1 Samuel 2:33

33 And every one of you that I do not cut off from My altar, I will cause your eyes to fail and your heart to grieve. ^[a] All your descendants ^[b] will die by the sword of men. ^[c]

1 Samuel 2:33 Meaning and Commentary

1 Samuel 2:33

And the man of thine
. Of his family, which should spring from him: whom I shall not cut off from mine altar: from serving there: who though he shall not be an high priest, but a common priest, as all the descendants of Aaron were,

shall be to consume thine eyes, and to grieve thine heart;
that is, the eyes and heart of his posterity; who though they should see of their family ministering in the priest's office, yet should make so poor a figure on account of their outward meanness and poverty, or because of their want of wisdom, and intellectual endowments, or because of their scandalous lives, that it would fill their hearts with grief and sorrow, and their eyes with tears, so that their eyes would fail, and be consumed, and their hearts be broken:

and all the increase of thine house shall die in the flower of their
age;
or "die men" ^F11; grown men, not children, when it would not be so great an affliction to part with them; but when at man's estate, in the prime of their days, perhaps about thirty years of age, the time when the priests entered upon their office to do all the work of it; the Targum is,

``shall be killed young men:''

it is more than once said in the Talmud ^F12, that there was a family in Jerusalem, the men of which died at eighteen years of age; they came and informed Juchanan ben Zaccai of it; he said to them, perhaps of the family of Eli are ye, as it is said, ( 1 Samuel 2:33 ) .

---

FOOTNOTES:

F11 (Myvna wtwmy) "morientur viri", Montanus, Tigurine version; "morientur virile aetate", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; so V. L.
F12 T. Bab. Roshhashanah, fol. 18. 1. & Yebamot, fol. 105. 1.

1 Samuel 2:33 In-Context

31 Behold, the days are coming when I will cut off your strength and the strength of your father’s house, so that no one in it will reach old age.

32 You will see distress in My dwelling place. Despite all that is good in Israel, no one in your house will ever again reach old age.

33 And every one of you that I do not cut off from My altar, I will cause your eyes to fail and your heart to grieve. All your descendants will die by the sword of men.

34 And this sign shall come to you concerning your two sons Hophni and Phinehas: They will both die on the same day.

35 Then I will raise up for Myself a faithful priest. He will do whatever is in My heart and mind. And I will build for him an enduring house, and he will walk before My anointed one for all time.

Footnotes

• [a]. Hebrew; LXX his eyes will fail and his heart will grieve
• [b]. Or increase
• [c]. DSS and LXX; MT will die as mortals or will die in the prime of life