Hophni

(pugilist) and Phinehas (brazen mouth), the two sons of Eli, who fulfilled their hereditary sacerdotal duties at Shiloh. Their brutal rapacity and lust, (1 Samuel 2:12-17,22) filled the people with disgust and indignation, and provoked the curse which was denounced against their father’s house, first by an unknown prophet, (1 Samuel 2:27-36) and then by Samuel. ch. (1 Samuel 3:11-14) They were both cut off in one day in the flower of their age, and the ark which they had accompanied to battle against the Philistines was lost on the same occasion. (1 Samuel 4:10,11) (B.C. 1130.)