Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice and at mine offering, which I have commanded [in my] habitation; and honourest thy sons above me, to make yourselves fat with the chiefest of all the offerings of Israel my people?
Ver. 29. Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice?] i.e., Why slight ye, and, as headstrong horses, a trample under foot my holy ordinances?
“ Quae tibi pro vili, sub pedibusque iacent? ”
And honourest thy sons above me.] Choosing rather to gratify them than to glorify me, by abdicating them from the priesthood. But it may be Eli feared lest the high priesthood should by this means go from his family, as it had before from Eleazar's for like misdemeanour, which also afterwards befell him, and he by seeking to prevent it, hastened it.
To make yourselves fat with the chiefest.] Whereby you intrench upon God's part. And because Eli himself ate part thereof, he is also blamed: or rather because he suffered these disorders. Of Claudius, Emperor, it was said, Non faciendo malus, sed patiendo, fuit. And of Edward the Confessor, that, by Earl Godwin's insolencies, though a good man, yet, not by doing, but enduring ill, he was held to be a bad prince. b
a Metaph. a refractario pecore. - Pisc.
b Dan. Hist.