Judges 17

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¹Now there was a man of the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Micah. ✦ ²And he said to his mother, “The 1,100 pieces of silver that were taken from you, about which you uttered a curse and also spoke it in my hearing, behold, the silver is with me; I took it.” And his mother said, “Blessed be my son by the Lord.” ✦ ³He then returned the 1,100 pieces of silver to his mother, and his mother said, “I wholly consecrate the silver from my hand to the Lord for my son to make a carved image and a cast metal image; so now I will return them to you.” ✦ ⁴So when he returned the silver to his mother, his mother took two hundred pieces of silver and gave them to the silversmith, who made them into a carved image and a cast metal image, and they were in the house of Micah. ✦ ⁵And the man Micah had a shrine and he made an ephod and household idols, and consecrated one of his sons, so that he might become his priest. ✦ ⁶In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes. ✦ ⁷Now there was a young man from Bethlehem in Judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite; and he was staying there. ✦ ⁸Then the man left the city, Bethlehem in Judah, to stay wherever he would find a place; and as he made his journey, he came to the hill country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah. ✦ ⁹Micah said to him, “Where do you come from?” And he said to him, “I am a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah, and I am going to stay wherever I may find a place.” ¹⁰Micah then said to him, “Stay with me and be a father and a priest to me, and I will give you ten pieces of silver a year, a supply of clothing, and your sustenance.” So the Levite went in. ✦ ¹¹The Levite agreed to live with the man, and the young man became to him like one of his sons. ¹²So Micah consecrated the Levite, and the young man became his priest and lived in the house of Micah. ✦ ¹³Then Micah said, “Now I know that the Lord will prosper me, because I have a Levite as a priest.” ✦

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Where this chapter connects

Judg 18 ·7 Judg 17 ·3 Exod 20 ·3 Jer 10 ·3 Matt 2 ·2 Deut 12 ·2 Isa 66 ·2 Matt 15 ·2

Christ at the center

Israel's cycle of sin and rescue through flawed deliverers cries out for a Savior who never fails — the true and final Judge and Deliverer who saves his people not for a season but forever.

How Judges 17 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.

Resources, by level

Lay

★ Start hereAudioThrough the WordThrough the Word · ~10 min/chapter · Free · evangelical
A clear ~10-minute audio teaching for every one of the Bible's 1,189 chapters — the most systematic free way to study chapter by chapter.

Pastoral

SermonChuck Smith — C2000 SeriesChuck Smith · Free · evangelical
Free verse-by-verse audio through the entire Bible from the founder of Calvary Chapel.

Commentaries & study tools

VideoBibleProject — Judges videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
VideoWatch teaching on Judges 17YouTube · Lay · Free
Sermons and chapter teaching from across YouTube.
CommentaryEnduring Word — Judges 17David Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical
Readable, verse-by-verse exposition of the whole chapter.
CommentaryMatthew Henry on JudgesMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
ReferenceBlue Letter Bible — Judges 17Blue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free
Interlinear, lexicon, and study tools across the chapter.

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