Judges 17: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

A man named Micah, from the hill country of Ephraim, admits to his mother that he took eleven hundred pieces of silver from her. She dedicates the silver to the LORD and has part of it made into images, which Micah keeps in a shrine along with an ephod and household idols, and he sets up one of his own sons as priest. A young Levite from Bethlehem in Judah comes by looking for a place to live, and Micah hires him as priest instead. The chapter says that there was no king in Israel and that Micah expected good from the LORD because a Levite served him.

Claim by Claim

1. 17:1
   • There was a man from the hill country of Ephraim.
   • The man's name was Micah.
2. 17:2
   • Micah said to his mother that eleven hundred pieces of silver had been taken from her.
   • Micah told his mother that she had uttered a curse concerning the stolen silver.
   • It is unclear whether the curse she uttered was pronounced against the thief in general or spoken against Micah himself.
   • Micah said his mother had also spoken the curse in his hearing.
   • Micah told his mother that the silver was with him.
   • Micah said that he himself had taken the silver.
   • His mother said that her son was blessed by the LORD.
3. 17:3
   • Micah returned the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother.
   • His mother said she had wholly dedicated the silver to the LORD from her own hand.
   • His mother said the dedication was on behalf of her son.
   • His mother said the silver was to be used to make a carved image and a cast image.
   • His mother said she would now return the silver to him.
4. 17:4
   • Micah returned the silver to his mother.
   • His mother took two hundred pieces of silver.
   • His mother gave the two hundred pieces of silver to a metalworker.
   • The metalworker made from the silver a carved image and a cast image.
   • The image or images stood in the house of Micah.
5. 17:5
   • The man Micah had a house of God, that is, a shrine.
   • Micah made an ephod.
   • Micah made household idols.
   • Micah installed one of his sons into the priestly office.
   • That son became Micah's priest.
6. 17:6
   • In those days there was no king in Israel.
   • In those days each man did what was right in his own eyes.
7. 17:7
   • There was a young man from Bethlehem in Judah.
   • The young man was of the family of Judah.
   • The young man was a Levite.
   • The young man was residing there as a resident alien.
8. 17:8
   • The man left the city of Bethlehem in Judah.
   • He left in order to settle wherever he could find a place.
   • He came to the hill country of Ephraim.
   • He came as far as the house of Micah.
   • He was making his journey.
9. 17:9
   • Micah asked him where he came from.
   • The man said he was a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah.
   • The man said he was going to settle wherever he could find a place.
10. 17:10
    • Micah told him to stay with him.
    • Micah told him to be to him a father and a priest.
    • Micah said he would give him ten pieces of silver per year.
    • Micah said he would give him a set of clothes.
    • Micah said he would give him his food.
    • The Levite went.
11. 17:11
    • The Levite agreed to dwell with the man.
    • The young man became to Micah like one of his own sons.
12. 17:12
    • Micah installed the Levite into the priestly office.
    • The young man became Micah's priest.
    • The young man lived in Micah's house.
13. 17:13
    • Micah said that he now knew the LORD would do good to him.
    • Micah gave as his reason that he had a Levite as his priest.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

17:1

Micah's name is a shortened form of the Hebrew Micayehu, "Who is like the LORD?" The longer form is used of him in verses 1 and 4 of the Hebrew text, then the short form for the rest of the chapter.

17:2

A shekel was a weight, not a coin; coined money did not yet exist. A shekel of silver was roughly 11–12 grams, so eleven hundred shekels is on the order of 28 pounds of silver, an enormous sum. Verse 10 shows a live-in priest being hired for ten shekels a year. When something was stolen and the thief unknown, the victim could pronounce a public curse on whoever had taken it, calling down harm on the culprit. The curse was thought to work whether or not the thief was named, which is why Micah, having heard it, speaks up. His mother's blessing is meant to cancel it.

17:3

"Set apart for the LORD" translates a word for dedicating property to a deity, putting it beyond ordinary use. The two objects are named by how they were made: one carved (from wood or stone, possibly overlaid with metal) and one cast in molten metal. The Hebrew phrase can be read as two separate images or as a single carved core plated with cast metal; the text does not settle it.

17:4

Only two hundred of the eleven hundred shekels actually go to the silversmith. The narrator states this without comment, leaving what happened to the rest unexplained.

17:5

"A shrine for gods" renders a Hebrew phrase that can equally mean "a house of God" or "a house of gods" (a private sanctuary, in contrast to a national one. An ephod was a priestly garment or vestment; in some passages it is also the object handled when seeking a yes-or-no answer from God, so the word covers both the clothing and its use in inquiry. "Household idols" translates teraphim, small figures kept in the home. They appear elsewhere in connection with divination and with family property claims; their exact form and size are not described. "Set apart to serve as priest" translates a Hebrew idiom, "filled his hand") the standard phrase for installing someone in priestly office. Micah performs it himself on his own son, though elsewhere in the law priesthood belongs to Aaron's descendants.

17:6

This sentence is the book's refrain for the period before Israel had kings; it recurs at 18:1, 19:1 and 21:25. "Right in his own eyes" is a Hebrew way of saying each man judged for himself what to do, with no authority above him.

17:7

The Levites were the tribe assigned to religious duties and given no territory of their own; they lived scattered in towns among the other tribes and depended on offerings and on the hospitality of their hosts. That is why this young man is traveling to find a place. "Bethlehem in Judah" is specified to distinguish it from another Bethlehem in the territory of Zebulun, in the north. Calling him "of the clan of Judah" while also calling him a Levite is odd, since the two are different tribes; the phrase may mean he was reckoned as living within Judah's clan territory rather than descended from Judah. The text is not clear. "Living there as an outsider" translates a term for a resident alien, someone dwelling long-term in a place where he had no ancestral land or kinship rights, and so no legal standing of his own.

17:8

Priests were supposed to come from one family only, the descendants of Aaron. Micah picking his own son was not how it was meant to work.

17:9

Israel had no king yet. There was no one over the whole nation to stop people from doing as they pleased. This line comes up again near the end of Judges.

17:10

"Father" here is a title of respect for a priest or adviser, not a claim about age, the man is young enough to be called Micah's son a verse later. Ten shekels of silver a year, with clothing and board, sets the whole annual wage at less than one percent of the silver mentioned in verse 2.

17:11

There was more than one town called Bethlehem, so the writer adds "in Judah" to show which one he means. It sat about five miles south of Jerusalem.

17:12

Again the Hebrew idiom "filled his hand": Micah installs the Levite in office himself, as he had installed his son in verse 5.

17:13

"Will do me good" means will make me prosper. Micah's reasoning is that hiring a man from the priestly tribe makes his home shrine, images and all, count as the real thing.