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"And the man said unto Eli, I am he that came out of the army, and I fled today out of
the army. And he said, What is there done, my son? And the messenger answered and
said, Israel is fled before the Philistines, and there hath been also a great slaughter among
the people, and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead, and the ark of God is
taken" (4: 16, 17).
The grim news is bluntly given, the army utterly routed, Hophni and Phinehas slain,
and the Ark taken.
"And it came to pass, when he made mention of the ark of God, that he fell from off
the seat backward by the side of the gate, and his neck brake, and he died: for he was an
old man, and heavy. And he had judged Israel forty years" (4: 18).
The ruin and degradation of the nation and his house, he could endure, but it was
when he learned of the Philistines capturing the ark of God that the awful realization of
this calamity sent him reeling backwards on his seat. He could bear the judgment of
Jehovah in the ruin and degradation of his house and descendants. He could bear to see
another preferred before him and his family as the judge in Israel. He could endure the
defeat in battle at the hands of the heathen. Even the news of the death of his sons. But
when his ears caught the words from the messenger that the ark of God was taken, that
was the calamity that caused his death. This was the fulfillment of the prophecy made
known to the boy Samuel by the Lord "at which both the ears of every one that heareth it
shall tingle" (I Sam. 3: 11).
The grief and consternation in Shiloh would be echoed in every town and village
throughout Israel. Not only those faithful men and women who had remained loyal to the
God of their fathers during the apostasy of the nation over the past twenty years, but the
people as a whole would be filled with a strange foreboding that must have caused
apprehension and fear. Yet nowhere do we read that repentance was felt, or that the
nation turned back from their idolatry. Such is the blackness of the human heart when
the mind is darkened by sin. Unless the light of the glorious gospel of grace had shined
into our hearts and minds, we too would have treated the Lord Jesus Christ with the
indifference which we see around us.
"And his daughter in law, Phinehas' wife, was with child, near to be delivered: and
when she heard the tidings that the ark of God was taken, and that her father in law and
her husband were dead, she bowed herself and travailed; for her pains came upon her.
And about the time of her death the women that stood by her said unto her, Fear not; for
thou hast born a son. But she answered not, neither did she regard it. And she named the
child Ichabod, saying, The glory is departed from Israel: because the ark of God was
taken, and because of her father in law and her husband. And she said, The glory is
departed from Israel: for the ark of God is taken" (I Sam. 4: 19-22).
This singular and circumstantial account of the death of the widow of Phinehas, the
evil prior, the son of Eli, which follows directly after the great national disaster is
recorded on the pages of Scripture because of the name she gave her son--Ichabod. Her
concern for the death of her husband and of her father-in-law was an evidence of her
natural affection, but her greater concern for the loss of the ark of God is made clear by
the meaning of the name she gave to the son that was born. "I", an exclamation of bitter