Nay, my sons; for it is no good report that I hear: ye make the LORD'S people to transgress.

Nay, my sons; for it is no good report that I hear: ye make Jehovah's people to transgress.

Do not so, my sons: for it is no good report that I hear, that you make the people of the Lord to transgress.

No, my sons, for it is no good report that I hear: ye make Jehovah's people transgress.

Nay, my sons; for the report which I am hearing is not good causing the people of Jehovah to transgress.,

No, my sons, the account which is given me, which the Lord's people are sending about, is not good.

Nay, my sons; for it is no good report which I hear the LORD'S people do spread abroad.

No, my sons, do not do this. For it is not a good report that I hear the people of the LORD spreading.

My sons, do not be willing. For it is no good report that I am hearing, so that you would cause the people of the Lord to transgress.

Nay, my sons; for [it is] no good report that I hear: ye make the LORD'S people to (q) transgress.
(q) Because they contemn their duty to God, (1-Samuel 2:17).

Nay, my sons,.... This seems to be too soft and smooth an appellation, too kind and endearing, considering the offence they were guilty of, and were now reproving for; rather they deserved to be called sons of Belial, the children of the devil, than sons of Eli, or brutes and shameless wretches, and such like hard names:
for it is no good report that I hear; a very bad one; far from being good, scarce anything worse could have been said of them; to rob persons of the flesh of their offerings, when there was a sufficient allowance made for them by law, and to be so impious as to require what was not their due, and even before the Lord had his; and to debauch the women that came to religious worship, and that in the sacred place of worship, they also being priests of the Lord, and married men; sins very shocking and sadly aggravated, and yet Eli treats them in this gentle manner:
ye make the Lord's people to transgress: by causing them to forbear to bring their sacrifices, being used in such an injurious and overbearing way; and by decoying the women into uncleanness, and by setting examples to others: or, "to cry out"; as in the margin of our Bibles, to exclaim against them for their exorbitant and lewd practices; so the Targum,
"the people of the Lord murmur because so ill used by them:''this clause may be read in connection with the former, "it is no good report that I hear, which ye cause to pass through the Lord's people"; ye occasion the people to speak ill of you everywhere, in the camp of Israel, throughout the whole nation; the report as it is bad, it is general, is in everyone's mouth; so Maimonides (u) interprets it; with which Jarchi and others agree (w).
(u) Moreh Nevochim, par. 1. c. 21. (w) Vid. T. Bab. Sabbat, fol. 55. 2. & praefat. Ben Chayim. ad Bib. Hebrews. Bomberg. & Buxtorf.

בּני אל, "Not, my sons," i.e., do not such things, "for the report which I hear is not good; they make the people of Jehovah to transgress." מערים is written without the pronoun אתּם in an indefinite construction, like משׁלּחים in 1-Samuel 6:3 (Maurer). Ewald's rendering as given by Thenius, "The report which I hear the people of God bring," is just as inadmissible as the one proposed by Bttcher, "The report which, as I hear, the people of God are spreading." The assertion made by Thenius, that העביר, without any further definition, cannot mean to cause to sin or transgress, is correct enough no doubt; but it does not prove that this meaning is inadmissible in the passage before us, since the further definition is actually to be found in the context.