1st Samuel 4:14 And when Eli heard the noise of the crying, he said, What meaneth the noise of this tumult? And the man came in hastily, and told Eli. 15 Now Eli was ninety and eight years old; and his eyes were dim, that he could not see.
[Patriarchs & Prophets pp 585] The sound of wailing and lamentation reached the watcher beside the tabernacle. The messenger was brought to him. And the man said unto Eli, “Israel is fled before the Philistines, and there hath been also a great slaughter among the people, and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead.” Eli could endure all this, terrible as it was, for he had expected it.
But when the messenger added, “And the ark of God is taken,” a look of unutterable anguish passed over his countenance. The thought that his sin had thus dishonored God and caused Him to withdraw His presence from Israel was more than he could bear; his strength was gone, he fell, “and his neck brake, and he died.” The wife of Phinehas, notwithstanding the impiety of her husband, was a woman who feared the Lord.
The death of her father-in-law and her husband, and above all, the terrible tidings that the ark of God was taken, caused her death. She felt that the last hope of Israel was gone; and she named the child born in this hour of adversity, Ichabod, or “inglorious;” with her dying breath mournfully repeating the words, “The glory is departed from Israel: for the ark of God is taken.”
1st Samuel 4:20 And about the time of her death the women that stood by her said unto her, Fear not; for thou hast born a son. But she answered not, neither did she regard it. 22 And she said, The glory is departed from Israel: for the ark of God is taken.
May God add His blessing to the study of His word. “Good night” and God bless!