What Does 1 Samuel 2:19 Mean?

And his mother made him a little robe, and brought it up to him from year to year, when she went up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice.

1 Samuel 2:19 · SDV

Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.

Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.

This verse in the King James

King James wording

King James Version

Moreover his mother made him a little coat, and brought it to him from year to year, when she came up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice.

THE KEY

The same Hebrew root describes Hannah bringing Samuel his coat and going up to worship, joining her yearly offering with her care for him.

THE MEANING

Hannah makes Samuel a coat and brings it to him year after year. Her care is part of the family’s recurring journey to worship: the trip that brings her to the offering also brings something made for her son.

THE ROOT

וְהַעֲלְתָה

wəhaʿălətāh

GROWS FROM

ע־ל־ה

to go up, rise, or bring up

“brought it up to him” in this verse is wəhaʿălətāh. The Hebrew uses forms of ⁨עלה⁩ both for Hannah bringing up Samuel’s coat and for her going up with her husband. English presents these as separate actions, while the shared root ties her care for Samuel to the family’s yearly ascent to worship.

ALSO GROWS

ʿōlāh: burnt offering; literally, that which rises or ascends

עֹלָה

The same root names an offering that ascends, alongside Hannah’s journey to offer sacrifice.

maʿăleh: ascent, step

מַעֲלֶה

This branch makes the root’s sense of upward movement explicit, echoing the repeated journey in the verse.

THE PATTERN

A garment can make care or belonging tangible on the body.

But Samuel was attending before the face of the LORD, a child belted with a linen ephod.

1 Samuel 2:18 · SDVSamuel’s garment accompanies him as a child serving before the LORD, while the next verse shows his mother bringing him another garment year by year.

Now Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, for he was the son of his old age, and he made him a coat of many colors.

Genesis 37:3 · SDVJoseph’s coat is made visible alongside his father’s love for him.

But the father said to his servants, "Quickly, bring out the first robe and put it on him, and give a ring into his hand and sandals onto his feet."

Luke 15:22 · SDVThe father places a robe on his son as part of welcoming him home.

THE THREAD

And this man went up out of his city yearly to bow down and to sacrifice to the LORD of hosts in Shiloh. And the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, the priests of the LORD, were there.

1 Samuel 1:3 · SDV

The Hebrew for “went up” in this verse comes from ⁨עלה⁩, the same root used when Hannah brings Samuel’s coat to him in 2:19. The yearly ascent is already the family’s rhythm of worship; Hannah’s return also carries something made for her son.

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