| International Standard Version | New Living Translation |
| 1The Ark of the LORD remained in Philistine territory for seven months. | 1The Ark of the LORD remained in Philistine territory seven months in all. |
| 2The Philistines summoned the priests and diviners and asked, "What should we do about the Ark of the LORD? Tell us how we should send it back to its place." | 2Then the Philistines called in their priests and diviners and asked them, “What should we do about the Ark of the LORD? Tell us how to return it to its own country.” |
| 3They said, "If you send the Ark of the God of Israel back, don't send it empty, but rather be sure to send back to him a guilt offering. Then you will be healed and will know why his oppression has not been removed from you." | 3“Send the Ark of the God of Israel back with a gift,” they were told. “Send a guilt offering so the plague will stop. Then, if you are healed, you will know it was his hand that caused the plague.” |
| 4They asked, "What is the guilt offering that we should send back to him?" "Five gold tumors and five gold mice," they answered, "according to the number of the lords of the Philistines, since the same plague was on all of you and on your lords. | 4“What sort of guilt offering should we send?” they asked. And they were told, “Since the plague has struck both you and your five rulers, make five gold tumors and five gold rats, just like those that have ravaged your land. |
| 5Make images of your tumors and images of the mice that are destroying your land, and you are to give glory to the God of Israel. Perhaps he will remove his pressure from you, your gods, and your land. | 5Make these things to show honor to the God of Israel. Perhaps then he will stop afflicting you, your gods, and your land. |
| 6Why should you harden your hearts just as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts? Isn't it true that after God toyed with them, they let Israel go, and off they went? | 6Don’t be stubborn and rebellious as Pharaoh and the Egyptians were. By the time God was finished with them, they were eager to let Israel go. |
| 7"So make a new cart, and take two milk cows that have never had a yoke on them. Hitch the cows to the cart and take their calves away from them and back to the house. | 7“Now build a new cart, and find two cows that have just given birth to calves. Make sure the cows have never been yoked to a cart. Hitch the cows to the cart, but shut their calves away from them in a pen. |
| 8Take the Ark of the LORD, put it on the cart, and put the gold objects that you are returning to him as a guilt offering in a box beside it. Then send it away and let it go. | 8Put the Ark of the LORD on the cart, and beside it place a chest containing the gold rats and gold tumors you are sending as a guilt offering. Then let the cows go wherever they want. |
| 9Keep watching it. If it goes up along the road to its own territory to Beth-shemesh, it's the LORD who has done this great evil to us. But if it does not, then we will know that he wasn't pressuring us. It happened to us as a natural event." | 9If they cross the border of our land and go to Beth-shemesh, we will know it was the LORD who brought this great disaster upon us. If they don’t, we will know it was not his hand that caused the plague. It came simply by chance.” |
| 10The men did this. They took two milk cows, hitched them to the cart, and penned up their calves in the house. | 10So these instructions were carried out. Two cows were hitched to the cart, and their newborn calves were shut up in a pen. |
| 11They put the Ark of the LORD, the box, the gold mice, and the images of their tumors on the cart. | 11Then the Ark of the LORD and the chest containing the gold rats and gold tumors were placed on the cart. |
| 12The cows took a straight path along the road to Beth-shemesh. They stayed on the highway, lowing as they went, and did not turn to the right or the left. The Philistine lords followed them as far as the border of Beth-shemesh. | 12And sure enough, without veering off in other directions, the cows went straight along the road toward Beth-shemesh, lowing as they went. The Philistine rulers followed them as far as the border of Beth-shemesh. |
| 13Now the people of Beth-shemesh were gathering their wheat harvest in the valley. They looked up, saw the Ark, and rejoiced to see it. | 13The people of Beth-shemesh were harvesting wheat in the valley, and when they saw the Ark, they were overjoyed! |
| 14The cart came to the field of Joshua of Beth-shemesh, and stopped there. In that place there was a large stone. They broke up the wood from the cart, and offered up the cows as a burnt offering to the LORD. | 14The cart came into the field of a man named Joshua and stopped beside a large rock. So the people broke up the wood of the cart for a fire and killed the cows and sacrificed them to the LORD as a burnt offering. |
| 15The descendants of Levi took down the Ark of the LORD, along with the box that was with it, containing the objects of gold, and they put them on the large stone. The men of Beth-shemesh offered burnt offerings and made sacrifices to the LORD that day. | 15Several men of the tribe of Levi lifted the Ark of the LORD and the chest containing the gold rats and gold tumors from the cart and placed them on the large rock. Many sacrifices and burnt offerings were offered to the LORD that day by the people of Beth-shemesh. |
| 16When the five Philistine lords saw this, they returned to Ekron that very day. | 16The five Philistine rulers watched all this and then returned to Ekron that same day. |
| 17These are the gold tumors that the Philistines returned as a guilt offering to the LORD: one for Ashdod, one for Gaza, one for Ashkelon, one for Gath, and one for Ekron. | 17The five gold tumors sent by the Philistines as a guilt offering to the LORD were gifts from the rulers of Ashdod, Gaza, Ashkelon, Gath, and Ekron. |
| 18The gold mice represented the number of all the Philistine towns belonging to the five lords, both fortified towns and unwalled villages. The large stone, beside which they put the Ark of the LORD, is a witness to this day in the field of Joshua of Beth-shemesh. | 18The five gold rats represented the five Philistine towns and their surrounding villages, which were controlled by the five rulers. The large rock at Beth-shemesh, where they set the Ark of the LORD, still stands in the field of Joshua as a witness to what happened there. The Ark Moved to Kiriath-Jearim |
| 19God struck down the men of Beth-shemesh because they had looked into the Ark of the LORD. He struck down 50,070 men among the people, and the people mourned because the LORD struck down the people with a great slaughter. | 19But the LORD killed seventy men from Beth-shemesh because they looked into the Ark of the LORD. And the people mourned greatly because of what the LORD had done. |
| 20The men of Beth-shemesh asked themselves, "Who can stand in the presence of the LORD, this holy God? And to whom will the Ark go from here?" | 20“Who is able to stand in the presence of the LORD, this holy God?” they cried out. “Where can we send the Ark from here?” |
| 21They sent messengers to the residents of Kiriath-jearim, who told them, "The Philistines have returned the Ark of the LORD. Come down and take it up with you." | 21So they sent messengers to the people at Kiriath-jearim and told them, “The Philistines have returned the Ark of the LORD. Come here and get it!” |
The Holy Bible: International Standard Version® Release 2.1 Copyright © 1996-2012 The ISV Foundation
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INTERNATIONALLY. | Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. |
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