The Ark Is Captured and Eli Dies

Samuel’s word had come to Israel. Then Israel went out to fight the Philistines, camping near Ebenezer while the Philistines camped at Aphek. When the battle began, Israel was defeated, and about four thousand soldiers were killed in the field.

In the camp, the elders of Israel asked why the Lord had let them be defeated. They decided to bring the ark of the Lord’s covenant from Shiloh, hoping it would save them from their enemies. Hophni and Phinehas, Eli’s two sons, were there with the ark. When it arrived, all Israel gave a great shout, and the earth resounded.

The Philistines heard the shouting and understood that the ark had come into Israel’s camp. They were afraid, yet they urged one another to be strong and fight. So the battle came again, and Israel was badly defeated. The army fled, thirty thousand foot soldiers fell, the ark was captured, and Hophni and Phinehas were killed.

A man of Benjamin ran from the battle to Shiloh that same day with torn clothes and dirt on his head. Eli, ninety-eight years old and unable to see, was sitting by the road, trembling for the ark of God. When the man brought the news into the city, the whole city cried out. Then he came and told Eli that Israel had fled, that there had been great slaughter, and that Eli’s two sons were dead.

When the messenger mentioned that God’s ark had been captured, Eli fell backward from his seat by the gate and died. He had judged Israel for forty years. Then Phinehas’ wife, who was close to giving birth, heard that the ark was taken and that her husband and father-in-law were dead. She gave birth to a son and named him Ichabod, saying that glory had departed from Israel because the ark of God had been taken. Soon after, she also died.