3Now the boy Samuel was serving Yahweh in the presence^a of Eli. The word of Yahweh was rare in those days; visions were not widespread. ²And then^b one day when Eli was lying in his place (now his eyes had begun to grow weak so that he was not able to see) ³and the lamp of God had not yet gone out, Samuel was lying in the temple^c of Yahweh where the ark of God was. ⁴Then Yahweh called out to Samuel and he said, “Here I am!” ⁵And he ran to Eli and said, “Here I am, because you called me.” But he said, “I did not call you. Go back and lie down.” So he went and lay down. ⁶And Yahweh called Samuel again, so Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, “Here I am, because you called me.” And he said, “I did not call you, my son. Go back and lie down.” ⁷Now Samuel did not yet know Yahweh, and the word of Yahweh had not yet been revealed to him. ⁸Again Yahweh called Samuel a third time, so he got up and went to Eli and said, “Here I am, because you called me.” Then Eli realized that Yahweh was calling the boy. ⁹So Eli said to Samuel “Go lie down. If he calls^d to you, then you must say, ‘Speak Yahweh, because your servant is listening.’ ” So Samuel went and lay down in his place.

¹⁰Then Yahweh came and stood there and called out as before,^e “Samuel! Samuel!” And Samuel said, “Speak, because your servant is listening.”

Read in Logos

1 Samuel 3:10: And the Lord came and stood, calling as at other times, “Samuel! Samuel!” And Samuel said, “Speak, for your servant hears.”

Footnotes

aLiterally “in the face of”
bLiterally “And it happened”
cAlthough the Hebrew text reads “temple,” this is a reference to the tabernacle (see 1:3, 9)
dLiterally “And it will happen that if he calls”
eLiterally “as an occurrence, in an occurrence”