1 Samuel 1:3 - Exposition

This man went up out of his city yearly. Once in the year Elkanah went up to offer sacrifice before the ark. The original command had required this thrice a year of all Israelites; but though a Levite and a religious man, Elkanah went up but once; and such apparently was the rule in our Lord's time ( Luke 2:41 ), the season preferred being naturally the passover, while the other feasts gave opportunities for the performance of this duty to those unable to leave their homes at so early a period of the year. The ark was now at Shiloh, a town in Ephraim, about ten miles south of Shechem; for Joshua had removed it from Gilgal ( Joshua 18:1 ), not merely because Shiloh occupied a more central position, but as marking the primary rank of his own tribe ( 1 Chronicles 5:1 , 1 Chronicles 5:2 ). Its destruction by the Philistines after the capture of the ark ( 1 Samuel 5:1 ) was so complete, and attended apparently by such barbarous cruelties ( Psalms 78:60-64 ), that it never recovered its importance, and Jeroboam passed it by when seeking for places where to set up his calves.

To sacrifice unto the LORD of hosts. This title of the Deity, " LORD (in capitals, i.e. Jehovah) of Hosts," is a remarkable one. Fully it would be "Jehovah God of Hosts," and the omission of the word God shows that the phrase was one of long standing shortened down by constant use. And yet, though found 260 times in the Bible, this is the first place where it occurs. "Lord of Hosts" (Lord not in capitals, and meaning master ruler ) occurs only once, in Isaiah 10:16 . "God of Hosts," Elohim-Sabaoth, though rare, occurs four times in Psalms 80:4 , Psalms 80:7 , Psalms 80:14 , Psalms 80:19 . The word Sabaoth, hosts, does not mean armies, inasmuch as it refers to numbers, and not to order and arrangement.. It is usually employed of the heavenly bodies ( Genesis 2:1 ; Deuteronomy 4:19 ; Deuteronomy 17:3 ), which seem countless in multitude as they are spread over the vast expanse of an Oriental sky ( Genesis 15:5 ); and as their worship was one of the oldest and most natural forms of idolatry ( Deuteronomy 4:19 ; Job 31:26-28 ), so this title is a protest against it, and claims for the one God dominion over the world of stars as well as in this lower sphere. Its origin then is to be sought at some time when there was a struggle between the worship of the sun and stars and the pure monotheism of the Hebrews. Occasionally the angels are called "the host of heaven" ( 1 Kings 22:19 ; Psalms 103:21 ; Psalms 148:2 ), whenever the allusion is to their number, but when the idea is that of orderly arrangement they are called God's armies ( Genesis 32:2 ).

The two sons of Eli ... were there. The right translation of the Hebrew is, "And there (at Shiloh) the two sons of Eli ... were priests." Eli apparently had devolved upon his sons his priestly functions, while he discharged the duties only of a judge. His position is remarkable. In the Book of Judges we find a state of anarchy. The people are rude, untutored, doing much as they pleased, committing often atrocious crimes, yet withal full of generous impulses, brave, and even heroic. There is little regular government among them, but whenever a great man stands forth, the people in his district submit themselves to him. The last judge, Samson, a man of pungent wit and vast personal prowess, seems to have been entirely destitute of all those qualities which make a man fit to be a ruler, but he kept the patriotism of the people alive and nerved them to resistance by the fame of his exploits. In Eli we find a ruler possessed of statesmanlike qualities. The country under him is prosperous; the Philistines, no longer dominant as in Samson's time, have so felt his power that when they gain a victory the Israelites are astonished at it ( 1 Samuel 4:3 ). Moreover, he is not only judge, he is also high priest; but instead of belonging to the family of Phinehas, the dominant house in the time of the Judges, he belongs to that of Ithamar. When, to solve the problem, we turn to the genealogies in the Chronicles, we find Eli's house omitted, though, even after the massacres at Shiloh and Nob, his grandson Ahimelech was still powerful ( 1 Chronicles 24:3 ), and one of his descendants returned from Babylon as jointly high priest with a descendant of Phinehas ( Ezra 8:2 ). How long a space of time elapsed between the rude heroism of Samson's days and Eli's orderly government in Church and State we do not know, but the difference in the condition of things is vast. Igor do we know the steps by which Eli rose to power, but he must have been a man of no common ability. Warrior as well as statesman, he had delivered the people from the danger of becoming enslaved to the Philistines. In his own family alone he failed. His sons, allowed to riot in licentiousness, ruined the stately edifice of the father's fortunes, and the Philistines, taking advantage of the general discontent caused by their vices, succeeded in once again putting the yoke on Israel's neck.