1 Samuel 2:1

Hannah Exalts the Lord in Prayer

2:1 Hannah prayed, ¹ 

“My heart rejoices in the Lord;

my horn ²  is exalted high because of the Lord.

I loudly denounce ³  my enemies,

for I am happy that you delivered me. ⁴ 

1 Samuel 2:10

2:10 The Lord shatters ⁵  his adversaries; ⁶ 

he thunders against them from ⁷  the heavens.

The Lord executes judgment to the ends of the earth.

He will strengthen ⁸  his king

and exalt the power ⁹  of his anointed one.” ¹⁰ 

[2:1]  ¹ tn Heb “prayed and said.” This is somewhat redundant in contemporary English and has been simplified in the translation.

[2:1]  ² sn Horns of animals have always functioned as both offensive and defensive weapons for them. As a figure of speech the horn is therefore often used in the Bible as a symbol of human strength (see also in v. 10). The allusion in v. 1 to the horn being lifted high suggests a picture of an animal elevating its head in a display of strength or virility.

[2:1]  ³ tn Heb “my mouth opens wide against.”

[2:1]  ⁴ tn Heb “for I rejoice in your deliverance.”

[2:10]  ⁵ tn The imperfect verbal forms in this line and in the next two lines are understood as indicating what is typically true. Another option is to translate them with the future tense. See v. 10b.

[2:10]  ⁶ tc The present translation follows the Qere, many medieval Hebrew manuscripts, the Syriac Peshitta, and the Vulgate in reading the plural (“his adversaries,” similarly many other English versions) rather than the singular (“his adversary”) of the Kethib.

[2:10]  ⁷ tn The Hebrew preposition here has the sense of “from within.”

[2:10]  ⁸ tn The imperfect verbal forms in this and the next line are understood as indicating what is anticipated and translated with the future tense, because at the time of Hannah’s prayer Israel did not yet have a king.

[2:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “the horn,” here a metaphor for power or strength. Cf. NCV “make his appointed king strong”; NLT “increases the might of his anointed one.”

[2:10]  ¹⁰ tc The LXX greatly expands v. 10 with an addition that seems to be taken from Jer 9:23-24.

[2:10]  sn The anointed one is the anticipated king of Israel, as the preceding line makes clear.