1 Samuel 7:2

And it came to pass, while the ark abode in Kirjathjearim, that the time was long,.... It could not be less than between forty and fifty years, for it remained here until the times of David, who

And it came to pass, while the ark abode in Kirjath-je'arim, that the time was long; for it was twenty years: and all the house of Israel lamented after the LORD. The ark abode ... twenty years.

The ark abode in Kirjath-jearim, and was not carried to Shiloh, its former place, either because that place was destroyed by the Philistines when the ark was taken, as may be gathered from this history, compared with ,14 26:6,9; or because God would hereby punish the wickedness, either of that particular place of Shiloh, or of the people of Israel, by keeping it in a private and obscure place, and that near to the Philistines, whither the generality of the people neither durst nor could safely come. It was twenty years; he saith not that this twenty years was all the time of the ark’ s abode there; for it continued there from Eli’ s time till David’ s reign, , which was forty years, ; but that it was so long there ere the Israelites were sensible of their sin and misery, ere they lamented, &c., as it follows. The house of Israel lamented after the Lord, i.e. they followed after God with lamentation for his departure and so long estrangement from them, and with prayers for his return and favour to them.

1 Samuel 7:2 And it came to pass, while the ark abode in Kirjathjearim, that the time was long; for it was twenty years: and all the house of Israel lamented after the LORD.Ver. 2. The time was long; for it was twenty years,] viz., Ere Samuel could bring them to this solemn conversion related in the verses following: so tough is the old Adam, and so difficult a thing it is to work upon such as are habituated and hardened in sinful practices. Samuel’ s song had been, as was afterwards Jeremiah’ s, "Woe unto thee, O Jerusalem! wilt thou not be made clean? when shall it once be?" Sed surdo fabulam; they refused to return, till God stopped them with the cross, suffered the Philistines grievously to oppress them, and then All the house of Israel lamented after the Lord.] Lamentatione quadam post Dominum universa domus Israel anhela fuit; so the Tigurines translate: they groaned in spirit, and sighed after the Lord, with storms of sighs, and showers of tears, from a right principle of "sorrow according to God." Some sense the words thus, they lamented after the Lord, that is, they could never go to worship but in fear of some mischief, because now the ark was in confinio Philistaeorum, in a place that bordered upon the Philistines; so that they did eat the bread of their souls in peril of their lives: as did also here the good people in Queen Mary’ s days.

(2) And it came to pass, while the ark abode in Kirjath-jearim, that the time was long; for it was twenty years.—Literally, And it came to pass, from the day that the Ark rested at Kirjath-jearim, that the time was long; for it was twenty years. There is something very touching in this sad note of time. We think we read Samuel’s own words here. The unwearied toiler for God and His dear people found the twenty years a weary period of waiting. We must not, however, by any means suppose that the hungering of Israel after their God-Friend only began after the twenty years of sorrow were over. It had been a stern trial time. The great victory of Aphek and the destruction of Shiloh had laid all Israel at the feet of their Philistine enemies, and they, we know, made their supremacy bitterly felt. The restoration of the Ark in no wise signified that they loosed their hold on the conquered people. This long time, when the hand of Philistia pressed so heavily on Israel, was the important period of Samuel’s life. For these twenty years he must have laboured incessantly to wake up the old worship of the Eternal and the pure life loved by God among the people. The early dreams of his boy days, the hopes excited by his burning enthusiasm, were scattered to the winds. The fatal battle of Aphek, the capture of the holy Ark, the death of his old guardian, the great high priestly judge Eli, the sack and devastation of Shiloh, the loved sanctuary, the terrible and continued oppression of Philistia, had opened the eyes of the young inspired man of God. Taught by the bitter lessons of adversity, he saw it was by no bold stroke of a few gallant patriots that the nation could be saved; all such efforts Samuel the seer, after the crushing defeat of Aphek, saw would only sink the nation into still lower depths of degradation and misery. Other and different things were needed before the lion standard of Judah could be safely unfurled, or the war-cry of Ephraim raised on her mountains. “What means he used we are not told, or what was his mode of life during those twenty years of waiting and work; but probably the life of the young prophet-judge was that of a fugitive, going stealthily from place to place that he might teach and preach, hiding in the caverns in the limestone ranges of Judæa, emerging thence to visit now one quarter of the country and now another, ever in danger, but gradually stirring up, not merely those districts which were contiguous to the Philistines, but all Israel to a sense of the greatness of their sins, and to the necessity of renewed trust in and return of old love to their God.

Verse 2. It was twenty years] This chapter contains the transactions of at least twenty years, but we know not the date of each event.

2–6. The National Repentance and Reformation under Samuel 2. And it came to pass, &c.] Better, And it came to pass, from the day when the ark rested in Kirjath-jearim, that a long time elapsed, even twenty years. Twenty years was not, as the E. V. seems to imply, the whole duration of the Ark’s sojourn at Kirjath-jearim, but the time that elapsed before the reformation now to be recorded. The period here passed over in silence was a dark page in Israel’s history, politically and religiously. They were vassals of the Philistines, reduced apparently to abject submission. The public worship of Jehovah was intermitted; for the Tabernacle seems to have been dismantled, and the Ark was in a private house. The people sank into gross idolatry. But meanwhile Samuel was growing in strength and influence, and when the right moment came and the desire for better things sprang up as the fruit of his prophetic labours, he was ready to take his place as the leader of the nation. lamented after the Lord] As a child follows the father who has been forced to turn a way in anger, and with sighs and tears entreats for reconciliation.

And all the house of Israel lamented ... - The occupation of the country about Shiloh by the Philistines 1 Samuel 7:3 was partly the reason for the ark being kept so long at Kirjath-jearim.

THE GREAT AND REFORM UNDER SAMUEL, 1 Samuel 7:2-17. 2. Twenty years — A period of silence in the history of Israel. What notable events occurred and what Samuel did during these twenty years are largely matters of conjecture.