October 23, 2020
Eli
I Samuel 2:27-36
Eli was Israel’s high priest in the closing days of the judges, a time when immorality and apostasy went hand in hand. He was Israel’s high priest, but he really had no claim to the position at all. He was not descended from the family of Eleazar, to whom the high priesthood belonged, but from the family of Ithamar, Aaron’s youngest son. It is typical of the confusion of the time that we have no idea how he came to be high priest. It is typical, also, that his whole career (as recorded in I Samuel) was one of utter failure.
First, he was a failure as a person. He was old. Young men see visions, the Bible says, and old men dream dreams. Eli dreamed away his days. “His eyes were dim, the Holy Spirit adds (I Sam. 4:15). He was physically blind tn his old age but also blind to the needs of the people. “Where there is no vision, the people perish” the Scripture declares (Prov. 29:18). Poor old Eli was blind even to the state of his own famly. Typical, too, was his treatment of Hannah. He could not even tell the difference between a drunken woman and a devout worshiper, and he had some harsh words for that brokenhearted soul. His half apology, when he realized his mistake, does him no credit either (1 Sam.
So, there was Eli, old, slothful, worn out, content to sit in his rocking chair and doze away his days while Israel sank ever deeper into the mire. Then, too, he was a failure as a parent. “His sons,” we are told, “made themselves vile’ (3:13). Their behavior was a national scandal. It was not safe for an attractive woman to bring a sacrifice to the altar. She was likely to fall foul of the lawless lusts of Eli’s sons. When people complained, Eli shrugged his shoulders and went back to sleep.
Eli’s sons also sinned against God. The Levitical Law set aside a portion of each sacrifice for the officiating priest. The fat, however was to be burned on the alter. That was God’s portion. Eli’s unscrupulous sons dared to rob God. They appropriated the fat for themselves (2:22-17). Eli merely slapped their wrists. He should have thrust them out of the priestly office. Instead, he indulged them.
Doubtless, he had never curbed them, never taken the rod to them, to break their wills when they were young, They grew up willful and wild, and wicked beyond words. So Eli’s failure as a parent was a serious thing, for he contributed two unregenerate sons to the priesthood. It brought about the downfall of his house.
Finally, and worst of all, Eli was a failure as a priest. He seems to have had little or nothing to do. He stands in contrast with Samuel, who went up and down the land seeking to arouse an apostate and apathetic people to a sense of sin and need. Eli waited for people to come to him. Few came. So all we see is a tired old man dozing in the sun.
The first time we meet him in the Bible he is propped up against a post of the tabernacle idling his life away. Later we see him sound asleep in bed. A little lad, entrusted to his care, had to wake him up three times before it finally dawned on him that God had something to say to the boy. Eli had long since ceased expecting that God might have something to say to the boy. The last time we see him he is sitting on a chair by the roadside. He fell of ff that seat and broke his neck. Such was Eli.
But there was one bright spot. He did a good job of bringing up little Samuel. Or did he? Maybe it was not so much due to old Eli that Samuel turned our so well. Perhaps that was a result of his mothers earnest prayers.