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The Beginning of the End
Tragic News Kills Eli
When the army went out to battle, Eli had stayed at Shiloh.
With dread he waited for the result of the conflict, “for his heart
trembled for the ark of God.” Day after day he sat outside the gate
of the tabernacle by the highway, anxiously expecting a messenger
to come from the battlefield.
Finally a Benjamite, “with his clothes torn and dirt on his head,”
rushed to the town and repeated to eager crowds the news of defeat.
The sound of wailing and crying reached Eli beside the tabernacle.
The messenger came to him and said, “Israel has fled before the
Philistines, and there has been a great slaughter among the people.
Also your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead.” Eli could
endure all this, terrible as it was, for he had expected it. But when
the messenger added, “and the ark of God has been captured,” a
look of extreme anguish passed over his face. The thought that his
sin had dishonored God and caused Him to withdraw His presence
from Israel was more than he could bear. He fell, “and his neck was
broken, and he died.”
The wife of Phinehas feared the Lord. The death of her father-
in-law and her husband, and above all, the terrible news that the ark
of God was taken, caused her death. She felt that the last hope of
Israel was gone. She gave the name Ichabod, or “inglorious,” to the
child born during this terrible time, with her dying breath mournfully
repeating the words, “The glory has departed from Israel, for the ark
of God has been captured.”
But the Lord had not completely cast His people aside, and He
used the ark to punish the Philistines. The divine presence, invisible,
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would still be with it to bring terror and destruction to those who
transgressed His holy law. The wicked may triumph for a time as
they see Israel being punished, but the time will come when they too
must receive the sentence of a holy, sin-hating God.
Heathen Gods Cannot Stand Before the Ark of God
In triumph the Philistines took the ark to Ashdod and placed it
in the house of their god Dagon. They imagined that the power that