1. During the time young Samuel was minister to the Lord under Eli, the word of the Lord was scarce and vision infrequent.
2. One day Eli was asleep in his usual place. His eyes had lately grown so weak that he could not see.
3. The lamp of God was not yet extinguished, and Samuel was sleeping in the temple of the Lord where the ark of God was.
4. The Lord called to Samuel, who answered, “Here I am.”
5. He ran to Eli and said, “Here I am. You called me.” “I did not call you,” Eli answered. “Go back to sleep.” So he went back to sleep.
6. Again the Lord called Samuel, who rose and went to Eli. “Here I am,” he said. “You called me.” But he answered, “I did not call you, my son. Go back to sleep.”
7. Samuel did not yet recognize the Lord, since the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him.
8. The Lord called Samuel again, for the third time. Getting up and going to Eli, he said, “Here I am. You called me.” Then Eli understood that the Lord was calling the youth.
9. So he said to Samuel, “Go to sleep, and if you are called, reply, ‘Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.’” When Samuel went to sleep in his place,
10. the Lord came and stood there, calling out as before: Samuel, Samuel! Samuel answered, “Speak, for your servant is listening.”
11. The Lord said to Samuel: I am about to do something in Israel that will make the ears of everyone who hears it ring.
12. On that day I will carry out against Eli everything I have said about his house, beginning to end.