In those days there was no king in Israel, and in those days the tribe of the Danites sought for themselves an inheritance to dwell in; for to that day [their lot] had not fallen to them for inheritance among the tribes of Israel.
Two facts sit side by side in this opening line: Israel had no king, and Dan had no portion of its own. The chapters that follow tie the two together.
Judges 17–21 do not follow the judges in time. They come last so the reader can see what lay under the whole history.
We have now reached the last division of the book. In it we get the revelation of the inner condition of the people, both toward God and toward one another. It lights up the whole history. So for this we go back behind the history. This condition is not the result of the history; it is its cause, and a lasting cause. The idolatry of Dan runs, as we are told, right through the whole period of the book.
The phrase names two failures at once.
Three hundred years after Moses warned them, we find the people in the land. But the closing chapters of Judges record a low moral condition, marked by gross corruption and violence. Two causes lie behind this low condition. First, they had thrown off the authority of God as their King. Second, as a result, every man was doing what was right in his own eyes. So they were marked by throwing off God's authority on one side, and by asserting human independence on the other.
The missing king is also a need the book keeps pointing to.
Something else is shown along with this — the need of a king. Give man a law, and he cannot be trusted to interpret it... This shows how the book of Judges prepares the way for the books of Kings; though there too it soon becomes clear that among all the kings who follow, the best are only shadows of the true King, for whom all creation waits.
Dan had land on paper but not in practice. Ridout weighs the wording, using an older English translation that prints words added by the translators in italics.
It is significant that the words "all their", joined to "inheritance", are in italics; they are not in the original. It really says: their inheritance had not fallen to them. In practice they had not inherited a place. Here is a people without a portion. As a matter of fact, the tribe of Dan had not taken their inheritance. The Philistines held a large part of it on one side, and, as we saw, Dan could not drive out the Amorites. So they were pushed up into the mountains and hemmed in so tightly that they had no enjoyment of their inheritance.
So Dan went looking for land somewhere else. Failure at home often turns into busy effort elsewhere.
No other tribe fails so completely to take hold of its inheritance. This is the only way we can understand that their lot had not fallen to them... Losing what is our own, and should be made our own, is often the reason for much restless activity among the people of God. It also explains much that looks like success in other directions... Here their own laziness or fear drove them to look for an inheritance somewhere else. Then they were as violent and greedy as they had been lazy before. Fallen human nature often shows itself in extremes like this.
An empty place does not stay empty.
This gives idolatry a fitting opening. The people of God who are not satisfied with the full enjoyment of their own inheritance are certainly ready for the enemy to come in and lead them astray. It is an unfilled heart, a heart that has not entered on its own portion, that lies open to these attacks.
Where Dan ended up says as much as what they left behind.
Laish was a quiet, prosperous town at the far north of Canaan... It offered Dan a conquest with no glory in it, but it also offered everything the natural heart could want. Dan had a battle to fight inside his own borders, a victory to win over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He chose a conquest with no danger, won at the far edge of the land. It lay far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was — an enemy left unchallenged, still holding Dan's true inheritance.
- No king — Israel threw off God's authority, and each man's own judgment took its place.
- No inheritance — Dan had land on paper. Philistines and Amorites kept it, because the tribe never drove them out.
- No rest — what you fail to take at home turns into restless searching somewhere else, and into work that can look like success.
- No defence — a heart not filled with its own portion is open ground, and idolatry walks straight in.
- No cost — Dan picked an easy conquest at the far edge of the land rather than face the real enemy sitting on what was already theirs.
And the children of Dan sent of their family five men of their whole number, men of valour, from Zoreah and from Eshtaol, to spy out the land, and to examine it; and they said to them, Go, examine the land. And they came to the hill-country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah, and lodged there.
Judges 18 opens with a tribe on the move. Verse 2 reads like an ordinary scouting trip. But two questions sit underneath it: why was Dan hunting for land at all, and why did the search end at a house full of idols?
Chapter 18 opens by saying Dan's inheritance had not fallen to them. One writer notes that the original wording says less than most translations do.
It matters that the words "all their," attached to "inheritance," are in italics; they are not in the original. It says, "[Their] inheritance had not fallen to them." In practice they had not inherited a place. Here is a people without a portion. In fact, the tribe of Dan had not taken their inheritance.
The land was theirs on paper. What Dan lacked was the strength to take it, and that lack is what sends the five men out.
Dan's allotted territory lay west of Benjamin, bordering the Mediterranean Sea (Josh. 19:40-48). But Philistines occupied most of it, and Dan did not have the energy to drive them out. So verse 1 says that their inheritance had not fallen to them. That is why they sent five men to look for what they thought was a better country (v. 2). Going north, they came to the mountains of Ephraim and found Micah's home a convenient place to stay.
Verse 2 has two halves: the search, and the night at Micah's house. One writer shows how the first led to the second.
From Zorah and Eshtaol they send out spies to search the land. Refusing God's choice for us we have, of course, to search out for ourselves. This becomes a snare to them by means of Micah's images: the path that is not with God is always exposed to Satan's ambushes.
The five men were not just looking for land. They were looking for land Dan could take without a fight.
Dan had proved himself the weakest of the tribes of Israel. The Amorites had forced him into the mountains (Judges 1:34), and he lacked the faith to take possession of his inheritance. So he sent out five men to scout, to search out the portion he still lacked. Laish was a quiet, prosperous town at the far north of Canaan. It lay far from the Zidonians who owned it, and it did business with no one. The city offered Dan a conquest with no glory in it, and on top of that, everything the natural heart could want… Dan had a battle to fight inside his own borders, a victory to win over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land. It was far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was — an enemy left undisturbed, holding Dan's true inheritance.
One writer puts the same choice to the reader.
The very things that you fear, that hamper you where you are, that are next to you, and that hinder you in the enjoyment of what is distinctly your own — those are the things you are to meet and overcome.
The same writer asks why a search party ends up lodging with an idol-maker.
God's people who are not satisfied with the full enjoyment of their own inheritance are ready for the enemy to come in and lead them astray. An unfilled heart is open to these attacks — a heart that has failed to take up its own portion… The Danites become restless, just as the Levite did. Like a bird that wanders from her nest, so is a man who wanders from his place.
The scouting trip did not end with the five men.
The tribe of Dan had failed to take the God-given inheritance (Josh. 19:40-46)… Then, in self-will and ignoring the will of God, they sent out spies to seek another inheritance. They meet Micah's priest, the man who serves for pay. The invaders take Micah's idols and his hired priest… Then they killed the people of Laish and set their city on fire. The whole tribe of Dan becomes idolatrous. We have in all a picture of complete apostasy.
- Unclaimed. God gave Dan land, but Dan never took it. Philistines held most of it and the Amorites drove the tribe into the hills, so Dan lived as a people without a portion.
- Restless. A heart that has not taken up its own portion grows restless — like a bird that wanders from her nest, so is a man who wanders from his place.
- Easier. Dan sent the five men after a cheap conquest at the far edge of the land, while the real enemy sat undisturbed inside Dan's own borders.
- Snared. A path that is not with God lies open to Satan's ambushes. Dan's scouts spent their first night in a house of idols.
- Apostasy. One man's private idols became a whole tribe's religion — a picture of complete apostasy.
When they were by the house of Micah, they knew the voice of the young man, the Levite; and they turned in thither, and said to him, Who brought thee hither? and what doest thou in this [place]? and what hast thou here?
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And he said to them, Thus and thus has Micah done to me; and he has hired me, and I am his priest.
Five scouts from the tribe of Dan stop at Micah's house and recognise the voice of a young Levite. They ask what he is doing there, and his answer turns on one word — Micah hired him.
In the previous verse the spies asked him three questions. His answer about being hired settles all three at once.
On their way, these five men met the Levite in the house of Micah and asked him: "Who brought you here? and what are you doing in this place? and what do you have here?" (v. 3). These questions should have opened the eyes of the Levite, if anything could have done so. What answer, in fact, could he give? His own will had brought him there, for he sought to establish himself; he did what Micah told him to do; he had money, a salary. These are the marks of every ministry that men appoint. Such ministry can go on entirely without God, since it depends on men and works for a salary.
One writer notes that the man feels no shame about it, and that the spies are quick to use him.
Micah finds his judgment also through the Levite who was to be the means of blessing to him from Jehovah. These wandering Danites already knew the wandering Levite, and they learn from him all about his present employment. He is not ashamed to speak of his hired priesthood, and they are quite ready to consult his oracle. They get the usual vague answer, and they read it to suit their own desires. But the end of this is not yet.
The man's own words mark a promotion he was never given. A Levite belonged to the service of God's house, but the priesthood was not his.
A Levite of Judah had, as a Levite, a connection with the house of the Lord, but no right to the priesthood. He happened to pass that way looking for a place to stay. Micah got hold of this man, who brought him a semblance of religious succession... Micah was doing well. He had installed a real Levite in his house. He valued him more than his own son, and he supported and paid him.
Another writer spells out what Micah's offer actually covered.
Micah invites him into his house, to be to him a father and a priest. He is to take charge of all Micah's religious interests. Micah will then be free from any care and difficulty about these, because he hands them all over to another man, who takes full charge of them. And so that he has no needless anxiety about his support, he is promised a fixed salary, paid by the year. He can look ahead for a whole year: salary, clothing, and his food included.
The spies now treat him as a channel to God, and he gives them what they came for.
He told them Micah had hired him to be his priest (v. 4). That impressed them, and they thought him qualified as a go-between they could rely on to ask God for them (v. 5)... The Levite did not need to inquire from God. He knew these men wanted a prosperous journey, so he gave them just the message they wanted... This poor man had no idea of the truth that Paul insists upon in Galatians 1:10, "If I still pleased men, I should not be a bondservant of Christ."
One writer reads the whole arrangement as a warning picture, not a curiosity of ancient history.
Here is a man-made god, a man-made worship and a man-made priest... Much of what is called worship is simply man-made, and it dishonours God as much as the idolatry of the nations, or even more... We have but one Priest as the people of God and that is our gracious Lord. Through His infinite grace all true believers are made priests with Him... Any other priesthood is man-made and a wicked assumption which has corrupted and is corrupting Christianity. The hirelings too are represented in this scene. Religious service is so much reduced to a commercial basis. And there is the delusion of thinking that the Lord must surely bless and give prosperity.
- Hired — The Levite's own word for his position is a wage. His answer shows his will brought him there, his employer directed him, and money kept him.
- Unashamed — He admits the deal without embarrassment. The spies hear it and trust him at once.
- Unauthorised — As a Levite he belonged to God's house, but the priesthood was never his. Micah paid for the appearance of it.
- Unreliable — He knew what these men wanted, so he gave them the message they wanted. A man who pleases men is no servant of Christ.
- Repeated — A man-made god gets a man-made priest. Where men turn service into a business, they still assume God must bless them.
And they said to him, Inquire, we pray thee, of God, that we may know whether our way on which we go shall be prosperous.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And the priest said to them, Go in peace before Jehovah is your way on which ye go.
Five men from the tribe of Dan stopped at Micah's house. They asked the young Levite there whether God would make their journey succeed. He sent them off with a blessing that sounds like the real thing. Commentators press two questions here. Who were these men consulting? Did any word from God pass through his mouth?
The Levite had already left the place God gave him. The spies did not weigh that. They treated him as an authority and asked him for direction.
They ask for direction from a man who has himself left the path God called him to. They are asking guidance, in effect, from a god that man has made: a god whose attributes have been trimmed, whose wisdom, holiness and righteousness have been cut away. In their place stands the image of man's own thinking — something that will not be too hard for man to obey and follow.
Rossier lists what actually put the Levite in that house.
His own will had brought him there; he wanted to set himself up. He did what Micah told him. He had money, a salary. These are the marks of every ministry that men appoint: it can run without God at all, since it depends on men and works for pay.
The text never says he consulted anyone. He read the men in front of him and told them what they came to hear.
The Levite did not need to inquire from God. He knew these men wanted a prosperous journey. So he gave them exactly the message they wanted: go in peace, and God's presence would be with them (v. 6). This poor man knew nothing of the truth Paul insists on in Galatians 1:10: "If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ."
What makes the reply so serious is the name he attaches to it. He tells them their journey is "under the eye of the LORD" — God's name on a message God never gave.
This is the man they ask about the road ahead, and they get the answer they wanted: "Go in peace. The journey on which you go is under the eye of the LORD" (v. 6). He had to mix the Lord's name into his false claim to be the people's oracle, or he would not have passed as a properly appointed minister.
The blessing covered a journey Dan should never have made. The enemy still held the land God gave the tribe, and Dan went after an easier target.
Dan had a battle to fight and a victory to win inside his own borders, over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest with no danger in it, far off at the end of the land, away from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses and away from his real enemy — who was left holding Dan's true inheritance without a word.
Commentators differ on how clear the priest's words were. On one reading the answer was vague, and the men read their own wishes into it.
He is not ashamed to talk about his hired priesthood, and they are quite ready to consult his oracle. They get the usual vague answer, and they read it to suit their own desires. But this is not the end of the story.
A strong inward sense that "the Lord led me" is not by itself evidence that He did.
God does not work by providence alone, and He does not guide His people by impressions that His word does not support. You might say the Lord led me to do this or that. But if it was not His holy word that led you, and not His Holy Spirit leading you through that Word, then take care. It may be only your own inclination leading you. Worse still, an enemy may have put the thought into your mind and arranged the circumstances to make them look like God's providence.
The promise of peace carried them to a quiet, unsuspecting town. Scripture records what they did there with unmistakable pity.
Then they came to Laish, to a people who were quiet and unsuspecting, and they struck them with the sword and burned the city with fire. Do we notice the pitying way — we can say it with reverence — in which the Holy Spirit describes what happened? Is there any such compassionate record of the taking of Jericho and Ai, where Israel was carrying out the Lord's own commands?
- Wrong road. Dan dodged the enemy in its own land and went after an easier prize far away. The men chose the errand first and asked for guidance afterwards.
- Wrong counsellor. They consulted a man who had left the place God gave him. Another man paid his wages, and he leaned on people instead of God.
- Wrong answer. He never asked God anything. He gave them the message they wanted and stamped the Lord's name on it. Some read his reply as vague enough for the men to fill in themselves.
- Wrong test. Impressions and helpful circumstances prove nothing on their own. God guides by His Word, and by His Spirit through that Word.
- Wrong end. "Go in peace" ended with a quiet town put to the sword. Scripture tells that story with a pity it never shows at Jericho.
And the five men departed, and came to Laish; and they saw the people that were therein, dwelling securely, after the manner of the Zidonians, quiet and secure; and no one was in the land who possessed authority, that might put [them] to shame in anything; and they were far from the Zidonians, and had nothing to do with [any] man.
Dan sends five scouts to the far north of the land. They find Laish: a town at ease, well supplied, and with no one nearby to defend it. Their report will decide the fate of that city. The verse raises two questions. Why was Dan looking for land here at all? And why does Scripture describe these victims with such pity?
The scouting trip was not a mission from God.
The tribe of Dan had failed to take the God-given inheritance (Josh. 19:40-46). "The Amorites pressed the people of Dan back into the hill country, for they did not allow them to come down to the plain" (Judges 1:34). Then, in self-will, they sent out spies to seek another inheritance. They disregarded the will of God entirely.
One writer draws out the principle, and the danger:
From Zorah and Eshtaol they send out spies to search the land. Refusing God's choice for us, we have, of course, to search out for ourselves. This becomes a snare to them through the idols in Micah's house. The path that is not with God is always exposed to Satan's ambushes.
Laish was more than an easy target. It was everything a weakened tribe could want.
Laish was a quiet and prosperous town at the northern edge of Canaan. It was far from the Sidonians who owned it, and it did no business with anyone. This city gave Dan the chance of a conquest with no glory in it. It also offered everything the natural heart could desire. The messengers called it a place with no lack of anything on earth. Apart from its wickedness, Laish was like a garden of the Lord. It was a conquest worthy of Lot, but not of Abraham. Dan had a battle to fight inside his own borders. He had a victory to win over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land. It was far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was. That enemy was left undisturbed, holding Dan's true inheritance.
One writer lists what the scouts found there:
These five spies went much farther north, beyond the borders of Naphtali. They found people living in peace, with no near neighbours and no need for weapons or walled towns. Laish had no king and no ties to any other people. This was exactly what the spies had been looking for. But the situation was most unusual. It was very different from what Israel's twelve spies found when they went to spy out Canaan (Num. 13:28-29).
Commentators read that peace differently. One takes the ease of Laish as a sign of moral collapse. He then turns the point back on the spies:
The Canaanites are living quiet and secure, in lawless self-indulgence. This shows them ripe for the judgment of God. They are clearly an easy prey; and the spies return with the good news to their waiting brothers. They would call it God's good news. We see the sins of others with sharp eyes, and we pronounce God's judgments readily enough. Self-interest and self-flattery are powerful in producing a kind of religion.
Some older translations read part of this verse differently. In them, no one in the land had authority to shame the people of Laish. One writer takes those words as the mark of the age:
This part of Judges shows nothing but lawlessness. There was not even a magistrate in the land who might put them to shame in anything.
No help could reach Laish from Sidon. One writer weighs how Scripture describes the attack:
Then they "came to Laish, to a people quiet and unsuspecting, and struck them with the edge of the sword and burned the city with fire. And there was no deliverer because it was far from Sidon, and they had no dealings with anyone" (Judges 18:27-28). Verse 7 of the same chapter describes them in the same way. Do we notice what we may reverently call the pitying way in which the Holy Spirit describes this act? And do we have any such compassionate record of the taking of Jericho and Ai? In those two cities, the Lord's own commands were being carried out in the destruction of the people.
- Refusal. Dan would not take the inheritance God had given, so the search of verse 7 starts in self-will, not in obedience.
- Substitute. Refusing God's choice means choosing for ourselves. A path taken without God lies open to the enemy's traps.
- Easy. Dan chose Laish because it was undefended and far away. The conquest cost nothing, far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses. Meanwhile the real enemy kept Dan's true portion.
- Blind. The spies read the self-indulgence of Laish as proof that God had handed the city over. We are quick to spot other people's sins, and self-interest can dress itself up as religion.
- Pitied. Scripture describes the victims with pity: quiet, unsuspecting, with no deliverer. It never uses that tone for Jericho or Ai, where God Himself gave the command.
-- And they came to their brethren at Zoreah and Eshtaol. And their brethren said to them, What [say] ye?
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And they said, Arise, and let us go up against them; for we have seen the land, and behold, it is very good; and ye are still! Be not slothful to go, to enter to take possession of the land.
The five scouts come home to Zorah and Eshtaol and press their whole tribe to move at once on Laish. Their words sound like faith, but the story raises a hard question: is this drive from God, or is it a people making up for the ground they never took at home?
The call not to be slow is strange coming from Dan. Their own territory was still in enemy hands.
No tribe fails so completely to take hold of its inheritance. This is the only way we can understand why their lot had not fallen to them. They had allowed the Philistines to regain the cities on the sea-coast, and the Amorites had forced them into the mountains. This is a loss of what is our own, and should be made our own. It is often the reason for much restless activity among the people of God, and for much that looks like success in other directions... Here we see them forced by their own laziness or fear to seek an inheritance elsewhere. They were then as violent and greedy as they had once been lazy. Human nature in fallen man usually shows itself in extremes like this.
"Very good" is the spies' own verdict. What made the land good was that nobody there could stop them, while their real fight waited at home.
This city gave Dan the chance of a conquest with no glory in it. It also offered everything the natural heart could desire. "A place," said the messengers, "where there is no lack of anything that is in the earth" (v. 10)... Dan had a battle to fight inside his own boundaries, a victory to win over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far edge of the land. It was far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from where his real enemy was. That enemy was left in undisturbed possession of Dan's true inheritance.
Once a people refuse the place God gave them, they must search out another for themselves. That search ran Dan into Micah's idols.
From Zorah and Eshtaol they send out spies to search the land. If we refuse God's choice for us, we have, of course, to search out a place for ourselves. This becomes a snare to them through Micah's images: the path that is not with God is always open to Satan's ambushes.
The spies come home sounding devout. Their report also shows how sharply we judge other people's sins.
The Canaanites are living quietly and safely, in lawless self-indulgence. That shows them ripe for the judgment of God. They are clearly an easy prey; and the spies return with the good news to their waiting fellow Danites. They would have it be God's good news. We see the sins of others with sharp eyes, and we are quick to pronounce God's judgments on them. Self-interest and self-flattery are powerful at producing a kind of religion. The spies speak to their fellow Danites in devout and earnest tones.
Another writer notes the same gap in the record itself:
They reported back to their fellow Danites in Zorah and Eshtaol. They urged them to seize the chance of taking a very good land with no significant opposition (vv. 8-10). They tell them God has given this land into their hand. Yet the record says nothing of their inquiring of God, or of God directing them.
Dan's mistake is not that they fought. It is where they chose to fight.
No one would say a word against their conquering territory that really belonged to them. But the point is that their activity was not connected with what God had given them. If they had aimed their activity at the Philistines, and been content to widen the boundary lines God Himself had given them, that would have been faith. But here they cannot enjoy what God has actually given them, so they go elsewhere to look for an easier place... How often God's people slip into an easier place! They want to settle down into a nicer portion than the rugged inheritance He has given them. Though it is a rugged inheritance, it yields the choicest fruit.
That choice had a long tail. The idolatry Dan picked up on the road settled into the whole tribe.
This subtle form of idolatry rules in the tribe of Dan until the captivity of the land. Those are significant words. It lasts until God comes in judgment and the ark is taken away from Shiloh.
- Slack first. Dan never took the inheritance God gave them. That unfinished ground is why they now hunt for another.
- Slack becomes frantic. Laziness flips into violence and greed. Busy work elsewhere can be the fruit of failure at home, not of faith.
- Easy is the tell. What made Laish "very good" was that it cost nothing to take, while the enemy they were meant to face stood untouched.
- Religion follows the plan. Having chosen for themselves, they dressed the choice in God's name — with no record of ever asking Him.
- The cost outlives the movers. The urgency of one day planted idolatry in a tribe that kept it until the land went into captivity.
When ye go in, ye shall come to a people secure, and the land is spacious in every direction; for God has given it into your hands; [it is] a place where there is no want of anything that is on the earth.
Five scouts return from the far north with a glowing report: rich land, wide open, and a people with no defences. They end by saying God has given the place into their hands. That one line turns a convenient raid into a mission. How does a tribe of Israel come to claim God's backing for a move He never ordered?
Dan had a territory already. They never took hold of it, and that failure set them wandering.
No tribe fails so plainly to take hold of its inheritance. That is the only way we can understand why no portion had fallen to them. They had let the Philistines take back the cities on the coast, and the Amorites had forced them into the mountains. This loss of what is ours, and what we should make our own, is often the reason for much restless activity among God's people. It also lies behind much that looks like success in other directions. ... Here we see them forced by their own laziness or fear to look for an inheritance somewhere else. They then became as violent and greedy as they had been idle before.
The scouts praise Laish for lacking nothing. That is what made it dangerous: it fed the appetite, and no one there could put up a fight.
The city gave Dan a chance at a conquest with no glory in it. It also offered everything the natural heart could want. "A place," said the messengers, "where there is no lack of anything that is in the earth" (v. 10). ... a conquest worthy of Lot but not of Abraham, and a temptation to the tribe of Dan in their weakened and careless state. Dan had a battle to fight inside his own borders, a victory to win over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land. It was far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was.
The claim that God has handed the land over sounds like faith. But it comes from men who had just asked a god of their own making for direction.
They get the very direction they want. They did just what people do today; they go and ask the god of their own thinking. When you ask God's guidance, are you asking an idol, or are you asking the living God? The living God has His will expressed in His Word. How often you find people saying, the Lord led me to do this or that, or the Lord laid it on my heart. They mean that they had an impression to do it. Was that impression from God?
They speak of Laish's guilt as freely as they speak of God's gift.
The Canaanites are living quiet and secure, in lawless self-indulgence, which shows them ripe for the judgment of God. They are plainly an easy prey, and the spies return with the good news to their waiting brothers. God's good news they would call it. We see the sins of others with sharp eyes, and we are quick to pronounce God's judgments. Self-interest and self-flattery have great power to produce a kind of religion, and so the spies talk to their brothers in a religious tone, with great feeling.
Compare this account with the earlier conquests God Himself commanded. The difference in tone is hard to miss.
Then they "came to Laish, to a people quiet and unsuspecting, and struck them with the edge of the sword and burned the city with fire. And there was no deliverer, because it was far from Sidon, and they had no dealings with anyone" (Judges 18:27-28). Verse 7 of the same chapter gives a similar description. Do we notice what we may reverently call the pity in the way the Holy Spirit describes what happened? Do we find any such tender record of the taking of Jericho and Ai, where Israel was carrying out the Lord's commands in destroying the people of those two cities?
The pull toward an easier portion is not confined to Dan.
They cannot enter into the enjoyment of what God has actually given them, so they go elsewhere for an easier place than the one held by the powerful Philistines. An easier place for themselves. How often God's people slip into an easier place, wanting to settle down in a pleasanter portion than the rugged inheritance He has given them. Though it is rugged, that inheritance yields the choicest fruit.
- Failure first. Dan never took the ground God gave. The search for an easier land grew out of that loss, and restless activity elsewhere can hide it.
- Cheap conquest. Laish offered everything the natural heart wants and no serious enemy — a prize fit for Lot, not for Abraham.
- Borrowed piety. "God has given it into your hands" came from men who had just asked a god of their own making.
- Quiet victims. Scripture pities the unsuspecting people of Laish. It never speaks that way of Jericho and Ai, where Israel obeyed God's own command.
- Rugged ground. Face the enemy at your own door. The harder inheritance is the one that yields the choicest fruit.
And there went from thence of the family of the Danites, out of Zoreah and out of Eshtaol, six hundred men girded with weapons of war.
Six hundred armed men march out of Zorah and Eshtaol — the whole fighting strength of a tribe on the move. Why did a tribe of Israel need to look for land at all? And why march north, instead of fighting for what God had already given it?
Dan's march begins in failure. These two towns were all Dan still held of a much larger allotment. One writer makes that shrunken foothold the key to everything that follows.
No tribe fails so badly to take hold of its inheritance. This is the only way we can understand that their lot had not fallen to them. They had let the Philistines take back the cities on the sea coast, and the Amorites had forced them into the mountains. This loss of what is our own, and of what we should make our own, is often the reason for much restless activity among the people of God. It lies behind much that looks like success in other directions too. As far as their original possession goes, their history clings around Zorah and Eshtaol. These names carry weight, cut off as they are from the rest of what God had allotted them. Here we see them forced by their own laziness or fear to look for an inheritance somewhere else. They were then as violent and grasping as they had been idle before.
The verse notes their weapons. The question is where they took them. Their target lay at the far end of the land. The enemy holding their own inheritance lay in the valley at their feet.
Dan had a battle to fight and a victory to win inside his own borders, over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land. It lay far from the eyes of God's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was. That enemy kept Dan's true inheritance, and no one said a word to him.
Another writer turns this into a direct question for the reader — the enemy nearest us is the one we are meant to face.
And so there is that hard thing lying right at your own door. You have looked at it and feared it. It has stood like a great barrier between you and what was your true enjoyment and privilege. That is the thing for you to conquer. If you do not, you will be like Dan. You will turn away from your proper place, and open your doors wider to taking lower ground about God and all His things. Is that not true? Is this not a real and important thing for us to notice? It is just this spirit of compromise, this looking for an easier path, that opens the way to dishonour and to disobeying our blessed God.
Five scouts had already gone this road ahead of the six hundred. Why did Dan need to search for land?
From Zorah and Eshtaol they send out spies to search the land. If we refuse God's choice for us, then of course we have to search things out for ourselves. This becomes a snare to them through Micah's images. A path that is not walked with God is always open to Satan's ambushes.
Zorah and Eshtaol appear again in Samson's story. One writer also notes when this march happened.
Samson grows, and the Spirit of Jehovah begins to stir him in the camp of Dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol. That camp had belonged to the six hundred men whose story is told later (ch. 18), though what they did happened long before Samson's time.
The road took the six hundred past Micah's house of idols. Notice what they wanted from it.
The five men knew this was a house of idol worship. Instead of keeping away from it, they told their company what was inside: an ephod, household idols, a carved image and a cast image. In other words, everything they needed for a well-rounded religion! So Micah was not the only one who had given in to the idolatry of the Canaanite nations. In this case all the 600 men of Dan had too. They were willing to rob Micah openly so that they could be religious themselves! What a state, so soon after Israel entered the land, as the book of Joshua records!
- Loss — Dan never took the land God gave it. The Philistines held the coast and the Amorites pushed Dan into the hills. Zorah and Eshtaol were a remnant, not a home.
- Restlessness — Ground we fail to hold breeds busy work elsewhere that can look like success. Dan swung from idleness to violence.
- Evasion — Six hundred armed men were enough for a far-off conquest without danger. They were not enough for the enemy in their own valley.
- Searching — Refuse God's choice, and we must scout the ground ourselves. That self-chosen road ran straight past Micah's idols.
- Spread — The men who fled their real battle carried one house's images into a whole tribe. One man's idolatry became a tribe's.
And they went up and encamped in Kirjath-jearim, in Judah; therefore they call that place Mahaneh-Dan to this day behold, it is behind Kirjath-jearim.
Six hundred armed men from one tribe leave their own towns and camp in Judah. The name they left on that ground outlasted the march. Why was a tribe of Israel on the road at all? Why name a campsite after themselves?
The march begins with a loss, not a conquest. Dan had land assigned but never took it. Commentators trace the restlessness of this march back to that failure.
No tribe fails so strikingly to lay hold on its inheritance. That is the only way we can understand that their lot had not fallen to them. They had let the Philistines take back the cities on the sea-coast. The Amorites had forced them into the mountains. We lose what is our own, and what we should make our own. That loss is often the reason for much restless activity among the people of God, and for much that looks like success in other directions.
The direction of travel matters. Laish, far to the north, was an easy target; the Amorites in Dan's own valley were not.
This city gave Dan the chance of a conquest with no glory in it. It also offered everything the natural heart could want. "A place," said the messengers, "where there is no lack of anything that is in the earth" (v. 10)... Dan had a battle to fight inside his own boundaries, a victory to win over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. So he chose a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land. It was far from the eyes of Jehovah's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was. That enemy kept undisturbed possession of Dan's true inheritance.
One writer turns this on God's people now. The issue is not the conquest but where the energy goes.
No one would say a single word against their conquering territory that really belonged to them. But their activity was not connected with what God had given them. If they had aimed their activity at the Philistines, if they had been content to widen the boundary lines God Himself had given them, that surely would have been faith... How often do God's people slip into an easier place. They want to settle down into a nicer portion than the rugged inheritance He has given them. Though it is a rugged inheritance, it yields the choicest fruit.
The stopping place is not a throwaway detail. The name stuck to that ground "to this day," and one writer reads the setting as matching the men who pitched there.
Soon a little army gathers at Kirjath-jearim, the forest city, which gives its fitting character to the "Camp of Dan."
A reference work fixes the spot and the name. It keeps the older wording "behind" Kirjath-jearim, where the ESV reads "west of":
"The camp of Dan," the place where six hundred men of Dan camped "behind" Kirjath-jearim on their march towards Laish. Judges 18:12: compare Judges 13:25.
That cross-reference opens something unexpected. Later, God's Spirit began to stir Samson on this same ground.
Samson grows, and the Spirit of Jehovah begins to urge him in the camp of Dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol. It had been the camp of the six hundred men whose history comes later in the book (ch. 18), though it happened much earlier than Samson's time. Amorites and Philistines had combined to crowd those men into narrow limits, so they went out to found a new Dan for themselves in the north. Such a spot would naturally work on Samson's young mind, and the Spirit would use it to inspire him with eager patriotism.
From this camp the march went on to Micah's house and his idols. Commentators tie that outcome to the inner state of the men.
God's people can fail to enjoy their own inheritance in full. Then they are just ready for the enemy to come in and lead them astray. An unfilled heart is open to these attacks — a heart that has failed to enter on its own portion... The Danites become restless, just as the Levite did, and like a bird that wanders from her nest, so is a man who wanders from his place.
And the searching itself carried its own risk:
If we refuse God's choice for us, we have to search things out for ourselves. That search became a snare to them through Micah's idols. A path that is not with God is always open to Satan's ambushes.
- Place lost. Dan never drove out the Philistines or Amorites, so the tribe had land on paper and nothing under its feet.
- Place left. Six hundred armed men march north. A conquest without danger cost less than the battle inside their own borders.
- Place camped. They pitch at the forest city, on Judah's ground, not their own. The forest suited the men who camped there.
- Place named. "Mahaneh-dan" keeps the tribe's own name on the map. On that same ground the Spirit later stirred Samson.
- Place filled. The road on from this camp led to Micah's idols. A heart that has not entered its own portion is open ground for the enemy.
And they passed thence to mount Ephraim, and came to the house of Micah.
Six hundred armed men from Dan are marching north to seize a city. On the way they turn into the hill country of Ephraim and stop at the door of a man named Micah. The verse reads like a travel note. But everything sad in the chapter hangs on it. Why does a tribe marching for land stop at a private shrine?
The journey only happens because Dan never took the land God had already assigned to him.
Dan had proved himself to be the weakest of the tribes of Israel. The Amorites forced him into the mountains. He lacked the faith to take possession of his inheritance, so he sent out five men to explore and search out the portion he still lacked... Dan had a battle to fight, a victory to gain within his own boundaries, over the Amorites of the valley; but this fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land. It was far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was. No one disturbed that enemy, and he kept possession of Dan's true inheritance.
The six hundred are walking a road their own scouts chose, not a road God chose.
From Zorah and Eshtaol they send out spies to search the land. If we refuse God's choice for us, then of course we have to search for ourselves. Micah's images turn this into a snare for them. A path that is not with God always lies open to Satan's ambushes.
The place named in the verse is not a remote frontier.
All this takes place not in some remote corner of even the little land of Israel, but in Mount Ephraim, quite near to Shiloh, where the ark of God was. In the same way, Israel made the golden calf at the very foot of Mount Sinai. You cannot measure distance from God by latitude and longitude.
People still ask for guidance, and they do not always ask where God speaks. One writer names what much of that searching amounts to.
God does not guide only by providence. And He does not guide His people by impressions that His word does not support. You might say the Lord led me to do this or that. But if His holy word has not led you, if His Holy Spirit has not led you through that Word, beware. It may be only your own inclination leading you. Or worse, an enemy has put a thought into your mind and arranged the circumstances to make them look providential. A vast amount of what people call guidance, or the leading of the Lord, is really asking at the house of Micah. It is asking a Levite who is taking the place of priest. It is asking an image that stands for your idol, or mine, instead of the living and true God.
At this stop the men take the shrine for themselves. Their own words show how good it looked to them.
The five men come back and tell the Danites about the people of Laish, and their habits. Six hundred armed men go out to take the place, and on their way they call at the house of Micah. It is worth noting what they say to their brothers: "Do you know that in these houses there are an ephod, household gods, a carved image, and a metal image?" Plainly these were things right in their eyes, and things they wanted.
This stop was not a small detour. It moved one household's worship into a whole tribe, and it stayed there.
Micah resists, but it is useless. He finds that the tribe is stronger than he is, and that their offer is stronger than any he can make. So the Levite goes off to his larger field with great gladness. He moves his idolatry, his image, his ephod and all his equipment up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry rules in the tribe of Dan, until the captivity of the land. Those are significant words: until God comes in judgment and takes the ark away from Shiloh. It prevails there, and leavens the whole nation.
- Unclaimed — Dan's march past Micah's door began with a fight the tribe would not fight. Ground left unconquered sends you looking elsewhere.
- Unguided — Refuse God's choice and the searching becomes our own. A self-chosen road runs past the enemy's ambushes.
- Unprotected — The detour happened near Shiloh, where the ark was. Nearness to God's dwelling is no shield when the heart is elsewhere.
- Borrowed — Images, an ephod and a priest of their own looked good to the whole company. Convenient religion always finds willing customers.
- Rooted — What the Danites took from this house they set up in Dan. It lasted until judgment fell and the ark left Shiloh. Private sin planted in a tribe outlives the man who made it.
Then the five men that had gone to spy out the country of Laish spoke and said to their brethren, Do ye know that there is in these houses an ephod, and teraphim, and a graven image, and a molten image? And now ye know what to do.
The five spies have found Laish, and six hundred armed men are marching to take it. On the way they stop at Micah's house, point out the gods kept inside, and tell their brothers to think it over.
The men do not point out the shrine as a danger. They list what is in it the way a person lists an opportunity — and the Levite inside proves just as open to a better offer.
It is worth noting what they say to their brothers: "Do you know that in these houses there are an ephod, household gods, a carved image, and a metal image?" These were clearly things that looked right in their eyes, and worth having. "Now therefore consider what you will do." After they talked it over, they seized everything at once, despite Micah's protest. They took the young Levite too, and he went along with it all. He thought it better to be a priest to a family and a tribe in Israel than to only one man.
Four objects are named. One writer counts what they add up to, and who wanted them.
The five men knew this was a house of idol worship. Instead of avoiding it, they told their company what was in it: an ephod, household idols, a carved image and a molded image — in other words, everything they needed for a well rounded-out religion! (v. 14). So Micah was not the only one who had given in to the idolatry of the Canaanite nations. Here it was all 600 men of Dan, and they were willing to boldly rob Micah so that they themselves could be religious!
These men wanted gods they could carry off. One writer says the trouble starts deeper than anything hands can make.
The root of all idolatry is self-will. It is making a god of our own. It starts with self and fashions a god — and not always out of silver or with our hands. In this enlightened age you would say there is very little danger of people fashioning gods with their hands. But there is a tool more cunning and skilful than the hands, and that is the intellect of man. Whenever a person puts self in the place of God's will, the human mind sets to work fashioning a god to please itself. And it does this in the name of the Lord, in the name of the true God.
Why does a robbery come wrapped in religious talk? One writer traces the piety back to what the men stood to gain.
Self-interest and self-flattery are powerful at producing a kind of religion. And the spies talk piously and fervently to their brothers.
At Micah's door the pious talk and the plundering meet.
Here the joining of superstition with immorality shows itself once more in a startling way. The spies recall their visit to the Levite. The chance of getting the images for themselves seems far too good to let pass.
The theft did not end at Micah's door. One writer follows the images into Dan and shows how long they stayed.
Micah resists, but it comes to nothing. He finds that the tribe is stronger than he is, and that its offers are stronger than any he can make. So the Levite goes off to his larger field with great gladness. He moves his idolatry, his image, his ephod and all the equipment he had, up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry continues in the tribe of Dan until the captivity of the land (significant words) — until God comes in judgment and takes the ark away from Shiloh. It continues there, and leavens the whole nation.
- Desired — The spies name the ephod and the images as things worth having. Then they tell the six hundred to decide what to do.
- Assembled — The four items make a complete religious kit. The whole company wanted one, not just Micah.
- Self-willed — The root is making a god to suit yourself. The mind can carve as well as the hands, and it works in God's name.
- Stolen — Self-interest breeds its own piety. The men talk religion to their brothers and rob a house on the same journey.
- Lasting — What they seized on the march stayed in Dan until the captivity of the land, and leavened the whole nation.
And they turned thither, and came to the house of the young man the Levite, the house of Micah, and inquired after his welfare.
Six hundred armed men of Dan are marching north. On the way they stop at a private house in the hill country of Ephraim. Five of their spies had already been there. They greet the young Levite who serves the house as priest. The greeting sounds friendly. The next five verses show what the visit was for.
Dan was on this road because of an earlier failure. Commentators trace the episode back to a tribe that never took hold of what God gave it.
No tribe fails so badly to take hold of its inheritance. This is the only way we can understand why their lot had not fallen to them. They had let the Philistines take back the cities on the sea-coast. The Amorites had forced them into the mountains. We lose what is our own, what we should have made our own. That loss is often the reason for much restless activity among God's people. It is also the reason for much that looks like success in other directions.
The verse turns on a small act: they turned off the road. Their journey there began earlier, with a search of their own.
From Zorah and Eshtaol they send out spies to search the land. If we refuse God's choice for us, then of course we must search out for ourselves. This becomes a snare to them through Micah's images: the path that is not with God is always exposed to Satan's ambushes.
The spies had already stopped here and asked this Levite for guidance. Writers point out who it was they were asking.
As these spies go, they recognise the voice of this Levite in the house of Micah. He is a priest, and they ask guidance on the basis of what he has set up. They ask direction from one who has himself departed from the path God had called him to. They ask guidance, as it were, of a god of man's own making, a god whose attributes have been clipped.
Ridout turns that into a test for anyone who says the Lord led them.
God does not act by providence only. And He certainly does not guide His people by impressions that His word does not support. You might say the Lord led me to do this or that. But if His holy word did not lead you, and if His Holy Spirit did not lead you through that Word, beware. It may be only your own inclination leading you.
The greeting sits between the spies' report of what was inside and the seizing of it. Their report was a shopping list.
They knew this was a house of idol worship. Instead of avoiding it, the five men told their company what was inside: an ephod, household idols, a carved image and a moulded image. In other words, everything they needed for a well-rounded religion! So Micah was not the only one who had given in to the idolatry of the Canaanite nations. Here all 600 men of Dan gave in too. They were willing to rob Micah outright so that they themselves could be religious!
The spies had not forgotten the house, and the priest they greeted turned out to be for sale.
The spies remember their visit to the Levite. The chance to get the images for themselves seems far too good to pass up. The hired priest shows himself to be nothing but a hireling. A greater personal gain for himself at once outweighs every obligation to his employer. He is "glad" of the robbery that will benefit him. For the Danites, as for other priest-minded people today, there is no need to respect the man himself, whose office is supposed to give him God's ear. Once again morality and religion are pulled apart. Those who draw near to God dishonour Him instead of glorifying Him.
The stop at this house was not a passing incident. It planted a system that outlasted everyone involved.
Micah resists, but it comes to nothing. He finds that the tribe is stronger than he is, and that their offers are better than any he can match. So the Levite goes off to his larger field full of gladness. He moves his idolatry, his image, his ephod and all his equipment up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry rules in the tribe of Dan. It rules until the captivity of the land — significant words — until God steps in with judgment and the ark is taken away from Shiloh. It rules there, and its influence spreads through the whole nation.
- Unfilled — Dan never took hold of what God gave it. An unfilled heart goes looking elsewhere. Restless activity can look like success in other directions.
- Turned aside — one small turn off God's path is where the ambush waits. Refuse God's choice, and you must search out your own.
- Asked — they asked direction from a man who had left the path God called him to. Guidance that is not grounded in God's word may be only your own inclination.
- Greeted — friendly words covered a planned robbery. People can collect religion like equipment while the conscience stays untouched.
- Established — one household's private idolatry became a whole tribe's religion. It lasted until God's judgment removed it.
And the six hundred men of the children of Dan, girded with their weapons of war, stood at the entrance of the gate.
Six hundred armed men stand at Micah's gate while five of them go inside to carry off his shrine. How did a tribe of Israel end up marching north under arms to steal another man's gods?
The march to the far north begins with land Dan already had and never claimed.
Dan had shown himself the weakest of the tribes of Israel. The Amorites forced him into the mountains (Judges 1:34). He lacked the faith to take possession of his inheritance, so he sent out five men to scout the portion he still lacked. … Dan had a battle to fight within his own borders, a victory to win over the Amorites of the valley. But this fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land. It was far from the eyes of those who witnessed for Jehovah, and far from the place where his real enemy stood. That enemy was left undisturbed, still holding Dan's true inheritance.
The men at the gate and the men inside the house act together. No conscience stops them.
While the 600 men waited at Micah's gate the five men went in and took all the things they had spoken of (vv. 16-17). The consecrated Levite asked them what they were doing, and they told him to keep quiet and go with the 600 men. … But mere religion can make one a robber without conscience!
These men wanted gods that could not even keep themselves from being carried off.
The six hundred follow the road taken by the spies, and come to the house of Micah. Here superstition and immorality join once more in a startling way. The spies recall their visit to the Levite, and the chance to take the images for themselves looks far too good to let pass. These gods were helpless, yet thought to be generous, and the men had perhaps supposed they had already tested their power. In idolatry there is no denying that people credit the image with some power. … But the blindness here is absolute: "Those who make them become like them," says the inspired Word; "so do all who trust in them."
The spies had already told the others what the house held.
The five men knew this was a house of idol worship. Instead of avoiding it, they told their company what was in it: an ephod, household idols, a carved image and a molded image — in other words all they needed for a well rounded-out religion! (v. 14). So Micah was not the only one who had given in to the idolatry of the Canaanite nations. Here all 600 men of Dan did too, and they were ready to rob Micah so that they themselves could be religious!
The priest in that house was a hired man, and he acts like one.
The hireling priest shows himself to be nothing more than a hireling. A greater personal advantage to himself at once outweighs every obligation to his employer. He is "glad" of the robbery he is going to profit from. The Danites, like others who exalt a priestly class today, see no need to respect the man whose office is supposed to give him God's ear. Once again morality and religion part company, and He is not glorified but dishonoured in those who draw near to Him.
What was taken from one house did not stay in one house.
Dan, having settled in the north of the land of Israel, became guilty of the great spiritual evil of public idolatry. They took the idols that had belonged to one disobedient man, and they adopted a worship completely opposed to the law of the God of Israel. … Some men have real ability as servants of God and can preach. They have been given the place of go-betweens between the people and God, and in some denominations they are even called "priests" — that is, priests in contrast to the common people. The title may be "priest" or "reverend" or anything else. Either way it goes against the truth of Christianity, and it has an element of idolatry in it, because it takes God's place in the thoughts of people.
- Not taken: Dan would not fight for the inheritance God gave, and the whole march north grows out of that refusal.
- Taken cheaply: he chose a conquest without danger, far from the place where his real enemy stood.
- Taken by force: six hundred weapons at the gate while five men empty a house — religion and robbery in one act.
- Taken as a hire: the hired priest drops his duty to his employer the moment a better offer comes, and he is glad of the theft.
- Taken up by a tribe: one man's homemade gods became public idolatry for Dan. The same pattern — a man-made priesthood set between God and His people — still carries the mark of idolatry.
And the five men that had gone to spy out the land went up, entered in thither, [and] took the graven image, and the ephod, and the teraphim, and the molten image; and the priest stood at the entrance of the gate with the six hundred men that were girded with weapons of war.
Judges 17–21 turns from battles and rescues to what was going on inside Israel's homes. Here a whole tribe helps itself to another man's religion, and the paid priest at the gate says nothing.
The closing chapters of Judges do not follow time order. They come at the end to explain everything before them, and the theft in Micah's house is the sample.
We have now reached the last division of the book. Here we see the inner condition of the people, both toward God and toward one another. It lights up the whole history. So we go back to a time before the history, because this condition is not the result of that history but its cause — and a lasting cause. The idolatry of Dan lasts, as we are told, right through the whole period of the book. By itself it is no more than a sample of the general state. Its whole significance lies in that — it is only a sample.
The four items did not appear all at once. The shrine grew one piece at a time.
How it grew is very simple. He has an image, so he must have a house to put his image in. Then, as he has a house, there must also be an ephod, or priestly garment, and teraphim — minor images, you might say — connected with it. And over all these there must be a priest to preside. Micah appoints one of his own sons as priest. But he soon finds something better than a priest of his own making, for he gets one who is at least partly a priest of God.
(The ESV calls the teraphim "household gods.") One writer adds that the ephod itself was a garment with no value at all once it was separated from the high priest who was meant to wear it:
"Micah had a house of gods, and made an ephod and teraphim," associating the false gods with the ephod, a valueless part of Jewish worship when separated from the high priest who wore it.
The five men had passed this house before. They came back not to warn the others away but to tell them what was inside.
The five men did not avoid the place they knew to be a house of idol worship. Instead they told their company that in that house there were an ephod, household idols, a carved image and a molded image — in other words all they needed for a well rounded-out religion! (v. 14). So Micah was not the only one who had given in to the idolatry of the Canaanite nations. In this case all 600 men of Dan had too, and they were willing to rob Micah so that they themselves could be religious!
Men could lift these gods and carry them off.
The six hundred follow the spies' road to the house of Micah. Here superstition joined to immorality shows itself once more in a startling way. The spies remember their visit to the Levite. The chance to get the images for themselves looks to them far too good to pass up. Gods so helpless and so generous... But blindness here is absolute: "Those who make them become like them," says the inspired Word; "so do all who trust in them."
The man paid to serve Micah's shrine stands right where he could have blocked the way. He does not.
The hired priest shows himself to be nothing but a hired man. A greater personal advantage at once outweighs every duty to his employer, and he is "glad" of the robbery that will benefit him. For the Danites, as for others today who trust in a priestly class, there is no need to respect the man whose office is supposed to give him the ear of God. Once again, morality is separated from religion. He is not glorified but dishonored in those who draw near to Him.
Another writer notes what the promotion did to his sense of guidance:
So the Levite, under the expectation of such advancement, is quite glad, and considers it now a distinct leading of the Lord, that he should enter upon this larger field of usefulness.
The shrine did not stay in one house. A whole tribe took it over.
Micah resists, but with no effect: he finds that the tribe is stronger than he is. So the Levite goes off into his larger field with great gladness. He moves his idolatry — his image, his ephod and all the equipment he had — up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry rules in the tribe of Dan until the captivity of the land, and those are significant words. It lasts until God comes in judgment and the ark is taken from Shiloh. It rules there, and it works through the whole nation like leaven.
- Sample — The theft is no odd incident. It is a sample of Israel's inner condition, and the cause of the book's sad history.
- Assembled — The shrine grew item by item: an image, a house for it, an ephod and teraphim, then a priest to preside.
- Stolen — A tribe robbed a private house so that it could be religious. The four items made a complete-looking worship.
- Helpless — Gods you can pick up and carry off expose their worshippers. Those who make them become like them.
- Spread — One man's shrine became a tribe's religion. It worked through the whole nation and lasted until God's judgment fell.
And these came into Micah's house, and took the carved image, the ephod, and the teraphim, and the molten image. And the priest said to them, What do ye?
Six hundred armed men of Dan stop at Micah's house on their way north. While they wait at the gate, the raiders strip the shrine bare, and the priest hired to mind it manages only one question: "What are you doing?"
The four objects listed in this verse did not appear all at once. One commentator traces how each piece called for the next:
The details of the development are very simple. In the fifth verse we find that he has an image, so he must have a house to put his image in. Then, as he has a house, there must also be an ephod, or priestly garment, and teraphim, minor images, as you might say, connected with it; and over all these there must be a priest to preside.
Another commentator turns that growth into a warning about small beginnings:
Yet there is development: the thing is a living seed that grows. All this was still "right" in Micah's eyes. Once we are committed to the guidance of our own minds, we can easily build up a whole system. The further we go, the more completely we go astray. How careful we need to be about beginnings!
The five men told their company what was in the house. Their interest was not in exposing Micah's idolatry but in owning it:
The five men knew the place was a house of idol worship. Instead of avoiding it, they told their company what was in that house: an ephod, household idols, a carved image and a moulded image — in other words, all they needed to have a well-rounded religion! (v. 14). So Micah was not the only one who had given in to the idolatry of the Canaanite nations. In this case all 600 men of Dan had given in too, and they were willing to rob Micah openly so that they themselves could be religious! What a condition was this, so soon after Israel's entering into the land as recorded in the Book of Joshua!
His protest lasts one sentence. What silences it is not an argument but an offer:
The consecrated Levite asked them what they were doing. They told him to keep quiet and go with the 600 men. For they asked him if it was not better for him to be a priest to a tribe of Israel than only of one man (vv. 18-19). When he heard this the pseudo-priest was glad. It meant nothing to him to steal from the man who had consecrated him, or to leave his job for a better paid one! (v. 20). But mere religion can make one a robber without conscience!
One writer notes what never came up in the discussion at all:
They dangled the promotion in front of him in the most dazzling way. He got a call to a more influential and better paid position. As to the will of God in the matter, that never entered the mind of the priest.
Nobody in the scene sees a clash between worship and robbery. That, one commentator argues, is the real exposure here:
The hired priest shows himself to be nothing more than a hired hand. A greater personal advantage to himself outweighs at once all obligations to his employer, and he is "glad" of the robbery by which he is to benefit. For the Danites, as for others today who rely on a priestly class, there is no need to respect the man whose office is supposed to give him the ear of God. Once again, morality is separated from religion, and those who draw near to Him dishonour Him instead of glorifying Him.
One commentator sums up the whole raid in a single line:
The gainers have lost; the loser, if he knows it, has gained.
What Dan carried home stayed there:
Micah resists, but it comes to nothing. He finds that the tribe is stronger than he is, and that their offer is stronger than anything he can hold out. So the Levite goes off into his larger field with great gladness. He moves his idolatry — his image, his ephod and all the equipment he had — up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry rules the tribe of Dan until the captivity of the land — significant words. It lasts until God comes in with judgment and the ark is taken away from Shiloh.
- Grown — the image needed a shrine, the shrine a garment, the garment a priest. Each step seemed right in Micah's own eyes, and a whole system grew from a small start.
- Carried — gods you can lift are gods that thieves can lift from you. Dan wanted all four items, because they made a religion look complete.
- Bought — the priest's one question dies the moment Dan offers him a bigger post. God's will never entered his decision.
- Divorced — here religion sits beside theft without a protest, and the man who should speak for God dishonours Him instead.
- Lost — the thieves carried off what could only harm them, and the robbed man was better off empty. What they gained stayed in Dan until judgment fell.
And they said to him, Hold thy peace, lay thy hand upon thy mouth, and go with us, and be to us a father and a priest. Is it better for thee to be a priest for the house of one man, or to be priest for a tribe and a family in Israel?
Six hundred men from the tribe of Dan have just stripped Micah's house of its idols. Now they turn to the Levite who served there, and their few words work as a warning, a bribe and a job offer at once.
Before the men mention promotion, they tell the Levite to be quiet. He had asked what they were doing. Their answer was a hand over his mouth. One commentator links that silence to what he was willing to walk away with:
The consecrated Levite asked them what they were doing and was told to keep quiet, and go with the 600 men. When he heard their offer the false priest was glad. It meant nothing to him to steal the property of the man who had consecrated him and to leave his employment for a more lucrative job! But mere religion can make one a robber without conscience!
The men dangle a bigger job: one household against a whole tribe. Nobody mentions God at all:
They set the promotion before him in the most dazzling way: "Is it better for you to be priest to the house of one man, or to be priest to a tribe and clan in Israel?" He got a call to a more influential and better-paid position. As for the will of God in the matter, that never entered the priest's mind. His "heart was glad" when they called him away to a new post. He took "the ephod and the household gods and the carved image" and went along with the people.
The move can sound respectable. A man leaves a small work for a large one and calls it the Lord's leading:
So the Levite expects such advancement and is quite glad. He now considers it a clear leading of the Lord that he should enter this larger field of usefulness. In other words, he gets a call to a place of more service, of wider usefulness, and he thinks he is led to go. I am not saying a single word against true, godly, devoted service to Christ, whatever name it goes by. I am speaking of that state of things which makes it possible for a man to push himself into the priesthood.
The same writer warns that a strong impression is not God's guidance:
God does not act by providence only. He certainly does not guide His people by impressions that His word does not support. You might say the Lord led me to do this or that. But if it has not been His holy word that led you, if it has not been His Holy Spirit that led you through that word, be careful. It may only be your own inclination leading you.
Micah had put this Levite on a salary. The moment a better salary appeared, the arrangement showed what it was worth:
The hired priest shows himself to be nothing but a hired man. A greater personal advantage to himself at once outweighs all his obligations to his employer. He is "glad" of the robbery he is going to profit from. The Danites saw no need to respect the man who, because of his office, was supposed to have the ear of God. Others who hold to a priestly class do the same today. Once again morality is divorced from religion.
He took the offer at once. Its effects outlasted him by centuries:
Driven by greed and ambition, it seems, he began and established that line of idolatrous priesthood. It continued in the tribe of Dan for many centuries, "until the day of the captivity of the land." That is, it lasted until the Assyrians carried away the ten northern tribes some six centuries later. Remember that when Jeroboam set up the two golden calves to be the gods of Israel, he placed one in Dan and one in Bethel. But at the beginning a Levite, the grandson of Moses, was the chief organiser of this idolatry!
One commentator draws a line from this scene to any arrangement that puts a man between God and His people:
Some men have ability as servants of God and can preach. They have been given the place of spiritual go-betweens between the people and God. Some denominations even call them "priests" — that is, priests as distinct from the common people. They may be called "priest" or "reverend" or given some other special title. Either way, this is contrary to the truth of Christianity. It has an element of idolatry in it, because it really takes God's place in people's thoughts.
- Bigger, not better. The Danites argue only from size — one house against a whole tribe — and the Levite never asks what God wants.
- Bigger silences. The offer comes with a hand over his mouth. A man moving up stops asking what the men are carrying off.
- Bigger pays. A hired priest acts like a hired man. A better offer outweighs every obligation.
- Bigger feels like guidance. A wider field of work can look like the Lord's leading. Only His word can tell you if it is.
- Bigger lasts. One glad "yes" set up a line of idol priests in Dan. It lasted for centuries, until the land went into captivity.
Then the priest's heart was glad, and he took the ephod, and the teraphim, and the graven image, and went in the midst of the people.
Six hundred armed men of Dan have stripped Micah's shrine, and they invite its young Levite priest to come and serve their whole tribe. The shock is not the theft but the priest's reaction: his heart was glad, and he carried the stolen images out himself.
The one question never asked in this verse is whether God wanted any of it. Rossier sets out the offer the Danites make, and what the priest never asks:
They made the promotion sound as dazzling as they could: "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?" So he got a call to a more influential and better-paid position. As to the will of God in the matter, that never entered the priest's mind. His "heart was glad" at the call to a new post. He took the ephod, the household gods and the carved image, and went along with the people.
The man does not weigh the offer. He just likes it.
Gladness looks like confirmation. The offer is bigger, so the Levite treats its size as proof that God is behind the move:
So the Levite expects this advancement and is quite glad. He now treats it as a clear leading of the Lord that he should enter this larger field of usefulness. In other words, he gets a call to a place of more service, of wider usefulness, and he thinks the Lord is leading him to go.
Ridout adds a caution. He is not speaking against true, devoted service to Christ. He is speaking about a man who pushes himself into a priesthood that was never his.
Micah had hired this Levite and paid him. A better offer now shows what a hired man really is:
The hired priest shows himself to be nothing but a hired man. A greater personal advantage to himself at once outweighs every obligation to his employer. He is "glad" of the robbery he is going to profit from. The Danites feel no need to respect the man whose office is supposed to give him God's ear. Others today who hold to a priestly class are no different. Once again morality is divorced from religion. God is not glorified but dishonoured in those who draw near to Him.
He walks away from the man who fed him, carrying that man's property, and feels nothing.
Up to this verse the idols belonged to one household. Once the priest carries them into the middle of a marching tribe, they belong to a nation. One writer follows the images from Micah's house into Dan's long history:
Micah resists, but it comes to nothing. He finds that the tribe is stronger than he is, and that their offers are better than any he can make. So the Levite goes off to his larger field with great gladness. He moves his idolatry, his image, his ephod and all his equipment up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry continues in the tribe of Dan. It lasts until the captivity of the land (significant words) — until God steps in with judgment and the ark is taken away from Shiloh. It leavens the whole nation. I have no doubt it also makes possible that deeper form of idolatry which grows out of it: the two calves that Jeroboam the son of Nebat set up. He put one in Ephraim, where the idolatry began, and the other in Dan, where it reached its height.
Rossier puts it in one line. With this man, whom the Danites call "their priest," idolatry in Dan became official.
This did not die with Dan. Ridout names what a man displaces when he takes a priestly place among God's people:
If there is anything we should resist and hate with all the energy of our souls, it is this. It contradicts the presence of the Holy Spirit in every believer. It contradicts the absolute and sole priesthood of Christ on high. And it contradicts the precious fact that every believer has access into the holiest place by the blood of Jesus.
- Glad, not guided. The priest's heart was glad — and that gladness replaced any question about what God wanted. A glad heart is not the same as God's guidance.
- Glad at a promotion. A bigger sphere, a better wage and a wider influence were enough to convince him the Lord was in it.
- Glad at a robbery. A hired man serves whoever pays more. Personal advantage cancelled every obligation to the man who had kept him.
- Glad, and the nation paid. One household's idolatry became a tribe's official religion. It spread through the whole nation and lasted until God's judgment took the land away.
- Glad in a place that was never his. The warning lasts: one man stands where Christ alone stands as priest. Yet the Holy Spirit lives in every believer, and every believer already has access to God.
And they turned and departed, and put the little ones and the cattle and the baggage before them.
Six hundred armed men from Dan leave Micah's house with his idols and his priest. Verse 21 sets the whole column moving north — children, animals and stolen goods — toward a town they mean to take.
The tribe already had a home. They were on the road because of a battle they would not fight.
Dan had proved himself to be the weakest of the tribes of Israel. Forced into the mountains by the Amorites (Judges 1:34), and lacking the faith to take possession of his inheritance, he sent out five men to scout out the portion he still lacked… This city gave Dan the chance of a conquest without glory, but it also offered everything the natural heart could desire… Dan had a battle to fight, a victory to win inside his own borders, over the Amorites of the valley. But this fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land, away from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses and far from his real enemy, who kept undisturbed possession of Dan's true inheritance.
Before they turned to go, they had emptied Micah's shrine. Even the priest who should have stopped them joined in.
While the 600 men waited at Micah's gate the five men went in and took all the things they had spoken of (vv. 16-17)… They asked him if it was not better for him to be a priest to a tribe of Israel than only of one man (vv. 18-19). When he heard this the false priest was glad. He thought nothing of robbing the man who had consecrated him, or of leaving his job for a better-paid one! (v. 20). But mere religion can make one a robber without conscience!
Older Bibles say they put "the carriage" before them. The word has nothing to do with a vehicle. Children, herds and packed-up homes went first, with the armed men behind. This was a move, not a raid.
This does not appear to be ever used in the scriptures in the modern sense of the word, but means 'the thing carried,' 'baggage.' Judges 18:21; 1 Sam. 17:22; Isa. 10:28; Acts 21:15.
The priest marched out with them. What moved him was the offer of a bigger post.
They described the promotion he would get in the most dazzling terms. "Is it better for you to be a priest to the house of one man, or that you be a priest to a tribe, and a family in Israel?" (v. 19). He got a call to a more influential and better-paid position. As to the will of God in the matter, that never entered the mind of the priest.
Another writer notes what the Levite called this move:
So the Levite, expecting such advancement, is quite glad. He now considers it a clear leading of the Lord that he should enter this larger field of usefulness. In other words, he gets a call to a place of more service, of wider usefulness, and he thinks he is led to go.
The column left a robbed man behind it, counting his losses.
Micah answered, "You have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, and you have gone away. What more do I have?"… Micah did not realise that he was far better off without these things. He had said before that he knew the Lord would be good to him because he had a Levite as priest (17:13). But now the Lord was being good to him by taking away the priest and his idols.
That quiet departure cast a long shadow.
The Levite goes into his larger field with great gladness and moves his idolatry, his image, and his ephod and all the equipment he had, up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry prevails in the tribe of Dan. It lasts until the captivity of the land (significant words), until God comes in judgment and the ark is taken away from Shiloh. It prevails there, and leavens the whole nation.
- Carried instead of conquered. Dan would not fight for the inheritance God gave, so the tribe packed up and went hunting an easy win far away.
- Carried away by theft. Religion without God made a Levite help rob the man who hired him.
- Carried baggage. "Carriage" in older Bibles means the things they carried. Children, livestock and goods went first; the fighting men came behind.
- Carried by ambition. A bigger post and better pay were all it took. Nobody asked what God wanted.
- Carried for generations. What walked north that day settled in, spread, and lasted until judgment fell.
They were already far from the house of Micah, when the men that were in the houses near to Micah's house were gathered together, and overtook the children of Dan.
Micah's neighbours catch up with the six hundred Danites who have marched off with his idols and his priest. The chase raises an uncomfortable question: what is a man defending when he runs after gods he made himself?
The closing chapters of Judges step outside the story. Commentators read them as the explanation of everything before.
We have now reached the last division of the book. Here we see the inner condition of the people, towards God and towards men — the clear light thrown on the whole history. For this we go back to before the history. This is not the result of the history but its cause, and a lasting cause: the Danite idolatry lasts, as the text tells us, right through the whole period of the book. By itself this is only a sample of the general state — and that is just its significance.
The Danites, on their way to seize new land, helped themselves to Micah's religious equipment. Five spies had already scouted the house.
They knew the place was a house of idol worship. Instead of avoiding it, the five men told their company what was inside: an ephod, household idols, a carved image and a moulded image — in other words, everything they needed for a well-rounded religion! So Micah was not the only one who had given in to the idolatry of the Canaanite nations. In this case all 600 men of Dan had too, and they were willing to rob Micah in the open so that they could be religious themselves.
These men pinned their hopes on gods that six hundred men could carry off without a fight.
Gods so helpless and so generous, whose power they perhaps supposed they had already tested — for in idolatry it is useless to deny some power credited to the image... But the blindness here is total: "Those who make them become like them," says the inspired Word, "so do all who trust in them."
Micah had to call on his neighbours. The one man in his house who might have stood with him had already changed sides.
The Danites asked the Levite whether it was not better for him to be a priest to a tribe of Israel than to one man only. When he heard this the false priest was glad. It meant nothing to him to steal from the man who had made him a priest, and to leave his job for a better-paid one! But mere religion can make a man a robber without conscience.
Another writer weighs what this priest's move meant for Dan.
As to the will of God in the matter, that never entered the priest's mind. His "heart was glad" at being called away to a new post... It is with this man, whom they called "their priest", that idolatry took on an official character in Dan.
Overtaking them achieved nothing. What Micah said when he caught up tells us whose religion it had been.
Micah ran after these robbers and said: "You have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, and you have gone away; and what do I have left?" What language! They had taken away his religion and the minister he had appointed, and he had nothing left! A man of faith would not have felt the loss of these things. He would still have had God Himself, His word, His priesthood and His house at Shiloh.
The answer he received was a threat, and the numbers settled it.
The Danites cut him short and told him to be quiet. They warned him that angry men might attack and kill him and his household. This was how cruel Israelites were to Israelites, so early in their history in the promised land. What could Micah's small company do against 600 armed men? They could only go back to their own homes and leave their worthless idols to do damage among the Danites.
The robbery did Micah a favour and did Dan lasting harm.
Micah did not realise that he was far better off without these things. He had said earlier that he knew the Lord would be good to him because he had a Levite as priest. But now the Lord was being good to him by depriving him of the priest and his idols.
The gainers have lost; the loser, if he knows it, has gained. The Danites depart with their loot in peace.
- Cause. These chapters do not just round off the book. They show the inner condition of the people — a cause that ran through the whole period.
- Made. Micah chased gods he had made himself. A man of faith would still have had God Himself, His word, His priesthood and His house at Shiloh.
- Bought. The hired priest left for a bigger post and better pay. The will of God never crossed his mind.
- Helpless. Gods that six hundred men can carry off cannot defend themselves or their owner. Those who make them become like them.
- Gain. The robbers took the loot, and the ruin that came with it. The man robbed lost only what he should never have had.
And they cried to the children of Dan. And they turned their faces, and said to Micah, What aileth thee, that thou comest with such a company?
Micah brings a crowd with him and chases six hundred men of Dan who have just emptied his shrine. They turn and ask what the matter is — but what has Micah lost, and was losing it a disaster or a mercy?
The men who ask Micah what is the matter are the men who have just taken everything he owned for worship. One writer notes how easily religion carried them into theft.
While the six hundred men waited at Micah's gate, the five men went in and took all the things they had spoken of. The consecrated Levite asked them what they were doing and was told to keep quiet and go with the six hundred men. For they asked him if it was not better for him to be a priest to a tribe of Israel than only to one man. When he heard this the false priest was glad. He thought nothing of stealing from the man who had made him his priest, or of leaving his job for a better paid one! But mere religion can make one a robber without conscience!
Micah's reply is a list of what he no longer has. He calls the images gods that he made, and still counts them as gods. One writer weighs that list against what a man of faith would still have had:
Micah ran after these plunderers. He said, "You have taken away my gods that I made, and the priest, and you have gone away; and what have I left?" What language! They had taken away his religion and the minister that he had appointed, and he had nothing left! A man of faith would not have felt the loss of these things. God Himself, His word, His priesthood and His house at Shiloh would still have remained.
Micah measured God's favour by what was in his house. The favour came, but not in the shape he expected:
Micah did not realise that he was far better off without these things. He had said before that he knew the Lord would be good to him because he had a Levite as priest. But now the Lord was being good to him by taking away the priest and his idols.
The Danites walk away loaded; Micah walks home empty. One writer flips that accounting over, with one condition on Micah's gain:
Little comment, surely, is needed here. The gainers have lost; the loser, if he knows it, has gained. The Danites depart with their booty in peace.
Micah's two losses go together: the images and the man he had hired to look after them. One writer draws a rule out of that pairing:
Wherever there is a man-made priest, there is a man-made god behind that. What do I mean by that? I mean that the human mind has been at work, shaping a god after its own thoughts. It takes the name of Christ. It takes certain truths of Christ, His teaching, everything of that kind. But out of these materials it shapes something that is not really Christ. And it is significant that this idol was made of silver.
Micah's protest failed. The effects reached far past his own house.
Micah resists, but it is useless: he finds that the tribe is stronger than he is. So the Levite goes off to his larger field with great gladness. He moves his idolatry, his image, his ephod and all his equipment up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry continues in the tribe of Dan. It goes on until the captivity of the land — significant words — until God steps in with judgment and the ark is taken away from Shiloh.
- Made. Micah's gods were things he made and a priest he hired, so his religion was only as secure as his front door.
- Taken. The men who emptied his shrine wanted it for themselves. Religion without conscience turns people into robbers.
- Stripped. His answer is a list of missing objects. A person of faith would still have had God, His word, His priesthood and His house at Shiloh.
- Mercy. The gainers lost and the loser gained. The Lord was good to Micah by taking away the priest and the idols he trusted.
- Spread. What Micah lost, Dan kept — the idolatry moved north and lasted until God stepped in with judgment.
And he said, Ye have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, and ye are gone away; and what have I more? and what is this that ye say to me, What aileth thee?
Micah chases the armed men of Dan who have carried off his idols and his priest. His own words give him away: the gods he calls his are the gods he made. His cry raises the question the whole episode turns on. What is left to a man when his religion can be carried away on someone else's shoulders?
Micah says the theft has left him with nothing. One writer checks that claim against what was still standing in Israel.
What language! They had taken away his religion and the minister he had appointed, and he had nothing left! A man of faith would not have felt the loss of these things; God Himself, His word, His priesthood and His house at Shiloh would still have remained.
The phrase "which I made" is the flaw in the whole arrangement. A god that owes its existence to its worshipper is a god that depends on him for everything else too.
So idols are set against Jehovah, but they cannot be compared with the true God for a moment. Jehovah is the Maker. An idol has to be made. Once it is made, it does not carry others; others have to carry it. Once it is set in its place, it cannot move. It cannot answer a cry for help. It cannot save anyone from trouble.
Earlier Micah had been sure of God's favour because he had hired a Levite — one of the tribe set apart for God's service — as his own priest. The theft turns that confidence inside out.
Micah did not realize that he was far better off without these things. He had said before that he knew the Lord would be good to him because he had a Levite as priest (17:13). But now the Lord was being good to him in depriving him of the priest and his idols.
The priest Micah hired leaves at once when a whole tribe outbids one household. His loyalty lasts only as long as the pay is the best on offer.
The hired priest shows that he is nothing more than a hired man. A greater personal advantage to himself outweighs at once every obligation to his employer, and he is "glad" of the robbery he is going to profit from. The Danites, like others today who trust in a priestly office, see no need to respect the man who is supposed, because of his office, to have God's ear. Once again, morality is cut off from religion, and those who draw near to Him dishonor Him instead of glorifying Him.
Micah lost his gods in a day. Dan set them up in a new city, and the damage outlived everyone involved.
His heart was glad of a better living and a wider sphere (verses 19, 20). So he leaves Micah's house with the lawless men of Dan. They destroy the town of Laish with fire and sword, and name their new city after themselves. There they set up the carved image, and a line of priests carried on there until the day the land went into captivity. For error takes root faster than truth, and bears fruit more plentifully and for longer.
Micah made his gods himself. One writer traces where that habit begins.
But the root of all idolatry is self-will. It is making a god of our own. It starts with self and shapes a god — not always out of silver, and not always with our hands... there is a tool more clever and skilful than the hands, and that is the mind of man. Wherever self takes the place of the will of God, you will find the human mind busy shaping a god to please itself. And it does this in the name of the Lord, in the name of the true God.
Micah had a god, a worship and a priest, all of his own making. One writer sees the same three things copied far beyond Judges.
Here is a man-made god, a man-made worship and a man-made priest... Much of what is called worship is man-made, and it dishonors God as much as the idolatry of the nations, or even more... As the people of God we have only one Priest, and that is our gracious Lord. By His infinite grace He makes all true believers priests with Him... Religious service is reduced so far to a business arrangement. And there is the delusion of thinking that the Lord is bound to bless and give prosperity.
- Made — Micah's own words condemn him. He calls them the gods he made. Whatever a man must make, he must also carry, and it cannot answer his cry or rescue him from trouble.
- Mine — his religion was private property — his images, his worship, his hired priest. Property can be taken, and it was.
- Mercy — the robbery was God being good to him. He once thought a hired Levite guaranteed blessing. Losing both idols and priest left him better off than he knew.
- Market — the hired priest went where the offer was larger, and the men who wanted him felt no need to respect him. Religion had been cut loose from morality on both sides.
- Multiplied — Micah lost his gods in a day. Dan kept the image until the land went into captivity. Error takes root faster and lasts longer than truth, so the only safe possession is the God no one can carry away.
And the children of Dan said to him, Let not thy voice be heard among us, lest men of exasperated spirit run upon you, and thou lose thy life and the lives of thy household.
Six hundred armed men of the tribe of Dan have stripped Micah's house of its images and taken away his hired priest. He chases them down to complain, and they answer him with a threat against his life and his family.
The Danites never answer Micah's charge. They order him to stop talking, and they put his household inside the threat too.
The Danites cut him off and told him to stop speaking. They threatened that angry men might attack and kill him and the members of his household (v. 25). This is how cruel Israelites were to Israelites, so early in their history in the promised land. What could Micah's small company do against 600 armed men? All they could do was go home and leave their worthless idols with the Danites, to the Danites' own harm (v. 26).
Micah's resistance collapses for the plainest of reasons — the other side is bigger.
And so, after the ineffective resistance of Micah, who finds that the tribe is stronger than he, and that the inducements are stronger than he can hold out, the Levite goes into his larger field with great gladness and moves his idolatry, his image, and his ephod and all the equipment which he had, up into Dan.
These robbers are religious men. They steal and threaten for the sake of worship, and the priest they carry off is glad to go.
The hired priest proves himself to be nothing more than a hired man. A greater personal advantage outweighs at once all his obligations to his employer. He is "glad" of the robbery he will profit from. The Danites see no need to respect the man whose office is supposed to give him the ear of God. Others today who make much of priesthood are the same. Once again, morality and religion are split apart, and those who draw near to God dishonour Him instead of glorifying Him.
Micah counts up what is left to him and finds nothing. His own words give away how much his religion was worth.
What language! They had taken away his religion and the minister that he had appointed and he had nothing left! A man of faith would not have felt the loss of these things. God Himself would still have remained, with His word, His priesthood and His house at Shiloh.
Losing everything looks like ruin for Micah. It may be the kindest thing God does for him in the whole story.
Micah did not realise that he was far better off without these things. He had said before that he knew the Lord would be good to him because he had a Levite as priest (17:13). But now the Lord was being good to him in depriving him of the priest and his idols.
Who won that day depends on who is doing the counting.
This needs little comment. The gainers have lost; the loser, if he knows it, has gained. The Danites go off with their loot in peace.
Nothing in Israel was holding the Danites back. The book of Judges traces the whole period to two root causes.
Moses had warned the people, "You shall not do according to all that we are doing here today, everyone doing whatever is right in his own eyes" (Deuteronomy 12:8). Three hundred years after this warning we find the people in the Land. Yet the closing chapters of Judges record a low moral condition, marked by gross corruption and violence. Two causes lie behind it. First, they had cast off the authority of God as their King. Second, and as a result, every man was doing what was right in his own eyes. So they were marked by two things: they threw off Divine authority, and they asserted human independence.
The images taken that day were not a passing scandal. They were planted, and they stayed planted.
The Levite goes off to his larger field with great gladness. He moves his idolatry, his image, his ephod and all the equipment he had, up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry keeps its hold on the tribe of Dan until the captivity of the land (those are significant words) — until God steps in with judgment, and the ark is taken away from Shiloh. It holds there, and it spreads through the whole nation.
- Made. Micah made his own gods, so he lost them the moment stronger men wanted them. A man of faith loses nothing: God Himself, His word, His priesthood and His house at Shiloh all remain.
- Taken. The thieves were religious men, and the priest was glad of the robbery that promoted him. Religion cut loose from morality dishonours God in the very people who draw near to Him.
- Threatened. Dan's only answer to Micah's complaint is the size of its army: be silent, or lose your life and your household's.
- Gained. Read from God's side, the theft is kindness — the gainers have lost, and the loser, if he knows it, has gained.
- Spread. One household's idols became a whole tribe's worship, and it lasted until God's judgment fell. This is what happens when people cast off God as King and every man does what is right in his own eyes.
And the children of Dan went their way; and Micah saw that they were too strong for him, and he turned and went back to his house.
Judges 17–18 opens a window onto private religion in Israel: a man named Micah built himself a shrine, hired a wandering Levite as his personal priest, and felt secure. In verse 26 that whole setup walks away down the road, and the question is whether Micah lost anything worth having.
Micah came after the raiders with a small company. The numbers decided the matter.
The Danites told him bluntly to be quiet. They threatened that angry men might attack and kill him and his household (v. 25). This shows how cruelly Israelites treated Israelites so early in their history in the promised land. What could Micah's small company do against 600 armed men? They could only retreat to their own homes and leave their unprofitable idols to the harm of the Danites (v. 26).
Micah counted what was left to him and reached zero. One writer names what he had overlooked.
Micah ran after these robbers and said: "You have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, and you have gone away; and what have I more?" (v. 24). What language! They had taken away his religion and the minister he had appointed, and he had nothing left! A man of faith would not have felt the loss of these things; God Himself, His word, His priesthood and His house at Shiloh would still have remained.
Earlier Micah had said he now knew the Lord would be good to him, because he had a Levite for a priest. One writer turns that claim back on him.
Micah did not realize that he was far better off without these things. He had said before that he knew the Lord would be good to him because he had a Levite as priest (17:13). But now the Lord was being good to him in depriving him of the priest and his idols.
Both sides walk away from the scene. Who came out ahead?
This needs little comment. The gainers have lost; the loser, if he knows it, has gained. The Danites depart with their loot in peace.
The Danites wanted these images because they believed they worked. They kept believing it even as they carried those gods away.
The spies recall their visit to the Levite, and the chance of getting the images for themselves seems to them all too good to let pass. Gods so helpless and so generous! They perhaps supposed they had already tested their power. In idolatry it is useless to deny that people credit the image with real power... But the blindness here is total: "Those who make them become like them," says the inspired Word, "so do all who trust in them."
A second writer traces where that kind of religion leaves a person who wants guidance.
They ask guidance, as it were, from a god that man has made himself. Its attributes have been clipped. Its wisdom, holiness and righteousness have been cut away. In their place stands the image of man's own thinking — something that will not be too hard for man to obey and follow.
Micah's private religion did not stay private. Carried into Dan, it went on to shape the whole nation.
Micah's resistance came to nothing. He finds that the tribe is stronger than he is, and that the offers made are stronger than any he can match. So the Levite goes off to his larger field with great gladness. He moves his idolatry, his image, his ephod and all the equipment he had, up into Dan. There this subtle form of idolatry prevails in the tribe of Dan — until the captivity of the land (significant words), until God steps in with judgment and takes the ark away from Shiloh. It prevails there, and leavens the whole nation. It makes possible, I do not doubt, that deeper form of idolatry which grew out of it: the two calves that Jeroboam the son of Nebat set up.
- Made. Micah made his own gods. Those who make such gods become like them: helpless, and no help to anyone who trusts them.
- Trusted. He had decided that owning a Levite guaranteed God's favour. His confidence rested on his own arrangements.
- Lost. Six hundred armed men were stronger than he was. Raiders could pick up his whole religion and walk off with it, so he went home.
- Gained. The theft was the Lord being good to him. He still had God, God's word and God's house at Shiloh — if only he had known it.
- Spread. The winners were the real losers. The stolen images took root in Dan until the land went into captivity. They spread through the whole nation and prepared the way for Jeroboam's calves.
And they took that which Micah had made, and the priest that he had had, and came upon Laish, upon a people quiet and secure; and they smote them with the edge of the sword, and burned the city with fire.
The last chapters of Judges show what Israel had become on the inside. Here Dan arrives at Laish with another man's idols and another man's priest, burns a town that never saw it coming, and leaves us asking why Dan was there at all.
Dan's march north was not obedience but a detour around a fight they had already lost.
The tribe of Dan had failed to take the God-given inheritance (Joshua 19:40-46). "The Amorites pressed the people of Dan back into the hill country, for they did not allow them to come down to the plain" (Judges 1:34). Then in self-will, entirely disregarding the will of God, they sent out spies to seek another inheritance. They meet Micah's priest, the hireling... Then they killed the people of Laish and set their city on fire. The whole tribe of Dan becomes idolatrous. We have in all a picture of complete apostasy.
Dan chose the easy target and left the real fight alone.
This city gave Dan the chance for a conquest with no glory in it. It also offered everything the natural heart could want. "A place," said the messengers, "where there is no lack of anything that is in the earth" (v. 10)... Dan had a battle to fight and a victory to win inside his own borders, over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost too much. He chose a conquest with no danger, at the far end of the land. It lay far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was. And that enemy kept hold of Dan's true inheritance, with no one saying a word.
The pattern outlives Dan. We pick the fight we can win.
Is it not a common thing in our own lives to choose what costs us least? We go after the enemies who are secure, at ease and easy to overthrow. We avoid those who are stronger and mightier than we are, whose power we fear, and who will overthrow us if we are not truly in communion with God. So Dan goes elsewhere for a portion, instead of taking the place God had marked out for him.
Commentators differ on how to read the victims. One writer hears pity in how the story is told, and sets it beside Israel's earlier wars:
Notice the pitying way the Holy Spirit describes this act; we say that with reverence. Do we have any such tender record of the taking of Jericho and Ai, when Israel destroyed the people of those two cities at the Lord's command?
Another writer sees that same quiet as lawless ease, already ripe for judgment. He also notes how the spies turned it into religious talk:
The Canaanites are living quiet and secure, in lawless self-indulgence. That shows them ripe for the judgment of God. They are clearly easy prey. So the spies go back with the good news to the brothers who are waiting for them. They would call it God's good news, for we see the sins of others with sharp eyes, and we pronounce God's judgments on them quickly. Self-interest and self-flattery are strong at producing a kind of religion, and the spies talk to their brothers in pious, eager words.
The fire was not the end. What Dan set up in its place lasted far longer.
The surprise of Laish is complete, and the Canaanites, whom God had already doomed, are cut off. Laish becomes Dan. But the idolatrous system that Micah began takes root there. It lasts until the land goes into captivity — that is, as the record tells us, as long as the house of God stood at Shiloh.
The new name told the truth about the conquerors. They stamped the place with their own ancestor rather than with God:
The children of Dan went their way, struck Laish, seized the city and "named it Dan, after the name of Dan their father" (v. 29). The name of Dan had more importance for them than that of Jehovah.
The record makes a point of naming them as Israel's own descendants.
Why are we told this? Perhaps because we could hardly believe, without the Holy Spirit stating it, that the descendants of one of Israel's sons could have done such things — things "right in their own eyes." But what might a believer do when he is not following the Lord? "For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins" (2 Peter 1:9). Yes, it may even come to that!
- Failure first. Dan never took the inheritance God gave. The Amorites pushed them back, and self-will sent them looking elsewhere.
- Cheapness chosen. Dan picked Laish because it was far, rich and defenceless. Meanwhile the real enemy kept Dan's real portion.
- Piety borrowed. Stolen idols and a hired priest travelled with the army, and the spies dressed their report up as good news from God.
- Violence excused. The town was quiet and unsuspecting. Commentators differ: does the account pity the victims, or mark them as ripe for judgment?
- Legacy left. The city burned. Dan's own name replaced the Lord's, and the idolatry planted there lasted until the land went into captivity.
And there was no deliverer, for it was far from Zidon, and they had nothing to do with [any] man; and it [lay] in the valley that is by Beth-rehob. And they built the city and dwelt therein.
Armed men from the tribe of Dan fall on Laish, burn it, and rebuild the city as their own. The verse explains why no one came to help: the town sat far from Sidon and kept to itself. Commentators ask what that quiet detail reveals about Dan, about Laish, and about us.
Laish was not the land God had given Dan. One writer traces the whole raid back to a tribe that would not fight the battle already assigned to it.
Laish was a quiet and prosperous town at the northern edge of Canaan. It lay far from the Sidonians who owned it, and it did no business with anyone. The city offered Dan a conquest with no honour in it, but it also offered everything the natural heart could want. Dan had a battle to fight, a victory to gain within his own borders, over the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far edge of the land. It was far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from the place where his real enemy was. Dan left that enemy undisturbed, still holding Dan's true inheritance.
The same slackness that lost Dan its own land drove it north. One commentator traces the pattern, and the sudden switch from idleness to violence.
We lose what is our own, and what we should make our own. That loss is often the reason for much restless activity among the people of God, and for much that looks like success in other directions... Here we see them forced by their own laziness or fear to seek an inheritance elsewhere. They were then as violent and greedy as they had earlier been idle. Human nature in fallen man usually shows itself in extremes of this kind.
Scripture does not report this attack the way it reports Jericho. One writer asks the reader to notice how the Spirit words it.
Then they "came to Laish, to a people quiet and unsuspecting, and struck them with the edge of the sword and burned the city with fire. And there was no deliverer because it was far from Sidon" (Judges 18:27-28)... Do we notice what we may reverently call the pitying way in which the Holy Spirit describes this transaction? Do we have any such compassionate record of the taking of Jericho and Ai, when Israel carried out the Lord's commands and destroyed the people of those two cities?
Commentators differ in emphasis here. Another writer, reading the same scene, stresses that the people of Laish were living "in lawless self-indulgence, which shows them ripe for the judgment of God," and that in the fall of the city "the Canaanites, doomed of God before, are cut off."
The tribe rebuilt the city and gave it a new name. What they called it shows where their heart was.
The children of Dan went their way, struck Laish, seized the city and "called the name of it Dan, after the name of Dan their father" (v. 29). The name of Dan mattered more to them than the name of the Lord. Such was, in a few words, the dark picture of the religious history of Israel.
The story does not end with a conquest. Dan carried something into the new city that outlasted the victory: the idol worship a man named Micah had started.
The surprise of Laish is complete, and the Canaanites, whom God had already doomed, are cut off. Laish becomes Dan. But there the idolatrous system that Micah began takes root. It lasts until the land goes into captivity; that is, we are told, as long as the house of God continued at Shiloh.
One writer turns this on the reader: the hard thing nearest you is the thing to face.
There is a hard thing lying at your very door. You have looked at it and feared it, and it has stood like a great barrier between you and your true enjoyment and privilege. That is the thing for you to conquer. Otherwise you will be like Dan. You will turn away from your proper place, and open your doors wider to taking lower ground about God and all His things. Is this not a real and important thing for us to notice — that this spirit of compromise and search for an easier path is what opens the way to dishonour, and to disobeying our blessed God?
- Avoided — Dan refused the fight God gave it at home, and looked for a cheaper victory far away.
- Easy — Laish fell because it stood alone: no deliverer, far from Sidon, no dealings with anyone. That ease was the whole attraction.
- Restless — What we lose at home, we chase elsewhere. The chase can even look like success. Laziness and violence are two ends of one fallen nature.
- Renamed — Dan put its own father's name on the new city, not the Lord's. That one choice sums up Israel's religious history.
- Rooted — Micah's idol worship went north with them and stayed. An easy conquest became a lasting corruption.
And they called the name of the city Dan, after the name of Dan their father, who was born to Israel; howbeit Laish was the name of the city at the first.
Judges 18 ends with armed men from Dan seizing a defenceless town and putting their own name over it. The new name looks like a small detail. It raises two questions. Why did a tribe have to go looking for a city at all? And whose name should a place in Israel carry?
Dan already had land of its own. The move north replaced a portion the tribe never took.
No tribe fails so badly to take hold of its inheritance. That is the only way we can make sense of the statement that their lot had not fallen to them. They had let the Philistines take back the cities on the sea coast, and the Amorites had forced them into the hills. This loss of what is ours, and what we should be making our own, is often the reason for much restless activity among the people of God. It is also the reason for much that looks like success in other directions... Here we see them forced by their own laziness or fear to look for an inheritance somewhere else. They were then as violent and greedy as they had been idle before.
Dan picked the easiest target on the map, and left the hard one alone.
Laish was a quiet and prosperous town at the northern edge of Canaan. It lay far from the Sidonians who owned it, and it did no business with anyone. This city gave Dan the chance of a conquest that brought no honour, but it also offered everything the natural heart could desire... Dan had a battle to fight and a victory to win inside his own borders, against the Amorites of the valley. But that fight would have cost him too much. He preferred a conquest without danger, won at the far end of the land. It lay far from the eyes of the Lord's witnesses, and far from his real enemy.
Whose name a city carries says who its people honour.
The children of Dan went their way, struck Laish, seized the city and "named the city Dan, after the name of Dan their ancestor" (v. 29). The name of Dan mattered more to them than the name of the Lord. That, in a few words, was the dark picture of the religious history of Israel.
The settlers brought Micah's stolen idols and his hired priest north with them.
Verse 31 adds the significant words "all the time that the house of God was at Shiloh." God did have a centre in Israel, though not yet in Jerusalem. But the Danites could assume they did not need it, since they had a worship of their own! As well as being against God, their false worship divided them from their brothers.
What began at Dan did not stay there, in place or in time.
Jonathan, a Levite and the grandson of Moses, started and established that line of idolatrous priesthood. It continued in the tribe of Dan for many centuries, "until the day of the captivity of the land" (Judges 18:30) — that is, until the Assyrians carried the ten northern tribes away (2 Kings 17)... You will remember that when the usurper Jeroboam set up the two calves of gold to be the gods of Israel, he placed one in Dan and one in Bethel (1 Kings 12:28-30)... Dan's poisonous influence on his fellow tribes seems to be implied in Jacob's dying prophecy, which describes Dan as "a serpent in the way, a viper by the path" (Genesis 49:17). This influence is first shown historically by the installing of Micah's carved image in the city of Dan (Judges 18:29-31). The corruption grew under the kings of Israel who followed. Before the Assyrian captivity, Amos prophesied of the judgment that would fall on those "who swear by the Guilt of Samaria, and say, 'As your god lives, O Dan'" (Amos 8:14).
One writer traces both the stolen gods and the stolen city to one root.
When the people of God are not satisfied with the full enjoyment of their own inheritance, they are surely ready for the enemy to come in and lead them astray. It is an unfilled heart, a heart that has failed to enter on its own portion, that is open to these attacks... The Danites become restless, just as the Levite did, and "like a bird that strays from its nest is a man who strays from his home."
- Unfilled — Dan never took the land God gave it. An unfilled heart is where idolatry gets in.
- Easy — they fought the weak enemy far away and left the strong one at home. The cheap victory was the unfaithful one.
- Renamed — they put their ancestor's name on the city, not the Lord's. That shows whose name weighed more with them.
- Rooted — stolen gods and a hired priest moved in with the new name. Dan worshipped its own way while God's house stood at Shiloh, and that cut it off from the other tribes.
- Spread — what one tribe planted at Dan grew into a king's golden calf, and then into a prophet's sentence of judgment on the whole north.
And the children of Dan set up the graven image; and Jehonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Moses; he and his sons were priests to the tribe of Dan until the day of the captivity of the land.
Judges 18 ends with a whole tribe settling into a stolen religion. Micah's carved image now stands in the new city of Dan, served by a hired Levite and his sons. Two questions press on this verse. Whose grandson was this priest, and how long did the damage last?
In the Hebrew text one letter, an "n", sits above the line. It turns "Moses" into "Manasseh." Commentators say copyists added it, and that "Moses" is the true reading.
The Revised Version has good reason for changing "Manasseh" to "Moses." Even D. Kimchi, a famous Rabbi, admitted the reason. The copyists were ashamed that a grandson of the lawgiver had sunk so low as to become the priest of an idol. So they hid the fact by putting "Manasseh" in its place. De Rossi and Kennicott both point to manuscripts that carry the true reading. Even the Masoretic text has this striking and suspicious feature: the "n" is written above the proper line. In unpointed Hebrew that letter is the only difference between the two names.
Trace this priest's family line and you reach Moses, Israel's lawgiver. It did him no good at all.
This Levite, who took the place of priest for idol worship, was a descendant of no other than Moses himself, the great lawgiver of Israel. What a thought! Is it not written on every verse we have read, "You must be born again"? There is no such thing as spiritual descent. There is no such thing as inheriting spiritual traits. The child of Moses may lead a people away from God just as readily as an enemy of God does, such as an uncircumcised heathen king.
Ridout presses the point on anyone who leans on a godly family name.
Think how solemn this is. Some men have been nearest to God in privilege and in service, and God has used them. Yet if their sons do not share their faith, those sons may use the godliness of their fathers as a cover for their own idolatry and their own turning away from God.
The Levite's move was not a single sin. It began a line of priests that lasted.
He was glad of a better living and a larger place (verses 19, 20). So he left Micah's house with the lawless men of Dan. They wiped out Laish with fire and sword and named the new city after themselves. There they set up the carved image, and a line of priests that did not fail until the day the land went into captivity. Error takes root faster than the truth, and it bears fruit more richly and lasts longer.
Israel already had one appointed place of worship, named in the very next verse. Dan simply built its own.
Verse 31 adds a telling phrase: "as long as the house of God was at Shiloh." God did have a centre in Israel, though not yet in Jerusalem. But the Danites could assume they did not need that centre, since they had a worship of their own! Their false worship was against God, and it also cut them off from their fellow Israelites.
Commentators differ over "until the day of the captivity of the land." Some read it as the Philistine oppression, since verse 31 ties the image to the years the house of God stood at Shiloh. Others read it as the Assyrian deportation, centuries later. That would make verse 30 a prophecy added afterwards.
The captivity of the land was the Philistine captivity… Micah's image was there all the time the house of God was in Shiloh, and that gives us a date… If it were not for verse 31, one might well suppose verse 30 to be a later, prophetic addition. In that case "the captivity of the land" might mean the Assyrian one. Either way Jonathan is still a near descendant of Moses. The question is one of interpretation.
Whatever the date, the damage did not stay in one town. It ran on through Israel's history.
Greed and ambition seem to have driven him. He started that line of idol-serving priests, and it went on in the tribe of Dan for centuries, "until the day of the captivity of the land"… When Jeroboam seized power and set up the two golden calves as the gods of Israel, he placed one in Dan and one in Bethel. Dying Jacob's prophecy seems to hint at Dan's subtle, poisonous, satanic influence on his fellow tribes, describing Dan as "a serpent in the way, a viper by the path."
- Name. The priest of Dan was Gershom's son and Moses' own grandson. Scribes added one letter to shield the lawgiver's name from the shame.
- Descent. Faith is not passed down a family line. "There is no such thing as spiritual descent." The best heritage can still produce a man who leads people away from God.
- Succession. One man wanted "a better living and a larger place." His choice hardened into a whole line of priests, because error takes root faster and lasts longer than truth.
- Rivalry. Dan's private worship stood alongside the real house of God at Shiloh. It cut them off from their own people as well as from God.
- Reach. What began with a stolen image ended in Jeroboam's golden calf at Dan. Commentators differ on whether the captivity named here is the Philistine one or the Assyrian.