¹In days the they there is no king in Israel, and in days the they the tribe of the Danite was searching to it inheritance to dwell; not the day the he fell to it until in the middle of the tribe of Israel in the inheritance.

²Dan sent the children from their family, five men from their ends, men, the children of strength, from Zorah and from Eshtaol, to walk along the land and to search it. They said to them, "Go, search the land." They went to the mountain of Ephraim, to the house of Micah, and lodged there.

³They were with the house of Micah, and they recognized the sound of the boy the Levite, and removed there, and said to him, "Who brought you here, and what do you make in, and what to you here?"

⁴He said to them, "As and as Micah made to me, he has hired me, and I was to him the priest."

⁵They said to him, "Inquire in God, and we will know our way, whether she will succeed in which we go over it."

⁶The priest said to them, "Go to the wholeness; before Yahweh is your way in which you will go in it."

⁷The five men went, and they came to Laish, and saw the people who were in her midst dwelling to the security, after the custom of the Sidonians, rested and trusted; and there was no shamed word in the land, one possessing restraint; and they were afar from the Sidonians, and they had no word with man.

⁸They came to their brothers at Zorah and Eshtaol, and their brothers said to them, "What do you say?"

⁹They said, "Rise, and let us come up over them, for we saw the land, and it is exceedingly good; and you are hushed — do not hesitate to go, to go to occupy the land.

¹⁰As you bring, you will come to a people trusted, and the land the wide of the hand; for God set it in your hand, a place which there is no there the need of all word which is in the land."

¹¹The Danite set out from there, from the family, from Zorah and from Eshtaol, six hundred men girded, the weapons of war.

¹²They came up to Kirjath-jearim, and encamped in Kirjath-jearim in Judah; over so they called the place Mahaneh-dan to this day; it is after Kirjath-jearim.

¹³They passed over from there to the mountain of Ephraim, and came to the house of Micah.

¹⁴The five men answered, those who go to walk along the land of Laish, and said to their brothers, "Did you know that there is in these houses an ephod and teraphims and an idol and a cast? And now know what you will make."

¹⁵There they removed, and came to the house of the boy the Levite, the house of Micah, and inquired to him to the wholeness.

¹⁶And six hundred men girded, the weapons of their war, stationed at the door of the gate, which were from the children of Dan.

¹⁷The five men came up, those who go to walk along the land, went there, took the idol and the ephod and the teraphims and the cast; and the priest stationed at the door of the gate with the six hundred men that were girded, the weapons of war.

¹⁸And these went to the house of Micah, and took the idol of the ephod and the teraphims and the cast; the priest said to them, "What do you make?"

¹⁹They said to him, "Be a craftsman; put your hand over your mouth, and go with us, and be to us to the father and to the priest. Is it good for you to be a priest to the house of one man, or for you to be a priest to a tribe and to a family in Israel?"

²⁰The heart of the priest went well, and he took the ephod and the teraphims and the idol, and went in the midst of the people.

²¹They turned and went, and put the family and the livestock and the splendid to their face.

²²They had gone far away from the house of Micah, and the men who were in the houses which were with the house of Micah cried out; they cleaved to the children of Dan.

²³They called to the children of Dan, and their face went partly round; and they said to Micah, "What to you, that you cried out?"

²⁴He said, "My God which I made, you took, and the priest, and you went; and what to me again? And what is this you will say to me, 'What to you?'"

²⁵The children of Dan said to him, "Do not hear your sound with us, lest men, the bitter of living being, press in you, and you gather your living being and the living being of your house."

²⁶The children of Dan went to their way; and Micah saw they were mightier than it, and turned, and returned to his house.

²⁷And they took which Micah made, and the priest who was to him, and went over Laish, over a people rested and trusted, and struck them with the edge of the sword, and made the city a burn in the fire.

²⁸And there was no deliverer, for she was afar from Sidon, and they had no word with man; and she was in the vale which to Beth-rechob; and they built the city and dwelled in it.

²⁹They called the name of the city Dan, in the name of Dan their father, which was born young to Israel; and though Laish was the name of the city at first.

³⁰The children of Dan raised to them the idol; and Jonathan the son of Gershom the son of Manasseh, he and his children, were priests to the tribe of the Danite, to the day of the uncovering of the ear of the land.

³¹They put to them the idol of Micah which he made, all the days of the house of God in Shiloh.