And he had two wives: the name of the one was Hannah, and the name of the other Peninnah; and Peninnah had children, but Hannah had no children.

And this man went up out of his city from year to year to worship and to sacrifice to Jehovah of hosts in Shiloh. And the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, the priests of Jehovah, were there.

And it came to pass on the day that Elkanah sacrificed, he gave to Peninnah his wife and to all her sons and her daughters portions;

but to Hannah he used to give a double portion, for he loved Hannah; but Jehovah had shut up her womb.

And her adversary provoked her much also, to make her fret, because Jehovah had shut up her womb.

And as he did so year by year, as often as she went up to the house of Jehovah, she provoked her thus; and she wept and did not eat.

And Elkanah her husband said to her, Hannah, why weepest thou? and why eatest thou not? and why is thy heart grieved? Am not I better to thee than ten sons?

and she was in bitterness of soul, and prayed to Jehovah, and wept much.

And she vowed a vow, and said, O Jehovah of hosts, if thou wilt indeed look on the affliction of thy handmaid, and remember me, and not forget thy handmaid, but wilt give unto thy handmaid a man child, then I will give him to Jehovah all the days of his life, and there shall no razor come upon his head.

And it came to pass as she continued praying before Jehovah, that Eli marked her mouth.

And Eli said to her, How long wilt thou be drunken? put away thy wine from thee.

And they rose up early in the morning and worshipped before Jehovah, and returned and came to their house at Ramah. And Elkanah knew Hannah his wife; and Jehovah remembered her.

And it came to pass when the time was come about after Hannah had conceived, that she bore a son, and called his name Samuel, saying, Because I have asked him of Jehovah.

And Elkanah her husband, and all his house, went up to sacrifice to Jehovah the yearly sacrifice and his vow.

But Hannah did not go up, for she said to her husband, I will wait until the child is weaned; then will I bring him, that he may appear before Jehovah, and there abide for ever.

And Elkanah her husband said to her, Do what is good in thy sight: abide until thou hast weaned him; only, may Jehovah fulfil his word. And the woman abode, and gave her son suck until she weaned him.

And she took him up with her when she had weaned him, with three bullocks, and one ephah of flour, and a flask of wine, and brought him to the house of Jehovah to Shiloh; and the boy was young.

And they slaughtered the bullock, and brought the boy to Eli.

And she said, Oh my lord, as thy soul liveth, my lord, I am the woman that stood by thee here to pray to Jehovah.

And also I have lent him to Jehovah: all the days that he lives, he is lent to Jehovah. And he worshipped Jehovah there.

Do not multiply your words of pride, let not vain-glory come out of your mouth; For Jehovah is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed.

Jehovah killeth, and maketh alive; he bringeth down to Sheol, and bringeth up.

He raiseth up the poor out of the dust; from the dung-hill he lifteth up the needy, To set him among nobles; and he maketh them inherit a throne of glory; For the pillars of the earth are Jehovah's, and he hath set the world upon them.

They that strive with Jehovah shall be broken to pieces; in the heavens will he thunder upon them. Jehovah will judge the ends of the earth; and he will give strength unto his king, and exalt the horn of his anointed.

And Elkanah went to Ramah to his house. And the boy ministered to Jehovah in the presence of Eli the priest.

and he struck it into the pan, or kettle, or cauldron, or pot; the priest took of it all that the flesh-hook brought up. So they did in Shiloh to all the Israelites that came there.

Even before they burned the fat, the priest's servant came, and said to the man that sacrificed, Give flesh to roast for the priest, and he will not accept sodden flesh of thee, but raw.

If the man said to him, They will immediately burn the fat entire, then take as thy soul desires; he would say to him, No, but thou shalt give it now; and if not, I will take it by force.

And his mother made him a little coat, and brought it to him from year to year, when she came up with her husband to sacrifice the yearly sacrifice.

And Eli blessed Elkanah and his wife, and said, Jehovah give thee seed of this woman for the loan which is lent to Jehovah. And they went to their own home.

So Jehovah visited Hannah, and she conceived, and bore three sons and two daughters. And the boy Samuel grew before Jehovah.

And Eli was very old, and heard all that his sons were doing to all Israel, and that they lay with the women that served at the entrance of the tent of meeting.

And he said to them, Why do ye such things? for I hear of your evil deeds from all this people.

If one man sin against another, God will judge him; but if a man sin against Jehovah, who shall intreat for him? But they hearkened not to the voice of their father, for Jehovah was minded to slay them.

And there came a man of God to Eli and said to him, Thus saith Jehovah: Did I plainly reveal myself to the house of thy father when they were in Egypt, in Pharaoh's house,

and choose him out of all the tribes of Israel, to be my priest, to offer upon mine altar, to burn incense, to wear the ephod before me? and I gave unto the house of thy father all the offerings by fire of the children of Israel.

Wherefore do ye trample upon my sacrifice and upon mine oblation which I have commanded in my habitation? And thou honourest thy sons above me, to make yourselves fat with the primest of all the oblations of Israel my people.

And thou shalt see an oppressor in my habitation, amidst all the good that shall be done to Israel; and there shall not be an old man in thy house for ever.

And the man of thine whom I shall not cut off from mine altar, shall be to cause thine eyes to fail and to grieve thy soul; and all the increase of thy house shall die in their vigour.

And this shall be the sign to thee, which shall come upon thy two sons, upon Hophni and Phinehas: in one day they shall die, both of them.

And I will raise up for myself a faithful priest, who shall do according to what is in my heart and in my mind; and I will build him a sure house; and he shall walk before mine anointed continually.

And it shall come to pass that every one that is left of thy house shall come to crouch to him for a small piece of silver and for a cake of bread, and shall say, Put me, I pray thee, into one of the priestly offices, that I may eat a morsel of bread.

And the boy Samuel ministered to Jehovah before Eli. And the word of Jehovah was rare in those days; a vision was not frequent.

And it came to pass at that time, when Eli lay in his place (now his eyes began to grow dim, he could not see),

that Jehovah called to Samuel. And he said, Here am I.

And he ran to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou calledst me. And he said, I did not call: lie down again. And he went and lay down.

And Jehovah called again, Samuel! And Samuel arose and went to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou calledst me. And he said, I did not call, my son: lie down again.

Now Samuel did not yet know Jehovah, neither had the word of Jehovah yet been revealed to him.

And Jehovah called again the third time, Samuel! And he arose and went to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou calledst me. And Eli perceived that Jehovah was calling the boy.

And Eli said to Samuel, Go, lie down; and it shall be, if he call thee, that thou shalt say, Speak, Jehovah, for thy servant heareth. So Samuel went and lay down in his place.

And Jehovah said to Samuel, Behold, I do a thing in Israel, at which both the ears of every one that heareth it shall tingle.

In that day I will perform against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house; I will begin and make an end.

For I have declared to him that I will judge his house for ever, for the iniquity which he hath known: because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not.

And Samuel lay until the morning, and opened the doors of the house of Jehovah. And Samuel feared to declare the vision to Eli.

And he said, What is the word that he has spoken to thee? I pray thee, keep it not back from me: God do so to thee, and more also, if thou keep back anything from me of all the word that he spoke to thee.

And Samuel told him all the words, and kept nothing back from him. And he said, It is Jehovah: let him do what is good in his sight.

And Samuel grew, and Jehovah was with him, and let none of his words fall to the ground.

And all Israel, from Dan even to Beer-sheba, knew that Samuel was established a prophet of Jehovah.

And Jehovah appeared again at Shiloh; for Jehovah revealed himself to Samuel at Shiloh by the word of Jehovah.

And what Samuel had said happened to all Israel. And Israel went out against the Philistines to battle, and encamped beside Eben-ezer; and the Philistines encamped in Aphek.

And the people came into the camp; and the elders of Israel said, Why has Jehovah smitten us to-day before the Philistines? Let us fetch ourselves the ark of the covenant of Jehovah out of Shiloh, that it may come among us, and save us out of the hand of our enemies.

So the people sent to Shiloh, and they brought from thence the ark of the covenant of Jehovah of hosts, who sitteth between the cherubim; and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were there by the ark of the covenant of God.

And it came to pass when the ark of the covenant of Jehovah came into the camp, that all Israel shouted with a great shout, so that the earth shook.

Shew yourselves valiant and be men, ye Philistines, that ye may not have to be servants to the Hebrews, as they have been servants to you: be men, and fight.

And the Philistines fought, and Israel was routed, and they fled every man to his tent; and there was a very great slaughter, and there fell of Israel thirty thousand footmen.

And the ark of God was taken; and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, died.

And there ran a man of Benjamin out of the battle, and came to Shiloh the same day, with his clothes rent and with earth upon his head.

And when he came, behold, Eli was sitting upon the seat by the way-side watching; for his heart trembled for the ark of God. And the man came to tell it in the city, and all the city cried out.

And the man said to Eli, I am he that came out of the battle, and I have fled to-day out of the battle. And he said, What has taken place, my son?

And the messenger answered and said, Israel has fled before the Philistines, and there has been also a great slaughter among the people, and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead, and the ark of God is taken.

And it came to pass, when he mentioned the ark of God, that he fell from off the seat backward by the side of the gate, and his neck broke, and he died; for the man was old, and heavy. And he had judged Israel forty years.

And his daughter-in-law, Phinehas' wife, was with child, near to be delivered; and when she heard the tidings that the ark of God was taken, and that her father-in-law and her husband were dead, she bowed herself and travailed; for her pains came upon her.

And as she was dying, the women that stood by her said, Fear not; for thou hast borne a son. But she did not answer, neither did she take it to heart.

And the Philistines took the ark of God, and brought it from Eben-ezer to Ashdod.

And when they of Ashdod arose early the next day, behold, Dagon had fallen on his face to the ground before the ark of Jehovah. And they took Dagon, and set him in his place again.

And when they arose early the next morning, behold, Dagon had fallen on his face to the ground before the ark of Jehovah; and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off upon the threshold; only the fish-stump was left to him.

Therefore neither the priests of Dagon nor any that come into Dagon's house tread on the threshold of Dagon in Ashdod to this day.

And they sent and gathered all the lords of the Philistines unto them, and said, What shall we do with the ark of the God of Israel? And they said, Let the ark of the God of Israel be carried about to Gath. And they carried the ark of the God of Israel about thither.

And it came to pass that, after they had carried it about, the hand of Jehovah was against the city with very great panic; and he smote the men of the city, both small and great, and hemorrhoids broke out upon them.

And they sent the ark of God to Ekron. And it came to pass, when the ark of God came to Ekron, that the Ekronites cried out, saying, They have brought about the ark of the God of Israel to us, to kill us and our people.

And they sent and gathered all the lords of the Philistines, and said, Send away the ark of the God of Israel, and let it go again to its own place, that it kill us not, and our people. For there was deadly alarm throughout the city: the hand of God was very heavy there;

and the men that died not were smitten with the hemorrhoids; and the cry of the city went up to heaven.

And the Philistines called for the priests and the diviners, saying, What shall we do with the ark of Jehovah? tell us wherewith we shall send it to its place.

And they said, If ye send away the ark of the God of Israel, send it not empty; ye must at any rate return him a trespass-offering: then ye shall be healed, and it shall be known to you why his hand is not removed from you.

Then they said, What is the trespass-offering which we shall return to him? And they said, Five golden hemorrhoids, and five golden mice, the number of the lords of the Philistines; for one plague is upon them all, and upon your lords.

And ye shall make images of your hemorrhoids, and images of your mice that destroy the land, and give glory to the God of Israel: perhaps he will lighten his hand from off you, and from off your gods, and from off your land.

And now make a new cart, and take two milch kine, on which there has come no yoke, and tie the kine to the cart, and bring their calves home from them;

And see, if it go up by the way of its own border to Beth-shemesh, it is he who has done us this great evil; if not, then we shall know that it is not his hand that touched us; it was a chance that happened to us.

And the men did so, and took two milch kine, and tied them to the cart, and shut up their calves at home.

And the kine went straight forward on the way to Beth-shemesh; they went by the one high way, lowing as they went; and they turned not aside to the right hand or to the left; and the lords of the Philistines went after them as far as the border of Beth-shemesh.

And they of Beth-shemesh were reaping the wheat-harvest in the valley; and they lifted up their eyes and saw the ark, and rejoiced to see it.

And the cart came into the field of Joshua the Beth-shemeshite, and stood there; and a great stone was there. And they clave the wood of the cart, and offered up the kine as a burnt-offering to Jehovah.

And the Levites took down the ark of Jehovah, and the coffer that was with it, in which were the golden jewels, and put them on the great stone; and the men of Beth-shemesh offered up burnt-offerings and sacrificed sacrifices the same day to Jehovah.

And the five lords of the Philistines saw it, and returned to Ekron the same day.

And these are the golden sores which the Philistines returned as a trespass-offering to Jehovah: for Ashdod one, for Gazah one, for Ashkelon one, for Gath one, for Ekron one;

and the golden mice, according to the number of all the cities of the Philistines belonging to the five lords, both fortified cities and villages of the peasantry; and they brought them as far as the great stone of Abel, whereon they set down the ark of Jehovah, which is to this day in the field of Joshua the Beth-shemeshite.

And the men of Beth-shemesh said, Who is able to stand before Jehovah, this holy God? and to whom shall he go up from us?

And they sent messengers to the inhabitants of Kirjath-jearim, saying, The Philistines have brought again the ark of Jehovah; come down, fetch it up to you.

And the men of Kirjath-jearim came, and fetched up the ark of Jehovah, and brought it into the house of Abinadab on the hill, and hallowed Eleazar his son to keep the ark of Jehovah.

And it came to pass, from the day that the ark abode in Kirjath-jearim, that the time was long; for it was twenty years. And all the house of Israel lamented after Jehovah.