Chapter 3

Revelation to Samuel. ¹ During the time young Samuel was minister to the Lord under Eli, the word of the Lord was scarce and vision infrequent. ^2 [a]One day Eli was asleep in his usual place. His eyes had lately grown so weak that he could not see. ³ The lamp of God was not yet extinguished,^[b] and Samuel was sleeping in the temple of the Lord where the ark of God was.^{(A) 4} The Lord called to Samuel, who answered, “Here I am.” ⁵ He ran to Eli and said, “Here I am. You called me.” “I did not call you,” Eli answered. “Go back to sleep.” So he went back to sleep. ⁶ Again the Lord called Samuel, who rose and went to Eli. “Here I am,” he said. “You called me.” But he answered, “I did not call you, my son. Go back to sleep.”

⁷ Samuel did not yet recognize the Lord, since the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him. ⁸ The Lord called Samuel again, for the third time. Getting up and going to Eli, he said, “Here I am. You called me.” Then Eli understood that the Lord was calling the youth. ⁹ So he said to Samuel, “Go to sleep, and if you are called, reply, ‘Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.’” When Samuel went to sleep in his place, ¹⁰ the Lord came and stood there, calling out as before: Samuel, Samuel! Samuel answered, “Speak, for your servant is listening.” ¹¹ The Lord said to Samuel: I am about to do something in Israel that will make the ears of everyone who hears it ring.^{(B) 12} On that day I will carry out against Eli everything I have said about his house, beginning to end. ¹³ I announce to him that I am condemning his house once and for all, because of this crime: though he knew his sons were blaspheming God, he did not reprove them.^{(C) 14} Therefore, I swear to Eli’s house: No sacrifice or offering will ever expiate its crime.^{[c] 15} Samuel then slept until morning, when he got up early and opened the doors of the temple of the Lord. He was afraid to tell Eli the vision, ¹⁶ but Eli called to him, “Samuel, my son!” He replied, “Here I am.” ¹⁷ Then Eli asked, “What did he say to you? Hide nothing from me! May God do thus to you, and more,^[d] if you hide from me a single thing he told you.” ¹⁸ So Samuel told him everything, and held nothing back. Eli answered, “It is the Lord. What is pleasing in the Lord’s sight, the Lord will do.”

Samuel Acknowledged as Prophet. ¹⁹ Samuel grew up, and the Lord was with him, not permitting any word of his to go unfulfilled.^{(D) 20 (E)}Thus all Israel from Dan to Beer-sheba came to know that Samuel was a trustworthy prophet of the Lord. ²¹ The Lord continued to appear at Shiloh, manifesting himself to Samuel at Shiloh through his word. Samuel’s word spread throughout Israel.