1 Samuel 3-5

1And the boy Samuel ministered to the LORD before Eli. Now in those days the word of the LORD was rare, and visions were scarce.

2And at that time Eli, whose eyesight had grown so dim that he could not see, was lying in his room.

3Before the lamp of God had gone out, Samuel was lying down in the temple of the LORD, where the ark of God was located.

4Then the LORD called to Samuel, and he answered, “Here I am.”

5He ran to Eli and said, “Here I am, for you have called me.” “I did not call,” Eli replied. “Go back and lie down.” So he went and lay down.

6Once again the LORD called, “Samuel!” So Samuel got up, went to Eli, and said, “Here I am, for you have called me.” “My son, I did not call,” Eli replied. “Go back and lie down.”

7Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, because the word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him.

8Once again, for the third time, the LORD called to Samuel. He got up, went to Eli, and said, “Here I am, for you have called me.” Then Eli realized that it was the LORD who was calling the boy.

9“Go and lie down,” he said to Samuel, “and if He calls you, say, ‘Speak, LORD, for Your servant is listening.’” So Samuel went and lay down in his place.

10Then the LORD came and stood there, calling as before, “Samuel! Samuel!” And Samuel answered, “Speak, for Your servant is listening.”

11Then the LORD said to Samuel, “I am about to do something in Israel at which the ears of all who hear it will tingle.

12On that day I will carry out against Eli everything I have spoken about his house, from beginning to end.

13I told him that I would judge his house forever for the iniquity of which he knows, because his sons blasphemed God and he did not restrain them.

14Therefore I have sworn to the house of Eli, ‘The iniquity of Eli’s house shall never be atoned for by sacrifice or offering.’”

15Samuel lay down until the morning; then he opened the doors of the house of the LORD. He was afraid to tell Eli the vision,

16but Eli called to him and said, “Samuel, my son.” “Here I am,” answered Samuel.

17“What was the message He gave you?” Eli asked. “Do not hide it from me. May God punish you, and ever so severely, if you hide from me anything He said to you.”

18So Samuel told him everything and did not hide a thing from him. “He is the LORD,” replied Eli. “Let Him do what is good in His eyes.”

19And Samuel grew, and the LORD was with him, and He let none of Samuel’s words fall to the ground.

20So all Israel from Dan to Beersheba knew that Samuel was confirmed as a prophet of the LORD.

21And the LORD continued to appear at Shiloh, because there He revealed Himself to Samuel by His word.

1Thus the word of Samuel came to all Israel. Now the Israelites went out to meet the Philistines in battle and camped at Ebenezer, while the Philistines camped at Aphek.

2The Philistines arrayed themselves against Israel, and as the battle spread, Israel was defeated by the Philistines, who struck down about four thousand men on the battlefield.

3When the troops returned to the camp, the elders of Israel asked, “Why has the LORD brought defeat on us before the Philistines today? Let us bring the ark of the covenant of the LORD from Shiloh, so that it may go with us to save us from the hand of our enemies.”

4So the people sent men to Shiloh, and they brought back the ark of the covenant of the LORD of Hosts, who sits enthroned between the cherubim. And the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the ark of the covenant of God.

5When the ark of the covenant of the LORD entered the camp, all the Israelites raised such a great shout that the ground shook.

6On hearing the noise of the shout, the Philistines asked, “What is this loud shouting in the camp of the Hebrews?” And when they realized that the ark of the LORD had entered the camp,

7the Philistines were afraid. “The gods have entered their camp!” they said. “Woe to us, for nothing like this has happened before.

8Woe to us! Who will deliver us from the hand of these mighty gods? These are the gods who struck the Egyptians with all kinds of plagues in the wilderness.

9Take courage and be men, O Philistines! Otherwise, you will serve the Hebrews just as they served you. Now be men and fight!”

10So the Philistines fought, and Israel was defeated, and each man fled to his tent. The slaughter was very great—thirty thousand foot soldiers of Israel fell.

11The ark of God was captured, and Eli’s two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, died.

12That same day a Benjamite ran from the battle line all the way to Shiloh, with his clothes torn and dirt on his head.

13When he arrived, there was Eli, sitting on his chair beside the road and watching, because his heart trembled for the ark of God. When the man entered the city to give a report, the whole city cried out.

14Eli heard the outcry and asked, “Why this commotion?” So the man hurried over and reported to Eli.

15Now Eli was ninety-eight years old, and his gaze was fixed because he could not see.

16“I have just come from the battle,” the man said to Eli. “I fled from there today.” “What happened, my son?” Eli asked.

17The messenger answered, “Israel has fled before the Philistines, and there has been a great slaughter among the people. Your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, are both dead, and the ark of God has been captured.”

18As soon as the ark of God was mentioned, Eli fell backward from his chair by the city gate, and being old and heavy, he broke his neck and died. And Eli had judged Israel forty years.

19Now Eli’s daughter-in-law, the wife of Phinehas, was pregnant and about to give birth. When she heard the news of the capture of God’s ark and the deaths of her father-in-law and her husband, she collapsed and gave birth, for her labor pains overtook her.

20As she was dying, the women attending to her said, “Do not be afraid, for you have given birth to a son!” But she did not respond or pay any heed.

21And she named the boy Ichabod, saying, “The glory has departed from Israel,” because the ark of God had been captured and her father-in-law and her husband had been killed.

22“The glory has departed from Israel,” she said, “for the ark of God has been captured.”

1After the Philistines had captured the ark of God, they took it from Ebenezer to Ashdod,

2carried it into the temple of Dagon, and set it beside his statue.

3When the people of Ashdod got up early the next morning, there was Dagon, fallen on his face before the ark of the LORD. So they took Dagon and returned him to his place.

4But when they got up early the next morning, there was Dagon, fallen on his face before the ark of the LORD, with his head and his hands broken off and lying on the threshold. Only the torso remained.

5That is why, to this day, the priests of Dagon and all who enter the temple of Dagon in Ashdod do not step on the threshold.

6Now the hand of the LORD was heavy on the people of Ashdod and its vicinity, ravaging them and afflicting them with tumors.

7And when the men of Ashdod saw what was happening, they said, “The ark of the God of Israel must not stay here with us, because His hand is heavy upon us and upon our god Dagon.”

8So they called together all the rulers of the Philistines and asked, “What shall we do with the ark of the God of Israel?” “It must be moved to Gath,” they replied. So they carried away the ark of the God of Israel.

9But after they had moved the ark to Gath, the LORD’s hand was also against that city, throwing it into great confusion and afflicting the men of the city, both young and old, with an outbreak of tumors.

10So they sent the ark of God to Ekron, but as it arrived, the Ekronites cried out, “They have brought us the ark of the God of Israel in order to kill us and our people!”

11Then the Ekronites called together all the rulers of the Philistines and said, “Send away the ark of the God of Israel. It must return to its place, so that it will not kill us and our people!” For a deadly confusion had pervaded the city; the hand of God was very heavy upon it.

12Those who did not die were afflicted with tumors, and the outcry of the city went up to heaven.