The Living Bible (84 page)

Judges
17

In the hill country of Ephraim lived a man named Micah.

    
²
 One day he said to his mother, “That thousand dollars you thought was stolen from you, and you were cursing about—well, I stole it!”

    
“God bless you for confessing it,” his mother replied.
³
 So he returned the money to her.

    
“I am going to give it to the Lord as a credit for your account,” she declared. “I’ll have an idol carved for you and plate it with the silver.”

    
^4-5
 So his mother took a fifth of it to a silversmith, and the idol he made from it was placed in Micah’s shrine. Micah had many idols in his collection, also an ephod and some teraphim, and he installed one of his sons as the priest.
⁶
 (For in those days Israel had no king, so everyone did whatever he wanted to—whatever seemed right in his own eyes.)

    
^7-8
 One day a young priest
*
from the town of Bethlehem, in Judah, arrived in that area of Ephraim, looking for a good place to live. He happened to stop at Micah’s house as he was traveling through.

    
⁹
 “Where are you from?” Micah asked him.

    
And he replied, “I am a priest from Bethlehem, in Judah, and I am looking for a place to live.”

    
^10-11
 “Well, stay here with me,” Micah said, “and you can be my priest. I will give you one hundred dollars a year plus a new suit and your board and room.” The young man agreed to this and became as one of Micah’s sons.
¹²
 So Micah consecrated him as his personal priest.

    
¹³
 “I know the Lord will really bless me now,” Micah exclaimed, “because now I have a genuine priest working for me!”
*

Judges
18

As has already been stated, there was no king in Israel at that time. The tribe of Dan was trying to find a place to settle, for they had not yet driven out the people living in the land assigned to them.
²
 So the men of Dan chose five army heroes from the cities of Zorah and Eshtaol as scouts to go and spy out the land they were supposed to settle in. Arriving in the hill country of Ephraim, they stayed at Micah’s home.
³
 Noticing the young Levite’s accent, they took him aside and asked him, “What are you doing here? Why did you come?”
⁴
 He told them about his contract with Micah, and that he was his personal priest.

    
⁵
 “Well, then,” they said, “ask God whether or not our trip will be successful.”

    
⁶
 “Yes,” the priest replied, “all is well. The Lord is taking care of you.”

    
⁷
 So the five men went on to the town of Laish and noticed how secure everyone felt. Their manner of life was Phoenician, and they were wealthy. They lived quietly and were unprepared for an attack, for there were no tribes in the area strong enough to try it. They lived a great distance from their relatives in Sidon, and had little or no contact with the nearby villages.
⁸
 So the spies returned to their people in Zorah and Eshtaol.

    
“What about it?” they were asked. “What did you find?”

    
^9-10
 And the men replied, “Let’s attack! We have seen the land and it is ours for the taking—a broad, fertile, wonderful place—a real paradise. The people aren’t even prepared to defend themselves! Come on, let’s go! For God has given it to us!”

    
¹¹
 So six hundred armed troops of the tribe of Dan set out from Zorah and Eshtaol.
¹²
 They camped first at a place west of Kiriath-jearim in Judah (which is still called “The Camp of Dan”),
¹³
 then they went on up into the hill country of Ephraim.

    
As they passed the home of Micah,
¹⁴
 the five spies told the others. “There is a shrine in there with an ephod, some teraphim, and many plated idols. It’s obvious what we ought to do!”

    
^15-16
 So the five men went over to the house and with all of the armed men standing just outside the gate, they talked to the young priest and asked him how he was getting along.
¹⁷
 Then the five spies entered the shrine and took the idols, the ephod, and the teraphim.

    
¹⁸
 “What are you doing?” the young priest demanded when he saw them carrying them out.

    
¹⁹
 “Be quiet and come with us,” they said. “Be a priest to all of us. Isn’t it better for you to be a priest to a whole tribe in Israel instead of just to one man in his private home?”

    
²⁰
 The young priest was then quite happy to go with them, and he took along the ephod, the teraphim, and the idols.
²¹
 They started on their way again, placing their children, cattle, and household goods at the front of the column.
²²
 When they were quite a distance from Micah’s home, Micah and some of his neighbors came chasing after them,
²³
 yelling at them to stop.

    
“What do you want, chasing after us like this?” the men of Dan demanded.

    
²⁴
 “What do you mean, ‘What do I want’!” Micah retorted. “You’ve taken away all my gods and my priest, and I have nothing left!”

    
²⁵
 “Be careful how you talk, mister,” the men of Dan replied. “Somebody’s apt to get angry and kill every one of you.”

    
²⁶
 So the men of Dan kept going. When Micah saw that there were too many of them for him to handle, he turned back home.

    
²⁷
 Then, with Micah’s idols and the priest, the men of Dan arrived at the city of Laish. There weren’t even any guards, so they went in and slaughtered all the people and burned the city to the ground.
²⁸
 There was no one to help the inhabitants, for they were too far away from Sidon, and they had no local allies, for they had no dealings with anyone. This happened in the valley next to Beth-rehob. Then the people of the tribe of Dan rebuilt the city and lived there.
²⁹
 The city was named “Dan” after their ancestor, Israel’s son, but it had originally been called Laish.

    
³⁰
 Then they set up the idols and appointed a man named Jonathan (son of Gershom and grandson of Moses!) and his sons as their priests. This family continued as priests until the city was finally conquered by its enemies.
³¹
 So Micah’s idols were worshiped by the tribe of Dan as long as the Tabernacle remained at Shiloh.

Judges
19

At this time before Israel had a king, there was a man of the tribe of Levi living on the far side of the hill country of Ephraim, who brought home a girl from Bethlehem in Judah to be his concubine.
²
 But she became angry with him and ran away, and returned to her father’s home in Bethlehem, and was there about four months.
³
 Then her husband, taking along a servant and an extra donkey, went to see her to try to win her back again. When he arrived at her home, she let him in and introduced him to her father, who was delighted to meet him.
⁴
 Her father urged him to stay awhile, so he stayed three days, and they all had a very pleasant time.

    
⁵
 On the fourth day they were up early, ready to leave, but the girl’s father insisted on their having breakfast first.
⁶
 Then he pleaded with him to stay one more day, as they were having such a good time.
⁷
 At first the man refused, but his father-in-law kept urging him until finally he gave in.
⁸
 The next morning they were up early again, and again the girl’s father pleaded, “Stay just today and leave sometime this evening.” So they had another day of feasting.

    
⁹
 That afternoon as he and his wife and servant were preparing to leave, his father-in-law said, “Look, it’s getting late. Stay just tonight, and we will have a pleasant evening together and tomorrow you can get up early and be on your way.”

    
¹⁰
 But this time the man was adamant, so they left, getting as far as Jerusalem (also called Jebus) before dark.

    
¹¹
 His servant said to him, “It’s getting too late to travel; let’s stay here tonight.”

    
^12-13
 “No,” his master said, “we can’t stay in this heathen city where there are no Israelites—we will go on to Gibeah, or possibly Ramah.”

    
¹⁴
 So they went on. The sun was setting just as they came to Gibeah, a village of the tribe of Benjamin,
¹⁵
 so they went there for the night. But as no one invited them in, they camped in the village square.
¹⁶
 Just then an old man came by on his way home from his work in the fields. (He was originally from the hill country of Ephraim, but was living now in Gibeah, even though it was in the territory of Benjamin.)
¹⁷
 When he saw the travelers camped in the square, he asked them where they were from and where they were going.

    
¹⁸
 “We’re on the way home from Bethlehem, in Judah,” the man replied. “I live on the far edge of the Ephraim hill country, near Shiloh. But no one has taken us in for the night,
¹⁹
 even though we have fodder for our donkeys and plenty of food and wine for ourselves.”

    
²⁰
 “Don’t worry,” the old man said, “be my guests; for you mustn’t stay here in the square. It’s too dangerous.”

    
²¹
 So he took them home with him. He fed their donkeys while they rested, and afterward they had supper together.
²²
 Just as they were beginning to warm to the occasion, a gang of sex perverts gathered around the house and began beating at the door and yelling at the old man to bring out the man who was staying with him, so they could rape him.
²³
 The old man stepped outside to talk to them.

    
“No, my brothers, don’t do such a dastardly act,” he begged, “for he is my guest.
²⁴
 Here, take my virgin daughter and this man’s wife. I’ll bring them out and you can do whatever you like to them—but don’t do such a thing to this man.”

    
²⁵
 But they wouldn’t listen to him. Then the girl’s husband pushed her out to them, and they abused her all night, taking turns raping her until morning. Finally, just at dawn, they let her go.
²⁶
 She fell down at the door of the house and lay there until it was light.
²⁷
 When her husband opened the door to be on his way, he found her there, fallen down in front of the door with her hands digging into the threshold.

    
²⁸
 “Well, come on,” he said. “Let’s get going.”

    
But there was no answer, for she was dead; so he threw her across the donkey’s back and took her home.
²⁹
 When he got there he took a knife and cut her body into twelve parts and sent one piece to each tribe of Israel.
³⁰
 Then the entire nation was roused to action against the men of Benjamin because of this awful deed.

    
“There hasn’t been such a horrible crime since Israel left Egypt,” everyone said. “We’ve got to do something about it.”