1 Samuel 2:23

23 And he said to them, Why do ye such things, (yea,) the worst things, which I hear of (from) all the people?

1 Samuel 2:23 Meaning and Commentary

1 Samuel 2:23

And he said unto them, why do ye such things?
&c.] As to impose upon the people that bring their offerings, by taking more than is due, and in a very indecent and imperious manner; and especially to defile the women when they came to worship: these were very scandalous sins, and deserved a more severe reprimand, and indeed a greater chastisement than by mere words; Eli should have rebuked them more sharply, and laid open the evil of their doings, and as a judge punished them for them:

for I hear of your evil doings by all this people;
the inhabitants of Shiloh, or who came thither to worship, who were continually making their complaints to Eli; which still shows his backwardness to reprove them in the manner he did until he was obliged to it by the continual remonstrances of the people against the practices of his sons; he did not attend to the information he had from a few persons, until it became general.

1 Samuel 2:23 In-Context

21 Therefore the Lord visited Hannah, and she conceived, and childed three sons and two daughters. And the child Samuel was magnified at the Lord (But their boy Samuel grew up in the presence of the Lord).

22 And Eli was full eld, and he heard all the things that his sons did in all Israel, and how they slept with women, that waited at the door of the tabernacle. (And Eli grew very old, and he heard of all the improper things that his sons did to all Israel, and how they slept with the women, who served at the entrance to the Tabernacle of the Witnessing.)

23 And he said to them, Why do ye such things, (yea,) the worst things, which I hear of (from) all the people?

24 Do not ye, my sons; it is not a good fame, that I hear, that ye make the Lord's people to do trespass. (Do not ye do this, my sons; for it is not a good report that I hear, that ye make the Lord's people to trespass.)

25 If a man sinneth against a man, God may be pleased to him by prayers and sacrifices; but if a man sinneth against the Lord, who shall pray for him? And they heard not the voice of their father, for God would slay them. (If a man sinneth against another man, God may make him appeased by prayers and sacrifices; but if a man sinneth against the Lord, who shall pray for him? But they would not listen to their father, for God had decided to kill them.)