1Sa 2:9 | KD | STEP | 1Sa 2:9-10 9 The feet of His saints He will keep, And the wicked perish in darkness; For by power no one becomes strong. 10 The Lord - those who contend against Him are confounded. He thunders above him in the heavens; The Lord will judge the ends of the earth, That He may lend might to His king, And exalt the horn of His anointed. The Lord keeps the feet of the righteous, so that they do not tremble and stumble, i.e., so that the righteous do not fall into adversity and perish therein (vid., Ps. 56:14; ; ). But the wicked, who oppress and persecute the righteous, will perish in darkness, i.e., in adversity, when God withdraws the light of His grace, so that they fall into distress and calamity. For no man can be strong through his own power, so as to meet the storms of life. All who fight against the Lord are destroyed. To bring out the antithesis between man and God, “Jehovah” is written absolutely at the commencement of the sentence in : “ As for Jehovah, those who contend against Him are broken ,” both inwardly and outwardly (חתת, as in ). The word עלו, which follows, is not to be changed into עליהם. There is simply a rapid alternation of the numbers, such as we frequently meet with in excited language. “ Above him ,” i.e., above every one who contends against God, He thunders. Thunder is a premonitory sign of the approach of the Lord to judgment. In the thunder, man is made to feel in an alarming way the presence of the omnipotent God. In the words, “ The Lord will judge the ends of the earth ,” i.e., the earth to its utmost extremities, or the whole world, Hannah’s prayer rises up to a prophetic glance at the consummation of the kingdom of God. As certainly as the Lord God keeps the righteous at all times, and casts down the wicked, so certainly will He judge the whole world, to hurl down all His foes, and perfect His kingdom which He has founded in Israel. And as every kingdom culminates in its throne, or in the full might and government of a king, so the kingdom of God can only attain its full perfection in the king whom the Lord will give to His people, and endow with His might. The king , or the anointed of the Lord , of whom Hannah prophesies in the spirit, is not one single king of Israel, either David or Christ, but an ideal king, though not a mere personification of the throne about to be established, but the actual king whom Israel received in David and his race, which culminated in the Messiah. The exaltation of the horn of the anointed to Jehovah commenced with the victorious and splendid expansion of the power of David, was repeated with every victory over the enemies of God and His kingdom gained by the successive kings of David’s house, goes on in the advancing spread of the kingdom of Christ, and will eventually attain to its eternal consummation in the judgment of the last day, through which all the enemies of Christ will be made His footstool. Samuel the servant of the Lord under Eli. Ungodliness of the sons of Eli . - forms the transition to what follows. After Hannah’s psalm of thanksgiving, Elkanah went back with his family to his home at Ramah, and the boy (Samuel) was serving, i.e., ministered to the Lord, in the presence of Eli the priest. The fact that nothing is said about Elkanah’s wives going with him, does not warrant the interpretation given by Thenius, that Elkanah went home alone. It was taken for granted that his wives went with him, according to (“all his house”). את־יחוה שׁרת, which signifies literally, both here and in , to serve the Lord, and which is used interchangeably with יי את־פּני שׁרת ( ), to serve in the presence of the Lord, is used to denote the duties performed both by priests and Levites in connection with the worship of God, in which Samuel took part, as he grew up, under the superintendence of Eli and according to his instruction.

‏ 1 Samuel 2:9

1Sa 2:9-10 9 The feet of His saints He will keep,

And the wicked perish in darkness;

For by power no one becomes strong. 10 The Lord - those who contend against Him are confounded.

He thunders above him in the heavens;

The Lord will judge the ends of the earth,

That He may lend might to His king, And exalt the horn of His anointed.

The Lord keeps the feet of the righteous, so that they do not tremble and stumble, i.e., so that the righteous do not fall into adversity and perish therein (vid., Ps. 56:14; Psa 116:8; Psa 121:3). But the wicked, who oppress and persecute the righteous, will perish in darkness, i.e., in adversity, when God withdraws the light of His grace, so that they fall into distress and calamity. For no man can be strong through his own power, so as to meet the storms of life. All who fight against the Lord are destroyed. To bring out the antithesis between man and God, “Jehovah” is written absolutely at the commencement of the sentence in 1Sa 2:10 : “As for Jehovah, those who contend against Him are broken,” both inwardly and outwardly (חתת, as in 1Sa 2:4). The word עלו, which follows, is not to be changed into עליהם. There is simply a rapid alternation of the numbers, such as we frequently meet with in excited language. “Above him,” i.e., above every one who contends against God, He thunders. Thunder is a premonitory sign of the approach of the Lord to judgment. In the thunder, man is made to feel in an alarming way the presence of the omnipotent God. In the words, “The Lord will judge the ends of the earth,” i.e., the earth to its utmost extremities, or the whole world, Hannah’s prayer rises up to a prophetic glance at the consummation of the kingdom of God. As certainly as the Lord God keeps the righteous at all times, and casts down the wicked, so certainly will He judge the whole world, to hurl down all His foes, and perfect His kingdom which He has founded in Israel. And as every kingdom culminates in its throne, or in the full might and government of a king, so the kingdom of God can only attain its full perfection in the king whom the Lord will give to His people, and endow with His might. The king, or the anointed of the Lord, of whom Hannah prophesies in the spirit, is not one single king of Israel, either David or Christ, but an ideal king, though not a mere personification of the throne about to be established, but the actual king whom Israel received in David and his race, which culminated in the Messiah. The exaltation of the horn of the anointed to Jehovah commenced with the victorious and splendid expansion of the power of David, was repeated with every victory over the enemies of God and His kingdom gained by the successive kings of David’s house, goes on in the advancing spread of the kingdom of Christ, and will eventually attain to its eternal consummation in the judgment of the last day, through which all the enemies of Christ will be made His footstool.Samuel the servant of the Lord under Eli. Ungodliness of the sons of Eli. - 1Sa 2:11 forms the transition to what follows. After Hannah’s psalm of thanksgiving, Elkanah went back with his family to his home at Ramah, and the boy (Samuel) was serving, i.e., ministered to the Lord, in the presence of Eli the priest. The fact that nothing is said about Elkanah’s wives going with him, does not warrant the interpretation given by Thenius, that Elkanah went home alone. It was taken for granted that his wives went with him, according to 1Sa 1:21 (“all his house”). את־יחוה שׁרת, which signifies literally, both here and in 1Sa 3:1, to serve the Lord, and which is used interchangeably with יי את־פּני שׁרת (1Sa 2:18), to serve in the presence of the Lord, is used to denote the duties performed both by priests and Levites in connection with the worship of God, in which Samuel took part, as he grew up, under the superintendence of Eli and according to his instruction.