Open English Translation 1SA Chapter 6

6 So it was that Yahweh’s box was held in Philistine territory for seven months, 2 then the Philistines called their priests and diviners and asked, “What should we do with Yahweh’s box? Show us how we can get it back away to its place.”

3 “If you’re going to send the God of Israel’s box back,” they responded, “don’t send it back by itself, but definitely return it to him with a guilt offering. Then you’ll all be healed, and you’ll all understand why you’ve been suffering.”

4 “What guilt offering should we send with it?” they asked.

“Five gold replicas of the tumours, and five gold mice,” they said. “That’s the number of our rulers, because the same plague affected both them and the people. 5 Make replicas of the tumours and replicas of the mice that have been destroying the land, and it will honour Israel’s God. Then perhaps he will less his punishment that’s been on you and on your gods and on your land. 6 Why have you all been so stubborn just like the Egyptians when Pharaoh made them stubborn? When Israel’s God dealt severely with them, didn’t the Egyptians send the Israelis away and they went? 7 So now, get a brand new cart with two nursing cows which have never had a yoke on their necks. Hitch the cows to the cart but take their calves back to their pen. 8 Then pick up Yahweh’s box and put it into the cart along with the gold objects that you are sending with it as a guilt offering put in another container beside the box. Finally, send the cart away and off it will go. 9 Then watch it. If it heads towards Beyt-Shemesh in Israeli territory, then it’s their god that caused this terrible calamity. But if not, then we’ll know that it wasn’t the Israeli god, and that it all happened to us by chance.”

10 So they followed those instructions: they took two cows that had been feeding calves and hitched them to the new cart, but they shut their calves away in the stall. 11 Then they put Yahweh’s box into the cart with the other container with the gold mice and the replicas of their tumours. 12 Amazingly, the cows went straight down the road going to Beyt-Shemesh. They stayed on that one highway, walking and mooing, and they never once deviated to the left or the right, and the Philistine rulers followed them as far as the border of Beyt-Shemesh.

13 Meanwhile in Beyt-Shemesh, the people were harvesting wheat in the valley, and when they looked up and saw the box, they were very happy. 14 The cart came into the field belonging to Yehoshua and then the cows just stood there. There was a large stone there, and the people split the sides of the wooden cart into pieces to start a fire, then offered the cows as a burnt sacrifice to Yahweh. 15 Then the Levites lifted down Yahweh’s box and the other container that was with it with the gold objects in it, and they placed them on the large stone. Then the men of Beyt-Shemesh offered up more burnt offerings and sacrificed sacrifices to Yahweh on that day. 16 The five Philistine rulers watched all this from a distance before returning to Ekron that same day.

17 The gold replicas of tumours that the Philistines sent back as a guilt offering to Yahweh were for the five cities: Ashdod, Gaza, Ashkelon, Gat, and Ekron. 18 And the gold mice were from the number of all the Philistine cities under the five rulers, including fortified cities as well as the villages in the open country, and as far as the large stone that they sat Yahweh’s box on. (It’s still in Yehoshua’s field in Beyt-Shemesh until this day.)

19 But some Beyt-Shemesh men looked into Yahweh’s box, and he killed seventy[fn] of them. The people mourned because Yahweh had caused such devastation among the people.

20 The Beyt-Shemesh men said, “Who can stand in front of the face of Yahweh, this holy God? And where should we send the box to from here?” 21 So they sent messengers to those living in Kiriat-Yearim, saying, “The Philistines have returned Yahweh’s box. Come over here and get it.”