⁷So then, prepare^c one new utility cart and two milking cows that have never had a yoke on them, and you must harness the cows to the utility cart and then turn their calves from following them to their stall. ⁸And you must take the ark of Yahweh and place it on the utility cart with the gold objects that you are returning to him as a guilt offering. You must place them in the container^d beside the ark and then send it off so that it goes away. ⁹You must watch; if it goes up by the way of its territory to Beth Shemesh, he has caused this great disaster to come on us. But if not, then we will know his hand has not struck us; it was by chance that this happened to us. ¹⁰So the men did so; they took two milking cows and harnessed them to the utility cart, but they shut up their calves in the stall. ¹¹Then they put the ark of Yahweh on the utility cart with the container^e holding the gold mice and the images of their tumors. ¹²The cows went straight on the way on the road to Beth Shemesh, on the one main road, lowing as they went.^f They did not turn aside to the right or to the left, and the rulers of the Philistines were walking after them up to the border of Beth Shemesh.

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Footnotes

cLiterally “take and make”
dOr perhaps “chest” or “bag”
eOr perhaps “chest” or “bag”
fLiterally “they went going and lowing”