1 Samuel 2:33

33 The few not cut off from serving at my altar will survive, but only so their eyes can go blind and their hearts break, and their children will die a violent death.

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 ) .

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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 The time is coming when I will put an end to your family, so it will no longer serve as my priests. All the members of your family will die before their time. None will reach old age.

32 You will watch with envy as I pour out prosperity on the people of Israel. But no members of your family will ever live out their days.

33 The few not cut off from serving at my altar will survive, but only so their eyes can go blind and their hearts break, and their children will die a violent death.

34 And to prove that what I have said will come true, I will cause your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, to die on the same day!

35 “Then I will raise up a faithful priest who will serve me and do what I desire. I will establish his family, and they will be priests to my anointed kings forever.

Footnotes

• [a]. As in Dead Sea Scrolls and Greek version, which read die by the sword; Masoretic Text reads die like mortals.