1 Samuel 1:1

Hannah Gives Birth to Samuel

1:1 There was a man from Ramathaim Zophim, ¹  from the hill country of Ephraim, whose name was Elkanah. He was the son of Jeroham, the son of Elihu, the son of Tohu, the son of Zuph, an Ephraimite.

1 Samuel 1:4

1:4 Whenever the day came for Elkanah to sacrifice, he used to give meat portions to his wife Peninnah and to all her sons and daughters.

1 Samuel 1:8

1:8 Finally her husband Elkanah said to her, “Hannah, why do you weep and not eat? Why are you so sad? ²  Am I not better to you than ten ³  sons?”

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¹ tc The translation follows the MT. The LXX reads “a man from Ramathaim, a Zuphite”; this is followed by a number of recent English translations. It is possible the MT reading צוֹפִים (tsofim) arose from dittography of the mem (מ) at the beginning of the following word.

² tn Heb “why is your heart displeased?”

³ sn Like the number seven, the number ten is sometimes used in the OT as an ideal number (see, for example, Dan 1:20, Zech 8:23).