Prophecy in 1 Samuel

“He raises the needy from the dust; from the ash heap lifts up the poor” (2:8). “May he give strength to his king, and exalt the horn of his anointed!” (2:10)

Reading

Hannah, barren and mocked, is given a son and sings of a God who turns the world upside down: “The LORD makes poor and makes rich, humbles, and also exalts” (2:7). Her song ends with a king, though Israel has none yet, and calls him the LORD's “anointed,” the first time Scripture gives that title to a king. The horn, a sign of strength, is lifted up for him.

Fulfilled

Mary's Magnificat is woven from Hannah's song: “He has thrown down the rulers from their thrones but lifted up the lowly” (Luke 1:52). Zechariah blesses God for raising up a horn of salvation in the house of David (Luke 1:69). The anointed king of Hannah's song is Jesus, the Christ, a title that means “anointed” (CCC 436). The liturgy pairs the two songs: on December 22 Hannah's song is the psalm and the Magnificat is the Gospel.

Unfolding

The reversal Hannah sings of is not finished. The Church prays the Magnificat every evening, and Revelation shows its end, when the proud city falls (Revelation 18) and those who stayed faithful reign with Christ (20:4).

See also

Prophecy in Luke: “from now on will all ages call me blessed”.

“Samuel answered, ‘Speak, for your servant is listening.’” (3:10)

Reading

At a time when “the word of the LORD was scarce and vision infrequent” (3:1), God calls a boy sleeping near the ark. Samuel grows up, and the LORD does not permit “any word of his to go unfulfilled” (3:19); all Israel knows him as “a trustworthy prophet of the LORD” (3:20). The Catechism suggests that he must have learned to pray from his mother Hannah and from the priest Eli (CCC 2578).

Fulfilled

Samuel stands at the head of the line of prophets; St. Peter says that all the prophets, from Samuel onward, announced the days of Christ (Acts 3:24). Luke tells of the boy Jesus in his Father's house in words that echo Samuel's growing up (1 Samuel 2:26; Luke 2:52). Samuel's answer has become the prayer of every vocation.

“You are not the one they are rejecting. They are rejecting me as their king.” (8:7)

Reading

The elders ask for “a king over us, like all the nations” (8:5). God grants it, but Samuel warns what such a king will do: take their sons, their fields and their freedom, until “you will cry out because of the king whom you have chosen” (8:18).

Fulfilled

The warning comes true within two generations: Solomon's forced labor and heavy yoke split the kingdom (1 Kings 12:4, 16). Yet God turns even the people's request to his purpose. The kingship he did not want for Israel becomes the line through which he gives them his own King, the Son of David, whose kingdom “does not belong to this world” (John 18:36). The rejection of God as king is heard again at the Passion, when the chief priests answer, “We have no king but Caesar” (John 19:15).

“Then Samuel, with the horn of oil in hand, anointed him in the midst of his brothers, and from that day on, the spirit of the LORD rushed upon David.” (16:13)

Reading

God sends Samuel “to Jesse of Bethlehem” (16:1). The tall elder sons are passed over, for “The LORD looks into the heart” (16:7), and the youngest, out with the sheep, is anointed. The shepherd boy from Bethlehem becomes the pattern of every later hope for a king.

Fulfilled

Jesus is born in Bethlehem, “the city of David” (Luke 2:4, 11; Micah 5:1). He is the Anointed, the Christ (CCC 436), and at his baptism the Spirit comes upon him (Luke 3:22) as it rushed upon David. The Good Shepherd is the son of the shepherd-king, chosen as David was, not by appearance but by the heart of God.

See also

Prophecy in Micah, on Bethlehem; Psalm 23, the LORD my shepherd.

“For the battle belongs to the LORD, who shall deliver you into our hands.” (17:47)

Reading

Goliath of Gath defies the armies of Israel, and no one will face him. David comes with a staff, a sling and five smooth stones: “You come against me with sword and spear and scimitar, but I come against you in the name of the LORD of hosts” (17:45). He wins “without a sword in his hand” (17:50).

Fulfilled

The Fathers read the duel as a figure of Christ, the Son of David, who goes out alone for his people and overcomes the enemy not with the world's weapons but by the wood of the Cross. One champion wins the victory and the whole people share it. On the Cross, St. Paul says, Christ was “despoiling the principalities and the powers” (Colossians 2:15).

Unfolding

The battle still belongs to the LORD. Revelation shows the same pattern at the end: the victory is won by “the blood of the Lamb” and by the word of the martyrs' testimony, not by the sword (Revelation 12:11).