¶ Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani [Aramaic] = "My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" (Matt. xxvii. 46—A.V. and R.V. text; or "Why didst Thou forsake Me?"—R.V. margin).  In Mark xv. 34, Eloi, Eloi is another Aramaic spelling of Eli, Eli. (The Sunday School Teacher's Bible Manual, Hunter, 1894)

ELI (עֵלִי) (2).  Biblical.  [Hebrew = "ascension," "height."  So named apparently because he had reached the elevated position of being high priest.  One of the Hebrew letters in this word differs from the corresponding one in Eli = "my God"].  Akin to Arabic Ali.  Usage: America, Canada, Basque country, England, Israel.

    The high priest who was the immediate predecessor of Samuel.  Deeply pious, he had the essential qualification for his exalted office, but there was one serious defect in his conduct—he was not sufficiently firm with his two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, giving them only mild reproof when their behaviour in the priestly office was absolutely scandalous.  Divine judgment against him and his house was therefore denounced by the lips of the youthful Samuel, who then held an office suitable to his years in connection with Eli and the tabernacle at Shiloh.  There was not after the erring dignitary himself to be an old man in his family.  His two sons were to die in a single day, and a faithful priest was to arise who should supersede Eli's descendants in their high office, leaving them under the necessity of applying to this stranger for subordinate appointments that they might be fed (1 Sam. i. 9—iii. 21).  The first part of the prediction was soon afterwards fulfilled, Hophni and Phinehas being killed in a battle with the Philistines, to which they had gone as custodians of the Ark.  Eli, now ninety-eight years old, and blind, was sitting outside on a seat, when a man arrived from the scene of strife to say that the Israelites were totally defeated, his two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, slain, and the Ark of God taken.  All but the last item of intelligence he was prepared to hear; but on learning that the Ark of God was captured by the enemy, he fell back apparently unconscious, and being stout, broke his neck and expired (iv. 1-18).  He had judged Israel forty years, or, by the Hebrew reckoning, from 1181 to 1141 B.C.  The judgment against his posterity was executed when Solomon deposed Eli's descendant Abiathar from the high priesthood, substituting Zadok in his room (1 Kings ii. 35). (Ibid., Hunter, 1894)