1 Samuel 2:1

And Hannah prayed and said,.... She had prayed before, but that was mental, this vocal; she had prayed and was answered, and had what she prayed for, and now she gives thanks for it; and thanksgiving

And Hannah prayed, and said, My heart rejoiceth in the LORD, mine horn is exalted in the LORD: my mouth is enlarged over mine enemies; because I rejoice in thy salvation. Hannah prayed, and said.

1 SAMUEL CHAPTER 2 Hannah’ s song, . Samuel ministers before the Lord, . Eli’ s sons are wicked, . Hannah beareth more children, ,21. Eli reproves his sons, but mildly . God by a proverb foretelleth the destruction of Eli’ s house, . Hannah prayed, i.e. praised God; which is a part of prayer, ; so it is a synecdochical expression. My heart rejoiceth, or, leapeth for joy; for the words note not only inward joy, but also the outward demonstrations of it. In the Lord, as the author and the master of my joy, that he hath heard my prayer, and accepted my son for his service. Mine horn is exalted; my strength and glory (which are oft signified by a horn, as ,24 92:10) are advanced and manifested to my vindication, and the confusion of mine enemies. My mouth is enlarged, i.e. opened wide, to pour forth abundant praises to God, and to give a full answer to all the reproaches of mine adversaries; whereas before it was shut through grief and confusion. Over mine enemies, i.e. more than theirs, or so as to get the victory over them, as she saith afterwards. Here she manifests her great prudence, and piety, and modesty, that she doth not name Peninnah, but only her enemies in the general. Because I rejoice in thy salvation; because the matter of my joy is no trivial or worldly thing, but that strange and glorious salvation or deliverance which thou hast given me from my own oppressing care and grief, and from the insolencies and reproaches of mine enemies, in giving me a son, and such a son as this, who shall be serviceable to God, and to his people, in helping them against their enemies, which she presaged, as may be guessed from .

1 Samuel 2:1 And Hannah prayed, and said, My heart rejoiceth in the LORD, mine horn is exalted in the LORD: my mouth is enlarged over mine enemies; because I rejoice in thy salvation.Ver. 1. And Hannah prayed, and said,] i.e., She praised God, and said; for there is not one petition in all this holy hymn: but thanksgiving is a principal part of prayer; it is also an artificial begging. My heart rejoiceth in the Lord.] Leapeth and danceth levaltoes, danceth a galliard; as did also Mary’ s for like cause; and betwixt this song and that of the holy Virgin there is a great likeness, as Peter Martyr rightly observeth. My horn is exalted in the Lord.] My might and mirth is advanced. A metaphor from horned creatures, or, as some say, from conquerors setting up their crest. My mouth is enlarged over mine enemies.] Peninnah and her accomplices, over whom now I can crow and triumph, my mouth magnifically praising the Lord.

(1) And Hannah prayed, and said.—“Prayed,” not quite in the sense in which we generally understand prayer. Her prayer here asks for nothing; it is rather a song of thanksgiving for the past, a song which passes into expressions of sure confidence for the future. She had been an unhappy woman; her life had been, she thought, a failure; her dearest hopes had been baffled; vexed, tormented, utterly cast down, she had fled to the Rock of Israel for help, and in the eternal pity of the Divine Friend of her people she had found rest, and then joy; out of her own individual experience the Spirit of the Lord taught her to discern the general laws of the Divine economy; she had had personal experience of the gracious government of the kind, all-pitiful God; her own mercies were a pledge to her of the gracious way in which the nation itself was led by Jehovah—were a sign by which she discerned how the Eternal not only always delivered the individual sufferer who turned to Him, but would also at all times be ever ready to succour and deliver His people. These true, beautiful thoughts the Spirit of the Lord first planted in Hannah’s heart, and then gave her lips grace and power to utter them in the sublime language of her hymn, which became one of the loved songs of the people, and as such was handed down from father to son, from generation to generation, in Israel, in the very words which first fell from the blessed mother of the child-prophet in her quiet home of “Ramah of the Watchers.” My heart rejoiceth.—The first verse of four lines is the introduction to the Divine song. She would give utterance to her holy joy. Had she not received the blessing at last which all mothers in Israel so longed for? Mine horn is exalted.—She does not mean by this, “I am proud,” but “I am strong”—mighty now in the gift I have received from the Lord: glorious in the consciousness “I have a God-Friend who hears me.” The image “horn” is taken from oxen and those animals whose strength lies in their horns. It is a favourite Hebrew symbol, and one that had become familiar to them from their long experience—dating from far-back patriarchal times—as a shepherd-people.

CHAPTER II Hannah's prophetic hymn, 1-10. Samuel ministers to the Lord, 11. The abominable conduct of Eli's sons, 12-17. Farther account of Samuel, and of the Divine blessing on Elkanah and Hannah, 18-21. Eli's reprehensible remissness towards his sons in not restraining them in their great profligacy, 22-26. The message of God to Eli, and the prophecy of the downfall of his family, and slaughter of his wicked sons Hophni and Phinehas, 27-36. NOTES ON CHAP. II Verse 1. And Hannah prayed, and said] The Chaldee very properly says, And Hannah prayed in the spirit of prophecy; for indeed the whole of this prayer, or as it may be properly called oracular declaration, is a piece of regular prophecy, every part of it having respect to the future, and perhaps not a little of it declaratory of the Messiah's kingdom. Dr. Hales has some very good observations on this prophetic song. "This admirable hymn excels in simplicity of composition, closeness of connection, and uniformity of sentiment; breathing the pious effusions of a devout mind, deeply impressed with a conviction of God's mercies to herself in particular, and of his providential government of the world in general; exalting the poor in spirit or the humble-minded, and abasing the rich and the arrogant; rewarding the righteous, and punishing the wicked. Hannah was also a prophetess of the first class, besides predicting her own fruitfulness, 1 Samuel 2:5, (for she bore six children in all, 1 Samuel 2:21,) she foretold not only the more immediate judgments of God upon the Philistines during her son's administration, 1 Samuel 2:10, but his remoter judgments 'upon the ends of the earth,' 1 Samuel 2:10, in the true spirit of the prophecies of Jacob, Balaam, and Moses. Like them, she describes the promised Saviour of the world as a KING, before there was any king in Israel; and she first applied to him the remarkable epithet MESSIAH in Hebrew, CHRIST in Greek, and ANOINTED in English, which was adopted by David, Nathan, Ethan, Isaiah, Daniel, and the succeeding prophets of the Old Testament; and by the apostles and inspired writers of the New. And the allusion thereto by Zacharias, the father of the Baptist, in his hymn, Lu 1:69, where he calls Christ a 'horn of salvation,' and the beautiful imitation of it by the blessed Virgin throughout in her hymn, Lu 1:46-55, furnishing the finest commentary thereon, clearly prove that Hannah in her rejoicing had respect to something higher than Peninnah her rival, or to the triumphs of Samuel, or even of David himself; the expressions are too magnificent and sublime to be confined to such objects.

Ch. 1 Samuel 2:1-11. The Song of Hannah Hannah’s song is a true prophecy. She is inspired “to discern in her own individual experience the universal laws of the divine economy, and to recognise its significance for the whole course of the Kingdom of God.” The deliverance from her proud adversary which had just been vouchsafed to her was but one instance of the great principles of Jehovah’s moral government of the world, principles which receive their fullest illustration in the exaltation of the Lord’s Christ through humiliation to victory, and which will only he fully realised when “the kingdoms of this world shall have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ.” Hence it is that her own peculiar circumstances are so soon lost sight of in the wider view of the dealings of God’s Providence. The failure to recognise this has led critics to deny the authenticity of the song, and to conjecture that some ancient triumphal war-pæan has been erroneously placed in Hannah’s month by the compiler of the book. A brief analysis will help to explain the connexion of thought. “Jehovah is the sole author of my deliverance. He shall be the theme of my song. There is none to be compared with Him for holiness, power, faithfulness: be silent before him, all ye proud boasters! He knows your thoughts and weighs your actions. Observe the vicissitudes of human fortune: the haughty are humbled, the humble exalted: this is Jehovah’s doing: for He is the Almighty Governor of the universe. He guides and guards His saints, and destroys the wicked. May He finally discomfit his adversaries, judge the world, and establish the kingdom of His Anointed One!” The Magnificat (Luke 1:46-55) should be carefully compared with Hannah’s song, of which it is an echo rather than an imitation. The resemblance lies in thought and tone more than in actual language, and supplies a most delicate and valuable testimony to the appropriateness of this hymn to Hannah’s circumstances. The 113th Psalm forms a connecting link between the two.

The song of Hannah is a prophetic Psalm. It is poetry. and it is prophecy.

1. Hannah prayed — As the lyric psalm of Habakkuk is called a prayer, (Habakkuk 3:1,) although its language is that of adoration — and as some of David’s psalms, which are really songs of praise, are