1 Samuel 3:14, commentary and pictures

God swore that the guilt of Eli's house would never be removed by any sacrifice or offering, that the sentence was final and would be fully carried out against him and his house. This closed the first direct message He gave to the child Samuel in the night at Shiloh, passing by the aged priest whose eyes were dim to speak to a youth who did not yet know Him in open vision. It came because Eli knew his sons made themselves vile and did evil in holy office, yet he failed as father, priest, and judge to restrain, remove, or judge them, honoring his sons above God. No offering could purge such guilt because their willful, brazen profanation dishonored the sacrifices pointing to Christ and trampled the atonement, and persistent refusal to forsake sin after reproof brings others to the same unpardonable point. The same sworn curse falls on parents and especially ministers today who from indulgence, ease, and lack of moral courage neglect to train, correct, and govern their households, for religious offerings cannot undo that neglect.

Setting of the Message

This solemn sentence stands at the close of the first direct prophetic message ever given to the child Samuel, who did not yet know the Lord in direct manifestation. God would speak no more to Eli, but passed by the aged priest to commune with a youth, and that passing by was itself a bitter yet deserved rebuke to Eli and his house. Eli received the rebuke through the child without envy, jealousy, or resentment toward Samuel, loving him as before while condemning himself.

The word of the Lord was precious in those days, with no open vision. In the temple where the ark of God was, before the lamp of God went out, Eli was laid down in his place with eyes grown dim so that he could not see, and Samuel was laid down to sleep. The Lord called Samuel three times, and each time Samuel supposed the voice was Eli's and ran to him, until Eli perceived that the mysterious call was God's voice. Then Eli instructed him to answer, Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth.

God entrusted the solemn message to the innocent boy Samuel, whom his mother had dedicated to His service, because Eli had neglected his solemn sacred charge to train his children in obedience. Eli would not hear with a firm will to obey, having become set in his own course as older persons may become unresponsive even when God speaks. Children and youth are more impressible, so the Lord can communicate with them and instruct and mold their minds as He did Samuel's. By this calling Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord from Dan even to Beersheba, receiving further revelations of God's will in the tabernacle at Shiloh, being told what would befall Israel because of its wickedness.

Reason for the Sentence

The sworn sentence came because Eli knew his sons were doing evil and making themselves vile and he did not restrain them, failing as priest and ruler and as father and judge in Israel to govern his household by God's rules and to train them in the Lord's way. The judgment therefore reached the parents as well as the sons, for even aged and experienced fathers serving in God's work are held accountable when they neglect duty at home. His neglect allowed their wrongdoing to continue and brought increasing sin and contamination to Israel.

Eli only remonstrated with words and took no decided measures to command, judge, restrain, separate, or put away the evil, though his sons were sons of Belial who knew not the Lord and were utterly unfitted for holy office. His blind affection and desire to avoid unpleasant feelings in the home led him to remonstrate but not command, shrinking from decided action against their wicked course. As an ease-loving, affectionate, indulgent father he submitted without feeling the importance of immediate action, saying it was the Lord to do as seemed good to Him. Discouraged and thinking it no use to correct his children, he remained indolent and failed to judge them and separate them from the Lord's service, by which God was dishonored.

He honored his sons above God and failed to remove them from holy office, though their wickedness was known. He dishonored God and misled the people by treating the sins of his own sons as less offensive than the sins of others, being quick to rebuke the people while finding excuses for his sons' perverse course in undue affection. To the extent he permitted or excused sin in his children he became a partaker in their guilt, and the evil was greatly heightened because as sons of the high priest they were connected with the work of God.

Though good, pure in morals, and loving purity and righteousness, Eli lacked moral courage to rebuke and reprove sin, to suppress evil, to remove his vile sons who profaned the house of God, and to strengthen the weak point in his character. Loving peace and harmony, he became insensible and blind to impurity and crime, incurring God's displeasure so that God took the matter in hand Himself. He confessed his guilt without renouncing the sin and without manifesting the fruits of true repentance, taking no effective measures to correct the evils polluting the sanctuary.

His sons' conduct was willful, profane, deliberate, and brazen, dishonoring God and treating with contempt the sacrifices that pointed to Christ's atonement, so that no sacrifice could atone for such deliberate transgression. They trampled on the blood of atonement, which is the source of the virtue of all sacrifices. Ministering in holy office while controlled by Satan, they polluted the whole atmosphere around them, fascinating men and women daily with sin and wrong and corrupting Israel until fearful reports filled the land.

That parental neglect let his sons make Israel sin and lead thousands to ruin, bringing increasing sin and contamination to the nation. God's authority was set aside and His worship neglected and despised, making it necessary for Him to interpose that the honor of His name might be maintained. Because Eli let his sons make Israel sin, terrible calamity came upon the nation.

Nature and Fulfillment of Judgment

God swore that the wrongdoing of Eli's house would never be cleansed by sacrifice or offering forever, and that oath meant the judgment was irrevocable. He would not pardon their transgressions or bless that house, but would cut them off in their sins, performing against Eli everything spoken concerning his house, beginning and also making an end. It was a deed done in Israel at which both ears of everyone hearing it would tingle. The sentence came because Eli as priest and ruler knew his sons made themselves vile and did evil yet did not restrain them, neglecting his duty to govern his household by God's rules. His blind affection and desire to avoid unpleasant feelings in the home led him only to remonstrate with words and not to command, judge, or put the evil away, shrinking from decided action against their wicked course and proving unworthy of his trust. He submitted to warning without feeling the importance of immediate action, saying it was the Lord to do as seemed good to Him, confessing guilt without renouncing sin or showing the fruits of true repentance. So the Lord passed him by and gave His message to the child Samuel, declaring He would judge Eli's house forever. The curse reached the parents as well as the sons, for negligence that dallies with sin holds parents accountable in great degree for the faults and follies of offspring.

The sons ministered in holy office while controlled by Satan, polluting the whole atmosphere around them, fascinating men and women daily with sin and corrupting Israel until fearful reports filled the land. Samuel as a child was surrounded by those most corrupting influences, seeing and hearing things that grieved his soul, yet he walked untainted with spotless robes of character, having no fellowship with or delight in their sins. He loved God and kept his soul in such close connection with Heaven that an angel was sent to talk with him concerning the sins of Eli's sons. Because Eli let his sons make Israel sin, terrible calamity came in defeat by the Philistines and the taking of the ark, and had the guilt of neglect been fully faced Israel might have been saved from humiliating defeat and the ark would not have fallen into enemy hands. Though God delayed His threatened judgments year after year, leaving time to redeem the failures of the past, Eli took no effective measures to correct the evils polluting the sanctuary and leading thousands to ruin. That forbearance caused Hophni and Phinehas to harden their hearts and become still bolder in transgression.

The warning was fulfilled when the guilty sons were slain in battle, many Israelites were slain, the ark of God was taken, and Eli fell backward and died. The taking of the ark broke his heart more than the death of his sons. His neglect to stand for what was right deprived Israel of strength and glory and weakened the nation, and religious offerings did not undo this guilt. Eli and Samuel made the messages of warning and reproof to the house known to the whole nation, hoping by so doing to counteract in some measure the evil influence of past neglect. The warnings were disregarded by the people as they had been by the priests. The iniquities openly practiced in Israel removed Israel's integrity and were not hidden from surrounding nations, who became still bolder and more determined in their own idolatry and crime and felt no sense of guilt for their sins as they would have felt had Israel preserved its integrity. Because God's authority had been set aside and His worship neglected and despised, a day of retribution was necessary for Him to interpose that the honor of His name might be maintained.

Why Sacrifice Could Not Purge

No sacrifice or offering could cleanse the guilt of Eli's house because the transgression was deliberate, willful, profane and brazen, dishonoring God in sacred service and treating with contempt the sacrifices that pointed to Christ's atonement. That contempt trampled upon the blood of atonement itself, which is the source of the virtue of all sacrifices, so no sacrifice could atone for such deliberate transgression.

The same irremediable state is reached when serious sin is long-standing and repeated with no desire to forsake it, and when reproof is continually rejected until sin can no longer be forgiven or atoned for. It is reached when pride, love of worldly fashions, empty talk and selfishness persist and choke out the good seed, leaving only a self-deceived Christian profession without renewal by God's grace and without a living experience with Him. Those who persist in evil in this way while God is proving and testing them may come to the point where their sins will not be purged by sacrifice or offering, and judgment against them is near and coming. Continued rejection of light sent from heaven finally brings people fully into the condition of the house of Eli, where iniquity can never be removed by sacrifice or offering. Heaven waits to communicate with teachers and students, but teachers who take the position of the Pharisees in the days of Christ shut out that communication at the very time when the destiny of souls is being decided and youth need much decided, positive teaching.

That hardening is seen in those who in a general way admit unworthiness yet refuse to confess the specific sins on conscience. Those sins are selfishness, overreaching, dishonesty toward God and toward the neighbor, and sins in the family, which bring God's frown upon His people. Like Achan they keep silent until proof forces admission, but admission after proof is not genuine repentance, for genuine repentance springs from a sense of the offensive character of sin. Instead self-complacency goes on as before until conscience hardens and warnings no longer arouse a sense of danger, ending with sins found out too late to save, when they cannot be purged. After every case has been decided for life or death the guilty will stand before the bar of God, and sins concealed from fellow men will find them out too late ever to be purged. So long as they can hide their transgressions many feel secure and flatter themselves that iniquity will not be strictly marked, but in that day no sacrifice nor offering will avail. Confession will then be drawn from each person by consequences to himself, forced from the soul by an awful sense of condemnation and a fearful looking for of judgment, and such confession cannot save the sinner.

Warning for Today

The sworn word against Eli's house holds parents in great degree accountable for the faults and follies of offspring, and places defective home management in a crisis to be seen and reformed. The iniquity would not be purged by sacrifice or offering because Eli as parent and as judge in Israel neglected duty, indulged his sons, knew they did evil and made themselves vile yet failed to restrain their wrong habits and practices, to judge them and separate them from holy office though as sons of Belial who knew not the Lord they were utterly unfitted for it, by which God was dishonored. He only remonstrated with words and took no decided measures to put the disgusting evil away from Israel, and as an ease-loving, affectionate father submitted without feeling the importance of immediate action, saying it was the Lord to do as seemed good to Him. That example of neglect in educating and disciplining children brings a curse that will assuredly fall on parents today who give the same neglectful education, for failure to train children in obedience lies at the very foundation of misery and crime, and religious offerings do not undo this guilt. The lesson is that parents must carefully train children in childhood and youth to control self and keep God's glory in view instead of allowing indulgence and gratification of self, and must correct evil practices and wrong habits before they spread to other children, lest if Satan blinds perception so they refuse to see and correct them the sin of Eli becomes their own sin bringing the same sworn judgment.

When parents approve and perpetuate children's sins they harm their own influence and the young they should have corrected, and when children likewise approve and continue fathers' sins both generations answer for wrongdoing and learn bitter lessons. The curse rests on both father and mother when they fail in duty and their own mismanagement is reflected back in the children, falling where children love not nor fear the Lord and have not kept the way of the Lord, which is an offense to God. It is avoided only by making crooked things straight, by laying matters open frankly instead of settling them by the false testimony of children, by not blaming others for the sure result of parental neglect, and by firm, decided discipline mingled with prayer.

Parental unfaithfulness that leaves faults uncorrected until they become second nature is a great wrong, treating the sins of one's own sons as less offensive than the sins of others while quick to rebuke the people, finding excuses in undue affection, and to the extent sin in children is permitted or excused becoming a partaker in their guilt. That unfaithfulness is tenfold greater in the family of those who stand in Christ's stead to instruct the people, for ministers who fail to control their own households mislead many, sanction evil instead of repressing it, and efface the distinction between right and wrong, purity and vice, with the evil greatly heightened because as sons connected with God's work they touch His cause. The same irreversible sentence will soon be pronounced on some among professed people who will not heed reproof over pride and love of fashion, who choose their own way and manifest evil passions of the heart, who will not obey while God is proving, testing, and trying them to separate unto Himself a pure and holy, self-denying, cross-bearing people. They will be left behind, their sins not cleansed forever, a heavy curse resting upon them, and when character is developed if they will not be zealous and repent God will spew them out of His mouth. The warning gave Eli a chance to work but he did not repent as the Ninevites did, remaining indolent and discouraged thinking it no use to correct his children, and he and his sons trusted more in the ark than in the God who gave it while the ark was of no consequence to them when they were not keeping the law it contained, warning of the same danger now of expecting knowledge of the law and the truth to save without yielding full obedience and letting it transform the character.

Eli's neglect is the measure by which Samuel is vindicated, for Samuel educated and trained his sons and was not to blame for their wrongdoing, so no such message from God came to him. Samuel taught God's warnings to Eli by precept and example so his sons knew them fully. When they were appointed to judge at Bethel and Beersheba and separated from their father's influence they were tested whether they would stay true to the principles taught, and they failed, turning aside after lucre, taking bribes, and perverting judgment. The people were then tempted to think Samuel had been neglectful like Eli, but his sore and disappointed heart did not make him guilty like Eli, showing how children by their course can weaken and counteract the best efforts of parents.