Commentaria in I Regum (I Samuelis)
Finally St. Chrysostom urges this example of Anna, book 3 Against the Revilers of the Monastic Life, and teaches that parents ought to permit their sons to be servants in the heavenly ministry, not bringing them into the temple, as Anna did Samuel, but dedicating them to heaven itself with the angels for the divine ministry, for religious minister to God together with angels; from which it follows also that they contribute much more to the glory and happiness of their parents than if they had remained in the world.
26. AS THY SOUL LIVETH,—that is, I swear by thy soul and life: or, what I say is as true as that thou livest, or I wish thee life.
28. THEREFORE I ALSO HAVE LENT (less rightly St. Gregory reads “commended”) HIM TO THE LORD ALL THE DAYS THAT HE SHALL BE LENT (shall be) TO THE LORD.—Lent, that is, delivered, as the Chaldee renders, given, as God gave him to me, as if she said: God gave him to me; wherefore I give back and dedicate him to God, that he may minister to Him perpetually in the tabernacle; for the Hebrew scaal, in Hiphil hischil, signifies not only to ask and request, but also to lend to one asked and requested, to give, to bestow, by catachresis; for the Hebrews’ verbs signify an action now begun, now perfected, especially in Hiphil. Scaal therefore signifies both to ask, and to hear the asking, or to give and bestow the thing asked. Whence Samuel here in the Hebrew is called as if Saul leel, that is, given or lent and delivered to God. Saul also, the first king of Israel, was so called, as if given by God, or asked by the people and called by God. Whence from Saul, who was of the tribe of Benjamin, Saul-Paul the Apostle, sprung from the same tribe of Benjamin, was named; hence he himself, at the beginning of his epistle, gives himself this title: “Paul, called an Apostle,” etc.
In the Hebrew there is a beautiful paronomasia. For Anna says: I scaalti, that is, I asked Samuel of God and obtained him; therefore I in turn hiscilti, that is, have lent and delivered him to God, that he may be Saul, that is, lent, given and dedicated to God through all his life. She alludes to the name Samuel, and gives it another etymology, as if she said: My Samuel was at the beginning so called as Saul meel, that is, asked of God; but now he is called Samuel as Saul leel, that is, given and offered, nay rendered back to the Lord: “All the days that he shall be lent (supply, shall be) to the Lord,” as if: as long as he shall survive, he shall be lent, given and dedicated to God, that He may use him at pleasure. Whence the Septuagint render chrēsin Kyriou, that is, the use of the Lord, as if she said: She delivered him to the Lord to be used for any use of His. Vatablus: I also have made him over to the Lord all the days in which he was made over to the Lord, as if she said: I gave him to the Lord, that through all his life he may be made over and devoted to the Lord. Hear St. Chrysostom, homily 2 On Anna: “See how modest she is; think not,” he says, “that I do a great or wonderful thing in dedicating my infant; I am not the author of this benefit, but I pay a debt; I received a deposit, and I restore it to Him who gave it.”
The same, homily 21 on the Epistle to the Ephesians: “Because she offered the firstfruits (of her sons, namely Samuel), her womb was made fruitful, and she obtained other brothers for him also.” Let parents imitate this, that they may not call back sons who aspire to Religion, but rather urge them on; for so they will be enriched by God both in sons and in means. Hear also St. Ambrose, Exhortation to Virgins, praising Juliana, a most noble matron of Rome, because she had dedicated her only son after the example of our Anna: “Thou, my son,” he says, “obtained by me and vowed by me, know by whom thou wast given to me; he fashioned thy face; he set thy limbs; he received my prayers, to whose temple, to whose service I consecrated thee before thou wast born. Not to thy parents, not to thyself, but to God wast thou born, whose thou beganst to be before thou camest forth from thy mother’s womb. And all indeed are his; but thou wast specially promised to the Lord; thou art rendered back; I, like Anna, promised that all the days and nights of thy life thou shouldst not depart from the sight of the Lord.”
“... a woman,” he says, “who left nothing for herself, offered to God all she had; whose life is a schooling of discipline and a certain pattern of chastity, by good purpose and better teaching.”
Hear also St. Bernard, epistle 110, addressing parents: “If God makes your son His own, what do you lose? or what does he himself lose? From rich he becomes richer, from noble more high-born, from illustrious more renowned; and what is greater than all these, from a sinner a saint; but you do not lose him; rather you gain through him many sons; as many as we are in Clairvaux, we receive him as brother, and you as parents.”
ALL THE DAYS.—Lyranus judges that Samuel ministered to God in the temple only until the fiftieth year of his age; for at that age Levites were released as if discharged, and were no longer bound to serve in the tabernacle, as is plain from Numbers chapter 8, verse 25. But this is repugnant to this place; whence others commonly judge that he served God in the temple through all his life. So Philo, in the book On Dreams, at the end, St. Augustine on Psalm 98, St. Jerome on Ezechiel chapter 44, Blessed Peter Damian, book 5, epistle 9, Chrysostom, homily 4 on the Acts, whom hear: “Consider Samuel, who after forty years, when he had administered the affairs of the people, was nevertheless still nourished in the temple.”
Hence the Fathers teach that the greatest care must be used by parents in the education of boys, and that the boys themselves ought from tender years to dedicate themselves to virtue and to God. Hear among others St. Chrysostom on Psalm 14, asking why this and other psalms are inscribed “unto the end,” and answering: “Because,” he says, “it teaches of justice and the other virtues; but he who teaches of these ought not to persuade them toward the end of life, but from the beginning and from the very cradle.” And a little after: “If,” he says, “none of you wishes to possess an old servant, how much more does God wish for youth, and joins it to Himself as an untouched virgin; that He may claim the firstfruits of his life, lest anyone, having wasted his youth on sin, reserve a languid and enervated old age for virtue, and temper the dregs of life with wisdom.”
And Clement of Alexandria, Paedagogus book 1, chapter 5: “As,” he says, “fathers and mothers look more gladly on the colts of horses, the calves of oxen, the whelps of lions, the fawns of deer, and the little child of man; so too the Father of all receives, loves and defends them.”
More on this matter our Mendoza heaps up here. Finally, what Plato said, that those who wish to become eminent in any art or science ought to practise it from boyhood, is more true in the pursuit of virtue and holiness. Hence eminent Saints from boyhood devoted themselves to holiness, and others.
Moreover this vow of the mother did not bind Samuel so that, when he grew up, he could not freely depart from the temple and choose another place and state of life, as Lessius teaches, treatise On Vows, doubt 10. Samuel nevertheless wished to keep his mother’s vow, and to make it good through all his life.
AND SHE PRAYED,—giving thanks to God, and singing the following canticle, chapter 2; for the first part of prayer ought to be the praise of God and thanksgiving, as Paul teaches. Hence praise is at times taken for prayer, as Lamentations chapter 2, verse 19: “Arise, give praise in the night.” And Jeremias chapter 7: “Therefore do not thou pray for this people, neither take to thee praise for them.” Anna, exulting for the birth of Samuel, sings a hymn to God, and at the same time prophesies of Christ. Soon, verse 12, the sins of the sons of Heli are narrated. Thence, verse 18, the ministry of Samuel, and the bearing of five children by Anna, blessed by Heli. Finally, verse 22, Heli rebukes his sons, but too gently: whence, verse 27, he is reprehended by God through a Prophet, who therefore announces to him the coming calamities of himself as well as of his sons and descendants.