1 Samuel 4:1-11

CAPTURE OF THE ARK, AND DEATH OF ELI’S SONS, 1 Samuel 4:1-11.

This section records the beginning of the downfall of Eli’s house, and that bitter affliction of the tabernacle the loss of the sacred ark. See note on 1 Samuel 2:32. Led by Jehovah’s word, as communicated through Samuel, Israel goes out to battle with the Philistines; but it is that it may be made to feel its utter weakness without Jehovah’s constant aid. The impiety of the nation demanded a signal chastisement, especially in the persons of its religious leaders, and Divine Wisdom saw fit to inflict it in the way here recorded. In the first engagement four thousand Hebrews are left dead upon the field. The survivors hasten to their camp, and whilst all hearts are quaking with terror, or quailing under a sense of bitter loss, the elders hold a speedy consultation. It was probably a midnight conference. They feel that Jehovah is not with them as he had been with their fathers, but they vainly imagine that to have the ark of the covenant among them will be to have a talisman against all possibility of failure. Delusive trust! They had yet to learn that in a wicked age, and under the ministry of a flagitious priesthood, Jehovah’s presence may forsake even the sacred symbols. The ark was brought, and with it Eli’s sons, but Jehovah came not.