Study Desk

Then the Israelites inquired of the LORD. (In those days, the ark of the covenant of God was there,

So the people came to Bethel and sat there before God until evening, lifting up their voices and weeping bitterly.

"Why, O LORD God of Israel," they cried out, "has this happened in Israel? Today in Israel one tribe is missing!"

But Ruth replied: "Do not urge me to leave you or to turn from following you. For wherever you go, I will go, and wherever you live, I will live; your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.

May the LORD repay your work, and may you receive a rich reward from the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have taken refuge."

"Go in peace," Eli replied, "and may the God of Israel grant the petition you have asked of Him."

There is no one holy like the LORD. Indeed, there is no one besides You! And there is no rock like our God.

Do not boast so proudly, or let arrogance come from your mouth, for the LORD is a God who knows, and by Him actions are weighed.

If a man sins against another man, God can intercede for him, but if a man sins against the LORD, who can intercede for him?" But they would not listen to their father, since the LORD intended to put them to death.

Then a man of God came to Eli and told him, "This is what the LORD says: 'Did I not clearly reveal Myself to your father's house when they were in Egypt under Pharaoh's house?

Therefore, the LORD, the God of Israel, declares: 'I did indeed say that your house and the house of your father would walk before Me forever. But now the LORD declares: Far be it from Me! For I will honor those who honor Me, but those who despise Me will be disdained.

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

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

"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."

So 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.

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

When he arrived, there was Eli sitting on his chair beside the road, 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.

The 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."

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

And 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.