Judges 17–18

Chapter 17

Micah’s Idolatry

¹Now there was a man of the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Micah.

²He said to his mother, “The eleven hundred pieces of silver which were taken from you, about which you uttered a curse ¹in my hearing, behold, the silver is with me; I took it.” And his mother said, “Blessed be my son by the Lord.”

³He then returned the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother, and his mother said, “I wholly dedicate the silver from my hand to the Lord for my son ^ato make a graven image and a molten image; now therefore, I will return ¹them to you.”

⁴So when he returned the silver to his mother, his mother took two hundred pieces of silver and gave them to the silversmith who made ¹them into a graven image and a molten image, and ²they were in the house of Micah.

⁵And the man Micah had a ^1ashrine and he made an ^bephod and ^2chousehold idols and ³consecrated one of his sons, ^dthat he might become his priest.

⁶In those days ^athere was no king in Israel; ^bevery man did what was right in his own eyes.

⁷Now there was a young man from ^aBethlehem in Judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite; and he was ¹staying there.

⁸Then the man departed from the city, from Bethlehem in Judah, to ¹stay wherever he might find a place; and as he made his journey, he came to the ^ahill country of Ephraim to the house of Micah.

⁹Micah said to him, “Where do you come from?” And he said to him, “I am a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah, and I am going to ¹stay wherever I may find a place.”

¹⁰Micah then said to him, “Dwell with me and be ^aa father and a priest to me, and I will give you ten pieces of silver a year, a suit of clothes, and your maintenance.” So the Levite went in.

¹¹The Levite agreed to live with the man, and the young man became to him like one of his sons.

¹²So Micah ¹consecrated the Levite, and the young man ^abecame his priest and ²lived in the house of Micah.

¹³Then Micah said, “Now I know that the Lord will prosper me, seeing I have a Levite as priest.”

Chapter 18

Danites Seek Territory

^1aIn those days there was no king of Israel; and ^bin those days the tribe of the Danites was seeking an inheritance for themselves to live in, for until that day ¹an inheritance had not ²been allotted to them as a possession among the tribes of Israel.

²So the sons of Dan sent from their family five men out of their whole number, ¹valiant men from ^aZorah and Eshtaol, to spy out the land and to search it; and they said to them, “Go, search the land.” And they came to ^bthe hill country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah, and lodged there.

³When they were near the house of Micah, they recognized the voice of the young man, the Levite; and they turned aside there and said to him, “Who brought you here? And what are you doing in this place? And what do you have here?”

⁴He said to them, “Thus and so has Micah done to me, and he has hired me and ^aI have become his priest.”

⁵They said to him, “Inquire of God, please, that we may know whether our way on which we are going will be prosperous.”

⁶The priest said to them, “Go in peace; your way in which you are going ¹has the Lord’s approval.”

⁷Then the five men departed and came to ^aLaish and saw the people who were in it living in security, after the manner of the Sidonians, quiet and secure; for there was no ¹ruler humiliating them for anything in the land, and they were far from the Sidonians and had no dealings with anyone.

⁸When they came back to their brothers at Zorah and Eshtaol, their brothers said to them, “What do you report?”

⁹They said, “Arise, and let us go up against them; for we have seen the land, and behold, it is very good. And will you ¹sit still? Do not delay to go, to enter, to possess the land.

¹⁰“When you enter, you will come to a secure people with a spacious land; for God has given it into your hand, ^aa place where there is no lack of anything that is on the earth.”

¹¹Then from the family of the Danites, from Zorah and from Eshtaol, six hundred men armed with weapons of war set out.

¹²They went up and camped at Kiriath-jearim in Judah. Therefore they called that place ^1aMahaneh-dan to this day; behold, it is ²west of Kiriath-jearim.

¹³They passed from there to the hill country of Ephraim and came to the house of Micah.

Danites Take Micah’s Idols

¹⁴Then the five men who went to spy out the country of Laish said to their kinsmen, “Do you know that there are in these houses ^aan ephod and ¹household idols and a graven image and a molten image? Now therefore, consider what you should do.”

¹⁵They turned aside there and came to the house of the young man, the Levite, to the house of Micah, and asked him of his welfare.

¹⁶The six hundred men armed with their weapons of war, who were of the sons of Dan, stood by the entrance of the gate.

¹⁷Now the five men who went to spy out the land went up and entered there, and took ^athe graven image and the ephod and ¹household idols and the molten image, while the priest stood by the entrance of the gate with the six hundred men armed with weapons of war.

¹⁸When these went into Micah’s house and took the graven image, the ephod and ¹household idols and the molten image, the priest said to them, “What are you doing?”

¹⁹They said to him, “Be silent, ^aput your hand over your mouth and come with us, and be to us ^ba father and a priest. Is it better for you to be a priest to the house of one man, or to be priest to a tribe and a family in Israel?”

²⁰The priest’s heart was glad, and he took the ephod and ¹household idols and the graven image and went among the people.

²¹Then they turned and departed, and put the little ones and the livestock and the valuables in front of them.

²²When they had gone some distance from the house of Micah, the men who were in the houses near Micah’s house assembled and overtook the sons of Dan.

²³They cried to the sons of Dan, who turned ¹around and said to Micah, “What is the matter with you, that you have assembled together?”

²⁴He said, “You have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, and have gone away, and what do I have besides? So how can you say to me, ‘What is the matter with you?’ ”

²⁵The sons of Dan said to him, “Do not let your voice be heard among us, or else ¹fierce men will fall upon you and you will ²lose your life, with the lives of your household.”

²⁶So the sons of Dan went on their way; and when Micah saw that they were too strong for him, he turned and went back to his house.

²⁷Then they took what Micah had made and the priest who had belonged to him, and came to ^aLaish, to a people quiet and secure, and struck them with the edge of the sword; and they burned the city with fire.

²⁸And there was no one to deliver them, because it was far from Sidon and they had no dealings with anyone, and it was in the valley which is near ^aBeth-rehob. And they rebuilt the city and lived in it.

^29aThey called the name of the city Dan, after the name of Dan their father who was born in Israel; however, the name of the city formerly was Laish.

³⁰The sons of Dan set up for themselves ^athe graven image; and Jonathan, the son of ^bGershom, the son of ¹Manasseh, he and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land.

³¹So they set up for themselves Micah’s graven image which he had made, all the time that the ^ahouse of God was at Shiloh.