest. It is this side of Samuel’s career that has been so well caught in the well-known pictures by Sir Joshua Reynolds.—Tr.]
1Sa_3:3-10. Steinmeyer (Testimonies to the glory of Christ, Berlin, 1847): The call of Samuel the Prophet, as an image of our entering into communion with the Lord; 1) How the occasion for this communion is given on the part of God, 2) How the condition of it is fulfilled on the part of Samuel, and 3) How this communion itself was begun.—Awaking from sleep! What a striking designation of the turning point between the old and the new in our life also. We were like them that sleep, them that dream, before we entered into communion with God. It is, however, certainly no arbitrary pre-supposition, that this pure, simple, upright nature had definite presentiments that he must be in what was his God’s, and that he was moved by a longing, even though not understood, after the hour which now struck; and even this position of heart appears to find in the image of sleep its beautiful, exactly-corresponding expression. More or less, however, the comparison will also be applicable to us all. If the grace of the Lord caused us to grow up in the temple of His church, as Samuel in the sanctuary at Shiloh, if we were, like him, from childhood nourished with the sincere milk of the word, then there will always in our awaking be a definite recollection that already long before we found ourselves unawares in this sphere, only that hitherto our eyes were holden, while now we are allowed to look freely and without hindrance into the riches of His grace and His truth.
[How far this sort of analogical preaching may be carried, is a question of opinion. There are many who will think it has been carried quite too far in this paragraph.—Tr.]
1Sa_3:8-9. The fact that Samuel, notwithstanding the old man’s assurance that he had not called him, appeared again, and came the third time, without consulting with flesh and blood, was a proof of his simplicity and uprightness. This is indeed the same uprightness which the Redeemer commends in Nathaniel, and here we have certainly a striking example of the Scripture saying: The Lord makes the upright prosper.—That the youth was ready without fretting to present himself three times for the service of his fatherly teacher—what else is it than his obedience towards him to whose discipline and service he had now devoted himself, so firmly grounded in obedience that he did not allow himself to be turned away from his simple, quiet path, not even by the most wonderful testimonies, by perfectly incomprehensible directions. And so with us too, if in any relation whatever we have only learned true obedience, if the position and state of our heart has become that of full and humble subjection, then we are no longer far from the Kingdom of God, which demands blind, unshakable obedience, within which one cannot maintain himself without giving himself up unconditionally to the one authority of Christ in faith as well as in life, and which utterly excludes all selfishness, in whatever form it may come up, all self-will, all entering upon a self-chosen path. [The analogy here and in what follows is extremely remote, and such a use of the passage would seem injudicious.—Tr.]—If we too have only first reached in general the point of being able to believe without seeing—for faith too must be learned—able to believe in the first place the human teaching, rebuking, consoling word,—well, then we are on the way, since the voice of the divine word is believingly received by us.
[Henry: There was a special Providence in it, that Samuel should go thus often to Eli; for hereby, at length, Eli perceived that the Lord had called the child, 1Sa_3:8. (1) This would be a mortification to him, and he would apprehend it to be a step toward his family’s being degraded, that when God had something to say he should choose to say it to the child Samuel, his servant that waited on him, and not to him. (2) This would put him upon inquiring what it was that God said to Samuel, and would abundantly satisfy him of the truth and certainty of what should be delivered, and no room would be left for him to suggest that it was but a fancy of Samuel’s.—Tr.]
1Sa_3:10. So then for the first time Samuel stands with consciousness in the presence of the majesty of God—and immediately all the riddles of life begin to be solved for him, and the meaning of his own life to become clear. What he says bears the clearest stamp of a really begun communion with the Lord. Is it not the resolve to say and to do all that the Lord might show him of his lofty thoughts and ways—is it not this, and nothing but this, that is expressed in Samuel’s words: Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth? Has he not thereby once for all renounced self-knowing and self-will? That was the faithfulness as a prophet, which all Israel from Dan even to Beersheba recognized in him (1Sa_3:20). And that which thus first established a true communion with the Lord could also alone be the power that maintained it. The constant prayer, “Speak, Lord,” and the constant vow, “Thy servant heareth,”—that is the hand which takes hold of God’s right hand, to be held fast by it with everlasting life.
1Sa_3:10. “Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth,” a testimony of unconditional devotion to the Lord: 1) How such a testimony is reached, (a) through the Lord’s awakening call, (b) through receptivity of heart for God’s word, and (c) through the deed of self-denial in the renunciation of all self-knowing and self-will; 2) What is therein testified and praised before the Lord: (a) humble subjection (Speak, Lord), (b) steadfast dependence on the Lord in free love (thy servant), (c) unconditional, joyful obedience to His will (thy servant heareth.)—Conditions of a blessed fulfillment of one’s calling for the Kingdom of God: 1) The experience of the power of the divine word: I have called thee by thy name; 2) The repeated call in prayer, “Speak, Lord!” and 3) The fulfillment of the vow: “thy servant heareth.”
1Sa_3:11. Lange: It is God’s design that when He causes great judgments to occur, men shall with holy terror accept them as a warning. God begins in good time to bring into holy fear the hearts of those whom he wishes to make special and great instruments of advancing His honor. 1Sa_3:12. Starke : The Lord’s word is true; Psa_33:4 [in German; Eng. Ver. correctly: right.—Tr.] Let men therefore not mock at God’s word and threatenings.—Calvin: The guilt becomes so much the greater, when God warns sinners of their transgressions, and they notwithstanding persevere in them. 1Sa_3:13. Eli’s guilt becomes so much the greater from the fact that it was known to him how shamefully his sons behaved, and he did nothing to remove this abomination from his house and from the sanctuary. Calvin: Those who are set for the purpose of chastising the wicked make themselves partakers of a like guilt with them, and go quite over to their side, when at most they express censure with words, and so give themselves the appearance of strictness and earnestness, but do not use the power conferred on them to interfere with the godlessness by deeds.
1Sa_3:14. If the sons of Eli had earnestly repented, they would have obtained grace. But as they were given up to their godless disposition, they must of necessity be hardened in their sins, and in spite of the offerings they presented, which were an abomination in the sight of the Lord, must suffer judgment.
[1Sa_3:11-14. Compare this warning with that previously sent to Eli (1Sa_2:27-36). 1) It is simpler, as was appropriate when given through a youth. 2) It is mainly a repetition of what he had been told before, as are so many of God’s messages to men;—the sin mentioned is ‘the iniquity which he knoweth’ (1Sa_3:13), and the punishment is ‘all, that I have spoken’ (1Sa_3:12). 3) It contains a still more severe threatening, as the former had not led to repentance; (a) an unknown horror is predicted, (b) a punishment of his family that shall never cease. 4) It arouses Eli to enough of spiritual life for submission (1Sa_3:18), but not enough for amendment. (Comp. addition by Tr. to Exegetical on 1Sa_3:14).—Tr.]
1Sa_3:18. We should never venture to dispute with God nor wish to speak against and oppose His purpose, but must, even when we do not recognize the ground of His judgments, yea, when we think we are suffering unjustly, adore the righteousness and holiness of His judgments. Eli bowed himself, it is true, in humility and reverence before the Divine Majesty, but we do not see that he stirred himself up to fulfil his duty towards his godless sons, whereby he would have made known by action the earnestness of his own conversion from the slackness and yielding compliance, which made him the sharer of his sons’ guilt. We should therefore lay it earnestly to heart, not merely with the mouth to give God the honor for His wisdom and righteousness, but upon His call to repentance to subject our own life to an earnest self-examination, in order that then we may beseech God to forgive our sins, and may with our whole heart avoid and flee from evil.
1Sa_3:19. The word of God does not return void, whether it promises or threatens, and preachers of the word of God learn with Samuel that none of their words fall to the ground, and this just in proportion as they are diligent to preach nothing else than God’s word.
[1Sa_3:15-18. Evil Tidings. 1) Samuel shrinks from telling them, as a painful duty. 2) Eli is anxious to be told, (a) He apprehends ill news for himself—accusing conscience—reminded of the warning given through the prophet (1Sa_2:27 sqq.) (b) But he desires to know the worst—earnestly conjures Samuel to tell him all. 3) Eli hears evil tidings with submission, (a) ‘He is Jehovah’—the sovereign God—the covenant God—‘too wise to err, too good to be unkind.’ (b) ‘Let him do,’ etc. He submits humbly, trustfully, lovingly. Hall: If Eli have been an ill father to his sons, yet he is a good son to God, and is ready to kiss the very rod he shall smart withal.)—Tr.]
1Sa_3:20. Samuel a true prophet of the Lord; 1) Whereby he was such. 2) How he proved himself such before the whole people. 3) How he was recognized as such by them. 4) How he is an example for the faithful in the ministry of God’s word.
Cramer: Not only of the whole church in general, but of every Christian hearer in particular is it demanded, that with reference to the doctrine taught he shall perceive whether it is right and true or not, and stand his ground. In the case of Samuel the word did not hold good: The prophet has no honor in his own country. He comes before us here as a prophet who has much honor in his own country, 1) Because he was a faithful prophet of God, 2) Because he was counted worthy by God of continual revelations through his word, and 3) God confirmed his proclamations by the publicly manifested fulfillment of them as a fulfillment of his word.
[1Sa_3:19-21. Henry: The honor done Samuel as a prophet: 1) God did him honor (a) By further manifestations of Himself to him. (b) By fulfilling what He spake by him. 2) Israel did him honor. (a) He grew famous. (b) He grew useful and very serviceable to his generation. He that began betimes to be good, soon came to do good.—Tr.]
Footnotes
[1][1Sa_3:1. = “ rare,” see Isa_13:12; Chald. renders “hidden.”—Tr.]
[2][1Sa_3:1. This word (נפרץ) is variously rendered: Sept. διαστέλλουσα, “distinguishing,” “explaining,” whence some would (without ground) change the text to פֹּרֵץ (which perhaps the Alex. translator read, the Nun omitted from preceding Nun); Chald. “revealed” = “broken open;” Syr. as Heb.; Arab., “the Lord had deprived the children of Israel of revelation in those days, and there was no revelation, to any one of them, and nothing appeared to him;” Vulg. “manifesta;” others, “broken,” “diffused,” “multiplied;” the Jewish interpreters (Rashi, Kimchi, Ralbag) follow the Targ.: Luther, wenig weissagung, “little prophecy;” Erdmann, verbreitet, “spread abroad;” Cahen, “repandu.” This last is probably the correct sense, see 1Ch_13:2; 2Ch_31:5.—Tr.]
[3][1Sa_3:2. Erdmann renders “when” (as Eng. A. V.) in order to show that the description from this point is introductory to 1Sa_3:4; but the literal translation, given above, clearly indicates the connection of thought, and avoids the interpretation of a construction into the text.—Tr.]
[4][1Sa_3:2 and 1Sa_3:4, Or, “was sleeping.”—Tr.]
[5][1Sa_3:3. טֶרֶם with Impf. following the subject = “not yet.”—Tr.]
[6][1Sa_3:3. The Eng. A. V. in making this unwarranted inversion of clauses, was probably controlled by the same motive which led the Masorites to separate שֹׁכֵב (“was lying”) from בְּהֵיבַל (“in the temple”) by the Athnach, namely, to avoid the seeming assertion that Samuel was sleeping in the sacred building. The Targum accordingly renders “was sleeping in the Court of the Levites,” borrowing this term apparently from Herod’s temple. For explanation see Exeg. Notes, in loco.—Tr.]
[7][1Sa_3:3. This is the only place where אל׳ (“God”) in the phrase ארוֹן אל׳ (“the ark of God”) occurs without the Art.; אל׳ often occurs with the force of a proper name, but no reason is apparent why the Art. is omitted here in this standing phrase. For discussion of the difference between אל׳ and האל׳ see Quarry’s “Genesis and its authorship,” pp. 270 sqq.—Tr.]
[8][1Sa_3:7. Erdmann: “had not yet learned to know,” which is substantially the same as Eng. A. V. On pointing of ידע see Exeg Notes, in loco.—Tr.]
[9][1Sa_3:8. The “didst” might now suggest an emphasis not given by the Heb.—Tr.]
[10][1Sa_3:9. The impersonal subject is proper, as Samuel did not know who the caller was.—Tr.]
[11][1Sa_3:10. Chald. softens this anthropomorphism into “revealed himself,” and the Rabbis add, by a voice from the Holy of Holies.—Tr.]
[12][1Sa_3:13. בַּעֲוֹן is difficult. It can be understood here only as in stat. const. with the following clause: Eli’s sin was “that he knew, etc.” So the Vulg. The Targ. and Syr. render as Eng. A. V.; Sept. gives “the iniquities of his sons,” and omits “that he knew;” Wellhausen omits בעין.—Tr.]
[13][1Sa_3:13. להם is here taken as reflexive. The true reading here is not clear; the old translators and critics treated it variously. Sept. has θεὸν as if it read אלהים, which Geiger (Urschrift, p. 271) and others adopt. See Erdmann’s remark on this in Exeg. Notes, in loco. Chald. reads as the Heb. (Targ. renders קלל by רגז here and elsewhere); Syr. has “his sons brought ignominy on the people,” reading apparently לעם. This is one of the eighteen cases of the “correction of the Scribes” (see Buxtorf’s Lex. s. v. תִּקוּן), who are said to have changed the original reading לִי “me” to להם “themselves,” to avoid the blasphemy, for which reason also Geiger holds that א׳ “God” was changed. Others suggest that the לי stood for ליהוה “Jehovah.” But it is hard to say how much reliance is to be put on these alleged corrections of the old Jewish critics, and here (as Wellhausen remarks) we expect the Acc. אוֹתִי not לִי after קלל. The external critical evidence is in favor of the reading אלהים “God,” but, the objection to this urged by Erdmann being strong, we can only, with him, retain the present text.—Tr.]
[14][1Sa_3:14. It seems desirable to express in an Eng. translation the difference between זבח and מנחה.—Tr.]
[15][1Sa_3:15. Sept. here adds “and rose in the morning,” which Thenius and Wellhausen think stood originally in the text, and fell out by similar ending. On the other hand, it is a natural filling out of a terse account, quite in the manner of the Sept.—Tr.]
[16][1Sa_3:17. The Eng. “I pray thee” is too strong for the Heb. נָא, for which we have no good equivalent.—Tr.]
[17][1Sa_3:21. On the addition of the Sept. here see Thenius and Wellhausen.—Tr.]
[18][Hazon, which is used chiefly in the later books of O. T., Isaiah 1) the picture presented to the mind in the ecstatic prophetic state; 2) the body of truth thus given to the prophet. It is the technical word for divine revelation (so contrasted with מַרְאֶה).—Tr.]
[19][See the remark of Tr. under “Textual and Grammatical.”—Tr.]
[20] כּחות is either verbal adj. כֵהוֹת, which forms a single conception with the preceding fin. verb (“they began dim,” i.e., “began to become dim”)—as in Gen_9:20 the same verb is connected with a subst., Ges., § 142, 4, Rem.—or Inf. Qal בְּהוֹת (comp., Isa_3:7; Gen_27:1; Deu_34:7 : Job_16:8; Zec_11:17), “which the punctuators avoided only because they had not elsewhere met with it” (Böttch.). [This whole note, quoted by Erdmann and Thenius from Böttcher, is somewhat unclear. The passages cited for the Inf. hardly bear on the question. Wellhausen declares the Inf. here without לְ impossible; but see Deu_2:25; Deu_2:31. Winer makes it Piel. Inf.—Tr.]
[21][The Sept. has “before the lamp was prepared,” which may point to the custom of keeping one light burning during the day, and thus indicate the late night or early morning.—Tr.].
[22] טֶרֶם is seldom used, as here, with the Perf. of past time; comp. Psa_90:2; Ew. § 337, 3, c. We might however point also יִדִעַ with Böttcher, and thus read, “in accordance with the following יִגָּלֶה, a Fiens [Impf.] with טֶרֶם, as is usual.”
[23]On the intrans. תְּצִלֶּינָה see Ew. §196 d [comp. Green’s Heb. Gr. §141, 2.—Tr.].
[24] כִהָה Pi. here trans. “to make faint, weak, frighten” by threatening, terrifying conduct, as elsewhere גָּעַר with בּ, increpare aliquem.
[25][The words “Eli who was roused to earnest interest” have been supplied by the translator, something amounting to this having fallen out of the text, probably by typographical error.—Tr.]
[26][This means not, “may God do to you as you do to me,” but “may God visit your refusal with appropriate punishment.”—Tr.]
[27][The origin of the figure has been sought for in various occurrences, as the spilling of water, the fall of an arrow, or any weapon of war, or of a house, but it is better understood in a general way as signifying “failures,” in contrast with a firm, upright position.—Tr.]
[28][It is an old opinion that there is here a reference to the personal Word, the second Person of the Trinity. The Targ. has “the word of Jehovah was his help,” and so some modern commentators, as Gill. But plainly there is no ground for this.—Tr.]
[29][On Roeh and Nabi see on 1Sa_9:9.—Tr.]
[30][The Papal Interdict forbids the celebration of divine service, the administration of the sacraments, ecclesiastical burial and marriage (by Romish ministers), and enjoins fasting and prayer.—Tr.]
[31][On the relation between ראה and חזה see below, 1Sa_9:9.—Tr.]
[32][Momentum, translation of Germ. “moment,” “essential or important element.”—Tr.]
[33][See also Fairbairn on Prophecy, Chap. 1, and Lee on Inspiration.—Tr.]
[34][In the Germ. versöhnungs-gnade—“grace of expiation.”—Tr.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain SAMUEL’S CALL, 1Sa_3:1-21.
SAMUEL’S CALL, 1Sa_3:1-21.
1. Samuel ministered — See note on 1Sa_2:11. According to Josephus, Samuel was now about twelve years old.
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The word of the Lord was precious in those days — יקר, precious, costly; an epithet applied frequently to very rare and costly stones. 2Sa_12:30; 1Ki_10:2; 1Ch_20:2; Eze_27:22. The meaning is that direct revelations from God had become exceedingly rare, and this fact was owing to the lamentable sinfulness of the priesthood and the people. As sinfulness in the individual heart drives away the Holy Spirit, so in the Hebrew nation it drove away the spirit of prophecy. A direct communication from God at such a time would truly be a precious thing. Unless we reckon Deborah, who is called a prophetess, (Jdg_4:4,) so far as we know only two prophets had appeared in Israel (see Jdg_6:8, and 1Sa_2:27) during the period that intervened between the time of Moses and this call of Samuel.
No open vision — Literally, No divine communication was spread; that is, published abroad, made known. If, perchance, God revealed himself to pious individuals here and there, he gave them private revelations; but the persons thus honoured were not thereby constituted public prophets, nor sent to publish their communications to the people. In the midst of such spiritual darkness Samuel arose as a new luminary in Israel.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain Ch. 1Sa_3:1-10. The Call of Samuel
Ch. 1Sa_3:1-10. The Call of Samuel
1. the child Samuel] According to Josephus, Samuel had just completed his twelfth year when the word of Jehovah came to him. In later times this age was a critical point in the life of a Jewish boy. He then became ‘a son of the Law,’ and was regarded as personally responsible for obedience to it. It was at the age of twelve that “the child Jesus” first went up to Jerusalem along with his parents (Luk_2:42).
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ministered] Cp. 1Sa_2:11; 1Sa_2:18.
was precious] Rather, was rare. In the general decay of religion, prophetic communications from God had almost entirely ceased. Cp. Amo_8:11; Psa_74:9. We read of two prophets only in the days of the Judges (Jdg_4:4; Jdg_6:8).
there was no open vision] Rather, there was no vision published abroad. The word is used in 2Ch_31:5 of the publication of a decree (E. V. came abroad). There was no publicly acknowledged prophet, whose ‘word came to all Israel.’
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (1) The child Samuel ministered unto the Lord.—The writer…
(1) The child Samuel ministered unto the Lord.—The writer of this history, although well aware of the great revolution accomplished in Israel by the prophet whose life and work the Holy Spirit bade him record, gives us but the simplest and shortest possible account of the child-days of him who was only second to Moses in his influence on the eventful story of the chosen people. But short and devoid of detail though the record be, it is enough to show us that the atmosphere in which the child lived was a pure and holy one; the boy was evidently kept apart from Hophni, Phinehas, and their impious self-seeking party. The high priestly guardian was evidently fully conscious of the importance of his charge, and he watched over his pupil with a tender watchful care. Perhaps his sad experiences with his evil headstrong sons had taught the old man wisdom; certainly the training he gave to Samuel was one that educated the boy well for his after-life of stirring public work. The notices of the childhood and boyhood are indeed brief. The first contrasts sharply the lawless profligacy of the priestly houses with the pure holy childhood passed in the sanctuary courts, probably always in the company of the old man. Hophni and Phinehas, the grown men prostituted the holy work to their own vile worldly ends: the child ministered before the Lord in his little white robe; and while in the home life of his own mother and father in Ramah, his brothers and sisters were growing up with the sorrows and joys of other Hebrew children, “the child Samuel grew before the Lord” amid the stillness and silence and the awful mystery of the Divine protection, which seems ever, even in the darkest days of the history of Israel, to have surrounded the home of the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord. It was amidst this silent, sacred mystery, apart from the disorders of his priestly sons, that Eli taught the boy the story of his ancestors, with only the dark curtains of the sanctuary hanging between master and pupil and the mystic golden throne of God, on which His glory was sometimes pleased to rest.
The writer wrote his gloomy recital of the wild unbridled life of the wicked priests, wrote down the weak, sorrowful remonstrances of the father and high priest, foreshadowing, however, their certain doom; and then, again, with their life of shame sharply contrasts the pure child-life of the little pupil of the old sorrow-stricken high priest—the boy whom all men loved. “And the boy Samuel grew on, and was in favour both with the Lord, and also with men.”
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Once more Eli, now weak with age, is warned of the sure consequences which would follow the evil licence and the irreligion of his priestly sons; and again the boy Samuel and his life, guided by Eli, his guardian and teacher, is contrasted with the wild, unchecked lawlessness of the priestly sons of Eli perpetually dishonouring religion and the sanctuary—a lawlessness which had just been denounced by the nameless prophet (1Sa_2:27-36).
Josephus tells us that Samuel, when the Lord first called him, was twelve years old. This was the age of the child Jesus when He disputed with the doctors in the Temple.
Was precious in those days.—Precious, that is, rare. “The word of the Lord” is the will of the Lord announced by a prophet, seer, or man of God. Between the days of Deborah and the nameless man of God who came with the awful message to Eli, no inspired voice seems to have spoken to the chosen people.
The “open vision” refers to such manifestations of the Divinity as were vouchsafed to Abraham, Moses, Joshua, and Manoah, and in this chapter to Samuel. There may possibly be some reference to the appearance of Divine glory which was connected with the Urim and Thummim which were worn by the high priest. This significant silence on the part of the invisible King the writer dwells on as a result of the deep corruption into which the priests and, through their evil example, a large proportion of the nation, had fallen.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain THE CALL OF SAMUEL (vers. 1-10).
THE CALL OF SAMUEL (vers. 1-10).
The word of the Lord was precious in those days. Or rather rare; it came but seldom, and there was no proper order of persons from whose ranks the "speakers for God" would naturally step forth. It was this which made the revelation of Jehovah"s will to Samuel an event so memorable both for the Jewish nation and for the Church; for he was called by the providence of God to be the founder of prophecy as an established institution, and henceforward, side by side with the king and priest, the prophet took his place as one of the three factors in the preparation for the coming of him who is a king to rule, a Priest to make atonement, and also a Prophet to teach his people and guide them into all the truth. There was no open vision. Literally, "no vision that broke forth". (see 2Ch_31:5, where it is used of the publication of a decree) The meaning is, that though prophecy was an essential condition of the spiritual life of Israel, yet that hitherto it had not been promulgated and established as a fact. The gift had not absolutely been withheld, but neither had it been permanently granted as a settled ordinance. There are in Hebrew two words for vision : the one used here, hazon, refers to such sights as are revealed to the tranced eye of the seer when in a state of ecstasy; while the other, march, is a vision seen by the natural eye. From the days, however, of Isaiah onward, hazon became the generic term for all prophecy. Ver. 2. Eli could not see. Ie. clearly. His sight was fast failing him, and Samuel, still called a child, na"ar, but probably, as Josephus states ("Antiq.," 5:10, 4), now fully twelve years old, was in constant attendance upon him because of his increasing infirmities. Both were sleeping in the temple; for literally the words are, And Samuel was sleeeping in the temple of Jehovah, where the ark of God was. Of course neither Eli nor Samuel were in the holy place; but, as in 1Sa_1:9, the word temple is used in its proper sense of the whole palace of Israel"s spiritual King, in which were chambers provided for the use of the high priest and those in attendance upon him.
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In ver. 3 the lamp is mentioned as fixing the exact time. Though it is said that the seven-branched candelabrum was "to burn always", (Exo_27:20) yet this apparently was to be by perpetually relighting it (ibid. 30:7, 8); and as Aaron was commanded to dress and light it every morning and evening, and supply it with oil, the night would be far advanced and morning near before it went out. In the stillness then of the late night Samuel, sunk in heavy sleep, hears a voice calling him, and springing up, naturally hurries to Eli, supposing that he needed his services. Eli had not heard the voice, and concluding that it was a mistake, bids Samuel return to his bed. Again the voice rings upon his ear, and again he hastens to Eli, only to be told to lie down again.
In ver. 7 the reason is given why Samuel was thus thrice mistaken. Samuel did not yet know Jehovah, neither was the word of Jehovah yet revealed unto him. Doubtless he knew Jehovah in the way in which the sons of Eli did not know him, (1Sa_2:12) i.e. in his conscience and spiritual life, but he did not know him as one who reveals his will unto men. Prophecy had long been a rare thing, and though Samuel had often heard God"s voice in the recesses of his heart, speaking to him of right and wrong, he knew nothing of God as a living Person, giving commands for men to obey, and bestowing knowledge to guide them in doing his will.
Vers. 1-10.
Light withheld.
The facts given are
1. A lack of the manifest revelations of the Divine will to which Israel hadbeen accustomed.
2. A consciousness of this want on the part of the few pious in Israel.
3. The continued service of Samuel in the ordinary routine of thesanctuary.
4. The resumption of the manifest revelation by the call of Samuel toreceive it.
5. Samuel experiences difficulty in recognising the call of God.
6. Eli renders to him the assistance by which he becomes recipient of theDivine communication. The statement concerning Samuel"s continued service in the sanctuary is evidently to prepare the way for the new prophet"s summons to important duties. The historian"s mind rests primarily on a dreary period during which a valued privilege was not enjoyed.
I A PROGRESSION OF LIGHT IS NEEDED IN THE CHURCH OF GOD. The ancient Jewish Church was very dependent for its growth in knowledge, in direction for present duty, and in advancing joy in life, upon well ascertained communications from God. The fragmentary history from patriarchal times onwards acquaints us with many specific instances in which "open vision," as distinguished from individual enlightenment for private uses, was vouchsafed. It is probable that much other light was given than we have record of, as truly as that the apostles received more from Christ than is explicitly contained in the Gospels. The clear light of God was necessary in successive years to enable Israel to do the work required in paving the way for Messiah. Therefore men looked for "vision" through some chosen instrument, and felt that the normal course of Providence was interrupted when, through long and weary years, none was granted. Substantially the light has now been given to the modern Church. No one is to "add to or take away from the words of the book" which God has given for the instruction and guidance of his people. But relatively, to the perception of the Church and of the individual, there is still a progression in what is made known to us. All the truth was in Christ before it gradually came forth "in divers manners to the fathers;" and all the truth requisite for salvation is in the word of God. But as occasional manifestations in ancient times brought successive beams of light from the original Source to supply the need of men, so now out of the word of God much light has to break forth for the instruction, guidance, and comfort of the Church. There is all the difference imaginable between adding to the sum of truth by traditions of men or superior "light of reason," and having the things of Christ revealed to us by the Spirit. Our growth in knowledge is consequent on clearer "visions" from God"s word.
II SPIRITUAL RECEPTIVITY IS A CONDITION OF RECEIVING FURTHER LIGHT FROM GOD. The absence of "open visions" in the days of Eli is implicitly accounted for by the circumstance that the official persons through whom the communications usually came were not in a state of mind to be so honoured by God. There seems to be a beautiful adaptation between the fitness of the instrument and the fulness of the truth conveyed. Isaiah"s intense spirituality of mind made him a fit instrument for conveying to men the more advanced truth revealed to him. The tone of the Apostle John"s nature qualified him for the special quality and degree of truth characteristic of his writings. There seem to be high regulative laws by which God sends forth his light to the spiritual man corresponding to those in the lower sphere of intellect and moral perception. The application of this principle is seen in the history of the Church and of the individual. When the leaders of the Church have been intent on earthly things, no advance has been made in the understanding of the Scriptures. As protoplastic life must pre-exist in order to the assimilation of protoplasm, so a certain spiritual light and love must dwell in man in order to the absorption into self of light from God"s word. No wonder if irreligious men cannot know the mysteries of the kingdom. The highest spiritual truth is not intellectually, but "spiritually discerned." Christ may have many things to say to us, but we, through deficient receptivity, "cannot bear them now." Hence the wisdom of God is often foolishness to men, or the darkness is real because the eye that should see is dim.
III It is a GREAT CALAMITY FOR ANY PEOPLE TO BE DEPRIVED OF THE LIGHT which ordinarily comes from God for human use. The historian indicates the sad loss from which the people were suffering in this withholding of "open vision." All light is good, only good. It is the chief means of life. It means cheer, safety, development. To be without it in any measure is, in that degree, to be practically blind, and to suffer all the evils of blindness. We mourn over those who cannot see the sweet, beautiful light of day. Agony enters us when we gaze on men devoid of the light of reason. The wisest grope as in perpetual fear when the pillar of fire and Divine silence show not the way to take. Worst of all when the Church has no guidance suited to its need. There have been periods when the written word has been almost lost to the mass of Christians. There are souls dark, sad, hopeless because no "vision" points to the Refuge from sin and the rest to come. If one could speak out the secret miseries of some who, dazed by exclusive gaze on the light of reason, feel that life is hopeless, the world would scarcely credit the story.
IV The LACK OF RECEPTIVITY BY WHICH this calamity is experienced is often THE RESULT OF A DEGENERATE, CORRUPT STATE OF MIND SELF-INDUCED AND LOVED. The spiritual unfitness of people and leaders in Eli"s day to receive more and frequent "visions" was the creation of their own wicked wills. The calamity of being left for a while was the fruit of their doings. Sin is a blinding power, as also a creator of positive aversion. The natural effect of religious declension is to render men indifferent to the value of God"s truth for its own sake and for its elevating influence; incapable of appreciating and even discerning it in its purity; prone to set a wrong interpretation upon it when in any degree it is given; and even, in many instances, disposed go refer that which professes to be from God to any other than the true source. It is a fair question how much of the professed rejection of Christianity on reasonable grounds is really traceable to the pure exercise of the reason under the guidance of an undefiled love of truth. Is not zeal to be free from such holy restraints as Christ imposes often an important element in the case? The finer and most convincing evidences of the truth of Christianity lie in the spiritual beauty and glory of the Christ, and this is a factor which mere intellectual processes cannot assess. How is it that the unholy always welcome objections to Christianity? It is ever true, "sin lieth at the door." "Ye will not come unto me." "Out of the heart are the issues of life.
V The CAUSE OF THE DEGENERACY which issues in a calamitous loss of spiritual light LIES IN A NEGLECT OF SUCH LIGHT AS IS ALREADY GIVEN. The inaptitude of Eli to receive "visions," and of the people to profit by them, was the fruit of a religious decay brought on by inattention to the instructions given by Moses, and a heedless performance of acts of worship. Thus calamity came of abuse or neglect of existing privileges. The principle holds good over a wide sphere. Unfaithfulness in some Churches of Asia led to the dire calamity of a removal of the "candlestick." Apostles sometimes turned from cities that failed to use the opportunities they afforded them. Those who, seeing the "Eternal Power and Godhead "in the "things that are made," glorified not God, had their "foolish heart darkened." An exclusive fondness for one side of intellectual nature, to the habitual neglect of the secret and subtle moral elements in conscience, often results in the folly and wickedness of finding not even a trace of God in the universe. Of many it may still be true, "Hadst thou known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace I but now they are hid from thine eyes.
VI The CORRUPTION OF AN AGE and consequent WITHHOLDMENT OF DIVINE LIGHT is NO PERMANENT BAR TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF TRUTH. Israel"s degeneracy brought its chastisement; yet God had a holy servant in reserve both to remove the impeding corruption and to continue the declarations of God"s will. Waters held back by a barrier retain and multiply their force, and in course of time will first sweep away the opposition and then flow peacefully on. God"s purposes are an eternal force pressing on into the future. In ancient times a measure of truth was given to the world to make ready a fit time and condition for the Christ to come; and this was done, if not by one unwilling instrument, yet by another when that was swept away. Likewise the Church is to get more truth from the Bible for the "perfecting of the saints;" and in spite of dark seasons it will rise to a clearer vision of the truth in Christ by the providential removal of obstructions and the introduction of a more holy and teachable order of men. Man lives and toils, and opposes and dies. God ever lives in full resistless energy.
Practical considerations:
1. It is a question how far errors and theological conflicts are to be associated with a defective spirituality arising from either over-absorption
2. in purely philosophical pursuits, external Church order, or political and party arrangements.
3. To what extent is it possible to remedy the absence of Divine truth inmuch of the literature of modern times.
1. By what means the Church and the individual may secure more of thatholy, teachable spirit by which alone a fuller vision of truth shall be enjoyed.
2. How far the conduct of controversies of the day respecting Divine truthis defective by not sufficiently taking into account the spiritual condition of men opposed to religion, and whether there is a proper dependence on the power of the Holy Spirit to give eyes to the blind.
3. To what extent, in personal seasons of darkness, the cause lies in ourpersonal indulgence in secret or open sin.
Lowly instruments.
The transition from the employment of Eli, as the messenger of God to the people, to Samuel, brings into view important truths concerning the instrumentality by which God effects his purposes concerning man.
I God always has IN RESERVE AND TRAINING SUITABLE INSTRUMENTS for promoting the ends to be sought in connection with Christ"s kingdom. Judged from the outward aspect of things, all around appeared dark and hopeless. There was no one able to cope with the difficulties of the position. A similar condition of things has been found in certain countries during the history of the Christian Church. Some desponding minds would find a correspondence in the prevailing unbelief and daring atheism of modern times. There are also conditions of the individual spiritual life when decay has apparently gone on to utter hopelessness. Missionaries have now and then felt almost the horror of despair in view of nameless barbarities. But two or three saw a little beneath the surface. Hannah was sure of coming deliverance. Elkanah in some degree shared her confidence, and Eli surmised a purpose of the Lord in the presence of the holy child of the sanctuary. And, answering to these better spirits of a corrupt age, there are always a few remnant who know and are comforted in the assurance that God has instruments in reserve. As in the case of Samuel, they are chosen, in training, and biding their time. There are instances of this general truth
1. In the preparation of the earth for man. From remote times there were already chosen, and qualified, and retained in other forms till fit season, the agencies by which, in spite of catastrophes of fire and convulsion and deluge, the beautiful earth would come forth in material realisation of the thought and purpose of God.
2. In the infant Christian Church. The end of Christ"s earthly life seemed most disastrous to his kingdom. The corruption and craft of the wicked were dominant, and the removal of the Saviour seemed to human judgment to be the climax of disaster. Yet God had chosen, was training and holding in reserve, the men by whom the evils of the age were to be overcome, and truth and righteousness and love asserted as never before.
3. In definite periods of the Church"s history. The scholastic subtleties of the middle ages on the one side, the deplorable decay of morals and the prostitution of Church ordinances to gain on the other, caused the earth to mourn. Nevertheless, in the seraphic devotion of here and there a devout monk, in the inquiring spirit of Erasmus, the clear intelligence of Melancthon, and the courage and firm grip of truth by Luther, God had his chosen instruments for producing a wonderful advance in all that pertains to freedom, purity, and Christian knowledge.
4. In the midst of the evils indicated by modern antagonism to Christianity. Doubtless the principles advocated, logically wrought out, as they are sure to be when the mass embrace them, contain the seeds of immorality, anarchy, and decay of noblest sentiments; and often there is an eagerness in adopting them which may well cause some to tremble. But God is alive, not dead. He has his agencies, fitted, and, so to speak, under restraint. They will be found to consist in the practical futility of all endeavour to get substitutes for a holy religion; the hopeless miseries into which individuals will be plunged; the horror created by the very violence of vice; the natural, never-to-be-quenched instinct which compels man to "cry out for the living God;" the calling forth of wise men of saintly life who are masters in secular knowledge; the silent force of Christian lives in health, sickness, and sorrow; and the aroused prayerfulness of the Church. Men like Samuel are in existence
5. In the conflict of the individual Christian life. The dire evils of latent sin, weak resolutions, from stains of early years, seem to be a "body of sin and death from which there is no escape. But God has in reserve the truth, the afflictions, the tenderness, the quickening power of the Holy Spirit, by which all these shall pass away, and a restored life shall result.
II The CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MOST EFFECTIVE INSTRUMENTS in working out God"s will are, SO FAR AS PERSONS ARE CONCERNED, WELL ASCERTAINED. There is great advantage in having the child life of Samuel sketched in contrast with the habits and principles of those no longer worthy to be the instruments for doing the highest work in the world. The qualities in Samuel that fitted him for his work were purity of life, deep love for God and his sanctuary, personal consecration to any service in which it might please God to employ him, and the humility that disdains not even menial work if God would thus have it. These qualities are really embraced in the one supreme quality conformity of will to the Divine will. In this respect all human instruments are alike when thoroughly effective. In so far as it is our "meat and drink" to do the Father"s will, our nature becomes a fit channel for the Divine energy to work through for spiritual ends. The failure of moral agents lies in the condition of the will. The power of Christian life in prayer, in work, in silent influence, is in proportion as the consecration takes the form of, "Not my will, but thine be done.
III The EFFECTIVENESS OF THE INSTRUMENTS used lies essentially in THE POWER WHICH WORKS THROUGH THEM. The excellent qualities of Samuel no doubt exercised a power appropriate to their own nature; but the real work he did was more than the mere natural influence of what he was. It was God who worked, not only within him to will and to do, but also with and by him. Everywhere in Scripture stress is laid on the unseen energy of God acting on the visible and invisible elements of things, and at last bringing all into subjection. The reality of the Divine power in the human instrument is often conspicuous. The child Samuel did not secure of himself the submission of the people or the deference of Eli. God wrought on their spirits and made them willing to take him as prophet. Saul was the stronger map, but God used David to slay Goliath. God, in the case of apostles, had chosen the "weak things of the world to confound the mighty." His grace was sufficient for them. "Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit.
General lessons:
1. There is the most perfect ground for confidence that agencies will be found for doing any work really essential to the salvation of men.
2. It is important for all so to live and labour that they may be available forany service requisite in seasons of trial.
3. The fitness of each Christian for doing greatest possible good in theworld rests with his own diligent self culture and entireness of consecration.
4. It is essentially necessary that in all effort God be recognised as theAuthor of all good.
Call to higher service.
The service of God is very wide and varied. Every true heart may find some employment therein. "They serve who wait," as also those who simply exhibit a holy life. The weary Christian invalid conveys many an impressive lesson to the strong and vigorous. The patient endurance of adversity may do more good than the enjoyment of prosperity. In making distinctions in the value of service rendered, we are not always in a position to pass perfect judgment. In one respect a lowly Christian may be "greater than John the Baptist." In reference to public functions there are gradations, and in this respect Samuel was called to a higher form of service.
I There ARE CALLS TO A SERVICE RELATIVELY HIGHER. In the estimation of Hannah and Eli, the early occupation of Samuel in the tabernacle was the initiatory stage of a life work. Except so far as a pure, simple life in contrast with vileness can teach, Samuel"s service was confined to attendance on the venerable high priest. The position for which he was finally called was more conspicuous, of wider influence, and involving the display of superior qualities. The narrative relating the call to this higher service is a record in spirit of what has often transpired in the course of history, and is being realised every day. Abraham, Moses, and David served God, each in his own restricted sphere, when they obeyed the Divine call. As Christ once summoned fishermen to leave their occupation to be fishers of men, so now others hear his voice urging them to leave the ship, the desk, the farm, to do his will in preaching the gospel. To the attentive ear of the devout there are frequent calls to rise to more arduous positions in the Church, or to enter on some line of private Christian endeavour that shall more truly bless mankind. Let devout men not forget that the Divine call to higher work is not confined to public functionaries. All kinds of workers are engaged on the spiritual temple.
II There is A SPECIAL FITNESS REQUIRED FOR HIGHER SERVICE. Obviously, only a Samuel trained by a devout mother, accustomed to the hallowed associations of the sanctuary, was suited for the work that had henceforth to be done. The chief elements that qualify for entrance on higher service are
1. Deep piety; for as piety is a requisite to all useful spiritual work, so deep piety is required for the more trying forms of usefulness.
2. Fidelity in lower forms. He that is faithful in that which is least becomes fitted for superior responsibilities. "Come up higher" is the voice which crowns earthly toil.
3. Natural aptitude for new emergencies. God never puts a man in a position for which natural powers when sanctified are unsuited. The wondrous adaptations in the material world find their analogies in the spiritual.
4. Readiness to endure what is unknown. God"s servants have to enter an untraversed ground, and their qualification for a call to this must embrace a spirit that says, "Here am I" "Speak, Lord." "What wouldst thou have me to do?" The representation given of Samuel, and of others in the Bible, shows that they were endowed with these qualifications. This, also, may be a test by which good men may now judge of themselves. No one ought to think of departing from any useful sphere of labour without severe scrutiny as to capabilities for heavier duties.
III The FITNESS FOR HIGHER SERVICE IS, IN SOME INSTANCES, UNCONSCIOUSLY ACQUIRED. Growth is not felt while in process, and only when attention is called to it is the fact recognised. Samuel became month by month more pious and true; his aptitudes enlarged, and his courage rose with every discharge of inconvenient duty. He became spiritually wealthy without being aware of it sure evidence of vital godliness. The disposition sometimes found to complain of one"s lot, to hanker after some more showy occupation in God"s service, and to watch and plan for personal advancement, is not a good sign. The humble deeds of opening the door, lighting the lamps of the house of God, when done out of pure love for the Lord of the sanctuary, are means of raising the tone of the entire life. To do the smallest deed for Christ is blessed, and years of such fond service is an education, the results of which are only brought out to view when a perhaps sudden demand is made for some difficult duty. By his bitter repentance, and the all-absorbing love for Christ consequent on full restoration, Peter little knew that he was becoming the man to lead the Church on to great triumphs.
IV The MEANS OF CALLING TO HIGHER SERVICE ARE WONDERFULLY SUITED TO THE CIRCUMSTANCE. The miraculous manifestation of the Divine Being was in harmony with the method by which, as Samuel knew from history of the past, God conveyed his will to men. No terror would arise in his spirit, for he was accustomed to reverence the house of God, and to feel that God was nigh. A pure, loving heart does not dread God. The more childlike the piety, the more welcome the thought and presence of the eternal Friend. If Samuel was to become a prophet, and the emergency required that a prophet should speak at that juncture; and if, for authentication, Eli must be used, it is difficult to conceive how these ends could be more naturally secured than by the manner in which the call was made. The objections men raise to what they call the anthropomorphism of such a portion of Scripture as this are utterly baseless. Does not God reveal himself in the material world by the visible things which are the outward expressions of his mind? Does it make any real difference to him whether he form them by a slow or by a more swift process? Was the first expression, in an act of creation, slow? Who, then, shall say that in expressing his moral purposes for men he must not and cannot adopt an ontward visible form, by which the mind to be taught shall be surely arrested? Given a revelation to be made, will men prescribe a priori and infallibly how God is to act in making it. If so, do they not draw on their human views, and create a God of their own? And what is this but anthropomorphism of deepest dye? All God"s acts are perfect. The call of his servants is by means suited to time, purpose, and condition. Abraham and others after him each heard the Divine voice differently, but naturally, so far as special conditions determine events. There are "diversities of operations," but "one Spirit." So now it may be by "still small voice," or by suggestion of the wise, or by pressure of circumstances, that his servants receive the assurance that God would have them enter on enlarged responsibilities.
V It is POSSIBLE THAT A CALL MAY NOT BE CLEARLY DISTINGUISHED AT FIRST. It was not wonderful that Samuel mistook the voice of God for the voice of man. It was Divine tenderness gradually to prepare his mind, through the suggestion of Eli, for a great event. God accommodates his voice of majesty to mortal ears. A spirit like Samuel"s, satisfied with the honour of doing anything in the house of God, would scarcely suppose that the greatest of honours was at hand. We are not sure that calls to higher service are in any case immediately clear. Scripture tells of the fact in many instances without reference to the mental history of the individuals. Abraham"s strong faith implies special difficulties, and possibly conflicts. Isaiah could scarcely believe that God would use him. Though the disciples knew that Jesus of Nazareth called them to be his servants, doubts subsequently came over them, for they "trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel." Good men become so habituated to lines of action, ruling of impulses, and guidance of common events, that at first they cannot recognise a superior will in new openings, new gentle longings, and pressure from without. It is by the use of ordinary faculties and means that the call to duty is ascertained. Samuel inquired of Eli, and followed the suggestions of the experienced. The great lines of duty are close to all who will take the trouble to know them. Wise men, passing events, openness of spirit, willingness to be led, these are the means by which every perplexed Samuel will be sure to solve his doubts. To know the possibility that God has some unknown duty to indicate, to be saying in heart, when attention is aroused, "Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth this is often the first step to a new career of usefulness.
HOMILIES BY D. FRASER. Vers. 1-18.
The old priest and the child prophet.
Every imagination must be struck by the contrast between the old man and the child. The more so, that the natural order of things is reversed. Instead of admonition to the child coming through the lips of age, admonition to the aged came through the lips of childhood.
1. THE CHARACTER OF ELI ILLUSTRATED.
1. His good points. The Lord had ceased to speak to or by Eli; but whenthe old priest perceived that the Lord had spoken to the child, he showed no personal or official jealousy. On the contrary, he kindly encouraged Samuel, and directed him how to receive the heavenly message. He did not attempt to interpose on the ground that he, as the chief priest, was the official organ of Divine communications, but bade the child lie still and hearken to the voice. Nor did he claim any preference on the ground of his venerable age. It is not easy to look with complacency on one much younger than ourselves who is evidently on the way to excel us in our own special province. But Eli did so, and threw no hindrance whatever in the way of the young child. Let God use as his seer or prophet whom he would. Eli was anxious to know the truth, and the whole truth, from the mouth of the child. He had been previously warned by a man of God of the disaster which his own weakness and his sons" wickedness would bring on the priestly line. (1Sa_2:27-36) But the evil of the time was too strong for him; and having effected no reform in consequence of that previous warning, the old man must have foreboded some message of reproof and judgment when the voice in the night came not to himself, but to the child. Yet he was not false to God, and would not shrink from hearing truth, however painful. "I pray thee hide it not from me." He meekly acquiesced in the condemnation of his house. Eli had no sufficient force of character or vigour of purpose to put away the evil which had grown to such enormity under his indulgent rule, but he was ready with a sort of plaintive surrender to Divine justice. It was not a high style of
2. character, but at all events it was vastly better than a self-justifying, God-resisting mood of mind.
3. His faults. No meek language, no pious acquiescence in his sentence,can extenuate the grievous injury which, through indecision and infirmity, Eli had brought on Israel at large, and on the priestly order in particular. His virtues may almost be said to have sprung out of his faults. He was benevolent, submissive, and free from jealousy because he had no force, no intensity. He could lament and suffer well because he had no energy. So he commanded little respect because, instead of checking evil, he had connived at it for a quiet life. "There are persons who go through life sinning and sorrowing, sorrowing and sinning. No experience teaches them. Torrents of tears flow from their eyes. They are full of eloquent regrets. But all in vain. When they have done wrong once they do wrong again. What are such persons to be in the next life? Where will the Elis of this world be? God only knows "(Robertson).
II THE CHILD CALLED TO BE A PROPHET. We may discern even in "little Samuel" the beginnings of a great character, prognostics of an illustrious career. The child was courageous, not afraid to sleep in one of the priest"s chambers alone, no father or mother near. And he was dutiful to the aged Eli, hastening to him when he thought that he had called in the night; and considerate to his feelings, reluctant to tell him in the morning the heavy judgments of which God had spoken. From that night he began to be a prophet. Very soon were the hopes of Hannah for her son fulfilled, nay, surpassed. "Samuel grew, and the Lord was with him, and did let none of his words fall to the ground." The nature of the first communication made through Samuel gave some indication of the future strain of his prophetic life and testimony. He was not to be one of those, like Isaiah, Daniel, and Zechariah, whose prophecies and visions reached far forward into future times. His function was more like that of Moses, Elijah, or Jeremiah, as a teacher of private and public righteousness. He was destined to maintain the law and authority of God, to rebuke iniquity, to check and even sentence transgressors in high places, to withstand the current of national degeneracy, and insist on the separation of Israel from the heathen nations and their customs. The pith of his life ministry lay in his urgency for moral obedience.
III LIGHT THROWN ON THE EARLY TRAINING OF GOD"S PUBLIC SERVANTS. It is acknowledged that some who have been eminently useful in Christian times have been converted in manhood, and their earlier life may seem to have been lost. Paul was so converted. So was Augustine. But these really form no exception to the rule that God directs the training of his servants from childhood. Paul had a good Jewish Rabbinical education, and, besides this, an acquaintance with Greek literature and forms of thought. Having been brought up a Pharisee, he was the more fitted after his conversion to estimate at its full force that Jewish resistance to Christianity on the ground of law righteousness which he above all men combatted. At the same time, knowing the world, and being from his youth up cultivated and intelligent according to the Greek standard, he was prepared to be, after his conversion, a most suitable apostle of Christ to the Gentiles. A similar process of preparation may be traced in Augustine. His early studies in logic and rhetoric prepared him, though he knew it not, to become a great Christian dialectician; and even the years in which he served his own youthful passions were not without yielding some profit, inasmuch as they intensified his knowledge of the power of sin, and ultimately of the sin vanquishing power of grace. By far the greater number of those who have served the Lord as prophets, preachers, or pastors of his flock, have been nourished up for such service from early years, though they knew it not. Some of them went first to other callings. John Chrysostom was at the bar; Ambrose in the civil service, rising to be prefect of Liguria; Cyprian was a teacher of rhetoric; Melancthon, a professor of Greek. Moses himself grew up a scholar and a soldier, and no one who saw him in the court of Egypt could have guessed his future career. But in such cases God guided his servants in youth through paths of knowledge and experience which were of utmost value to them when they found at last their real life work for his name. There is danger, however, in sudden transitions from one walk of life to another, and from one mould of character to another. It is the danger of extravagance. There is a proverb about the excessive zeal of sudden converts; and there is this measure of truth in it, that persons who rapidly change their views or their position need some lapse of time, and some inward discipline, before they learn calmness, religious self-possession, and meekness of wisdom. It is therefore worthy of our notice that God gave Moses a long pause in the land of Midian, and Paul also in Arabia. We return to the fact that the great majority of God"s servants in the gospel have grown up with religious sentiments and desires from their very childhood. So it was with John the Baptist, with Timothy, with Basil, with Jerome, with Bernard of Clairvaux, with Columba, with Usher, with Zinzendorf, with Bengel, and many more. So it was with Samuel. His first lessons were from the devout and gifted Hannah in the quiet home at Ramah. From his earliest consciousness he knew that he was to be the Lord"s, and a specially consecrated servant or Nazarite. Then he was taken to Shiloh, and his special training for a grand and difficult career began. Early in his life he had to see evil among those who ought to have shown the best example. He had to see what mischief is wrought by relaxation of morals among the rulers of what we should call Church and State, so that an abhorrence of such misconduct might be deeply engraved on his untainted soul. But at the same time Samuel grew up in daily contact with holy things. The sacred ritual, which was no more than a form to the wicked priests, had an elevating and purifying influence on the serious spirit of this child. And so it was that Samuel, conversant day by day with holy names and symbols, took a mould of character in harmony with these took it gradually, firmly, unalterably. It gave steadiness to his futureministry; for he was to retrieve losses, assuage excitements, re-establish justice, reprove, rebuke, and exhort the people and their first king. Such a ministry needed a character of steady growth, and the personal influence which attends a consistent life. So the Lord called Samuel when a child, and he answered, "Speak; for thy servant heareth." May God raise up young children among us to quit themselves hereafter as men to redress wrongs, establish truth and right, heal divisions, reform the Church, and pave the way for the coming King and the kingdom! F.
HOMILIES BY B. DALE Vers. 1-18. (SHILOH.)
Samuel"s call to the prophetic office.
"The Lord called Samuel" (ver. 4).
In Israel"s fane, by silent night, The lamp of God was burning bright; And there, by viewless angels kept, Samuel, the child, securely slept.
A voice unknown the stillness broke, "Samuel!" it called, and thrice it spoke. He rose he asked whence came the word. From Eli? No; it was the Lord.
Thus early called to serve his God, In paths of righteousness he trod; Prophetic visions fired his breast, And all the chosen tribes were blessed (Cawood).
Introductory.
1. This call to the prophetic office took place at a time of great moral andspiritual darkness. "The word of the Lord" (the revelation of his mind and will to men) "was rare in those days; for" (therefore, as the effect; or because, as the evidence of the absence of such revelation) "there was no vision" (prophetic communication) "spread abroad" among the people (ver. 1; 2Ch_31:5)
(1) The word of God is needed by man because of his ignorance of the highest truths, and his inability to attain the knowledge of them by his own efforts.
(2) Its possession is hindered by prevailing indifference and corruption.
(3) Its absence is worse than a famine of bread (Psa_74:9; Amo_8:11) and most destructive. (Pro_29:18)
1. It was the commencement of a fresh series of Divine communications,which culminated in the teaching of the great Prophet, "who spake as never man spake" (Act_3:24; Heb_1:1) This is the chief general significance of the event. "The call of Samuel to be the prophet and judge of Israel formed a turning point in the history of the Old Testament kingdom of God.
2. It was given to one who was very young (twelve years old, according to Josephus, when childhood merges into youth; Luk_2:42) and who held the lowest place in the tabernacle, where Eli held the highest, but who was specially prepared for the work to which he was called. "Shadows of impenitent guilt were the dark background of the picture from which the beams of Divine love which guided that child of grace shone forth in brighter relief" (Anderson).
3. It came in a manner most adapted to convince Eli and Samuel that it wasindeed from the Lord (ver. 8), and to answer its immediate purpose in regard to both. Notice
I THE VOICE of the Lord.
1. It was heard in the temple (vers. 2, 3), or palace of the invisible King of Israel, proceeding from his throne in the innermost sanctuary (Exodus 1Sa_4:4; Heb_9:5) not now, however, addressing the high priest, but a child, as a more loyal subject, and more susceptible to Divine teaching. (Mat_11:25, Mat_11:26)
2. It broke suddenly on the silence and slumbers of the night; "ere the lamp of God went out," i.e. toward the morning a season suitable todeep and solemn impression. "Untroubled night, they say, gives counsel best." The light of Israel before God, represented by the golden candelabrum, with its "seven lamps of fire," was burning dimly, and the dawn of a new day was at hand.
3. It called Samuel by name, not merely as a means of arousing him, but as indicating the Lord"s intimate knowledge of his history and character, (Joh_10:3) and his claims upon his special service. The All-seeing has a perfect knowledge of each individual soul, and deals with it accordingly.
1. It was often relocated, with ever increasing impressiveness. Natural dulness in the discernment of spiritual things renders necessary the repetition of God"s call to men, and his patience is wonderfully shown in such repetition.
2. It was in the last instance accompanied by an appearance. "Jehovah came, and stood, and called" (ver. 10). Probably in glorious human form, as in former days. "Allied to our nature by engagement and anticipation, the eternal Word occasionally assumed its prophetic semblance before he dwelt on earth in actual incarnate life." There could now be no doubt whence the voice proceeded; and even the delay which had occurred must have served to waken up all the faculties of the child into greater activity, and prepare him for the main communication he was about to receive.
II THE RESPONSE of Samuel.
1. He did not at first recognise the voice as God"s, but thought it was Eli"s (vers. 4-6). For "he did not yet know the Lord" by direct and conscious revelation, "neither was the Word of the Lord revealed to him" (literally, made bare, disclosed; as a secret told in the ear, which has been uncovered by turning back the hair (Gen_25:7; 1Sa_9:15; Job_33:16) as it was afterwards (ver. 21). "We must not think that Samuel was then ignorant of the true God, but that he knew not the manner of that voice by which the prophetical spirit was wont to awaken the attention of the prophets" (John Smith"s "Sel. Discourses," p. 208). "God speaketh
2. once, yea twice, yet man perceiveth it not". (Job_33:14) How often is his voice deemed to be only the voice of man!
3. He acted up to the light he had (vers. 7, 8). Three times his rest was broken by what he thought was the voice of Eli; three times he ran to him obediently, uncomplainingly, promptly; and three times he "went and lay down in his place" as he was bidden. The spirit which he thus displayed prepared him for higher instruction.
1. He obeyed the direction given him by the high priest (ver. 9). Although Eli could not himself hear the voice, yet he perceived that it was heard by another, showed no indignation or envy at the preference shown toward him, and taught him to listen to the Lord for himself, and what be should say in response. "He showed himself a better tutor than he was a parent" (Hall).
2. He responded in a spirit of reverence, humility, and obedience to the voice that now uttered his name twice (ver. 10). "Speak; for thy servant heareth." His omission of the name "Jehovah" was perhaps due to his overwhelming astonishment and reverence But be confessed himself to be his servant, virtually ratifying of his own accord his dedication to his service, and testified his readiness to "hear and obey." Oh, what an hour is that in which the presence of the Lord is first manifested in living force to the soul! and what a change does it produce in all the prospects and purposes of life!. (Gen_28:16, Gen_28:17) "We were like them that sleep, them that dream, before we entered into communion with God.
III THE COMMUNICATION of God to Samuel.
1. It differed from the message of the "man of God," which had come some time previously, in that it was more brief, simple, and severe; and was given to Samuel alone, without any express direction to make it known to Eli, who seems to have paid no regard to the warning he previously received.
2. It was an announcement of judgment on the house of Eli which would be
(1) Very startling and horrifying to men (ver. 11).
(2) The fulfilment of the word which had been already spoken (ver. 12).
(3) Complete. "When I begin, I will also make an end.
(4) Righteously deserved, inasmuch as his sons had grievously sinned, and he knew it as well as the approaching judgment, and restrained them not (ver. 13; Jam_4:17) "Sinners make themselves vile (literally, curse themselves), and those who do not reprove them make themselves accessaries" (M. Henry).
(5) Permanent and irrevocable. "Forever." "I have sworn," etc. (ver. 14).
1. It was very painful to Samuel because it was directed "against Eli" (ver. 12 as well as his house), for whom he entertained a deep and tender affection. The "burden of the Lord" was heavy for a child to bear. It was his first experience of the prophet"s cross, but it prepared him for his future work. "Woe to the man who receives a message from the gods.
2. It put his character to a severe test, by leaving to his discretion the use which he should make of so terrible a communication. Wisdom and grace are as much needed in using God"s communications as in receiving and responding to his voice.
IV THE DISCLOSURE by Samuel to Eli.
1. It was not made hastily or rashly (ver. 15). "He lay down till the morning," pondering the communication; he suffered it not to interfere with the duty that lay immediately before him, but rose and "opened the doors of the house" as usual, though with a heavy heart; and exhibited great calmness, self-control, discretion, and considerate reserve. He "feared to show Eli the vision" lest he should be grieved, or take it in a wrong manner.
2. It was only made under strong pressure (vers. 16, 17). "Samuel, my son (B"ni), said Eli; and "how much is expressed by this one word!" (Thenius). He asked, he demanded, he adjured.
3. It was made truthfully, faithfully, and without any reserve (ver. 18).
4. It was followed by a beneficial effect. Not, indeed, in rousing the high priest to strenuous efforts for the reformation of his house, which he probably deemed impossible, but in leading him to acknowledge that it was the Lord who had spoken, and to resign himself to his will. No such effect followed the warning previously addressed to him. A similar spirit was shown by Aaron, (Lev_10:3) by Job_1:21, by David, (2Sa_18:14, 2Sa_18:15, 2Sa_18:32, 2Sa_18:33) by Hezekiah, (2Ki_20:19) and, above all, by the great High Priest himself. (Mat_26:42) No other Divine message came apparently to Eli or his house. Henceforth there was only the silence that precedes the thunderstorm and the earthquake. D.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before…
1Sa_3:1-10
And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before Eli.
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The child prophet
This white flower blossomed on a dunghill. The continuous growth of a character, from a child serving God, and to old age walking in the same path, is the great lesson which the story of Samuel teaches us. The child is father of the man, and all his long days are bound each to each by true religion. There are two types of experience among Gods greatest servants. Paul, made an apostle from a persecutor, heads the one class. Timothy in the New Testament and Samuel in the Old represent the other. An Augustine or a Bunyan is made the more earnest, humble, and whole-hearted by the remembrance of a wasted youth and of Gods arresting mercy. But there are a serenity and continuity about a life which has grown up in the fear of God that have their own charm and blessing. It is well to have much transgression forgiven, but it may be better to have always been innocent and ignorant of it. Samuels peaceful service is contrasted, in the second half of the first verse, with the sad cessation of Divine revelation in that dreary time of national laxity. A demoralised priesthood, an alienated people, a silent God,--these are the outstanding features of the period, when this fair life of continuous worship unfolded itself. This flower grew in a desert.
What Samuels call resembles in modern times
The call of Samuel was not a call to become a servant of God,--that call Samuel had received when he was first brought to the tabernacle, and there solemnly dedicated to Gods service,--but to be a prophet of God, and a great reformer of the Church and nation. Moreover, in bad times of the Church, and in evil days, whatever shape the evil takes, whether it shows itself in the form of profligacy and a relaxation of wholesome discipline, or in wide-spread superstition, or in doubt and unbelief, Almighty God even now-a-days raises up men who are fitted to grapple with the evil, and to set right (with His gracious assistance) the things that are wrong This is the way in which all great changes for good have been made in the world--they have been all brought about by one or two strong characters, suited by Gods Providence to the times in which they lived, who have been vividly impressed with the sad state of things around them, and have resolved, it may be very early in life, to devote their whole time and energy to mending it. But now observe what are the conditions of such a thing happening. Little Samuel, when the call of God reached him at the age of twelve was found not doing anything remarkable or extraordinary, but engaged in the ordinary commonplace duties of his station. It is wonderful how many cases there are in the Bible of persons called to be or to do something great, when they were engaged in doing the common everyday duties of their station. Gideon, Moses, David, Elisha. What do these and several other instances of the same sort teach, but that in order to be called by God to something good and great, people need not travel out of the high-road of their commonplace everyday occupations, but rather should be found busied in these occupations? (Dean Goulburn.)
A reformation beginning in the soul of a child
In the days when the High Priest Eli was judge of Israel, there appeared in the sanctuary of Shiloh a wonderful child: his name was Samuel. It was a dark and stormy time; there were fears within and fightings without. Israel was climbing a steep hill--arduously, painfully. Her progress was slow; she was alternately worsted and victorious. And the struggle was more arduous from the fact that there was no prophecy. It was an age of materialism. The hands of Moses were no longer uplifted on the mountain; the eyes of Moses no longer gazed on a promised glory. Religion had become a form; its spirit had fled. There were few remains left of that heroic time when Joshua had fought for God, and Deborah had sung for God. The nation had lost its poetry, and had lost its faith, these had to be rekindled anew at the lamp of heaven. Where was the new kindling to begin? Where was the Divine spirit to touch the world once more? In the heart of the sage? No. In the breast of the old man? No. In the leaders of the Jewish armies? No. It was to begin in the soul of a little child. Out of the mouth of a babe in knowledge, God was to ordain strength. (George Matheson, D. D.)
The child prophet no miracle
Was he a miracle--this little Samuel? No--in the view characteristic of the Bible he is the real and normal aspect of humanity. So normal is he that Christ says we must all return to his state before we can become seers. What, think you, does Jesus mean when He declares that we can only realise the beauty of the Kingdom through the eyes of a little child? Is it not simply this, that to see the beauty of anything we require a first eye? Take the Bible itself. To see the beauties of the Bible, one would require to say to us what the prophet said to Hezekiah, Let the shadow go back ten degrees. We should need to be transported back into lifes morning, to divest ourselves of all preconceived opinions, to imagine that we were reading the record for the first time. That is precisely the standpoint which Christianity promises to create. It professes to make old things new, in other words, to let us see the old things as they looked when they were new, and so to give us a true sense of their power and beauty. What is this but to recreate in us the life of Samuel l What is this but to say that the true seer must ever be a child, that, however grownup he be, it is by the survival of his childhood that he sees the Kingdom of God. Little Samuel is no miracle. He reveals the normal law of faith. (George Matheson, D. D.)
And the Word of the Lord was precious in those days.
The Word of the Lord precious
From Moses to Samuel, a period of several hundred years, there was no prophet regularly appointed; particular revelations were made to individuals; but there was no acknowledged prophet. The natural consequence was, that such intimations of the Divine will, as were then given, made a deeper impression: they were more highly valued and more eagerly sought for, than when the gift of prophecy, in after ages, became more common. Such is the perverseness of man; blessings of every description are estimated, not according to their excellence, but their rarity; not according to the ease, but the difficulty, with which they are to be obtained. And further, when in possession of a blessing, we are often utterly insensible of its value; we abuse it in thoughtless excess, and are ready to squander it away; but the moment it is departed, we discover our blindness and folly. Meat and drink and raiment, the air we breathe, the sun and the shower, excite no spirit of gratitude, and by many are scarcely received and remembered as blessings; but in the days of famine and pestilence, amidst the warfare and desolation of raging element, these benefits and mercies are painfully acknowledged, and ardently desired. And thus it is of domestic happiness and comfort: the value of home is frequently not appreciated until it is forsaken and lost; the worth of a friend is sometimes but lightly considered, till he goes hence and is no more sees. These observations are also illustrative of the feeling and conduct of men, in regard to their spiritual privileges and blessings. We are apt to express a wonder at the obstinate indifference of the people of Israel to their religious advantages and instructions; we are astonished, that they could forget their miraculous deliverances by the hand of Moses, and the manifold revelations vouchsafed through him for their knowledge and guidance: yet in truth, the history of Israel is but too faithful a picture of the people of God in other times and other countries; by no means excluding our own. Before the age of printing, when the copies of the sacred word were comparatively few, the Christian, who was so happy as to possess one, commonly regarded it as a treasure. The value set upon the word of God, its preciousness in the heart of man, is not proportioned to the frequency and the fulness of its communication. It is in almost every dwelling, but not in every dwelling esteemed and loved. The Bible is grievously neglected both by rich and poor. From this lamentable neglect of the word of God, we may readily account for the want of religious principle, for the decay of religious character, for the overspreading of corruption and vice, so notorious in the Christian world. Let us suppose that it should please God, for the heedlessness of this nation, to deprive us of the privilege and blessing of the Bible; and to declare, that the neglected ministry of His word should be continued no longer: we should undoubtedly regard this as the direst calamity which could possibly befall us. Then let us be consistent; and whilst we do enjoy this invaluable favour of heaven, let it be cherished and improved. Let the Gospel, instead of being less precious to us, on account of its universal publication, and its facility of attainment, be therefore prized the more. (J. Slade, M. A.)
The preciousness of the word of the Lord in the day of evil
I. The Word of the Lord--To this high honour the Bible professes to aspire: it claims to be nothing less than the word of the Lord What does the Christian believe, compared with the man who believes that the Scriptures are a cunningly-devised fable? It is to him we plainly apply the exclamation, O man, great is thy faith. We indeed believe difficulties; but he believes absurdities: we believe mysteries; but he swallows absolute impossibilities. O Christian, your faith does not stand in the wisdom of man but in the word of God: yet the wisdom of man has always been on your side. Take up your Bible now, and examine it internally--is it not worthy of God? Upon the same principle that when I survey the works of creation I exclaim, This is the finger of God; so when I peruse the Scriptures, I feel the impress of the Divine agency: I am perfectly sure, that whoever was the author of the Book, he was a holy being, he was a wise being he was a benevolent being; I am sure he knew me perfectly, and was concerned for my welfare
II. Its preciousness.--Precious means valuable; something of great worth and importance. You will observe the preciousness of a thing is very distinguishable from the truth of it, in the former argument. Nothing can indeed be valuable and important that is not true; but a thing may be true without being valuable and important. But here both these are conjoined--the veracity and the excellency. This may be inferred, not only from the Author, but the design. What is the design now of the word of God, but the restoration of man from all the effects of moral evil, and placing him in a condition superior to that in which he was originally created? The most precious book in the world to me ought to be that which contains the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord: and this volume does contain it. How precious is it to have a standard of doctrine with regard to our belief; so that if we feel perplexities we may call in the judgment of God the Father Himself. How satisfactory is it to have a rule of duty with regard to conduct. How wretched we must feel if we had been left to conjecture what God would have us to do, and how he would have us to walk. As to matters of moment, here everything is so legibly inscribed, that he may run that reads it. We must not, before we dismiss this part of our subject, overlook its influence and efficacy. We do not mean now with regard to the illumination of the mind, or the relief of the pardoned conscience, or the setting of the mans poor heart at rest, so that he shall no longer run up and down this wide world, crying, Who will shew us any good? but we refer now to his moral transformation. If any man be in Christ he is a new creature. And we must also observe the value of the Scriptures, as it appears not only when personally, but relatively considered. You will observe that where it is not available to renew, it restrains: where it does not sanctify it civilises. The Jews had the Oracles of God committed to them; this it was which humanised them. How precious should the Scriptures be that have closed so many avenues of wretchedness, and opened so many scenes of comfort.
III. The season of its preciousness. It would be precious in itself, if no one ever regarded it: just as the jewel is equally valuable though the swine trample it under its hoofs But it is with the word as it is with the Author of it; to them that believe He is precious, and to them that believe it is precious. The word of the Lord was particularly precious in those days.
1. The days of destitution. Such were the days of Samuel: this Was the case also in after times with the church, when they said, We see not any signs; there is no more any prophet; neither is there among us, any that knoweth how long. How precious were the Scriptures before their translation; how many were there to whom the sacred treasure was inaccessible. Suppose now the word of God was remaining in the original Hebrew and Greek, what would it then be to you? Why, it would be like a spring shut up, a fountain sealed; like so many fine paintings hung up in a dark room. In the days of Queen Mary the use of it was absolutely prohibited; we read of one farmer who gave a whole load of hay for a single leaf of one of the epistles. The word of the Lord was precious in those days. There may be something like these days of destitution existing in some instances now: they may be produced by accidents, by diseases, by deafnesses, and so on. One is deaf, so that he cannot hear the word; another is blind, so that he cannot see. I remember, some years ago, a farmer in the country, a very pious man, he was advancing in years, and his eyes were growing dim: I often saw him reading the Scriptures at his window, and he seemed to be musing as well as reading; he seemed to be committing it to memory: and when I asked him, I found this was the case: O, said he, I am making provision for a dark day, that when I can no longer read, in the multitude of my thoughts I shall have comfort left to my soul. We all know best the value of a thing by the want of it. The word of the Lord was precious in those days.
2. The days of conviction.
3. The days of affliction. Said Bolingbroke under his affliction, my philosophy forsakes me in my affliction. But did Sir Philip Sidneys philosophy forsake him, when, after a battle, he having to undergo a dreadful operation, said to the surgeon, Sir, you are come to a poor timid creature in himself; but to one who, by the grace of God, is raised above his own weakness: and therefore, do not dishonour your art in sparing the patient. The word of the Lord was precious in those days. What days?
4. Dying days. I was one day called in to see a poor man on his dying bed; and he began, the moment I entered the room, to address me in these words: Sir, said he, I have a long journey before me, and I dont know one step of the way. Hobbes of Malmesbury, when he was dying, said, I leave my body to the grave, and my soul to the great Perhaps. I am taking, says he, a step in the dark. This was not the worst of it; he was not only taking a step in the dark, but a step into the dark. (W. Jay.)
The precious word
Precious or rare--for the word may be translated so--precious because it was translated so--precious because it was rare. Like the long dry season, the heavens seemed to be sealed; and the coming of Samuel was the beginning of a new era. The Word of the Lord was rare! We have got to speak of the Bible as being the Word of the Lord, and, speaking broadly, the Bible is a store of messages from God. I question sometimes whether the Bible has gained anything by being no cheap. It was rare once, and it is sure that it was precious when it was rare. When the City of London had but one Bible chained to the reading desk of St. Pauls Cathedral the citizens of London crowded to hear it read. The Word of the Lord was precious in those days. Now this implies several things.
1. First of all, that God does speak to men. Deism, the coldest thing, perhaps, in the shape of a religion that man has ever believed--Deism says it is beneath God to have any longing to come into personal intercourse with men. A man may write a book and inspire you with his ideas, yet he may resent it very much if you propose to bring yourself into personal intercourse with him. Mr. Haweis speaks of the astonishment with which Mr. Tennyson received him when, as a young fellow something like eighteen years of age, he ventured to call upon the poet to thank him for what the poetry had been to him as a young man; and perhaps, who knows! to ask the poets exposition of one or two particular passages; but the poet seemed to think the youth was very eccentric, if not very impudent. So the Deist might study the laws and phenomena of Nature--the great book which carries upon it the signature of the Author, the signature of God; but, he says, it would be irreverence for him to presume for a moment that he could be of concern to the great Author, that the Almighty should send special messages to him. God was to him what the Sphinx was to the Egyptian worshipper--there was a light in its face which suggested that it could tell the worshipper wonderful things if it cared to tell, but that it would keep it all to itself. So to Deism God was a sphinx; He never spoke.
2. Finding by seeking. It is a matter of greatest importance that we should believe that. Many men never see God, never hear His voice, because they de not expect to do so. They never look for Him, they never hush themselves to listen for Him. Darwin was always discovering some fresh fact in Nature, but then he was always looking for them; he was always making experiments, always giving Nature an opportunity to show how she did her work. He knew that Nature was always speaking if he only gave her a chance. But he never expected God to speak to him. He gave up praying because he had persuaded himself that God never spoke to man.
3. The many voices of God. Let me add be that, God speaks in many ways. The voices of God are many--the voice of reason, the voice of conscience, the voice of material nature. Why, science is getting to protest that as emphatically as anybody ever did. We often sing, So God is here, let us adore, and How awful is this place. If there is any place where that might be sung with propriety, it is the laboratory where the chemist and the physicist are at work. This gives an entirely new meaning to nature. A barrel organ may give correct music: the barrel organ does not make a mistake. The violin gives you the same music, yet not the same. There is a mans soul in the violin. Nature, as the materialist talks about it, is a mere barrel organ. Nature is a violin to the man who knows that every note of it is produced by the finger touch of God, the mind of God, the heart of God, the delight of God in the world that He has made, is in it. I heard a phonograph the other day sing a song of Adelina Patti. It was not absolutely Adelina Patti, but it was correct. There was not one missing note in it, every word, every intonation, the liquid clearness of the beautiful voice; why it was absolutely human. I have heard of a General taking a leaf out of his pocketbook on the field of battle, handing it over to a messenger, and sending the message to someone somewhere in the rough battle. It was a rough missive; the man to whom it was sent kept it, though, as a memorial of the battle. It conveyed the commanders message as effectively as if it had been written an embossed paper. So people nowadays make a great to-do about the numerical or the technical mistakes which are said to be found in the Old Book. Do not be foolish; it is a message written on poor paper if you like, here and there, but the message is none the worse for that. Do not demean yourself to talk of the paper--what of the Message? Robert Browning speaks of a musician who had music in him that no instrument that he had ever tried had been able to reveal. It haunted him, it pained him, it was a burden to him; and he must tell the music out. So he built his own instrument, and had the supreme joy of uttering the music that was in him. God had told Himself in the words of seer, and prophet, and psalmist, but He had never told Himself thoroughly yet. But He will find a voice for Himself; the love of God, the law of righteousness, which must not be insulted, even though the world be wrecked. He told it by the cross. Glorious is the cross; Gods last voice, the Word of the Lord.
4. Deaf to the Word. Now let me add to that. The direst misfortune, the direst calamity that can happen to man is that Gods Word should cease to come to him. It is not that the Word ever ceases for the matter of that. Science has been making the most wonderful progress during our day. Nature seems to have taken the veil from off her face; but Nature has always been doing this, Nature has always been willing to tell her secrets. But in these days our ears are opened, and we are ready to hear. The misery of the world has always been making an appeal; but philanthropy, in the sense in which we understand philanthropy today, has only just been born. The world is only just beginning to understand that it owes pity end help to the poor, to the criminal, to the wicked one. We may bury our souls in frivolity and never take the trouble to think: but literature is here, art and science are here, and the bread which maketh the soul of man hale and strong--this is here. The Word of the Lord is always here; it is only that we drown it in the din of frivolities and material ambitions. Never read and never think, and no new ideas will ever come to you. The spirit of truth and understanding never thrusts itself upon those who never seek it.
5. Seasons of awakening. And lastly, there are seasons when the Church awakes to a vivid sense of that. These seasons of awakening come to every high region and touch into life every high matter you can think of. We talk about the Dark Ages in England; for centuries the world was asleep; the Word of God was rare in those days. The men to whom it came were few, a rare soul now and then; a Wyckliffe heard the voice of God, but as a whole that period was a long sleep. At last England awoke. There was the richness literature; there came intellectual awakening. In the age of Shakespeare England was born again. There was a spiritual awakening. Luther shook Europe. The Reformers lit a fire which has never been put out. (J. Morlais Jones.)
Wanted: A prophet
There was no open vision. It was a time of stagnation and stupor. It was a time in which all men had sunk into a dead level of dulness and formality and mere routine. There was no enthusiasm, no earnestness. Men went through their work and lived their lives in a humdrum languishing sort of way, without heart and without spirit. There was a complete absence of that intensity of feeling which is ever the evidence of a strenuous life. There was no open vision. It was a time of deep religious depression. It was a gelid, torpid, tortoise-like existence that man led. New, there are people who say that we are passing through a similar period of spiritual depression now, and have been passing through it for some long time, in the different countries of Europe, and especially in our own country. Why had God ceased to speak to, and commune with, His people as of yore?
1. Well, in the first place, there was no prophet; there was no man to act as a go-between. There was no prophet who could communicate Gods message to His people. It was a lack of men with the prophetic gift. God always speaks to His people through chosen witnesses, and when these chosen witnesses are not forthcoming, Gods voice is silent. Old Eli was, indeed, a man of God, but his utter failure to rule his own house discredited him. The channel of communication was choked up in that quarter, simply owing to the weakness and imbecility of the man of God. Before God can communicate with the world there must be a chosen vessel. The vessel itself must be filled first before the world can receive the messages of God. What we need just now is a man who is intellectually head and shoulders above his fellows, and who would act as a great leader of men. We are in a kind of backwater as regards the possession of men of commanding intellect and personality just now; but I cannot help thinking, nevertheless, that our greatest need of all is a mighty prophet of God, a man with a message from the Lord, a man able to stir up the nation to its very depth in spiritual things. Musical services are all very well, and I enjoy them; but they are not our chief need. It is not a great singer that we want, but it is a great prophet, a man full of the Holy Ghost and of power, who will rouse the indifferent and the careless, and stir up the lukewarm and the half-hearted, and make the religion of Christ a power in the land once again.
2. Again, there was no open vision because the people were not in a proper mood to receive the vision. The soil was not congenial, so to speak, for the growth of prophets. It was a time of deep spiritual dearth, a time in which men and women were almost wholly engrossed in the material and the present. The supply of prophets was just exactly equal to the demand, and that was--nil! Prophesying in the sense of forth-telling--preaching--is not much in favour just now. There is this incessant clamour for extremely short sermons, which is not at all a healthy sign. Why do not men go to church? Why, because your immature, unsubstantial, perfunctory ten minutes discourse, which you falsely call a sermon, has driven them out, for, wherever the sermon is a real thing, manfully grappling with great life problems, there the men do congregate, and there they will continue to congregate, for there they receive a message from God. And the word of the Lord was precious in those days; there was no open vision.
3. But, again, I am glad to be able to observe that this time of depression and lassitude and spiritual famine was not continuous and permanent. God never wholly deserts His people. Again He sends His prophets to speck to them and to reveal precious truths to them. Ah, and it is ever so. It is always when the fortune of the church is at its lowest that God sends His servants, the prophets, to rouse it and to cleanse it. It was in the darkest days of the Papacy, when Alexander Borgia sat on the throne of St. Peter, that Savonarola made his appearance. It was when the sale of indulgences had become a scandal and a menace to the very existence of religion and of the church that Luther came, and with his mighty voice initiated the Reformation. And it was in the dark and materialistic days of the eighteenth century, when our own beloved church was dying of apathy and respectability that Wesley and Whitefield and the leaders of the evangelical revival came, and set in motion that mighty wave of spiritual fervour and enthusiasm which has not wholly spent its force yet. And mark you! All these mighty revolutions, and revivals, and reformations have been brought about by the power of prophesying--by the foolishness of preaching. It is to preaching that even the Oxford Movement owes its origin and vitality. It was Kebles sermon on National Apostasy, according to all reliable testimony, that gave that movement its birth. And it is by preaching that the next great spiritual awakening is to be brought about. Meantime, our duty is plain. We must pray God to speed the time of this awakening, to speed the time when this terrible spiritual stagnation is at an end. (R. Jones.)
There was no open vision.--
Times without vision
I. There are times of open vision. This phrase has been a difficulty to interpreters, It has been explained as referring to the times in earlier Jewish history when God appeared in the pillars of cloud and fire, and by angelic ministry. It has also been explained as referring to the opera and authoritative promulgation of Divine truth. It has been noticed as a feature of human history that it divides into alternate periods marked by the possession and the lack of spiritual insight. There are times of open vision. Heaven, then, is near to men. They are sensitive to spiritual impressions. They are inclined to attach spiritual meanings to material things. The gift of vision is diffused. The things that are unseen and eternal appear. These are periods of religious activity and progress. The happy age following the conquest under Joshua was a time of open vision. The nation had enjoyed the heavenly gift. The present century, in contrast with the past, is a period of vision. It is a characteristic of this age that the supernatural is looked for and readily believed. With all our vast material progress, we have made a spiritual advance vet greater. It has been a period of delusions, so ready have men been to listen to all voices. But it has also been an age of faith. Would that we might be spared its dreary contrast.
II. There are times without open vision--when heaven is far away, when men have faith only in what they see and handle. The eighteenth was such a century. Science and philosophy made marvellous advances; but they were atheistic. The light of the Puritan century had faded out of the sky; or the eye of the new generation could not receive its illumination. Men questioned, derided, triumphed over religion Then was the deification of the worldly spirit. The church was invaded. The clergy became unspiritual. With the loss of vision, truth is lost. This is especially true of the stern truths--our accountability to God, the guilt and doom of sin, the fixed and narrow limits of probation, the final judgment, and the eternity of its awards. In such an age there is no fear of God before mens eyes. The picture of the times of Samuel, in the account of the wickedness of Elis sons, is appalling.
III. There is no time without the Word of the Lord. Though the vision is at times withholden, God is always with us in his word. Why the vision is withdrawn we may not be able to explain. God has a purpose, It is sufficient that he still speaks. Samuel represented a renewed and more extensive dispensation of the word. The spoken word, like the written, has never been lost. Visions might be interrupted, but not the continuity of revelation. It has never ceased.
IV. The word requires a human ear. Elis sons wanted the ear that hears Gods voice. The hearing of Eli, like his sight, was dim; Samuel had a sensitive ear. The Lord revealed himself to Samuel. Literally, says Stanley, the Lord uncovered the ear--a touching and significant figure taken from the manner in which the possessor of a secret moves back the long hair of his friend and whispers into the ear thus laid bare the word that no one else may hear.
V. The Word of God requires human lips to speak it. Samuel has received the message. He must deliver it to Eli. (Monday Club Sermons.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain
CHAPTER V.
SAMUEL'S VISION.
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1Sa_3:1-21.
IT is evident that Samuel must have taken very kindly to the duties of the sanctuary. He was manifestly one of those who are sanctified from in- fancy, and whose hearts go from the first with sacred duties. There were no wayward impulses to subdue, no hankerings after worldly freedom and worldly enjoyment; there was no necessity for coercive measures, either to restrain him from outbursts of frivolity or to compel him to diligence and regularity in his calling. From the first he looked with solemn awe and holy interest on all that related to the worship of God; that, to him, was the duty above all other duties, the privilege above all other privileges. God to him was not a mere idea, an abstraction, representing merely the dogmas and services of religion. God was a reality, a personality, a Being who dealt very closely with men, and with whom they were called to deal very closely too. We can easily conceive how desirous little Samuel would be to know something of the meaning of the services at Shiloh; how scrupulous to perform every duty, how regular and real in his prayers, and how full of reverence and affection for God. He would go about all his duties with a grave, sweet, earnest face, conscious of their importance and solemnity; always thinking more of them than of anything else, - thinking perhaps of the service of the angels in heaven, and trying to serve God as they served Him, to do God's will on earth as it was done in heaven.
At the opening of this chapter he seems to be the confidential servant of the high priest, sleeping near to him, and in the habit of receiving directions from him. He must be more than a child now, otherwise he would not be entrusted, as he was, with the opening of the doors of the house of the Lord.
The evil example of Hophni and Phinehas, so far from corrupting him, seems to have made him more resolute the other way. It was horrid and disgusting; and as gross drunkenness on the part of a father sometimes sets the children the more against it, so the profligacy of the young priests would make Samuel more vigilant in every matter of duty. That Eli bore as he did with the conduct of his sons must have been a great perplexity to him, and a great sorrow; but it did not become one at his time of life to argue the question with the aged high priest. This conduct of Eli's did not in any respect diminish the respectful bearing of Samuel towards him, or his readiness to comply with his every wish. For Eli was God's high priest; and in engaging to be God's servant in the tabernacle Samuel knew well that he took the high priest as his earthly master.
1. The first thing that engages our special attention in this chapter is the singular way in which Samuel was called to receive God's message in the temple.
The word of God was rare in those days; there was no open vision, or rather no vision that came abroad, that was promulgated to the nation as the expression of God's will. From the tone in which this is referred to, it was evidently looked on as a want, as placing the nation in a less desirable position than in days when God was constantly communicating His will. Now, however, God is to come into closer contact with the people, and for this purpose He is to employ a new instrument as the medium of His messages. For God is never at a loss for suitable instruments - they are always ready when peculiar work has to be done. In the selection of the boy Samuel as his prophet there is something painful, but likewise something very interesting. It is painful to find the old high priest passed over; his venerable years and venerable office would naturally have pointed to him; but in spite of many good qualities, in one point he is grossly unfaithful, and the very purpose of the vision now to be made is to declare the outcome of his faithlessness. But it is interesting to find that already the child of Hannah is marked out for this distinguished service. Even in his case there is opportunity for verifying the rule, "Them that honour Me I will honour." His entire devotion to God's service, so beautiful in one of such tender years, is the sign of a character well adapted to become the medium of God's habitual communications with His people. Young though he is, his very youth in one sense will prove an advantage. It will show that what he speaks is not the mere fruit of his own thinking, but is the message of God. It will show that the spiritual power that goes forth with his words is not his own native force, but the force of the Holy Spirit dwelling in him. It will thus be made apparent to all that God has not forsaken His people, corrupt and lamentably wicked though the young priests are.
Both Eli and Samuel sleep within the precincts of the tabernacle. Not, however, in the sanctuary itself, but in one of those buildings that opened into its courts, which were erected for the accommodation of the priests and Levites. Eli's sight was failing him, and perhaps the care of the lamp as well as the door was entrusted to Samuel. The lamp was to burn always (Exo_27:20), that is, it was to be trimmed and lighted every morning and evening (Exo_30:7-8); and to attend to this was primarily the high priest's duty. The lamp had doubtless been duly trimmed, and it would probably continue burning through a good part of the night. It was not yet out when a voice fell on the ears of Samuel, loud enough to rouse him from the profound slumber into which he had probably fallen. Thinking it was Eli's, he ran to his side; but Eli had not called him. Again the voice sounded, again Samuel springs to his feet and hastens to the high priest; again he is sent back with the same assurance. A third time the voice calls; a third time the willing and dutiful Samuel flies to Eli's side, but this time he is sent back with a different answer. Hitherto Samuel had not known the Lord - that is, he had not been cognizant of His way of communicating with men in a supernatural form - and it had never occurred to him that such a thing could happen in his case. But Eli knew that such communications were made at times by God, and, remembering the visit of the man of God to himself, he may have surmised that this was another such occasion. The voice evidently was no natural voice; so Samuel is told to lie down once more, to take the attitude of simple receptiveness, and humbly invite God to utter His message.
There are some lesser traits of Samuel's character in this part of the transaction which ought not to be passed over without remark. The readiness with which he springs from his bed time after time, and the meekness and patience with which he asks Eli for his orders, without a word of complaint on his apparently unreasonable conduct, make it very clear that Samuel had learned to subdue two things - to subdue his body and to subdue his temper. It is not an easy thing for a young person in the midst of a deep sleep to spring to his feet time after time. In such circumstances the body is very apt to overcome the mind. But Samuel's mind overcame the body. The body was the servant, not the master. What an admirable lesson Samuel had already learned! Few parts of early education are so important as to learn to keep the body in subjection. To resist bodily cravings, whether greater or smaller, which unfit one for duty; temptations to drink, or smoke, or dawdle, or lie in bed, or waste time when one ought to be up and doing; to be always ready for one's work, punctual, methodical, purpose-like, save only when sickness intervenes, - denotes a very admirable discipline for a young person, and is a sure token of success in life. Not less admirable is that control over the temper which Samuel had evidently acquired. To be treated by Eli as he supposed that he had been, was highly provoking. Why drag him out of bed at that time of night at all? Why drag him over the cold stones in the chill darkness, and why tantalize him first by denying that he called him and then by calling him again? As far as appears, Samuel's temper was in no degree ruffed by the treatment he appeared to be receiving from Eli; he felt that he was a servant, and Eli was his master, and it was his part to obey his master, however unreasonable his treatment might be.
2. We proceed now to the message itself, and Samuel's reception of it. It is substantially a repetition of what God had already communicated to Eli by the man of God a few years before; only it is more peremptory, and the bearing of it is more fixed and rigid. When God denounced His judgment on Eli's house by the prophet, he seems to have intended to give them an opportunity to repent. If Eli had bestirred himself then, and banished the young men from Shiloh, and if his sons in their affliction and humiliation had repented of their wickedness, the threatened doom might have been averted. So at least we are led to believe by this second message having been superadded to the first. Now the opportunity of repentance has passed away. God's words are very explicit - ''I have sworn unto the house of Eli that the iniquity of Eli's house shall not be purged with sacrifice nor offering forever." After the previous warning, Eli seems to have gone on lamenting but not chastising. Hophni and Phinehas seem to have gone on sinning as before, and heedless of the scandal they were causing. In announcing to Samuel the coming catastrophe, God shows Himself thoroughly alive to the magnitude of the punishment He is to inflict, and the calamity that is to happen. It is such that the ears of every one that heareth it shall tingle. God shows also that, painful though it is, it has been deliberately determined, and no relenting will occur when once the terrible retribution begins. "In that day will I perform against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house; when I begin I will also make an end." But terrible though the punishment will be, there is only too good cause for it. "For I have told him that I will judge his house for ever, for the iniquity which he knoweth; because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not." There are some good parents whose sons have made themselves vile, and they would fain have restrained them but their efforts to restrain have been in vain. The fault of Eli was, that he might have restrained them and he did not restrain them. In those times fathers had more authority over their families than is given them now. The head of the house was counted responsible for the house, because it was only by his neglecting the power he had that his family could become openly wicked. It was only by Eli neglecting the power he had that his sons could have become so vile. Where his sons were heirs to such sacred functions there was a double call to restrain them, and that call he neglected. He neglected it at the time when he might have done it, and that time could never be recalled.
So, there is an age when children may be restrained, and if that age is allowed to pass the power of restraining them goes along with it. There are faults in this matter on the part of many parents, on the right hand and on the left. Many err by not restraining at all. Mothers begin while their children are yet infants to humor their every whim, and cannot bear to hold back from them anything they may wish. It is this habit that is liable to have such a terrible reaction. There are other parents that while they restrain do not restrain wisely. They punish, but they do not punish in love. They are angry because their children have broken their rules; they punish in anger, and the punishment falls merely as the blow of a stronger person on a weaker. It does not humble, it does not soften. What awful consequences it often brings!
What skeletons it lodges in many a house! God has designed the family to be the nurse of what is best and purest in human life, and when this design is crossed then the family institution, which was designed to bring the purest joy, breeds the darkest misery. And this is one of the forms of retribution on wickedness which we see carried out in their fullness in the present life! How strange, that men should be in any doubt as to God carrying out the retribution of wickedness to the bitter end! How singular they should disbelieve in a hell! The end of many a career is written in these words: - "Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee; know therefore, and see that it is an evil thing and bitter that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, and that My fear is . not in thee, saith the Lord God of hosts."
3. And now we go on to the meeting of Eli and Samuel. Samuel is in no haste to communicate to Eli the painful message he has received. He has not been required to do it, and he lies till the morning, awake we may believe, but staggered and dismayed. As usual he goes to open the doors of God's house. And then it is that Eli calls him. "What is the thing that He hath said unto thee?" he asks. He adjures Samuel to tell him all. And Samuel does tell him all. And Eli listens in silence, and when it is over he says, with meek resignation, "It is the Lord; let Him do what seemeth Him good."
We are touched by this behaviour of Eli. First we are touched by his bearing toward Samuel. He knows that God has conferred an honour on Samuel which He has not bestowed on him, but young though Samuel is he feels no jealousy, he betrays no sign of wounded pride. It is not easy for God's servants to bear being passed over in favour of others, in favour of younger men. A feeling of mortification is apt to steal on them, accompanied with some bitterness toward the object of God's preference. This venerable old man shows nothing of that feeling. He is not too proud to ask Samuel for a full account of God's message. He will not have him leave anything out, out of regard to his feelings. He must know the whole, however painful it may be. He has learned to reverence God's truth, and he cannot bear the idea of not knowing all. And Samuel, who did not wish to tell him anything, is now constrained to tell him the whole. ''He told him every whit, and hid nothing from him." He did not shun to declare to him the whole counsel of God. Admirable example for all God's servants! How averse some men are to hear the truth! And how prone are we to try to soften what is disagreeable in our message to sinners - to take off the sharp edge, and sheathe it in generalities and possibilities. It is no real kindness. The kindest thing we can do is to declare God's doom on sin, and to assure men that any hopes they may cherish of His relenting to do as He has said are vain hopes - ''When I begin," says God, "I will also make an end."
And we are touched further by Eli's resignation to God's will. The words of Samuel must have raised a deep agony in his spirit when he thought of the doom of his sons. Feeble though he was, there might have arisen in his heart a gust of fierce rebellion against that doom. But nothing of the kind took place. Eli was memorable for the passive virtues. He could bear much, though he could dare little. He could submit, but he could not fight. We find him here meekly recognizing the Divine will. God has a right to do what He will with His own; and who am I that I should cry out against Him? He is the Supreme Disposer of all events; why should a worm like me stand in His way? He submits implicitly to God. "The thing formed must not say to Him that formed him, Why hast Thou formed me thus"? What God ordains must be right. It is a terrible blow to Eli, but he may understand the bearings of it better in another state. He bows to that Supreme Will which he has learned to trust and to honour above every force in the universe.
Yes, we are touched by Eli's meekness and submission. And yet, though Eli had in him the stuff that martyrs are often made of, his character was essentially feeble, and his influence was not wholesome. He wanted that resolute purpose which men like Daniel possessed. His will was too feeble to control his life. He was too apprehensive of immediate trouble, of present inconvenience and unpleasantness, to carry out firm principles of action against wickedness, even in his own family. He was a memorable instance of the soundness of the principle afterwards laid down by St. Paul: "If a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the Church of God?" He greatly needed the exhortation which God gave to Joshua - "Be strong and of a good courage." It is true his infirmity was one of natural temperament. Men might say he could not help it. Neither can one overcome temperament altogether. But men of feeble temperament, especially when set over others, have great need to watch it, and ask God to strengthen them where they are weak. Divine grace has a wonderful power to make up the defects of nature. Timid, irresolute Peter was a different man after his fall.
Divine grace turned him into a rock after all. The coward who had shrunk from before a maiden got courage to defy a whole Sanhedrim. In the ministers of God's house the timid, crouching spirit is specially unseemly. They, at least, would need to rest on firm convictions, and to be governed by a resolute will. "Finally, brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand."
4. Samuel is now openly known to be the prophet of the Lord. "Samuel grew, and the Lord was with him, and did let none of his words fall to the ground." Little didst thou think, Hannah, some twenty years ago, that the child thou didst then ask of the Lore would ere long supersede the high priest who showed so little tact and judgment in interpreting the agitation of thy spirit! No, thou hast no feeling against the venerable old man; but thou canst not but wonder at the ups and downs of Providence; thou canst not but recall the words of thine own song, "He bringeth low, and lifteth up." And Samuel has not to fight his way to public recognition, or wait long till it come. "All Israel, from Dan even .to Beersheba, knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord."
And by-and-bye other oracles came to him, by which all men might have known that he was the recognized channel of communication between God and the people. We shall see in our next chapter into what trouble the nation was brought by disregarding his prophetic office, and recklessly determining to drag the ark of God into the battlefield. Meanwhile we cannot but remark what a dangerous position, in a mere human point of view, Samuel now occupied. The danger was that which a young man encounters when suddenly or early raised to the possession of high spiritual power. Samuel, though little more than a boy, was now virtually the chief man in Israel. Set so high, his natural danger was great. But God, who placed him there, sustained in him the spirit of humble dependence. After all he was but God's servant. Humble obedience was still his duty. And in this higher sphere his career was but a continuation of what had been described when it was said, "The child Samuel ministered to the Lord in Shiloh."
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain 1Sa_3:1. “The child Samuel.” According to Josephus, Samuel was…
CRITICAL AND EXPOSITORY NOTES.—
1Sa_3:1. “The child Samuel.” According to Josephus, Samuel was now twelve years old. “Precious,” i.e., rare. “The word was rare that came directly from the Lord by prophetic announcement to the people; the proper organs were lacking, persons who were filled with the Spirit of the Lord, that they might be witnesses of His word; there was lacking also in the people the living desire for the direct revelations of God in His word” (Lange’s Commentary). “No open vision,” lit. “no vision spread abroad.” “Here vision includes all the ways whereby God revealed Himself to men. Which He did then so seldom that, whatsoever revelation there might be privately to some pious persons, there was none then publicly acknowledged to be a prophet” (Patrick).
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1Sa_3:2. “His eyes began to wax dim.” This mention of Eli’s dimness of sight is introduced parenthetically. It explains Samuel’s supposition that he had been called by Eli: the imperfect vision of the aged priest would make him dependent upon the services of an attendant, and these services Samuel was probably appointed to render” (Hobson). “The lamp of God,” i.e., the seven-branched candlestick. “This stood in the centre, on the left of the entrance, and is now mentioned for the last time. It was superseded in the reign of Solomon by the ten separate candlesticks, but revived after the captivity by the copy of the one candlestick with the seven branches, as is still seen on the arch of Titus. It was the only light of the Tabernacle during the night” (Dean Stanley). “Went out.” This indicates that the time was near morning. “Temple.” See on 1Sa_1:9. “The sanctuary was so encased with buildings as to give it the name and appearance of a house or temple” (Dean Stanley). “Samuel slept in the court, where cells were built for the priests and Levites to live in when serving in the sanctuary. See 1Sa_3:15. (Keil). “The high-priest was not in domestic residence at the temple, much less, therefore, at the tabernacle.… But Eli, who was now an aged man, with all his family grown up and settled in their own households, might, both from feeling and convenience, incline to reside constantly at his humble official lodge, under the shadow of the tabernacle. The proper place of Samuel would have been among the attendant Levites, but on account of his personal services to the high-priest, he rested not far from him” (Kitto). “The Lord.” Jehovah. “This name stands after the temple because it is the Covenant God who descends to His people, and dwells with them, that is brought before us. On the other hand, in connection with the lamp and the ark, Elohim is used in the sense of the Divine in general” (Lange’s Commentary).
1Sa_3:4. “The Lord called Samuel.” “Probably by a voice from the ark in the Holy of Holies” (Wordsworth).
1Sa_3:5. “He ran,” etc. “Which shows the great readiness and promptness of his obedience, which made him come, yea, run at his first call” (Patrick).
1Sa_3:7. “Did not yet know,” etc. “He had not the special knowledge of God which was given by extraordinary revelation” (Lange’s Commentary). “Revealed,” literally uncovered. “The metaphor is transferred in a certain way in 1Sa_9:15, where it is said (Hebrew) that the Lord uncovered the ear of Samuel. Our word revelation may be taken as including both these ideas” (Hobson). (See comments on 1Sa_3:21.)
1Sa_3:10. “Stood.” The voice becomes a vision. “A personal presence, not a mere voice, or impression upon Samuel’s mind is here indicated “(Bishop Hervey).
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—1Sa_3:1-10
THE VOICE OF THE UNSEEN
I. Special preparation qualifies for special revelation. “Samuel ministered unto the Lord before Eli.” In any branch of service, whether rendered to men or more directly to God, training is needed before a man is fit to fulfil its duties. Men to whom the voice of nature has spoken in any special manner are generally men who have been her students from their early years, and their long waiting upon her in her temple has made them capable of receiving special revelations from her. Newton and Faraday were made partakers of some of her secrets only after years of training in her school, and the same may be said of the poets and artists whose ears have been opened, or whose vision has been enlightened in an especial manner to hear her voice, or to see her beauties. David’s early days were spent in meditating upon the heavens that declared the glory of God and the firmament that showed the Divine handiwork. Doubtless this early training had much to do with his susceptibility to impressions from the works of God in nature in his after-life, and made him able to see God in all the things that He has made. God, by early training, fitted him to be not only a king and a soldier, but a poet. So Samuel was prepared, by early and special training, to receive special revelations from God.
II. Early religious training fits men for great and important work in after life. From his very early days Samuel dwelt in the sanctuary of the Lord, and was in daily attendance upon the services of His house. Corrupt as were some of those who ministered in holy things, there were doubtless some good and elevating influences around him which would accustom him to the thought of the God of his fathers, and tend to prepare him for the special work to which he was destined. The comparatively easy and pleasant ministry unto the Lord within His house prepared him for the sterner service he was to be called to render without the courts in a more public capacity. The sailor’s child is first taught to handle an oar in the sheltered cove before his father’s cottage, in sight of home and within reach of his mother’s eye. But this easy exercise is to fit him in after years to move out into the wide ocean and face the perils of the storm, and with a skilful hand pilot his vessel safely over a dangerous sea. The home-life of every well-trained child is a calm and peaceful bay, in which, encircled by loving laws and gentle words, he is being fitted to fight the difficulties and temptations of life outside the charmed circle. In due time he moves out into the vast sea of life, and finds himself in a world altogether different from his childhood’s home; but the holy influences that were around him there have fitted him for taking his place and doing his work in the world, so as to glorify God and bless himself and others. So it ought to be with every member of a godly household, so it was with Samuel. The “gentleness of God” (2Sa_22:36) as he experienced it in the comparatively calm and peaceful atmosphere of his early days, made him fit to fulfil the arduous mission to which he was afterwards called, and strengthened him to fulfil all the Divine commands even to the terrific one of “hewing Agag in pieces before the Lord” (1Sa_15:33). What a contrast was the last-mentioned stern service to the gentle ministry of his early days, but obedience to the will of God was doubtless the motive power in both. This habit of obedience is the one which above all others, perhaps, fits men bravely and faithfully to fulfil their duties to God and men. If a child has been accustomed from a sense of duty to render obedience to his human father or guardian he will come more readily to subject his will to his Divine Father. Submission to the lesser and imperfect being prepares the way for submission to the Almighty and Perfect One. We see from Samuel’s ready response to what he supposed was the call of Eli, how accustomed he was to render implicit obedience to him who stood to him in the place of his earthly father, and this submission to a human will and authority was one of the most important elements in his early training to fit him in after life to render unhesitating obedience to the word of the Lord, and to shrink from no service which He called upon him to perform.
III. God speaks when His speech is most needed. Rain is never so precious as when famine has set in from lack of it. When the clouds have for long ceased to yield refreshment to the earth, then every drop is as precious as gold. When there is lack of the rain of heaven, then there is dearth, and disease, and death. So is it in the spiritual world when there is a lack of spiritual teaching. From this soul-famine there springs apace all kinds of spiritual diseases, and souls perish for lack of bread. In Israel, at this period of its history, there was such a soul-famine, and with few exceptions its whole “head was sick, and its heart was faint” in consequence, and “wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores” broke out in the lives of those who ought to have been fit mediums for the descent of that spiritual rain which makes glad the wilderness and the solitary place, and causes the spiritual desert to rejoice and blossom as the rose. In this time of great need God broke the long silence, and in this word coming to Samuel there was “a sound of” that “abundance of rain” which was to be poured down upon this highly-favoured people almost unceasingly until the time of Malachi. This voice of God, coming to the youthful Samuel in the night watches, was to be the beginning of a long series of “open visions,” and of an abundant revelation of the mind and will of God. But the first drops of the shower fell in a time of spiritual drought, and famine, and disease.
IV. God speaks through spiritually qualified instruments. A coloured glass is not a fit medium to transmit the pure white light of the sun. A blackened glass almost entirely shuts out his rays; light can hardly find any entrance through such a medium. God’s silence had been of so long continuance because those who ought to have been fit mediums to transmit His word were utterly incapable even of receiving it. Neither Eli nor his sons were qualified instruments by which God could reveal His will to the people. Even the high-priest himself was not one whose spiritual nature was sufficiently awake to render him capable of receiving visions of God. And he who would reveal to others the word of the Lord must be able first to see and hear for himself. But Samuel was of an entirely different nature. His ear had been rendered susceptible to spiritual voices, his eyes were fitted to discern spiritual realities, and his will was so far in harmony with the will of God—his desire to serve the Lord was so far single and unbiassed,—as to render him a fit medium through which the light of the Divine word could be transmitted.
V. The unseen world is as real as that which is seen. The personality of Eli in the tabernacle was one that could be seen—it was within the reach of Samuel’s bodily senses. But he came to be conscious of a Person, quite as real, though ordinarily beyond the reach of his vision. He who spoke to Samuel in his sleep was as real an existence as was the priest to whom he at first attributed the voice. That Samuel at first mistook the voice of the invisible God for the voice of the visible Eli shows how strongly he was assured of the reality of the person who spoke to him—how certain he felt that the voice belonged to a real and actual existence. That which is unseen by our mortal eye is as real, and is as near to us, as that which our bodily vision can apprehend, and it only needs God to awaken our spiritual senses to make us conscious of this. Many a man can testify from his own experience that communion with God is quite as much a reality as any communion with man. Samuel, during his minority, had many a conversation with the aged Eli, and had doubtless received some good impressions from his intercourse with the old priest. But the intercourse which he held from this time forth with a person who spoke to him from the invisible world was as real and far more impressive than any he had ever had with the person before whom he had so long ministered to the Lord. So real was it, and so strong an impression did it make upon him that he could afterwards reproduce the words that had been spoken to him, and felt that communion with Him whose dwelling is not with flesh, was a more influential fact of his life than any intercourse with men. He had been conversant with many facts concerning Jehovah before this time, but he now awoke to such a personal consciousness of His existence, and such an abiding sense of His nearness, that up to this crisis in his history it is said of him that he “knew not the Lord.”
OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS
1Sa_3:1. Since the extraordinary gifts stand in close connection with the ordinary, we must conclude that the latter also were sparingly dealt out, that among the masses there was a great deal of lukewarmness, and even open apostasy. The want of a reformation was urgent. That the extraordinary gifts, however, had not quite disappeared, we learn from the example of the man of God who comes to Eli to upbraid him with his sins and also to announce the Divine judgment. And with respect to the ordinary gifts, we are led to the conclusion that there was at that time a not inconsiderable ekloge, not only by the institution of holy women (see Critical Notes on 1Sa_2:21), but also by the custom of the Nazarite, of which we have two contemporaneous examples in Samson and Samuel, and must therefore have been pretty widely spread. Hence we infer that the spirit of piety was by no means dead, especially since an institution such as that of the Nazarites stands in close connection with the whole national tendency, and can only flourish when more or less supported by it.—Hengstenberg.
Faithful in little, and therefore entrusted with more, being the next famous prophet to Moses, and called the first (Act_3:24; 2Ch_35:18).—Trapp.
The time of Samuel’s appearance in Israel as prophet was a time of an internal judgment of God, which consisted in the lack of intercourse of God with His people by revelation. It was a theocratic interdict incurred by the continual apostasy of the people from their God … Such a judgment came upon Saul (1Sa_28:6; 1Sa_28:15).… The same law presents itself in all periods of the kingdom of God; men lose the source of life, God’s revealed word, by a Divine judgment, when they withdraw from intercourse with the living God, and will not accept His holy word as the truth which controls their whole life.—Lange’s Commentary.
1Sa_3:2. God lets old Eli sleep, who slept in his sin; and awakes Samuel to tell him what He would do with his master. He, who was wont to be the mouth of God to the people, must now receive the message of God from the mouth of another; as great persons will not speak to those with whom they are highly offended, but send them their checks by others.—Bishop Hall.
1Sa_3:4. He answered “Here am I.” A hearing ear is a sweet mercy; and a heavy ear, a grievous judgment (Isa_6:9).—Trapp.
1Sa_3:5-6. He would not have lain down to sleep had he thought that the Lord had spoken unto him. So, if men did but consider that God speaketh unto them by His ministers, they would hear and heed much better. How oft do we either turn a deaf ear to God’s call, or else mistake, and run another way, till He please to speak home to our hearts, and cause us to hear Him.—Trapp.
1Sa_3:10. For the first time Samuel stands with consciousness in the presence of the majesty of God—and immediately all the riddles of life begin to be solved for him, and the meaning of his own life to become clear. What he says bears the clearest stamp of a really begun communion with the Lord. Is it not the resolve to say and to do all that the Lord might show him of His lofty thoughts and ways—is it not this, and nothing but this, that is expressed in “Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth?” Has he not thereby once for all renounced self-knowing and self-will? That was the faithfulness as a prophet, which all Israel, from Dan even to Beersheba, recognised in him (1Sa_3:20). And that which thus first established a true communion with the Lord could also alone be the power that maintained it. The constant prayer, “Speak, Lord,” and the constant vow, “Thy servant heareth”—that is the hand which takes hold of God’s right hand, to be held fast by it with everlasting life. “Speak, Lord,” etc., a testimony of unconditional devotion to the Lord.
1. How such a testimony is reached (a), through the Lord’s awakening call; (b), through receptivity of heart for God’s word; (c) through the deed of self-denial in the renunciation of all self-knowledge and self-will.
2. What is therein testified and praised before the Lord—(a) humble subjection [speak, Lord]; (b) steadfast dependence on the Lord in free love [Thy servant]; (c) unconditional, joyful obedience to His will [Thy servant heareth]. Conditions of a blessed fulfilment of one’s calling for the kingdom of God—
1. The experience of the power of the Divine word: I have called thee by name.
2. The repeated call in prayer, “Speak, Lord.”
3. The fulfilment of the vow: “Thy servant heareth.”—Lange’s Commentary.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain 1Sa 3:1-10
1Sa 3:1-10
Of Bible boys Samuel is a chief favourite. The reason is that nothing under the sun is more beautiful than piety in childhood. Nothing like grace for making the young graceful. Martin Luther in his gentler moments dwelt with great tenderness on the boyhood of Samuel. He found in him what he longed to see in his own boys and in all boys. When God called "Samuel, Samuel," he answered at once, "Speak, Lord; for Thy servant heareth." There we have, as in a nutshell, the history of a child of God.
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I. The Lord speaking.—God speaks to us: (1) in His Providence; (2) in His Word; (3) by His Spirit.
II. The child hearing.—The ear is one of the main gateways of the soul. But far more wonderful is the inner ear of the heart, or the conscience, by which you hear the noiseless voice of God. You may mistake the voice at first; Samuel did so. But if you mistake God’s voice, He will speak to you again and again till you know both the Speaker and His message; and then you will be like this delighted child when he lay listening to his name pronounced by Jehovah’s lips.
III. The child serving.—Samuel was one of the ministering children of the Bible, for in his childhood he ministered before the Lord. His obedience was: (1) prompt; (2) hearty; (3) lifelong. His motto all through life was, "Speak, Lord; for Thy servant heareth."
J. Wells, Bible Children, p. 133.
In this passage four thoughts are suggested:—
I. The sleep.—That night God was present in a special manner. He was near to Samuel. But Samuel was unconscious of His presence, for he was asleep. That sleeping boy was a picture of what many boys and girls amongst ourselves are, in a different sense—spiritually asleep. There is (1) the sleep of carelessness; (2) the sleep of sin; (3) the sleep of security.
II. God’s awakening call.—God has many ways of awakening sleepers: (1) There is God’s call in the Word; (2) there is God’s call in Providence.
III. The lying down again.—In Samuel’s case this was all right and good. He was an unusually dutiful child. Whenever he was called up he sprang, and that again and again. In the case of most, the lying down again is fatal. It is never safe to count upon more than one call; it is never safe to neglect the first. That was what Lot’s wife did, and she never got another chance.
IV. God’s call recognised and answered.—Let us go to God as Samuel went to Eli, saying, "Here am I, for thou calledst me."
J. H. Wilson, The Gospel and its Fruits, p. 3.
References: 1Sa 3:1-19.—F. Langbridge, The Sunday Magazine, 1885, p. 671. 1Sa 3:7.—Outline Sermons to Children, p. 32; Parker, vol. vii., p. 59.
1Sa 3:8
I. We may define a call, as usually understood, to be an inward conviction of the soul that such and such is the will of God concerning it, accompanied with an irresistible desire to obey the conviction. In such cases a test is required. There is perhaps no extent of self-deception to which an individual may not be led who concentrates the whole of his thoughts and meditations upon the internal emotions of which he is sensible. Hence the necessity of erecting a tribunal without, to which may be referred the judgment of the inward conviction, and by which we may see whether the voice which is abroad in our hearts, stirring and moving, harmonises with the voice of parents and brethren and priest, that so we may, with Eli, perceive of a surety whether the Lord hath called His child.
II. There is another criterion by which men might go far to ascertain the nature of those internal sensations of which they speak, namely the criterion of outward circumstances. In order to test feeling, we want something removed as far as possible from what is exciting. In the majority of cases it may be fairly assumed that what we are is what God would have us be; the station of life in which we find ourselves is that which He would have us fill. When, therefore, we seem to be Divinely led to an extraordinary course of conduct, it is no vain prudence which bids us inquire whether outward circumstances tend to encourage or dissuade us. Calls to abandon our present position should be rigidly examined, if we would not be beguiled like unstable souls, and be proved in the end to have forsaken our own mercies.
Bishop Woodford, Sermons Preached in Various Churches, p. 193.
1Sa 3:9
Samuel was called to be a prophet of God in a great crisis of Jewish history. His appearance was quieter and less dramatic than those of Moses and Elijah, but it was almost as momentous. The epoch was one of those which determine the character and destiny of nations. One great act in the drama of Jewish history was closing, another was opening. Two great revolutions were effected: the one political, the other religious.
Samuel was clearly one of those men of manifold gifts and functions whom God raises up in great crises and for great services. His entire course and character were probably determined by the spirit in which he responded to God’s first call, and discharged the arduous service to which he was called.
Notice:—
I. Life is full of voices of God, only we lack the spiritual faculty which discerns them. (1) When we think of God’s voice we probably think first and most spontaneously of God’s revelation of His will in the Bible. (2) There are again voices of God’s providence, which, if we have docile hearts, we shall not fail to recognise. (3) The instincts and yearnings of our own spiritual nature are an unmistakeable voice of God. (4) And to this religious nature God speaks by the motions and monitions of His Holy Spirit; awakening solicitudes, exciting desires, touching impulses. (5) In moments of intellectual perplexity, amid the tempest and earthquake of intellectual strife, the still small voice of the religious soul is heard—God’s voice within us. (6) In quieter and more thoughtful moods of life we hear the voice of God. (7) God has voices that reach us in crowds; distinct, perhaps loud, above every din of business or clamour of strife or song of revelry. (8) In moments of temptation, even, God’s voice finds a tongue in some lingering power of conscience, in some sensitive remnants of virtue, in some angel memories of a pious home and an innocent heart. (9) In times of sorrow God’s voice comes to us; summoning us to faith in His will, His purpose, and His presence, and to patience and acquiescence in the sacrifice demanded of us. (10) Most terrible of all is it when the first voice of God that we seriously listen to is a sentence of doom. (11) Again, at what unlikely times and in what unlikely places God may speak to us. (12) To what unlikely persons God’s call comes.
II. How then do we respond to God’s call? Is not Samuel’s answer, "Speak, Lord; Thy servant heareth," in its childlike simplicity, faith and submissiveness, a most beautiful and perfect type of what our answer should be? Even the maturest and most saintly cannot transcend this response of the temple-child.
III. One more lesson we may learn, viz. the religious importance of the passive or receptive side of our spiritual life. This is the conclusion of the whole matter—that in the activities of our zeal we do not forget its inspirations in God. The more entire our spirit of dependence, the more effective the work we do.
H. Allon, The Vision of God, p. 257.
The life of Samuel was great, regarding him as the instrument which God chose for changing the civil polity of His chosen people. To Samuel was intrusted the inauguration of the kingdom of Israel. He also stands at the head of the great succession of prophets whom God sent to His people.
I. Notice, first, that this great character comes before us in connection with the dedication of the child by his parents. If great men avail themselves of the tendencies of their day, and do raise their own and help forward the generation that follows; if God is educating humanity, leading it, bringing it to Himself; may we not be keeping back the true progress of our race by accepting these immortal instruments from Him, but failing to give them back to Him, to work His will as long as He may require them?
II. His call to God’s service. The Bible is full of the history of the calls of God. The mode of the call has been various, and the manner in which the call has been received has been various also. We are all taught to expect to be called by God. None are too poor, too humble, too little gifted; all are to be fellow-workers with Him.
III. Notice the message which Samuel was called upon to deliver. It required him to announce to the aged Eli, the friend and protector of his youth, the destruction of his family before God. The delivery of this message clearly implied courage. There is an element of reproof contained in all messages of the truth, in whatever line of life they are delivered. In all great lives there is an element of reproof, and also of singularity and loneliness, from which men naturally shrink, and which they require real courage to maintain. Each man has a work to do which is his own and not another’s. From One only he need never feel alone; from Him who called him to the work he has to do, and with whom and in whom the life’s work should be done.
Bishop King, Oxford and Cambridge Undergraduates’ Journal, Oct. 23rd, 1879.
God speaks to us in many different ways and in many different tones. (1) He speaks to us by the works of nature. (2) He speaks to us by the dispensations of His providence. (3) He speaks to us by the voice of conscience. (4) He speaks to us by the words of the Bible and the teaching of His holy Church. (5) He speaks to us at the hour of death.
J. Wilmot-Buxton, Literary Churchman Sermons, p. 89.
I. Samuel was happy in his start in life. He was blessed with pious parents, who, even from his birth, devoted him to God’s service.
II. Samuel had early learned to obey: his habits of obedience won him the favour of Eli; yea, more, they won him the favour of the Lord Himself.
III. In Samuel’s answer to God’s call we see: (1) obedience; (2) perseverance; (3) patience.
IV. God speaks to children: (1) by His works; (2) by means of His holy word. If we wish to learn we must present to the Lord a teachable spirit.
G. Litting, Thirty Sermons for Children, p. 127.
References: 1Sa 3:9.—F. D. Maurice, Sermons, vol. vi., p. 163; Bishop Walsham How, Plain Words to Children, p. 96; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. x., No. 586; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. xx., p. 335.
1Sa 3:10
The call of Samuel is very different in its circumstances from the call of St. Paul; yet it resembles it in this particular, that the circumstance of his obedience to it is brought out prominently even in the words put into his mouth by Eli in the text. The characteristic of all Divine calls in Scripture is: (1) to require instant obedience, and (2) to call us we know not to what; to call us on in the darkness. Faith alone can obey them.
I. Those who are living religiously have from time to time truths they did not know before, or had no need to consider, brought before them forcibly; truths which involve duties, which are in fact precepts ’and claim obedience. In this and similar ways Christ calls us now. He works through our natural faculties and circumstances in life.
II. These Divine calls are commonly sudden and as indefinite and obscure in their consequences as in former times. The call may come to us: (1) through the death of a friend or relative; (2) through some act of sacrifice, suddenly resolved on and executed, which opens as it were a gate into the second or third heaven—an entrance into a higher state of holiness. (3) The call may come through the hearing or reading of Scripture, or through an unusual gift of Divine grace poured into our hearts.
III. Nothing is more certain than that some men do feel themselves called to high duties and works to which others are not called. No one has any leave to take another’s lower standard of holiness for his own. We need not fear spiritual pride if we follow Christ’s call as men in earnest. Earnestness has no time to compare itself with the state of other men; earnestness has too vivid a feeling of its own infirmities to be elated at itself. It simply says, "Speak, Lord; for Thy servant heareth." "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?"
J. H. Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons, vol. viii., p. 17 (see also Selection from the same, p. 11).
I. No doubt the prophets of God were exceptional men. But in God’s world the exceptional is always the evangelistic. God never makes any man for himself, least of all a prophet. The prophet Samuel illustrates the universal freedom of prophetic activity in the Hebrew community, freshly embodies the law expressed by Moses that inspiration is without limits or impediments from above, and is never exclusive in its intended range, or exhausted in its available supply.
II. Christ asserts over and over again the doctrine of the continuity of inspiration. His consolation, amid opposition and defeat, is that His Father reveals the truths of His kingdom to the open and trustful hearts of "babes" like young Samuel, and He solaced His followers by telling them that the Holy Spirit would tell them "all things, and bring all things to their remembrance" that He has said to them in His familiar ministry. The last word of God has not been spoken. The last counsel for a perplexed humanity has not been given.
We are but at the dawn of Revelation, and there is not and cannot be any "finis" with the Eternal.
III. The results of Samuel’s inspiration are also possible to us. These results were four: (1) an enlarged and purified conception of God; (2) a strong and governing sway for ethical ideas of God and of life; (3) a contagious impulsion of others towards God and righteousness; (4) a fine susceptibility of advance in religious, social and national activity.
J. CLIFFORD, Daily Strength for Daily Living, p. 139.
I. God called a child, not the old prophet Eli.
II. God called Samuel four times, because he did not understand at first.
III. When God calls us to service, He calls us to honour.
T. Champness, Little Foxes, p. 119.
References: 1Sa 3:10.—R. D. B. Rawnsley, A Course of Sermons for the Christian Year, p. 273; F. W. Farrar, Silence and the Voices of God, p. 3; J. Van Oosterzee, Year of Salvation, vol. ii., p. 419; J. Vaughan, Sermons, 1869, p. 213 (see also Old Testament Outlines, p. 61); Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 338; E. Garbett, The Soul’s Life, p. 52. 1Sa 3:11-13.—R. D. B. Rawnsley, Village Sermons, 1st series, p. 196. 1Sa 3:11-14.—Parker, vol. vi., p. 248.
1Sa 3:13
It was at Shiloh that Eli spent his years. Tranquil and busy, and in the main, honourable years they were. Shiloh was well-fitted to be the seat of ecclesiastical rule, lying as it did well off the main highroad which ran through the country from north to south, lying among hills which fairly shut it in on all sides but one, their sides terraced with vines and olives and fig trees, while in the plain below stood the tabernacle, containing the most precious things in Israel. During the greater part of the year Shiloh was as quiet as any small country cathedral town in England. Only when at the great yearly festival devout Israelites crowded from every tribe to their central national sanctuary, was its solitude invaded. Well might it have seemed an ideal house of prayer and study, of mild authority and ripe wisdom, where piety and purity and philanthropy might be trained to high perfection for the common good. Yet Shiloh was the scene of the base avarice, the high-handed violence, the vulgar profligacy of the sons of Eli; and Shiloh was the scene of Eli’s weakness, so culpable in itself, so fraught with ruin to his family and his home.
I. Eli, let us observe, was otherwise, personally, a good man.
He was resigned, humble, and in a true sense, devout. He submits to be rebuked and sentenced by his inferiors without a word of remonstrance. His personal piety is especially noticeable at the moment of his death. He might have survived the national disgrace; but that the Ark of the Sacred Presence should be taken, that he could not survive—it touched the Divine honour, and Eli’s devotion is to be measured by the fact that the shock of such a disgrace killed him on the spot.
II. Eli’s personal excellence was accompanied by a want of moral resolution and enterprise which explains the ruin of his house. He should have removed his sons from the office which they dishonoured. Instead of that, he only talked to them. His sin was one of which only an amiable man could be guilty, but in its consequences it was fatal.
III. Two observations suggest themselves in conclusion: (1) No relationship can be more charged with responsibility than that between a parent and his children. (2) No outward circumstances can of themselves protect us against the insidious assaults of evil, or against the enfeeblement of a truant will.
H. P. Liddon, The Family Churchman, July 14th, 1886 (see also Fenny Pulpit, No. 1160).
1Sa 3:14
I. There must have been in Eli a real sense of the sacredness of his function. Whatever reverence a man can inspire by showing that his heart is personally engaged in his work, that it caused him inward delight, he will have inspired. But there is a limit to this kind of respect, and moreover a mischief in it. Eli was a pious or devout man; he was evidently a kind-hearted, amiable man, but he was not, strictly speaking, a righteous man. He did not care that God’s order should be established, that wrong-doers should be punished. So long as he could keep his internal quietness all was well. He was the specimen of a departing age; he was sincere, no doubt, but his sincerity would die with him.
II. What then has become of that order of which we have heard so much? The order is just where it always was; not shattered or shaken in the smallest degree; confirmed and established by the unbelief of the people, the crimes of Hophni and Phinehas, and the imbecility of their father. If it was not of God, it was false from the first; if it was of God, He could prove it to be His, and prove that He was not dependent upon the order, but the order upon Him. Man breaks the course of his obedience; he will not believe that God is with him of a truth. Then God shows him that He is. He does not allow him to remain in his delusion, to shut his eyes and fancy that he is unseen.
III. There are two methods in which this revelation of the reality of things was made to Israel at this time: (1) by the call of Samuel; (2) by retribution. The righteous Judge of the world shows that the world cannot go on without Him; that priests who try to establish their rule as if they had one of their own and were not merely His servants, must of all men pay the penalty of their sin and unbelief. The people whom they have perverted into godlessness must taste the fruit of their godlessness. The Philistines came against Israel—the ark was taken. But God was the same wherever the ark might be. He still spoke out His judgments and His prophecies by Samuel’s voice. In due time, having proved that the nation lived only in Him and by Him, He gave it health and restoration.
F. D. Maurice, Patriarchs and Lawgivers of the Old Testament, p. 336.
1Sa 3:18
I. Notice first the history and fate of Eli. (1) Observe his amiability and kindness, shown in his readily retracting his opinion of Hannah and changing the language of uncharitable-ness into that of benediction. (2) Observe the piety of Eli. What meek submission is discernible in his exclamation when, through the instrumentality of Samuel, the destruction of himself and of his father’s house was predicted! "It is the Lord; let Him do what seemeth Him good." (3) Eli was a good man, a pious man, but he was weak and indolent, and in consequence he did not discharge with vigour the duties of an office which he might have declined, and the emoluments of which he enjoyed, the further consequence being a great detriment to the public affairs of the Church and nation over which he presided. (4) For this Eli met with the punishment he deserved; he sacrificed his duty for the sake of peace, and notwithstanding his sacrifice he found trouble; his grey hairs were brought in sorrow to the grave.
II. Consider the early years of Samuel. (1) Samuel, young as he was, seems alone in Eli’s house to have been conscientiously doing his duty, and among the revealed dealings of God with man we find this to have been a general rule, that God selected as His immediate agents persons who had been previously prepared by moral discipline for the work for which He designed them. (2) In this preparation of Samuel, although something depended on himself, yet in some things he was also dependent on others. It was Hannah who brought him to the house of the Lord when he was yet young. His piety, though an acquisition, was also an inheritance. He was supported by her prayers as well as his own; her precept and example had influence over him; he was indebted to Eli also. By our actions we help one another; by our prayers we are to help one another. No man liveth unto himself. Man, from his very birth, is linked to man.
W. F. Hook, Parish Sermons, p. 21.
References: 1Sa 3:19.—J. Harrison, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiv., p. 49; R. M. McCheyne, Additional Remains, p. 81. 1Sa 3:19-21.—G. B. Ryley, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiii., p. 185.
1Sa 3:20
An Italy once, an India twice, have succumbed to a boyish resolve. In the higher sphere, that of conquest in the intellectual world, it is mere matter of necessity that to be a great poet, scholar, or orator, must have been the boy’s resolve before it was the man’s reward. Careers like these must be chosen by the open eyes of boyhood, must be pursued with all its vivid forces. Again, in the higher spiritual world how young have been most of our chieftains, the saints of heaven, at the time when their choice was made and proclaimed. It has often been noticed how young the great leaders of European Christendom have ever been.
I. Notice first that in the text we have a resolution, and a young resolution.
II. The second point is what Samuel resolved to do, and at what time. To be a prophet of the Lord seems to imply such grace from heaven, such free-will on the part of God—God everything, man nothing. And perhaps we may be liable to forget that the man may be prepared and fitted for his work or otherwise, and that by the line which he has himself taken. Samuel gave himself up to be what God would have him to be, to be that in the best way and in the most perfect degree.
III. The history is not the history of countries or of Churches only. It is the history of the cause of God, and there is no place, no society, in which the cause of God does not go through the self-same phases, maintained and counteracted; and when should boyish resolve more affect the Church of God than as it works in our society?
IV. It is inconsistency on our part which weakens the cause of our Master in any place. We must be established, we must be faithful, to be servants of the Lord. (1) No one can serve God without prayer. Prayer is the means of obtaining that strength which is our chief want. (2) A second point is friendship. Mere ordinary friendships do good on the whole, but how much more would they do if there were a little resolve, a little more holding yourselves and your friends true to principles which you respect, and if you established yourselves to be true friends to each other.
Archbishop Benson, Boy Life: Sundays in Wellington College, p. 11.
References: 1Sa 3:21.—Parker, vol. vii., p. 60. 1Sa 4:3.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. iv., No. 186; Parker, vol. vi.. p. 259; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. x., p. 278; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iii., p. 255. 1Sa 4:7.—Parker, vol. vii., p. 60.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain 1 Samuel
1 Samuel
THE CHILD PROPHET
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1Sa 3:1 - 1Sa 3:14.
The opening words of this passage are substantially repeated from 1Sa 2:11, 1Sa 2:18. They come as a kind of refrain, contrasting the quiet, continuous growth and holy service of the child Samuel with the black narrative of Eli’s riotous sons. While the hereditary priests were plunging into debauchery, and making men turn away from the Tabernacle services, Hannah’s son was ministering unto the Lord, and, though no priest, was ‘girt with an ephod.’ This white flower blossomed on a dunghill. The continuous growth of a character, from a child serving God, and to old age walking in the same path, is the great lesson which the story of Samuel teaches us. ‘The child is father of the man,’ and all his long days are ‘bound each to each’ by true religion. There are two types of experience among God’s greatest servants. Paul, made an Apostle from a persecutor, heads the one class. Timothy in the New Testament and Samuel in the Old, represent the other. An Augustine or a Bunyan is made the more earnest, humble, and whole-hearted by the remembrance of a wasted youth and of God’s arresting mercy. But there are a serenity and continuity about a life which has grown up in the fear of God that have their own charm and blessing. It is well to have ‘much transgression’ forgiven, but it may be better to have always been ‘innocent’ and ignorant of it. Pardon cleanses sin, and even turns the memory of it into an ally of holiness; but traces are left on character, and, at the best, years have been squandered which do not return. Samuel is the pattern of child religion and service, to which teachers should aim that their children may be conformed. How beautifully his double obedience is expressed in the simple words! His service was ‘unto the Lord,’ and it was ‘before Eli’; that is to say, he learned his work from the old man, and in obeying him he served God. The child’s religion is largely obedience to human guides, and he serves God best by doing what he is bid,-a lesson needed in our days by both parents and children.
Samuel’s peaceful service is contrasted, in the second half of the first verse, with the sad cessation of divine revelations in that dreary time of national laxity. A demoralised priesthood, an alienated people, a silent God,-these are the outstanding features of the period when this fair life of continuous worship unfolded itself. This flower grew in a desert. The voice of God had become a tradition of the past, not an experience of the present. ‘Rare’ conveys the idea better than ‘precious.’ The intention is not to tell the estimate in which the word was held, but the infrequency of its utterance, as appears from the following parallel clause. The fact is mentioned in order to complete the picture of Samuel’s ‘environment’ to fling into relief against that background his service, and to prepare the way for the narrative of the beginning of an epoch of divine speech. When priests are faithless and people careless, God’s voice will often sound from lowly childlike lips. The man who is to be His instrument in carrying on His work will often come from the very centre of the old order, into which he is to breathe new life, and on which he is to impress a new stamp.
The artless description of the night in the Tabernacle is broken by the more general notice of Eli’s dim sight, which the Revised Version rightly throws into a parenthesis. It is somewhat marred, too, by the transposition which the Authorised Version, following some more ancient ones, has made, in order to avoid saying, as the Hebrew plainly does, that Samuel slept in the ‘Temple of the Lord, where the ark was.’ The picture is much more vivid and tender, if we conceive of the dim-eyed old man, lying somewhat apart; of the glimmering light, nearly extinct but still faintly burning; and of the child laid to sleep in the Tabernacle. Surely the picturesque contrast between the sanctity of the ark and the innocent sleep of childhood is meant to strike us, and to serve as connecting the place with the subsequent revelation. Childlike hearts, which thus quietly rest in the ‘secret place of the Most High,’ and day and night are near His ark, will not fail of hearing His voice. He sleeps secure who sleeps ‘beneath the shadow of the Almighty.’ May not these particulars, too, be meant to have some symbolic significance? Night hung over the nation. The spiritual eye of the priest was dim, and the order seemed growing old and decrepit, but the lamp of God had not altogether gone out; and if Eli was growing blind, Samuel was full of fresh young life. The darkest hour is that before the dawn; and that silent sanctuary, with the slumbering old half-blind priest and the expiring lamp, may stand for an emblem of the state of Israel.
The thrice-repeated and misunderstood call may yield lessons of value. We note the familiar form of the call. There is no vision, no symbol of the divine glory, such as other prophets had, but an articulate voice, so human-like that it is thought to be Eli’s. Such a kind of call fitted the child’s stature best. We note the swift, cheery obedience to what he supposes to be Eli’s voice. He sprang up at once, and ‘ran to Eli,’-a pretty picture of cheerful service, grudging not his broken sleep, which, no doubt, had often been similarly broken by similar calls. Perhaps it was in order to wait on Eli, quite as much as to tend the lamp or open the gates, that the singular arrangement was made of his sleeping in the Temple; and the reason for the previous parenthesis about Eli’s blindness may have been to explain why Samuel slept near him. Where were Eli’s sons? They should have been their father’s attendants, and the watchers ‘by night . . . in the house of the Lord’; but they were away rioting, and the care of both Temple and priest was left to a child.
The old man’s heart evidently went out to the boy. How tenderly he bids him lie down again! How affectionately he calls him ‘my son,’ as if he was already beginning to feel that this was his true successor, and not the blackguards that were breaking his heart! The two were a pair of friends: on the one side were sedulous care and swift obedience by night and by day; on the other were affection and a discernment of coming greatness, made the clearer by the bitter contrast with his own children’s lives. The old and the young are good companions for one another, and often understand each other better and help each other more than either does his contemporaries.
Samuel mistook God’s voice for Eli’s, as we all often do. And not less often we make the converse blunder, and mistake Eli’s voice for God’s. It needs a very attentive ear, and a heart purged from selfishness and self-will, and ready for obedience, to know when God speaks, though men may be His mouthpieces, and when men speak, though they may call themselves His messengers. The child’s mistake was venial. It is less pardonable and more dangerous when repeated by us. If we would be guarded against it, we must be continually where Samuel was, and we must not sleep in the Temple, but ‘watch and be sober.’
Eli’s perception that it was God who spoke must have had a pang in it. It is not easy for the old to recognise that the young hear God’s voice more clearly than they, nor for the superior to be glad when he is passed over and new truth dawns on the inferior. But, if there were any such feeling, it is silenced with beautiful self-abnegation, and he tells the wondering child the meaning of the voice and the answer he must make. What higher service can any man do to his fellows, old or young, than to help them to discern God’s call and to obey it? What nobler conception of a teacher’s work is there than that? Eli heard no voice, from which we may probably conclude that, however real the voice, it was not audible to sense; but he taught Samuel to interpret and answer the voice which he heard, and thus won some share of a prophet’s reward.
With what expectation in his young heart Samuel lay down again in his place! This time there is an advance in the form of the call, for only now do we read that the Lord ‘came, and stood, and called’ as before. A manifestation, addressed to the inward eye, accompanied that to the ear. There is no attempt at describing, nor at softening down, the frank ‘anthropomorphism’ of the representation, which is the less likely to mislead the more complete it is. Samuel had heard Him before; he sees Him now, and mistake is impossible. But there is no terror nor recoil from the presence. The child’s simplicity saves from that, and the child’s purity; for his little life had been a growing in service and ‘in favour with God and man.’
The answer that came from the child’s lips meant far more than the child knew. It is the answer which we are all bound to make. Let us see how deep and wide its scope is. It expresses the entire surrender of the will to the will of God. That is the secret of all peace and nobleness. There is nothing happy or great for man in this world but to love and do God’s will. All else is nought. This is solid. ‘The world passeth away, . . . but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.’ Everything besides is show and delusion, and a life directed to it is fleeting as the cloud-wrack that sweeps across the sky, and, whether it is shone on or is black, is equally melting away. Happy the child who begins with such surrender of self to be God’s instrument, and who, like Samuel, can stand up at the end and challenge men’s judgment on his course!
The answer vows prompt obedience to yet undisclosed duty. God ever calls His servants to tasks which only by degrees are made known. So Paul in his conversion was bid to go into Damascus, and there learn what more he was to do. We must first put ourselves in God’s hands, and then He will lead us round the turn in the road, and show us our work. We get it set for us bit by bit, but the surrender must be entire. The details of His will are revealed as we need them for the moment’s guidance. Let us accept them in bulk, and stand to the acceptance in each single case! That is no obedience at all which says, ‘Tell me first what you are going to bid me do, and then I will see whether I will do it.’ The true spirit of filial submission says, ‘I delight to do Thy will; now show me what it is.’ It was a strange, long road on which Samuel put his foot when he answered this call, and he little knew where it was to lead him. But the blessing of submission is that we do not need to know. It is enough to see where to put our lifted foot. What comes next we can let God settle.
The answer supplicated further light because of present obedience. ‘Speak! for Thy servant heareth,’ is a plea never urged in vain. The servant’s open ear is a reason for the Lord’s open lips. We may be quite sure that, if we are willing to hear, He is more than willing to speak; and anything is possible rather than that His children shall be left, like ill-commanded soldiers on a battlefield, waiting for orders which never come. ‘If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know.’
The sad prophecy which is committed to such apparently incongruous lips reiterates a former message by ‘a man of God.’ Eli was a kindly, and, in his way, good man, but wanting in firmness, and acquiescent in evil, partly, perhaps, from lack of moral courage and partly from lack of fervent religion. He is not charged with faults in his own administration of his office, but with not curbing his disreputable sons. The threatenings are directed, not against himself, but against his ‘house,’ who are to be removed from the high priestly office. Nothing less than a revolution is foretold. The deposition of Eli’s family would shake the whole framework of society. It is to be utterly destroyed, and no sacrifice nor offering can purge it. The ulcer must have eaten deep which required such stern measures for its excision. The sin was mainly the sons’; but the guilt was largely the father’s. We may learn how cruel paternal laxity is, and how fatal mischief may be done, by neglect of the plain duty of restraining children. He who tolerates evil which it is his province to suppress, is an accomplice, and the blood of the doers is red on his hands.
It was a terrible message to give to a child; but Samuel’s calling was to be the guide of Israel in a period of transition, and he had to be broken early into the work, which needed severity as well as tenderness. Perhaps, too, the stern message was somewhat softened, for the poor old man, by the lips through which it came to him. All that reverent love could do, we may be sure, the young prophet would do, to lighten the heavy tidings. Secrecy would be secured, too; for Samuel, who was so unwilling to tell even Eli what the Lord had said, would tell none besides.
God calls each child in our homes as truly as He did Samuel. From each the same obedience is asked. Each may, like the boy in the Tabernacle, grow up ‘in the nurture and admonition of the Lord,’ and so escape the many scars and sorrows of a life wrongly begun. Let parents see to it that they think rightly of their work, and do not content themselves with conveying information, but aim at nothing short of helping all their children to hear and lovingly to yield to the gentle call of the incarnate God!
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain The Call of Samuel
The Call of Samuel
1. Precious] RM, 'rare': see Isa_13:12. There was no prophet then. Open] rather, 'published, widely announced': cp. 2Ch_31:5.
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3. Ere the lamp of God went out] The lamp ('the seven-branched candlestick') burned all night in the sanctuary, so that the time was early morning: cp. Exo_27:21. Samuel seems to have been sleeping in some chamber near the ark. Cp. RV, 'was laid down to sleep, in the temple of the Lord, where the ark of God was.' On the ark see Intro. § 5.
10. Came, and stood] the Voice became a Vision.
13. Made themselves vile] LXX reads 'Because his sons cursed God.' See on 2Sa_12:14.
15. Doors] The Tabernacle was no longer a mere tent, but at this time had been replaced by a substantial building. This was a natural consequence of its occupying a fixed position.
18. It is the Lord] So Eli was at heart loyal, though he had shown culpable weakness.
19. Let none of his words fall to the ground] i.e. accomplished all his.predictions. For the idea cp. Deu_18:21, Deu_18:22.
20. Established] i.e. accredited, approved. Prophet] see Intro. § 4.
21. In Shiloh by the word of the lord]
These words are wanting in LXX, and the connexion gains greatly by their omission.
1Samuel 41a. And the word of Samuel came to all Israel] This clause should really form the conclusion of 1 Samuel 3 as it does in RV. Samuel proclaimed to all his countrymen the revelation he had received.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain the word
the word
Or, a word from the LORD was unusual in those days; there was no public vision.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain 4. Samuel’s Call and Prophetic Ministry
4. Samuel’s Call and Prophetic Ministry
CHAPTER 3
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1. Samuel’s call (1Sa 3:1-9)
2. The message from Jehovah (1Sa 3:10-18)
3. Samuel the prophet (1Sa 3:19-21)
After the priesthood had so completely failed and divine judgment had been pronounced, Samuel receives his call to the prophetic office. He continued his ministrations as a Levite during the time that the word of the Lord was precious (literally, rare); there was no vision. Up to this time Samuel had not known the Lord nor had the word of the Lord been revealed to him (verse 7). It must have been near the hour of dawn, for the tabernacle lamp was not yet gone out, when the voice of Jehovah called Samuel by name. He knew him, as He knows all His own by name. Three times the voice called and three times he ran unto Eli. Then Eli understood that Jehovah called the child and he instructed him to answer at the next call--”Speak, Jehovah, for thy servant heareth.” Jehovah then appeared and stood and called again. Samuel in answering omits the word “Jehovah” Eli had told him to use. He may have omitted the name Jehovah out of reverential fear. He hears thus from Jehovah’s lips the message of doom for Eli and his house, which he faithfully transmitted to Eli in the morning. He kept nothing back and Eli bowed to it in resignation; however, he did not repent. “By the faithful discharge of a commission so painful, and involving such self-denial and courage, Samuel had stood the first test of his fitness for the prophetic office. Henceforth “the word of the LORD” was permanently with him. Not merely by isolated commissions, but in the discharge of a regular office, Samuel acted as prophet in Israel. A new period in the history of the kingdom of God had commenced, and all Israel, from Dan to Beer-sheba, knew that there was now a new link between them and their God, a living centre of guidance and fellowship, and a bond of union for all who were truly the Israel of God.” (A. Edersheim, Bible History.)
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain The Lord Reveals Himself to Samuel
The Lord Reveals Himself to Samuel
v. 1. And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before Eli, as a special servant of the Sanctuary, under the immediate direction of the high priest. And the Word of the Lord was precious in those days, it rarely happened that the Lord sent a message by direct prophetic announcement; there was no open vision, literally, "there was no vision spread abroad," made public frequently. There was lacking, on the one hand, a pious, God-fearing priesthood and, on the other hand, an appreciation of the divine Spirit’s work through the Word. "Jehovah had indeed promised His people to send prophets, who should reveal to them His will and counsel, Deu 18:15 ff. ; Cf Num 23:23; but since divine Revelation presupposes willingness to accept the truth on the part of man, the unbelief and the disobedience of the people was able to hinder the fulfillment of this and similar prophecies, and God could in punishment deprive the idolatrous people of His Word. " (Keil. )
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v. 2. And it came to pass at that time, when Eli was laid down in his place, namely, to sleep at night in the room reserved for him, and his eyes began to wax dim that he could not see, this being added by way of parenthesis, in order to explain the action of Samuel, who supposed that Eli was calling him to assist him in some manner,
v. 3. and ere the lamp of God, the large candlestick with its seven lamps, whose oil was replenished every morning, since they went out toward morning, went out in the Temple of the Lord, where the ark of God was, and Samuel was laid down to sleep,
v. 4. that the Lord called Samuel; and he answered, Here am I. So Samuel was sleeping in one of the rooms which were built in the court of the Tabernacle for the use of the priests and Levites who happened to be on duty, and it was toward morning.
v. 5. And he ran unto Eli and said, Here am I; for thou calledst me. That was the conclusion which he naturally drew, and his faithful willingness took him to the room of Eli as quickly as he could get there—a fine example to many a young man of our days. And he, Eli, said, I called not; lie down again, evidently supposing that Samuel had merely dreamed he was being called. And he went and lay down.
v. 6. And the Lord called yet again, Samuel! And Samuel arose, and went to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou didst call me. He was again, as a faithful servant, ready to do his master’s bidding; there was no peevish discontent in his voice for having been called out of his rest. And he, Eli, answered, I called not, my son; lie down again, still believing that the young man was being misled by some illusion of the senses.
v. 7. Now, Samuel did not yet know the Lord, neither was the Word of the Lord yet revealed unto him. This is added by way of explanation. Samuel did not yet possess the special, direct knowledge of God, for this was given only by an extraordinary Revelation of Jehovah, in dreams and in visions, and this form of manifestation was at that time practically unknown in Israel; hence his ignorance.
v. 8. And the Lord called Samuel again the third time. And he arose and went to Eli, still with the same cheerful willingness which disregarded its own comfort, and said, Here am I; for thou didst call me. He was ready for service day or night, and without the slightest irritation. And Eli perceived that the Lord had called the child. This was the conclusion which Eli reached from his knowledge of God’s manner of dealing with His prophets.
v. 9. Therefore Eli said unto Samuel, Go, lie down; and it shall be, if He call thee, that thou shalt say, Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth. So Samuel, ever obedient, even while he may have wondered about the strangeness of the command, went and lay down in his place.
v. 10. And the Lord, who had at first manifested Himself merely by His voice, came, and stood, in a vision which must have been plainly visible to Samuel upon awakening, and called as at other times, Samuel! Samuel! Then Samuel answered, Speak, for Thy servant heareth. Samuel is not only an example of obedience, but also of willingness to hear the voice of the Lord. Like him all believers should open their ears and hearts to God and give heed to the voice which comes to us in the Word.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 Yahweh's word was rare
Yahweh's word was rare
"Yahweh did not often speak to people"
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The lamp of God
This is the seven-candle lampstand in the holy place of the tabernacle that burned every day and through the night until it was empty.
the temple of Yahweh
The "temple" was actually a tent, but it was where the people worshiped, so it is best to translate the word as "temple" here. See how you translated this in 1 Samuel 1:9.
translationWords
Samuel
servant
Yahweh
word of God
prophet
vision
God
house of God
ark of the covenant
call
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 3:1 messages . . . were very rare .…
3:1 messages . . . were very rare . . . visions were quite uncommon: God was not disclosing his will through prophets or priests, so the period was spiritually dark. However, that darkness was about to end when God communicated with Samuel (3:2–4:1a).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.