When the man Elkanah went up with all his family to offer the annual sacrifice to the LORD and to fulfill his vow, Hannah did not go. She said to her husband, "After the boy is weaned, I will take him and present him before the LORD, and he will live there always."
"Do what seems best to you," Elkanah her husband told her. "Stay here until you have weaned him; only may the LORD make good his word." So the woman stayed at home and nursed her son until she had weaned him.
After he was weaned, she took the boy with her, young as he was, along with a three-year-old bull, an ephah of flour and a skin of wine, and brought him to the house of the LORD at Shiloh. When they had slaughtered the bull, they brought the boy to Eli, and she said to him, "As surely as you live, my lord, I am the woman who stood here beside you praying to the LORD. I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him. So now I give him to the LORD. For his whole life he will be given over to the LORD." And he worshiped the LORD there.
Then Elkanah went home to Ramah, but the boy ministered before the LORD under Eli the priest.
How old was Samuel when Hannah gave him to Eli? He could have been less than a year old, perhaps only a few months old. It sounds like this was the order of events:
- Annual sacrifice; Hannah prays for a child
- Hannah conceives
- Hannah gives birth to Samuel
- Annual sacrifice; Elkanah and family attend while Hannah and Samuel stay home
- Samuel is weaned
- Hannah and Samuel join the family at the sacrifice
- Elkanah (and family) return home, but Samuel stays with Eli
I'm curious. Could you please tell me what brought you to this page by mentioning it in a comment? I won't publish the comment, if you ask me not to.
What brought me here? I was wondering how old a child was when weaned in OT times. I don't think I got the answer yet.
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