The Judges & Ruth

The five men who went to spy out the land went up, and came in there, and took the engraved image, and the ephod, and the teraphim, and the molten image: and the priest stood by the entrance of the gate with the six hundred men girt with weapons of war.

When these went into Micah’s house, and fetched the engraved image, the ephod, and the teraphim, and the molten image, the priest said to them, “What are you doing?”

They said to him, “Hold your peace, put your hand on your mouth, and go with us, and be to us a father and a priest. Is it better for you to be priest to the house of one man, or to be priest to a tribe and a family in Israel?”

The priest’s heart was glad, and he took the ephod, and the teraphim, and the engraved image, and went in the midst of the people.

So they turned and departed, and put the little ones and the livestock and the goods before them.

When they were a good way from the house of Micah, the men who were in the houses near to Micah’s house were gathered together, and overtook the children of Dan.

They cried to the children of Dan. They turned their faces, and said to Micah, “What ails you, that you come with such a company?”

He said, “You have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, and have gone away, and what more do I have? How then do you say to me, ‘What ails you?’”

The children of Dan said to him, “Don’t let your voice be heard among us, lest angry fellows fall on you, and you lose your life, with the lives of your household.”

The children of Dan went their way: and when Micah saw that they were too strong for him, he turned and went back to his house.

They took that which Micah had made, and the priest whom he had, and came to Laish, to a people quiet and secure, and struck them with the edge of the sword; and they burnt the city with fire.

There was no deliverer, because it was far from Sidon, and they had no dealings with any man; and it was in the valley that lies by Beth Rehob. They built the city, and lived therein.

They called the name of the city Dan, after the name of Dan their father, who was born to Israel: however the name of the city was Laish at the first.

The children of Dan set up for themselves the engraved image: and Jonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Moses, he and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land.

So they set them up Micah’s engraved image which he made, all the time that God’s house was in Shiloh.

In those days, when there was no king in Israel, there was a certain Levite living on the farther side of the hill country of Ephraim, who took to him a concubine out of Bethlehem Judah.

His concubine played the prostitute against him, and went away from him to her father’s house to Bethlehem Judah, and was there the space of four months.

Her husband arose, and went after her, to speak kindly to her, to bring her again, having his servant with him, and a couple of donkeys: and she brought him into her father’s house; and when the father of the young lady saw him, he rejoiced to meet him.

His father-in-law, the young lady’s father, retained him; and he stayed with him three days: so they ate and drink, and lodged there.

On the fourth day, they arose early in the morning, and he rose up to depart. The young lady’s father said to his son-in-law, “Strengthen your heart with a morsel of bread, and afterward you shall go your way.”

So they sat down, ate, and drank, both of them together: and the young lady’s father said to the man, “Please be pleased to stay all night, and let your heart be merry.”

The man rose up to depart; but his father-in-law urged him, and he lodged there again.

He arose early in the morning on the fifth day to depart; and the young lady’s father said, “Please strengthen your heart and stay until the day declines”; and they both ate.

When the man rose up to depart, he, and his concubine, and his servant, his father-in-law, the young lady’s father, said to him, “Behold, now the day draws toward evening, please stay all night: behold, the day grows to an end, lodge here, that your heart may be merry; and tomorrow go on your way early, that you may go home.”

But the man wouldn’t stay that night, but he rose up and departed, and came over against Jebus (the same is Jerusalem): and there were with him a couple of donkeys saddled; his concubine also was with him.