Lives of Scripture

Eliel led the clan of Hebron, one of the Kohathite Levite families, with eighty kinsmen under him in David's reorganization of Levitical service (1 Chronicles 15:9). He appears at a turning point in Israel's worship: David's first attempt to bring the ark of the covenant to Jerusalem had ended in disaster when Uzzah, steadying the ark on a cart, touched it and was struck dead, because it had not been carried the way the Law prescribed (1 Chronicles 13:7-10). Chastened, David gathered the priests and Levites and called Eliel by name along with the other Levitical chiefs -- Uriel, Asaiah, Joel, Shemaiah, and Amminadab -- telling them, "You are the heads of the fathers' households of the Levites; consecrate yourselves, both you and your relatives, that you may bring up the ark of the LORD... to the place that I have prepared for it" (15:11-12). David added bluntly that their earlier failure came "because we did not seek Him according to the ordinance" (15:13). This time Eliel and his fellow Levites did it correctly: "the sons of the Levites carried the ark of God on their shoulders with the poles thereon, as Moses had commanded according to the word of the LORD" (15:15). The ark entered Jerusalem safely, and celebration followed. Eliel's part is brief but real: named obedience that corrected a costly earlier mistake, restoring right worship of the LORD in Israel's new capital.