Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Harold R. Holmyard III" <hholmyard AT ont.com>]

Dear Jonathan,

> Chronicles "doctors" the genealogies. The Chronist makes Samuel a Levite,
> instead of an Ephraimite as in 1 Samuel 1:1, because in his time, with the
> Torah already out and operative, a non-Levite couldn't have assumed priestly
> functions.

HH: It may be more complicated than that. Hannah 
may have surrendered ownershp of the child in 
some sense:

1Sam. 1:11 And she made a vow, saying,  "O LORD 
Almighty, if you will only look upon your 
servant's misery and remember me, and not forget 
your servant but give her a son, then I will give 
him to the LORD for all the days of his life, and 
no razor will ever be used on his head."

HH: Even people, just as possessions, could be 
dedicated to the Lord to become His property:

Lev. 27:28 ¶ "'But nothing that a man owns and 
devotes to the LORD - whether man or animal or 
family land - may be sold or redeemed; everything 
so devoted is most holy to the LORD.

HH: And such dedicated people and things 
consequently came into the possession of the 
priests:

Num. 18:14 ¶  "Everything in Israel that is devoted to the LORD is yours.

Lev. 27:21 When the field is released in the 
Jubilee, it will become holy, like a field 
devoted to the LORD; it will become the property 
of the priests.

HH: This is not a new idea. Albright suggested 
that Samuel, though born in the tribe of Ephraim, 
was attached to the tabernacle as a Nazirite and 
was therefore drawn by Levitical tradition into 
family attachment to the tribe of Levi.

                                        Yours,
                                        Harold Holmyard