Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Judges 18:11

And there went from thence of the family of the Danites, out of Zorah and out of Eshtaol, six hundred men appointed with weapons of war.

11. six hundred men ] Not the whole clan, but only the more enterprising members of it; the rest remained behind in the south. The armed men took their women and children with them ( Jdg 18:21); altogether the numbers must have reached a thousand.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Verse 11. Six hundred men] These were not the whole, for we find they had children, c., Jdg 18:21 but these appear to have been six hundred armed men.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

Of the family; by which it again appears, that the tribe, Jdg 18:1, is put for family.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

11-21. there went from thence of thefamily of the Danites . . . six hundred menThis was thecollective number of the men who were equipped with arms to carry outthis expeditionary enterprise, without including the families andfurniture of the emigrants (Jud18:21). Their journey led them through the territory of Judah,and their first halting place was “behind,” that is, on thewest of Kirjath-jearim, on a spot called afterwards “the camp ofDan.” Prosecuting the northern route, they skirted the base ofthe Ephraimite hills. On approaching the neighborhood of Micah’sresidence, the spies having given information that a privatesanctuary was kept there, the priest of which had rendered themimportant service when on their exploring expedition, it wasunanimously agreed that both he and the furniture of theestablishment would be a valuable acquisition to their proposedsettlement. A plan of spoliation was immediately formed. While thearmed men stood sentinels at the gates, the five spies broke into thechapel, pillaged the images and vestments, and succeeded in bribingthe priest also by a tempting offer to transfer his services to theirnew colony. Taking charge of the ephod, the teraphim, and the gravenimage, he “went in the midst of the people”a centralposition assigned him in the march, perhaps for his personalsecurity; but more probably in imitation of the place appointed forthe priests and the ark, in the middle of the congregated tribes, onthe marches through the wilderness. This theft presents a curiousmedley of low morality and strong religious feeling. The Danitesexemplified a deep-seated principle of our naturethat men havereligious affections, which must have an object on which these may beexercised, while they are often not very discriminating in the choiceof the objects. In proportion to the slender influence religionwields over the heart, the greater is the importance attached toexternal rites; and in the exact observance of these, the conscienceis fully satisfied, and seldom or never molested by reflections onthe breach of minor morals.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

And there went from thence of the family of the Danites,…. Or families, the singular being put for the plural; for it can hardly be thought that such a number of men, as after mentioned, went out of one family:

out of Zorah, and out of Eshtaol; the two places the spies were sent from, and now had returned unto: and upon their report, and at their instigation, and by the encouragement they gave, there were

six hundred men appointed with weapons of war; that set out armed from the above places, on the expedition to take Laish.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

Removal of Six Hundred Danites to Laish – Robbery of Micah’s Images – Conquest of Laish, and Settlement There. – Jdg 18:11, Jdg 18:12. In consequence of the favourable account of the spies who returned, certain Danites departed from Zorea and Eshtaol, to the number of 600 men, accoutred with weapons of war, with their families and their possessions in cattle and goods (see Jdg 18:21), and encamped by the way at Kirjath-jearim (i.e., Kuriyet Enab; see Jos 9:17), in the tribe territory of Judah, at a place which received the permanent name of Mahaneh Dan (camp of Dan) from that circumstance, and was situated behind, i.e., to the west of, Kirjath-jearim (see at Jdg 13:25). The fact that this locality received a standing name from the circumstance described, compels us to assume that the Danites had encamped there for a considerable time, for reasons which we cannot determine from our want of other information. The emigrants may possibly have first of all assembled here, and prepared and equipped themselves for their further march.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

(11) Appointed.Literally, girded. This was not a mere raid of warriors, but the migration of a section from the tribe, accompanied by their wives and children, and carrying their possessions with them (Jdg. 18:21). The numbers of the whole tribe at the last census had been 64,400 (Num. 26:43).

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

11. Six hundred men So confident were they of victory that they took along with them, as appears from Jdg 18:21, their little ones, and their cattle and precious things. This entire expedition was a fulfilling of Jacob’s prophetic words: “Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horse’s heels, so that his rider shall fall backward.” Gen 49:17. So, too, Moses likens Dan to a young lion of Bashan that leaps forth suddenly from his ambush upon the prey. Deu 33:22.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘ And there set out from there of the family of the Danites, out of Zorah, and out of Eshtaol, six hundred men armed with weapons of war.’

The decision having been made a powerful contingent of ‘six hundred’ men set out in order to accomplish the conquest of the land in mind. They were accompanied by their wives, children and possessions, for their object was to secure a permanent settlement (see Jdg 18:21). Thus they would be accompanied by oxcarts carrying all that they needed. A similar migration of people is described in the temple of Medinet Hebu where Raamses III described the approach of invaders accompanied by their wives and children in two-wheeled oxcarts, only in their case to face total defeat.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Jdg 18:11 And there went from thence of the family of the Danites, out of Zorah and out of Eshtaol, six hundred men appointed with weapons of war.

Ver. 11. Six hundred men. ] Picked out for the purpose, and very well appointed: they and their families, a whole colony of them, set forward for Laish, by the persuasion of the spies. Oh that we could as easily prevail with people to take God’s kingdom by force, to storm heaven, and to lay hold upon eternal life! Plutarch a telleth of the Gauls, that after they had once tasted of the grapes that grew in Italy, they never rested till they had possessed themselves of that country. Oh that we would do so for heaven!

a In Camillo.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)