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"And when she had weaned him, she took him up with her, with three bullocks, and
one ephah of flour, and a bottle of wine, and brought him unto the house of the Lord in
Shiloh: and the child was young."
He was now to be brought up with the children of the priests to serve in the
sanctuary, as Hannah had promised. Three bullocks were said to have been brought by
the mother at the presentation of Samuel. The LXX reads "a calf of three years old".
Dr. E. W. Bullinger refers back to Gen. 15: 9, where God makes the covenant with
Abraham concerning his descendants and the land, and commands him to "take an heifer
of three years old". On the other hand some scholars say that one bullock would have
been the burnt offering by which the child would have been consecrated to the Lord, and
the other two the yearly festival offerings brought at the time of the Passover. Whichever
is true the fact remains that Hannah offered her son as a living sacrifice to the Lord
through the shed blood of that one offering according to the law. Today we have no need
for an animal sacrifice, but can offer ourselves in service to our heavenly Father through
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ which is far more effective and acceptable.
The narrative continues in chapter 1: as follows:
"And they slew a bullock, and brought the child to Eli. And she said, O my lord, as
thy soul liveth, my lord, I am the woman that stood by thee here, praying unto the Lord.
For this child I prayed; and the Lord hath given me my petition which I asked of Him:
therefore also I have lent him to the Lord; as long as he liveth he shall be lent to the
Lord" (I Sam. 1: 25-28).
Hannah here in a wonderful acknowledgement of God's gracious answer to her prayer
resigns the son that was given her. No tears, no mention of the hard tussle that must have
gone on in her heart in having to part now from the son she had so long awaited. Hannah
is a shining example of one who kept her word, no matter what the cost. The promise
that was wrung from her heart was faithfully fulfilled. It certainly needed courage and
resolution of a high degree to bring the son she cherished to Shiloh, and to leave him
behind. All true service to the Lord must at some stage involve some degree of sacrifice
like this.
The word `lent' in verse 28 is not a true translation of the original text. It is the same
Hebrew word which is used in verse 20, where we read, "Because I have asked him of
the Lord", and also in verse 27 "the Lord hath given me my petition which I asked of
Him". The sense of this passage would be "The Lord gave him to me, and now I have
returned him whom I obtained by prayer, as one asked". The only other occurrence
where this word is translated `lent' in Scripture is Exod. 12: 36:
"And the Lord gave the people favour in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they lent
unto them such things as they required. And they spoiled the Egyptians."
Here, once again, it does not mean that the Egyptians loaned the Israelites their jewels
and clothes, for they could never hope to have them returned. The Israelites `asked' and
the Egyptians gladly gave them: they pressed them even upon their one time slaves in
their anxiety to be rid of them. So Hannah gladly surrendered the boy she had prayed for