1 Samuel 4:12-22

Living Bible

¹² A man from the tribe of Benjamin ran from the battle and arrived at Shiloh the same day with his clothes torn and dirt on his head.^{[a] 13} Eli was waiting beside the road to hear the news of the battle, for his heart trembled for the safety of the Ark of God. As the messenger from the battlefront arrived and told what had happened, a great cry arose throughout the city.

¹⁴ “What is all the noise about?” Eli asked. And the messenger rushed over to Eli and told him what had happened. ¹⁵ (Eli was ninety-eight years old and was blind.)

¹⁶ “I have just come from the battle—I was there today,” he told Eli, ¹⁷ “and Israel has been defeated and thousands of the Israeli troops are dead on the battlefield. Hophni and Phinehas were killed too, and the Ark has been captured.”

¹⁸ When the messenger mentioned what had happened to the Ark, Eli fell backward from his seat beside the gate and his neck was broken by the fall, and he died (for he was old and fat). He had judged Israel for forty years.

¹⁹ When Eli’s daughter-in-law, Phinehas’ wife, who was pregnant, heard that the Ark had been captured and that her husband and father-in-law were dead, her labor pains suddenly began. ²⁰ Just before she died, the women who were attending her told her that everything was all right and that the baby was a boy. But she did not reply or respond in any way. ^21-22 Then she murmured, “Name the child ‘Ichabod,’ for Israel’s glory is gone.” (Ichabod means “there is no glory.” She named him this because the Ark of God had been captured and because her husband and her father-in-law were dead.)