a. Micah’s household and the Danite migration (17:1–18:31)
a. Micah’s household and the Danite migration (17:1–18:31)
The first of the two appendices deals with domestic and religious affairs in the household of Micah and with his involvement with the migrating Danites. It is highly probable that these events came after those recorded in the second appendix (chapters 19–21), but being generally connected with chapters 13–16 (the Samson narratives), inasmuch as both are connected with the Philistine pressure on the tribe of Dan, they have been set first. Frequently in the Old Testament it may be observed that connection of subject matter takes precedence over chronological sequence.
17:1–6. Micah and his mother. The tribal portion of Ephraim lay in mainly hilly country, but the hill country of Ephraim (RV, RSV) appears to refer to that wider tract of country between Bethel and Esdraelon which included a portion of western Manasseh. No more positive location of the home of Micah can be given, except for the fact that it lay on the general route between the tribal portion of Dan and the town of Laish in the extreme north. Micah, whose name is the shortened form of Micahyahu (‘who is like Yahweh?’), which occurs in the Hebrew text in verses 1 and 4, is introduced in an unfavourable light as a thief who stole a large amount from his own mother. For a possible explanation of the eleven hundred pieces of silver see the note on 16:5. Micah’s confession of his guilt and his restoration of this small fortune was undoubtedly conditioned by the curse which his mother had placed on the thief, and the fact that this was uttered in his hearing may suggest that she was not without her suspicions. The power of a curse was considered to be very real in the ancient world; ‘not a mere sound on the lips but an agent sent forth … an active agent for hurt.’2 The curse could, however, be countermanded by the blessing of the one who had pronounced it and this is the purpose of the blessing uttered by Micah’s mother; the restoration of the money led to the revoking of the malediction. The sincerity of the woman is questionable; when the money was stolen she affirmed that she had dedicated it (AV, RV mg.) to the Lord, but when it was returned she gave only one-fifth of the total amount for this purpose (cf. Acts 5:1, 2). It may be that her motive was to enhance the heinousness of the theft and thus to increase the possibility of restoration! Money dedicated to the deity was taboo and dared not be used for any other purpose.
A lamentable ignorance of the provisions of Israelite worship is also revealed, for the making of any graven image was expressly forbidden (Exod. 20:4, 23; Deut. 4:16). Israel’s faith was to be an imageless faith; Israel’s God was not to be honoured by being cast into the likeness of any earthly creature. The graven image was probably carved out of wood or stones, possibly overlaid with silver, but the molten image (the word derived from the verb ‘to pour out’) was made of solid silver. However, there are indications in the text that there was only one image, for the pronoun it (as in RV, RSV) should stand in place of they (AV) at the end of verse 4 and only one image is mentioned in 18:20, 30, 31. Possibly the older designation graven image was used generically and then qualified by molten image to define the method of construction. It has been suggested that the image may have been in the form of a bull, which is found throughout a wide area of the ancient world as the representation of the deity. The gods were often depicted as standing, or more rarely sitting, on the back of a bull, which by its strength and power of fertility well represented the essence of the nature cults. Aaron had made a bull or calf image while Moses was in the holy mountain (Exod. 32:4) and, at a later date, Jeroboam ben-Nebat made similar images to set up at the shrines at Dan and Bethel (1 Kgs 12:28–30). Most scholars accept that these were not intended to represent Yahweh but rather to serve as the visible throne upon which the invisible Yahweh was conceived to sit. But the great danger of associating the worship of Yahweh with the bull, the symbol of the Canaanite fertility cults, will be apparent. If this image of Micah’s was indeed of this type, he must have been ignorant or forgetful of the fate which overtook the Israelites after Aaron’s act (Exod. 32:19–35).
Other instances of irregularity appear in this narrative. Exodus 20:24 provided for the setting up of a sanctuary at the place of a theophany, but Micah makes his shrine at the place of his own convenience, in his own home (5). Here he housed his molten image, an ephod (see note on 8:27) and a teraphim. The teraphim (the word is plural in form but singular in meaning) are frequently associated with the home throughout the Old Testament period and were almost certainly household gods. Like the ephod they were associated with divination. It may be that originally, i.e. before the patriarchal period, they were the mummified heads of the family forefathers, to be replaced at a later date by pottery figurines. Whenever they are mentioned in the Old Testament they are invariably condemned, either directly or indirectly.
The final aberration of Micah was the consecration of his own son as priest. Before the separation of the whole tribe of Levi to the priestly offices (Num. 3:5ff.) it is likely that the priestly duties were fulfilled by the first-born (Jewish rabbinic scholarship regards Exod. 24:5 in this light). The bypassing of the Levitical priesthood by Micah may be due either to a breakdown in the distribution of the Levites amongst the community or to an overlooking, wilful or ignorant, of the provisions of the Law. It is striking that, when a Levite did appear on the scene, he was immediately preferred. The expression consecrated (5, AV, RV) is literally ‘filled the hand of’, which is the standard expression for induction into the priestly office. The background of this unusual figure of speech is the filling of the hand of the officiating priest with portions of a sacrifice, particularly the wave-offering (Exod. 29:24, etc.). The editor did not condemn these malpractices; he simply contented himself with the observation that there was no king in Israel, every man pleased himself. But since ‘to do what was right in one’s own eyes’ is tantamount to saying that a state of anarchy existed, the inference is that this led inevitably to an undesirable and disorderly situation.
17:7–13. Micah and the Levite. Micah’s private, well-equipped shrine, attended by his own son, sufficed him until the arrival of a genuine Levite. The Levites, according to the Mosaic legislation, were allocated forty-eight cities for their personal use (Num. 35:1ff.; Josh. 21:1ff.). These cities were evenly distributed throughout the land to ensure maximum effectiveness, but it is apparent that the political and social disorders of the judges’ period had caused this organization to lapse. Micah does not seem to have had access to the services of a Levite up to this point. The clause and he sojourned there (7) appears out of place, since the Levite had left Beth-lehem-judah and had not yet been invited to settle in Micah’s home at Mount Ephraim. Since the words sojourned there have exactly the same consonants as the name of Gershom, one of the two sons of Moses, and as the Levite is named in 18:30 as ‘Jonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Moses’, it may be that this was the original reference here (see note on 18:30). The suggestion is strengthened by the incidental nature of the reference in 18:30. The latter part of verse 7 may therefore have been ‘and he was the son of Gershom’, or ‘and he was Jonathan the son of Gershom’, which probably signifies a descendant of Gershom, not his actual son.
Hitherto this young man had been resident in Beth-lehem-judah of the family of Judah. There is no cause for confusion here and no need to resort to a theory of duplicate narratives, one stating that the man was a true Levite and the other that he was a Judean. Often associated with this view is the suggestion that the term Levite indicates one who exercises a particular function, not necessarily a member of the tribe of Levi. Support for this view is often claimed by reference to Samuel, who was an Ephraimite by birth (1 Sam. 1:1) and yet is listed with the tribe of Levi (1 Chr. 6:16–34). The fact that Samuel was ‘given to the Lord’ and brought up in the priestly sanctuary at Shiloh, where he was trained as a priest, made him an exceptional character; hence his inclusion in the Levitical list. A simpler explanation is that Beth-lehem-judah was virtually a composite name, distinguishing it from other places of the same name in other areas, so the repetition of the name Judah is not significant beyond indicating where the Levite was domiciled.
It is not clear why the Levite had been displaced from Bethlehem. Possibly it was because the support upon which the Levites depended was not forthcoming. Micah, hearing of his situation, gave an invitation to him to stay and minister to him. The terms of settlement, ‘board and lodging’, a new set of garments and ten pieces of silver (approximately £2) each year make very interesting reading in the light of the present high standard of living and working conditions, as well as giving some indication of the relative value of the amounts in 16:5 and 17:2.
The relationship between Micah and Jonathan, his Levite, is also significant; Jonathan was to be a father and a priest to Micah, but he became like one of Micah’s sons (10, 11). Many minister-congregation relationships would be improved if the former was a father in the things of God to his flock and the latter showed fatherly concern in providing material things for their minister. So Micah ‘filled the hand of’ the young man (see note on 17:5) and, with a certain superstition, faced the future with assurance now that he had a properly qualified man to handle religious affairs.
18:1–6. Micah’s Levite and the Danite spies. We have already noted the predicament of the tribe of Dan (1:34, 35 and the Samson narratives). The Danites were quite unable to occupy the territory allocated to them (Josh. 19:41–46) due to the opposition of the Amorites and then the pressure of the Philistines. Pressed up into the hill-country, they were confined to a very small area in the region of Zorah and Eshtaol, where the activities of Samson centred (13:2, 25), in territory which, according to Joshua 15:33, was also on the border of Judah. Probably the difficulties in settlement made for a lack of precision in the intertribal boundaries. The reference to the ‘camp of Dan’ (13:25; 18:12) also hints at an unsettled situation. At last, in desperation, a considerable group of them (see note on 18:11) decided to seek a more congenial and secure situation. Joshua 19:47 gives a summary of this northward migration and was added to the details of the Danite territory after the event. The sending of the five spies to reconnoitre the land recalls the incidents of Numbers 13. On their way they came to Mount Ephraim and recognized the voice of the Levite (3). Possibly he had passed through their territory on his journeyings or, due to the close connection between the tribes of Dan and Judah, they may conceivably have known him when he was at Beth-lehem. Alternatively, their recognition may not have been personal but of his southern accent or of one fulfilling the duties of a Levite. Their barrage of questions having been met with satisfactory replies, they requested guidance on their own mission (5). Since the sanctuary of Micah was designed to give such help it was readily forthcoming after the Levite had consulted the oracle. His favourable reply was to have an important bearing upon subsequent events.
18:7–10. The report of the Danite spies. The northward journey of the Danites took them about 100 miles from their starting-point before they found a satisfactory location for their proposed new settlement. They were now clear of the region occupied by the Israelites and in a small but very fertile area populated by people of Phoenician or Aramean stock (a very slight amendment to the word man, at the end of verse 7, gives the reading ‘Aram’). Laish or Leshem (Josh. 19:47), which appears as Lus(i) in Egyptian texts of c. 1850–1825 BC, has been identified as the modern Tell el-Qâdi. The size of the mound, about half a mile in diameter, which was the site of the ancient city, witnesses to its importance. Its natural connections were with the area to the south, for it was cut off from Aram (Syria) by the bulk of Mount Hermon and from Phoenicia by the Lebanon range. There was an assured water supply from the springs and streams which supplied the Jordan waters. Of great importance, in view of the relatively small fighting force of the Danites (11), was the fact that the inhabitants of the land, secure in their isolation, had taken no precautions against a surprise attack. The unanimous and enthusiastic report of the spies when they returned to their brethren and the urgency with which they advocated action are in marked contrast to the doleful account of the ten companions of Joshua and Caleb (Num. 13:27–29, 31–33).
18:11–20. The despoliation of Micah’s sanctuary. Six hundred Danite warriors responded to the challenge and moved northwards with their families and possessions (21), forming a party of about two or three thousand. The relatively small numbers may indicate the decimation of the tribe resulting from years of hostile pressure. Alternatively, it may be that when the moment of decision came a majority were unwilling to leave their familiar surroundings. If this incident be dated before the events described in the Samson narratives, then it is obvious that only a portion of the tribe left the region of Zorah and Eshtaol, but this is not clearly indicated in the text. The question of verse 19 suggests that the major part of the tribe migrated and so Jonathan was able to be a priest unto a tribe and a family in Israel.
The short journey of the first day took them in a north-easterly direction to the west (behind, AV, RV) of Kiriath-jearim, no more than 8 or 9 miles from their starting-point. Kiriath-jearim was one of the four towns of the Gibeonite confederacy which entered by guile into an alliance with Joshua (Josh. 9:17). Mahaneh-dan (‘the camp of Dan’) is not to be confused with the place of the same name in 13:25, since the latter was between Zorah and Eshtaol. The next day brought them to the vicinity of the house of Micah at Mount Ephraim. The repetition of certain expressions, such as an ephod, and teraphim, and a graven image, and a molten image (14, 17, 18, 20), and the six hundred men appointed with their weapons of war (16, 17) has suggested to some scholars a combination of narratives. A more plausible explanation is that an oral stage of the tradition is reflected, with a deliberate repetition on the part of the narrator, for the sake of effect. It is clear that he took a somewhat heartless delight in this brazen theft of the treasures of Micah’s shrine, with 600 stalwarts standing by to intimidate the lawful owner.
The words at the end of the comment by the five spies (14) was a thinly-veiled suggestion, and a minor deviation brought the whole company to Micah’s home. Here the five spies, no doubt influenced by the apparent success of their appeal to the oracle on their earlier visit, advanced and renewed their acquaintance with the Levite, while the 600 warriors took up a threatening station at the gate. The gate (16) is always used of the entrance to a village or city, never of the door of a house. But since no name is given to this particular place (Mount Ephraim gives only a vague idea of its whereabouts), and since only a few men were enlisted from the surrounding homes (22), it appears that it was little more than a cluster of dwellings around the home of Micah.
It is not clear whether the five spies, or a group from the main body, purloined the essential articles from the sanctuary. The feeble remonstrances of the Levite were soon silenced by the prospect of promotion, from being a spiritual counsellor for a small company to exercising the same function for a whole tribe. The complete lack of loyalty to Micah, overlooking the latter’s kindness, and the mercenary attitude of the Levite reflect discreditably on him and on the standards of the age. The flock of God in all ages has been bedevilled by false shepherds who seek only their own self-interest and advancement. With gladness of heart the Levite connived at this act of armed robbery and went with his new masters, taking with him all the cultic trappings of the shrine of his original benefactor.
18:21–26. Micah’s abortive intervention. The Danites, realizing that they could expect trouble, took the precaution of interposing their armed men between their dependants, cattle and baggage and any pursuing force, a device which would also indicate that they were not to be trifled with. Micah’s more mobile force soon overtook them and from this point on the Danites blustered and threatened their way through, trampling over justice in the consciousness of their superior might. They knew full well why they were being pursued, but when this was made plain to them in tones of understandable indignation they threatened Micah and his men with force if he continued to disturb the peace. The expression angry fellows (25), lit. ‘men bitter of soul’, indicates men easily aroused and capable of fierce action (cf. 2 Sam. 17:8 where the same phrase is translated ‘chafed in their minds’). Enraged but helpless in the presence of such an aggressive attitude, Micah had no alternative but to return home empty-handed. The gods which he had made (24) were completely unable to avert this catastrophe (cf. Isa. 44:9–20; 46:6, 7). The incident is a sad commentary on the disturbed state of the land at this time, with no strong, centralized authority to ensure that justice was ultimately done. The revealing comment of 18:1 shows the editor’s diagnosis of the situation.
18:27–31. The capture of Laish. The quiet security of the peaceable inhabitants of Laish was no protection against the weapons of the determined Danites and they were soon annihilated. Their isolation, in which they trusted, left them helpless, for there was no possibility of securing help from either Zidon or Aram (see note on verse 7). From the fire-stricken ruins there arose the city of Dan, named in honour of the tribal ancestor. Its location was in the valley that lieth by Beth-rehob (lit. ‘house of the open place’), which may be the Rehob of Numbers 13:21, the most northerly city observed by the twelve spies. There the Danites set up a sanctuary and installed Jonathan as their priest. The AV follows an emendation introduced into the Hebrew text by reading the son of Manasseh (30). The consonants (mšh) are those of the name of Moses the father of Gershom (Exod. 2:21, 22, etc.), but a supra-linear n has been introduced between the first two to give the consonants of Manasseh. It is universally agreed that the reference was originally to Moses. The reason for the amendment may have been to safeguard the reputation of this great leader by excluding him from the pedigree of this time-serving and idolatrous Levite. The alteration to Manasseh may have been designed to suggest a correspondence of character between the Levite and the most wicked of Judah’s kings (2 Kgs 21), a device which would bring discredit upon the Danite priesthood instituted by Jonathan. Dan was one of the two sanctuaries set up by Jeroboam I at the time of the disruption in order to counteract the centripetal influence of Jerusalem (1 Kgs 12:26–30). The golden calf or bull he set up may have been modelled after the molten image of Micah. Dan and Bethel, the cult-centres of Jeroboam’s debased priesthood, were especially obnoxious to the priests of Judah.
30. Until the day of the captivity of the land is usually taken as a reference to the defeat of Israel and the deportation of many of its inhabitants by Tiglath-pileser III of Assyria in 733–732 BC, or to the final reduction of the land and the deportation under Sargon in 722–721 BC (2 Kgs 15:29; 17:6). In this case the historical reference could have been added by a later editor. But the reference to the house of God at Shiloh (31) suggests a link with an earlier period connected with the Philistines. This occasion could have been either after the twin defeat at Aphek (1 Sam. 4:1–11) or, more probably, after the death of Saul, when David reigned over Judah from Hebron, Ish-baal reigned over a truncated Israel from Mahanaim in Transjordania and the Philistines, presumably, controlled all the other areas including Dan (2 Sam. 2:8–11). It is inconceivable that David would have left untouched this idolatrous religious sanctuary at Dan, which suggests that it no longer functioned during his reign over the united kingdom. There is no record of the destruction of Shiloh in the historical books, but the event itself is noted in Jeremiah 7:12, 14; 26:6; and Psalm 78:60. Archaeological evidence shows clearly that the temple there was destroyed about 1050 BC, which must have been immediately after the events of 1 Samuel 4.
It is frequently stated that these chapters were intended to justify the establishment of the northern sanctuary of Dan by pointing to its association with a descendant of Moses and its history going back as far as the shrine at Shiloh. The details of the narrative make this unlikely, however, for neither the Levite nor the Danites come out at all creditably. It is far easier to assume that the editor had no religious axe to grind, but incorporated these incidents to illustrate his main thesis, namely the disorder and irregularity of the political and religious life of Israel during the period.