Read the passage and its setting
1 Samuel 2:27–2:36, King James Version
Italic words were supplied in the English translation for clarity.
1 Samuel 2:27–2:36
A man of God announces judgment on Eli's house
The Main Point
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
What Is Happening Here?
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
What Came Before—and What Comes Next?
1 Samuel 2:22–2:26 has just established this movement: Eli hears reports that his sons exploit Israel and lie with women serving at the sanctuary, rebukes them, but they do not listen; Samuel continues to grow in favor.
1 Samuel 3:1–3:10 next develops the story this way: In a time when revelation is rare, Samuel repeatedly mistakes the LORD's call for Eli until Eli understands and instructs him to listen.
Follow the Transition to Kingship
See why this section appears here and how the author's scene leads to its meaning.
Why Is This Passage Here?
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest. It answers the pressure established before it and creates the condition the following unit must address.
Follow the Scene
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
The scene's speech, action, or evaluation sets up the next movement without making every narrated choice exemplary.
What Is the Author Saying?
Why This Interpretation Fits
Narrative movement
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
Language control
The charge concerns Eli's protection and benefit within his sons' abuse, not ordinary parental love.
Ethical boundary
The oracle does not authorize inherited stigma, starvation, retaliation against clergy families, or using divine judgment language to bypass evidence and due process.
Understand the Meaning and Its Boundaries
Clarify the words that matter and keep the conclusion no broader than the passage allows.
Words That Matter
honourest thy sons above me
See the cited Masoretic Hebrew record ·
The charge concerns Eli's protection and benefit within his sons' abuse, not ordinary parental love.
What the Passage Is Not Saying
Reading 1 Samuel 2:27–2:36 within the complete received narrative rules out these uses:
The oracle does not authorize inherited stigma, starvation, retaliation against clergy families, or using divine judgment language to bypass evidence and due process.
Context check: An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest. The point is the narrated movement and its evaluation together; neither the most vivid speech nor the eventual outcome can carry the whole interpretation alone.
What Remains True Today
Accountability requires hearing the full movement—An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest. The oracle does not authorize inherited stigma, starvation, retaliation against clergy families, or using divine judgment language to bypass evidence and due process.
Respond and Remember
Let the meaning shape life carefully, then practice explaining the section in context.
How This Should Shape Us
Why these applications follow
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest. The point is the narrated movement and its evaluation together; neither the most vivid speech nor the eventual outcome can carry the whole interpretation alone.
Accountability requires hearing the full movement—An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest. The oracle does not authorize inherited stigma, starvation, retaliation against clergy families, or using divine judgment language to bypass evidence and due process.
What accountable response follows?
If this scene is invoked in a decision, identify the speaker, authority, affected people, evidence, and uncertainty first. The oracle does not authorize inherited stigma, starvation, retaliation against clergy families, or using divine judgment language to bypass evidence and due process.
A Concrete Example
A study group can compare the verse claims with the complete unit, list who bears the cost, and test its proposed application against “A man of God announces judgment on Eli's house.”
Teach It Back
Explain 1 Samuel 2:27–2:36 in your own words, including its movement, one source-controlled detail, one uncertainty, one affected person, and one misuse the context rules out.
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Go Deeper
The main explanation above stands on its own. Open these optional sections for fuller language, history, disagreements, and source locations.
Read it sentence by sentenceEach line inside the larger movement
Narrative movement
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
Language control
The charge concerns Eli's protection and benefit within his sons' abuse, not ordinary parental love.
Ethical boundary
The oracle does not authorize inherited stigma, starvation, retaliation against clergy families, or using divine judgment language to bypass evidence and due process.
Original-language wording and grammarTechnical detail appears only where it helps
honourest thy sons above me
The charge concerns Eli's protection and benefit within his sons' abuse, not ordinary parental love.
How certain? probableWhat the first readers would have understoodRelevant history and culture
Ancient setting and recoverable limits
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest. Historical and social reconstruction remains limited by the received narrative, textual plurality, and selective comparative evidence; no source proves every speech, motive, number, miracle, or theological explanation.
How certain? probableWhy translations sometimes differMaterial translation choices
KJV language and material alternatives
The KJV expression “honourest thy sons above me” is read with the Masoretic wording and the inspected NET notes. The charge concerns Eli's protection and benefit within his sons' abuse, not ordinary parental love. Material textual differences remain visible where they affect the unit.
How certain? probableEarlier Scripture and inherited backgroundSupported quotations, allusions, and inherited ideas
Torah, Judges, Samuel-Kings, and Jewish reading
Judges, Torah, and the continuing Samuel-Kings narrative provide the nearest literary and theological horizon; their ancient peoples and conflicts must not be flattened into modern labels.
How certain? strongHow this connects with the rest of ScriptureThe passage's own meaning remains primary
Responsible canonical connections
Later biblical reception may compare monarchy, anointing, lament, covenant, and kingship only after this unit's own ancient setting and literary work are established.
How certain? probableTextual variantsManuscript differences only when they affect meaning
Textual and reconstruction limits
The identity of the faithful priest and the relation of this oracle to later priestly houses are interpreted in several ways; the indictment of Eli's complicity is clearer than one exhaustive fulfillment scheme.
How certain? probableWhere careful interpreters disagreeThe strongest options and their difficulties
Where do careful readers disagree?
Best judgment: The identity of the faithful priest and the relation of this oracle to later priestly houses are interpreted in several ways; the indictment of Eli's complicity is clearer than one exhaustive fulfillment scheme.
How certain? probableTheology that emerges from this passageConclusions drawn after reading the complete section
Theological contribution
The received narrative joins divine judgment or mercy with accountable human action: An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
How certain? strongTheological contribution
Within 1 Samuel's received movement from Shiloh through contested monarchy to Gilboa, An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
How certain? strongCommon ways this passage gets misusedFair explanation, context check, and stronger reading
The oracle does not authorize inherited stigma, starvation, retaliation against clergy families, or using divine judgment language to bypass evidence and due process.
A vivid line from 1 Samuel 2:27–2:36 can be detached from its speaker, literary form, ancient power, affected people, material uncertainty, and later qualification.
An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest. The point is the narrated movement and its evaluation together; neither the most vivid speech nor the eventual outcome can carry the whole interpretation alone.
Accountability requires hearing the full movement—An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest. The oracle does not authorize inherited stigma, starvation, retaliation against clergy families, or using divine judgment language to bypass evidence and due process.
The text-supported movement remains: An unnamed prophet recalls priestly privilege, indicts Eli for honoring his sons above God and sharing the offerings, announces the household's collapse, and promises a faithful priest.
Research trail and exact locationsThe source record behind this section
Supports: Exact displayed KJV words, verse order, paragraph metadata, supplied-word markup, and complete unit coverage.
1 Samuel 2:27–2:36, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM-derived repository corpus
Supports: Masoretic Hebrew wording and morphology, with the two KJV-Hebrew versification shifts stated rather than silently offset.
Open Scriptures MorphHB v2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/1Sam.xml, OSIS 2:27–2:36; KJV 20:42 spans Hebrew 20:42–21:1, KJV 21:1–15 maps to Hebrew 21:2–16, KJV 23:29 maps to Hebrew 24:1, and KJV 24:1–22 maps to Hebrew 24:2–23
Supports: Only the translator notes actually printed for these verses, used for lexical, grammatical, textual, historical, and older-English controls.
NET Bible First Edition Notes, 1 Samuel PDF, printed pp. 504–543, exact tc/tn/sn entries attached to 2:27–2:36
Supports: One relatively early integrated/two-edition account of composition, structure, and historiographic value, retained as a contested model.
Garsiel, JHS 10.5 (2010), pp. 1–42, named structural or composition discussion covering the movement that includes 1 Samuel 2:27–2:36
Supports: Only the publisher-visible book architecture and theological scope; the paywalled body is not treated as inspected.
Goldingay, The Theology of the Book of Samuel (2024), official frontmatter and TOC: 1 Samuel 1:1–4:1a, pp. 14–49
Supports: Publisher-visible alternative framing of Israelite state formation, early monarchy, history, and biblical historiography; paywalled detail is not attributed.
Dietrich, Oxford Handbook of the Historical Books (2020), pp. 94–108, official abstract and page range
Supports: One literary, ethical, and political account of divine and human violence; publisher-visible scope does not establish consensus.
Gilmour, Divine Violence in the Book of Samuel (2021/2022), official abstract and TOC: relevant discussion for 1 Samuel 2:27–2:36, including 1 Samuel 12 pp. 71–81, Saul's rejection pp. 90–139, Eli's house pp. 140–150, or ark violence pp. 154–185 as applicable
Sources for This Section
These records identify the source, the claim it supports, and the exact location used. A source remains evidence to evaluate; it does not replace the biblical text.
Biblical text
King James (Authorized) Version — eng-kjv2006
eBible.org and CrossWire Bible Society
USFM archive eng-kjv2006_usfm.zip; source files dated 2026-08-19; downloaded 2026-08-24; archive SHA-256 aec1b3b26c622fd3d963d2bbac963016b9513246ffbfa20da00bb100372ea007; normalized corpus SHA-256 09aef51d90488aa7b9722b3fd9a93f4b25f6bf2064c5fd798fb39673c300ddf2.
Supports: Exact displayed KJV words, verse order, paragraph metadata, supplied-word markup, and complete unit coverage.
Exact location: 1 Samuel 2:27–2:36, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM-derived repository corpus
Open source ↗hebrew text and morphology
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible: 1 Samuel
Open Scriptures
Open Scriptures, release 2.2
Supports: Masoretic Hebrew wording and morphology, with the two KJV-Hebrew versification shifts stated rather than silently offset.
Exact location: Open Scriptures MorphHB v2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/1Sam.xml, OSIS 2:27–2:36; KJV 20:42 spans Hebrew 20:42–21:1, KJV 21:1–15 maps to Hebrew 21:2–16, KJV 23:29 maps to Hebrew 24:1, and KJV 24:1–22 maps to Hebrew 24:2–23
Open source ↗translation and translator notes
NET Bible First Edition Notes: 1 Samuel
Biblical Studies Press
Biblical Studies Press, 2006
Supports: Only the translator notes actually printed for these verses, used for lexical, grammatical, textual, historical, and older-English controls.
Exact location: NET Bible First Edition Notes, 1 Samuel PDF, printed pp. 504–543, exact tc/tn/sn entries attached to 2:27–2:36
Open source ↗peer reviewed open access scholarly article
The Book of Samuel: Its Composition, Structure and Significance as a Historiographical Source
Moshe Garsiel
The Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 10.5, 2010
Supports: One relatively early integrated/two-edition account of composition, structure, and historiographic value, retained as a contested model.
Exact location: Garsiel, JHS 10.5 (2010), pp. 1–42, named structural or composition discussion covering the movement that includes 1 Samuel 2:27–2:36
Open source ↗scholarly monograph frontmatter and table of contents
The Theology of the Book of Samuel
John Goldingay
Cambridge University Press, 2024
Supports: Only the publisher-visible book architecture and theological scope; the paywalled body is not treated as inspected.
Exact location: Goldingay, The Theology of the Book of Samuel (2024), official frontmatter and TOC: 1 Samuel 1:1–4:1a, pp. 14–49
Open source ↗scholarly handbook chapter abstract and metadata
Israelite State Formation and Early Monarchy in History and Biblical Historiography
Walter Dietrich
The Oxford Handbook of the Historical Books of the Hebrew Bible, 2020
Supports: Publisher-visible alternative framing of Israelite state formation, early monarchy, history, and biblical historiography; paywalled detail is not attributed.
Exact location: Dietrich, Oxford Handbook of the Historical Books (2020), pp. 94–108, official abstract and page range
Open source ↗scholarly monograph abstract and contents
Divine Violence in the Book of Samuel
Rachelle Gilmour
Oxford University Press, 2021 online; 2022 print
Supports: One literary, ethical, and political account of divine and human violence; publisher-visible scope does not establish consensus.
Exact location: Gilmour, Divine Violence in the Book of Samuel (2021/2022), official abstract and TOC: relevant discussion for 1 Samuel 2:27–2:36, including 1 Samuel 12 pp. 71–81, Saul's rejection pp. 90–139, Eli's house pp. 140–150, or ark violence pp. 154–185 as applicable
Open source ↗