Judges 17:5

had an house of gods But according to his lights Micah was a zealous worshipper of Jehovah; so follow Marg. had an house of God, i.e. a private shrine. The narrative hardly permits the identification of Micah's beth-elohimwith Beth-el, as has been proposed; nor does it intend to brand his shrine, and the sanctuary at Dan, as idolatrous foundations.

an ephod and teraphim Instruments for consulting the divine oracle; 1 Samuel 23:9-12; Zechariah 10:2. In Hosea 3:4 they are mentioned, together with sacrifice and pillar, in a way which suggests that they were to be found in public sanctuaries. Such was the case with the ephod, Judges 8:27 note; but the terâphim as a rule seem to have been household sacra, perhaps images shaped in human form (Genesis 31:19; Genesis 31:34 f.; 1 Samuel 19:13; 1 Samuel 19:16), associated with superstitious practices such as divination and witchcraft, and therefore discountenanced by the higher religion; Genesis 35:2; Genesis 35:4 E; 1 Samuel 15:23; 2 Kings 23:24; Ezekiel 21:21 [60]. The archaic miniature idols, generally figures of Ashtoreth, which have been unearthed at Taanach and Gezer, are supposed to have been terâphim, but without much probability. See the illustrations in Vincent, Canaan, pp. 153 ff.; Driver,

[60] The Jerusalem Targum on Genesis 31:19 thus explains what the terâphim were: -they kill a first-born male and cut off his head, and salt it in salt and spices, and write spells on a leaf of gold which they place under the tongue, and set it up on the wall, and it speaks with them." This barbarous magic must actually have existed in popular practice.

Schweich Lectures, p. 57. Gressmann, Eschatologie, p. 345 n., accepts the view that if the ephod was the mantle, the terâphim were the masks of the sacred image; the priest put them on to deliver an oracle, and was then supposed to be invested with the power of the Deity. But this does not seem to explain the private, domestic use of the terâphim. The etymology and meaning of the word are unknown; it occurs only in the plural, even when referring to a single object (e.g. 1 Samuel 19:13; 1 Samuel 19:16); see Gesenius-Kautzsch, Hebr. Gram.28, §124 h, Meyer, Die Israeliten, p. 212.

and consecrated one of his sons Judges 17:12, installed lit. filled the hand of. The idiom probably originated from the custom of filling the hands of a candidate for the priestly office with choice portions of the sacrifice, if we may suppose that the ceremonial enjoined in P was based upon traditional usage; Exodus 29:22-25; Leviticus 8:25-28; cf. 2 Chronicles 13:9; 1 Kings 13:33. In Ezekiel 43:26 the phrase has become entirely conventionalized, and is applied to the altar (lit. fill ye its hand). An exact equivalent was used in Assyrian for conferring a dignity on a person, e.g. the god Ashur -filled his hand with a matchless kingdom," KB. i. p. 191.

The verse throws a valuable light on the religious practice of the period. The head of a family could install a son as priest to his household (cf. 1 Samuel 7:1; 2 Samuel 8:18), and the priestly office was not confined to Levites (cf. 1 Samuel 2:18; 1 Samuel 3:1; 1 Samuel 7:9 f. etc., 2 Samuel 20:26), though a Levite was considered to possess superior skill and fitness for it, Judges 17:13. Of course this was entirely at variance with later theory and custom. In Deuteronomy (viith century) the only priests we hear of are the Levites, and according to the compiler of the Book of Kings none but Levites had the right to exercise priestly functions (1 Kings 12:31; 1 Kings 13:33); all Levites might be priests (Deuteronomy 10:8 f., Judges 18:1-8). In the following age Ezekiel draws a distinction between Levites, and confines the priesthood to the descendants of Zadok, degrading the rest to the rank of priests" servants (Ezekiel 44:10-16); while finally, according to the Priestly Code, only the descendants of Aaron can be priests (Exodus 28; Numbers 3:10, etc.). A later scribe, familiar with what had become the established rule in his day, draws attention to the irregularity in the present case, and puts it down to the general lack of order in the days before the monarchy; cf. Judges 18:1; Judges 19:1; Judges 21:25. The remark implies that the scribe who added it was writing? time when there were kings in Israel.