I know that you left because you were so anxious to get back home, but why did you steal my household gods?"

But if you find that anyone here has your gods, he will be put to death. Here, with our men as witnesses, look for anything that belongs to you and take what is yours." Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen Laban's gods.

So Jacob said to his family and to all who were with him, "Get rid of the foreign gods that you have; purify yourselves and put on clean clothes.

Joshua said to all the people, "This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, has to say: 'Long ago your ancestors lived on the other side of the Euphrates River and worshiped other gods. One of those ancestors was Terah, the father of Abraham and Nahor.

Then he gave them back to his mother. She took two hundred of the pieces of silver and gave them to a metalworker, who made an idol, carving it from wood and covering it with the silver. It was placed in Micah's house.

This man Micah had his own place of worship. He made some idols and an ephod, and appointed one of his sons as his priest.

Then the five men who had gone to spy on the country around Laish said to their companions, "Did you know that here in one of these houses there is a wooden idol covered with silver? There are also other idols and an ephod. What do you think we should do?"

Meanwhile the six hundred Danite soldiers, ready for battle, were standing at the gate.

When the men went into Micah's house and took the sacred objects, the priest asked them, "What are you doing?"

This made the priest very happy, so he took the sacred objects and went along with them.

They had traveled a good distance from the house when Micah called his neighbors out for battle. They caught up with the Danites

Micah answered, "What do you mean, 'What's the matter?' You take my priest and the gods that I made, and walk off ! What have I got left?"

Then she took the household idol, laid it on the bed, put a pillow made of goats' hair at its head, and put a cover over it.

The king of Babylonia stands by the signpost at the fork of the road. To discover which way to go, he shakes the arrows; he consults his idols; he examines the liver of a sacrificed animal.

In just this way the people of Israel will have to live for a long time without kings or leaders, without sacrifices or sacred stone pillars, without idols or images to use for divination.