1 Samuel
6
- When the ark of the LORD had been in Philistine
territory seven months,
- the Philistines called for the priests and
the diviners and said, "What shall we do with the ark of the LORD? Tell
us how we should send it back to its place."
- They answered, "If you return the ark
of the god of Israel, do not send it away empty, but by all means send a guilt
offering to him. Then you will be healed, and you will know why his hand has
not been lifted from you."
- The Philistines asked, "What guilt
offering should we send to him?" They replied, "Five gold tumors
and five gold rats, according to the number of the Philistine rulers, because
the same plague has struck both you and your rulers.
- Make models of the tumors and of the rats
that are destroying the country, and pay honor to Israel's god. Perhaps he
will lift his hand from you and your gods and your land.
- Why do you harden your hearts as the Egyptians
and Pharaoh did? When he treated them harshly, did they not send the Israelites
out so they could go on their way ?
- "Now then, get a new cart ready, with
two cows that have calved and have never been yoked. Hitch the cows to the
cart, but take their calves away and pen them up.
- Take the ark of the LORD and put it on the
cart, and in a chest beside it put the gold objects you are sending back to
him as a guilt offering. Send it on its way,
- but keep watching it. If it goes up to its
own territory, toward Beth Shemesh, then the LORD has brought this great disaster
on us. But if it does not, then we will know that it was not his hand that
struck us and that it happened to us by chance."
- So they did this. They took two such cows
and hitched them to the cart and penned up their calves.
- They placed the ark of the LORD on the cart
and along with it the chest containing the gold rats and the models of the
tumors.
- Then the cows went straight up toward Beth
Shemesh, keeping on the road and lowing all the way; they did not turn to
the right or to the left. The rulers of the Philistines followed them as far
as the border of Beth Shemesh.
- Now the people of Beth Shemesh were harvesting
their wheat in the valley, and when they looked up and saw the ark, they rejoiced
at the sight.
- The cart came to the field of Joshua of
Beth Shemesh, and there it stopped beside a large rock. The people chopped
up the wood of the cart and sacrificed the cows as a burnt offering to the
LORD.
- The Levites took down the ark of the LORD,
together with the chest containing the gold objects, and placed them on the
large rock. On that day the people of Beth Shemesh offered burnt offerings
and made sacrifices to the LORD.
- The five rulers of the Philistines saw all
this and then returned that same day to Ekron.
- These are the gold tumors the Philistines
sent as a guilt offering to the LORD -- one each for Ashdod, Gaza, Ashkelon,
Gath and Ekron.
- And the number of the gold rats was according
to the number of Philistine towns belonging to the five rulers -- the fortified
towns with their country villages. The large rock, on which they set the ark
of the LORD, is a witness to this day in the field of Joshua of Beth Shemesh.
- But God struck down some of the men of Beth
Shemesh, putting seventy of them to death because they had looked into the
ark of the LORD. The people mourned because of the heavy blow the LORD had
dealt them,
- and the men of Beth Shemesh asked, "Who
can stand in the presence of the LORD, this holy God? To whom will the ark
go up from here ?"
- Then they sent messengers to the people
of Kiriath Jearim, saying, "The Philistines have returned the ark of
the LORD. Come down and take it up to your place."
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