A birth announcement 1:19-20

Hannah's godly character surfaces again in the naming of Samuel. His name means "heard of God"or "God hears."Hannah, whose name means "grace"or "graciousness,"recognized that Samuel's birth was not just a coincidence but an answer to prayer and a supernatural gift from God.

"Yahweh is the key actor in the narrative. Hannah could speak complaint and petition only because she submitted to Yahweh. Eli could give assurance to her only because he spoke on behalf of Yahweh. The son is born only because Yahweh remembered. Everything depends on asking Yahweh and being answered by Yahweh. Thus scene 3 [vv. 19-20] resolves scene 1 [vv. 3-8], but only by way of the decisive intrusion of Yahweh through scene 2 [vv. 9-18]."²⁴