Her husband dead; her father-in-law dead; she is dying; but the real tragedy? The glory has departed!
Israel has been defeated. Scores lie dead on the battlefield. Then inspiration hits. Why not force God to be with them? So Eli’s sons commit the ultimate blasphemy, treating God like a good luck charm. Israel, like Samson before them, “did not know that the Lord had departed” ( Jdg 16:20). God wasn’t with them, and there was nothing magic in the ark. Israel’s earth-shaking shout had echoed down the valley; what did the Philistines conclude? “Who will deliver us from the hand of these mighty gods? These are the gods who struck the Egyptians with all the plagues…Be strong and conduct yourselves like men, you Philistines, that you do not become servants of the Hebrews” (1 Sam 4:8-9). Talk about reverse psychology! The ark, not taken seriously by Israel, was taken very seriously by Philistia. “So the Philistines were afraid, for they said, ‘God has come into the camp!’” (v 7). The result? “There fell of Israel thirty thousand foot soldiers. Also the ark of God was captured; and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, died” (vv 10-11). Note: Before vowel points were added, the Hebrew words for “thousand” and for a military “unit” looked the same; numbers are difficult to discern in the OT. In any case, when the news arrived at Shiloh, 98-year-old Eli was told that his sons had been killed; but when he heard that the ark was taken, “Eli fell off the seat backward…and his neck was broken and he died” (v 18). Likewise “his daughter-in-law, Phinehas’ wife, was…due to be delivered; and when she heard the news that the ark of God was captured, and that her father-in-law and her husband were dead, she…gave birth…And about the time of her death…she named the child Ichabod, saying, ‘The glory has departed from Israel!’” (vv 19-21). Oh no! What next?