And the man Micah had a shrine and he made an ephod and household idols and consecrated one of his sons, that he might become his priest.

Micah then said to him, “Dwell with me and be a father and a priest to me, and I will give you ten pieces of silver a year, a suit of clothes, and your maintenance.” So the Levite went in.

So Micah consecrated the Levite, and the young man became his priest and lived in the house of Micah.

Then Micah said, “Now I know that the Lord will prosper me, seeing I have a Levite as priest.”

He said to them, “Thus and so has Micah done to me, and he has hired me and I have become his priest.”

The priest said to them, “Go in peace; your way in which you are going has the Lord’s approval.”

Now the five men who went to spy out the land went up and entered there, and took the graven image and the ephod and household idols and the molten image, while the priest stood by the entrance of the gate with the six hundred men armed with weapons of war.

When these went into Micah’s house and took the graven image, the ephod and household idols and the molten image, the priest said to them, “What are you doing?”

They said to him, “Be silent, put your hand over your mouth and come with us, and be to us a father and a priest. Is it better for you to be a priest to the house of one man, or to be priest to a tribe and a family in Israel?”

The priest’s heart was glad, and he took the ephod and household idols and the graven image and went among the people.

He said, “You have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, and have gone away, and what do I have besides? So how can you say to me, ‘What is the matter with you?’”

Then they took what Micah had made and the priest who had belonged to him, and came to Laish, to a people quiet and secure, and struck them with the edge of the sword; and they burned the city with fire.