Breadcrumb: Are you deaf?

When God calls Samuel for the first time, Samuel goes rushing to Eli, thinking that it was the old priest who summoned him. Eli, confused, tells him that it wasn't him, and orders Samuel to go back to bed. This happens a second time, and then a third. Finally, Eli realizes that Samuel must be hearing the voice of God, and tells him not to come running the next time it happens. On the fourth calling, God gives Samuel a prophecy, the first of many. But we have to wonder whether God was teasing Samuel all this time. Either God sounded like Eli, in which case it's only natural that Samuel would run to his foster-father, or he didn't, in which case we have to wonder about this inauspicious start to Samuel's career as a prophet. (1 Sam. 3)