What Does Judges 17:5 Mean in the King James?
And the man Micah had an house of gods, and made an ephod, and teraphim, and consecrated one of his sons, who became his priest.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
Micah’s homemade worship reaches even ordination: the Hebrew says he “filled his son’s hand,” making priesthood something his household furnishes.
THE MEANING
A household can gather its sacred life under one person’s choices: a shrine, ritual objects, and an appointed priest all belong under the same roof. The son’s consecration is pictured as a hand being filled, so the role is something furnished within that household.
THE ROOT
וַיְמַלֵּא אֶת־יַד
waymalle et-yad
GROWS FROM
מלא
To be full; to fill.
English gives the result, “consecrated”; Hebrew gives the gesture, “filled the hand.” The same root appears in מִלּוּאִים (millu’im), the term for installation or ordination, giving the appointment the texture of a hand being equipped for its office.
ALSO GROWS
male: Full; to be full.
מָלֵא
The root’s sense of fullness makes the consecration phrase concrete: a hand is filled for its work.
millu’im: Installations; ordination offerings.
מִלּוּאִים
This same-root term for installation echoes the verse’s picture of priestly consecration as filling a hand.
THE PATTERN
When people make sacred objects and authority for themselves, their choices can become a household’s or community’s sacred order.
And Gideon made an ephod thereof, and put it in his city, even in Ophrah: and all Israel went thither a whoring after it: which thing became a snare unto Gideon, and to his house.Then answered the five men that went to spy out the country of Laish, and said unto their brethren, Do ye know that there is in these houses an ephod, and teraphim, and a graven image, and a molten image? now therefore consider what ye have to do.Moreover ye see and hear, that not alone at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people, saying that they be no gods, which are made with hands:THE THREAD
And thou shalt put them upon Aaron thy brother, and his sons with him; and shalt anoint them, and consecrate them, and sanctify them, that they may minister unto me in the priest’s office.The phrase translated “consecrated” here is literally “filled the hand,” the same installation idiom used for Aaron and his sons. That shared wording shows priestly office as something placed into the hand for its work.
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