Verse:
1 Samuel 4:17
And the messenger (gospel / basar) answered and said, Israel is fled before the Philistines, and there hath 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 .
Commentary by Adam Clarke
Verse 17. And the messenger answered Source
Never was a more afflictive message, containing such a variety of woes, each rising above the preceding, delivered in so few words.
1. Israel is fled before the Philistines.
This was a sore evil: that Israel should turn their backs upon their enemies, was bad; and that they should turn their backs on such enemies as the Philistines, was yet worse; for now they might expect the chains of their slavery to be strengthened and riveted more closely.
2. There hath also been a great slaughter among the people.
A rout might have taken place without any great previous slaughter; but in this case the field was warmly contested, thirty thousand were laid dead on the spot. This was a deeper cause of distress than the preceding; as if he had said, "The flower of our armies is destroyed; scarcely a veteran now to take the field."
3. Thy two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead.
This was still more afflictive to him as a father, to lose both his sons, the only hope of the family; and to have them taken away by a violent death when there was so little prospect of their having died in the peace of God, was more grievous than all.
4. The ark of God is taken.
This was the most dreadful of the whole; now Israel is dishonoured in the sight of the heathen, and the name of the Lord will be blasphemed by them. Besides, the capture of the ark shows that God is departed from Israel; and now there is no farther hope of restoration for the people, but every prospect of the destruction of the nation, and the final ruin of all religion! How high does each wo rise on the back of the preceding! And with what apparent art is this very laconic message constructed! And yet, probably, no art at all was used, and the messenger delivered the tidings just as the facts rose up in his own mind.
How vapid, diffused, and alliterated, is the report of the messenger in the Persae of AEschylus, who comes to the queen with the tremendous account of the destruction of the whole naval power of the Persians, at the battle of Salamis? I shall give his first speech, and leave the reader to compare the two accounts.
Of which I subjoin the following translation by Mr. Potter:-
Wo to the towns through Asia's peopled realms! Wo to the land of Persia, once the port Of boundless wealth! how is thy glorious state Vanish'd at once, and all thy spreading honours Fallen, lost! Ah me! unhappy is his task That bears unhappy tidings; but constraint Compels me to relate this tale of wo: Persians! the whole barbaric host is fallen.
This is the sum of his account, which he afterwards details in about a dozen of speeches.
Heroes and conquerors, ancient and modern, have been celebrated for comprising a vast deal of information in a few words. I will give three examples, and have no doubt that the Benjamite in the text will be found to have greatly the advantage.
1. Julius Caesar having totally defeated Pharnaces, king of Pontus, wrote a letter to the Roman senate, which contained only these three words:-
VENI, VIDI, VICI; I came, I saw, I conquered. This war was begun and ended in one day.
2. Admiral HAWKE having totally defeated the French fleet, in 1759, off the coast of Brittany, wrote as follows to King George II.:-
"SIRE, I have taken, burnt, and destroyed all the French fleet, as per margin.-HAWKE."
3. NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE, then general-in-chief of the French armies in Italy, wrote to Josephine, his wife, the evening before he attacked Field Marshal Alvinzi, the imperial general:-
"Demain j'attaquerai l'enemie; je le battrai; et j'en finirai." "To-morrow I shall attack the enemy; I shall defeat them, and terminate the business." He did so: the imperialists were totally defeated, Mantua surrendered, and the campaign for that year (1796) was concluded.
In the above examples, excellent as they are in their kind, we find little more than one idea, whereas the report of the Benjamite includes several; for, in the most forcible manner, he points out the general and particular disasters of the day, the rout of the army, the great slaughter, the death of the priests, who were in effect the whole generals of the army, and the capture of the ark; all that, on such an occasion, could affect and distress the heart of an Israelite. And all this he does in four simple assertions.
Commentary by Bakers Dictionary
In military matters, "to evangelize" is to bring news of the outcome of a military engagement, usually a victory ( 1 Sam 31:9 ;2 Sam 18:31 ;1 Kings 1:42 ; but cf. 1 Sam 4:17 ). This secular usage serves as the background for the theological usage in Isaiah and the psalms. Source
1 Sam 31:9 2 Sam 18:31
They cut off his head and stripped off his armor, and they sent messengers throughout the land of the Philistines to proclaim the news in the temple of their idols and among their people. 1 Kings 1:42
Then the Cushite arrived and said, "My lord the king, hear the good news! The LORD has delivered you today from all who rose up against you."
Even as he was speaking, Jonathan son of Abiathar the priest arrived. Adonijah said, "Come in. A worthy man like you must be bringing good news."
Commentary by David Guzik
As Eli hears the commotion in the city regarding the loss of the battle, the priests, and the ark, he asks for information, and the messenger tells him the story of bad to worse to worser to worst: Israel has fled before the Philistines (bad), and there has been a great slaughter among the people (worse). Also your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead (worser); and the ark of God has been captured (worst).
Source
Commentary by Jamieson, Fausset, Brown
1Sa 4:12-22. ELI HEARING THE TIDINGS.
13-18. Eli sat upon a seat by the wayside--The aged priest, as a public magistrate, used, in dispensing justice, to seat himself daily in a spacious recess at the entrance gate of the city. In his intense anxiety to learn the issue of the battle, he took up his usual place as the most convenient for meeting with passers-by. His seat was an official chair, similar to those of the ancient Egyptian judges, richly carved, superbly ornamented, high, and without a back. The calamities announced to Samuel as about to fall upon the family of Eli [1Sa 2:34] were now inflicted in the death of his two sons, and after his death, by that of his daughter-in-law, whose infant son received a name that perpetuated the fallen glory of the church and nation [1Sa 4:19-22]. The public disaster was completed by the capture of the ark. Poor Eli! He was a good man, in spite of his unhappy weaknesses. So strongly were his sensibilities enlisted on the side of religion, that the news of the capture of the ark proved to him a knell of death; and yet his overindulgence, or sad neglect of his family--the main cause of all the evils that led to its fall--has been recorded, as a beacon to warn all heads of Christian families against making shipwreck on the same rock.Source
1Sa 2:34
" 'And what happens to your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, will be a sign to you-they will both die on the same day.
Commentary by John Gill
And the messenger answered and said Israel is fled before the Philistines;
He delivered his account gradually, beginning with generals, and then proceeding to particulars, and with what he thought Eli could better bear the news of, and so prepared him for the worst; in which he acted a wise part: and there hath also been a great slaughter among the people;
they have given way and retreated, and which might possibly be done without great loss, and which, though it was bad news, might not be so very bad: and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead;
this is worse news still; however, the number of the slain is not given, nor any mention of particular persons that were killed: so that, for any thing yet said, his own sons might be safe: but then it follows, and the ark of God is taken;
the news of which must be very affecting to him, and strike him closely; though he might expect and be prepared for it by what both the man of God and Samuel from the Lord had related to him: Source
the thing he feared, and his heart trembled before for it; this was the closing and cutting part of the account; the messenger foresaw that this would the most affect him, and therefore referred it to the last.
Commentary by Matthew Henry
The account of the defeat of the army, and the slaughter of a great number of the soldiers, was very grievous to him as a judge; the tidings of the death of his two sons, of whom he had been so indulgent, and who, he had reason to fear, died impenitent, touched him in a tender part as a father; yet it was not for these that his heart trembled: there is a greater concern upon his spirit, which swallows up the less; he does not interrupt the narrative with any passionate lamentations for his sons, like David for Absalom, but waits for the end of the story, not doubting but that the messenger, being an Israelite, would, without being asked, say something of the ark; and if he could but have said, "Yet the ark of God is safe, and we are bringing that home," his joy for that would have overcome his grief for all the other disasters, and have made him easy; but, when the messenger concludes his story with, The ark of God is taken, he is struck to the heart, his spirits fail, and, it should seem, he swooned away, fell off his seat, and partly with the fainting, and partly with the fall, he died immediately, and never spoke a word more. His heart was broken first, and then his neck. So fell the high priest and judge of Israel, so fell his heavy head when he had lived within two of 100 years, so fell the crown from his head when he had judged Israel about forty years: thus did his sun set under a cloud, thus were the folly and wickedness of those sons of his, whom he had indulged, his ruin at last.
Thus does God sometimes set marks of his displeasure in this life upon good men who have misconducted themselves, that others may hear, and fear, and take warning. A man may die miserably and yet not die eternally, may come to an untimely end and yet the end be peace. Dr. Lightfoot observes that Eli died the death of an unredeemed ass, whose neck was to be broken, Exodus 13:13. Yet we must observe, to Eli's praise, that it was the loss of the ark that was his death, not the slaughter of his sons. He does, in effect, say, "Let me fall with the ark, for what pious Israelite can live with any comfort when God's ordinances are removed?" Farewell all in this world, even life itself, if the ark be gone.Source
Exodus 13:13
Redeem with a lamb every firstborn donkey, but if you do not redeem it, break its neck. Redeem every firstborn among your sons.
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Prepared by William C. Barman for George Young Memorial United Methodist Church -- Palm Harbor, FL on 9/2/03; 7:13:12 AM