The Story of Micah’s Idols

In this chapter, the story moves from the various judges of Israel to an anecdote that illustrates the overall worsening spiritual situation in the land. The people turn from the Lord and do more and more wrong among themselves. The last verse of the book of Judges is very telling, “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in their own eyes.” The same words come in the present chapter, in Judges 17:6.

In this story, a man named Micah (not to be confused with the prophet Micah) took a lot of silver money from his mother. He confesses that he did this, and returns the money to her. She says, “May you be blessed by the Lord, my son!” She finds a silversmith to melt down the silver money to make an idol which gets set up in their house. One of Micah’s sons is then appointed as the priest to serve this idol.

The spiritual meaning of this is that an idol of any kind is a falsifying of our own worship and sense of the Lord. An idol is a ‘thing’ in a ‘place’, vested with power, whereas our worship and sense of the Lord is that he is fully everywhere and in everything. (Arcana Caelestia 3479, 3732) The essence of idolatry is that it emphasises external forms with no attention to the place and purpose of internal forms and realities. Our ‘idols’ can be whatever we love or desire or feel is important to us, over and above the Lord.

The story then shifts to a wandering Levite, a priest of Israel, who came from Bethlehem in Judah, and is looking for any place to stay. Israel had appointed six cities for Levites to live in, but this Levite is a wanderer. He eventually meets Micah, who takes him into his house and makes him a paid priest. Micah feels important because of this development.

This part of the story depicts the decline of Israel from its worship of the Lord to a state of allowing anything to be done if it seems right in someone’s eyes. The Levite is a trained priest, trained in the law of Moses, someone who should know the commandments of the Lord and also their prohibitions. This Levite is ‘looking for a place to go to’ which describes his apparent falling away from true priesthood. (See the description in Apocalypse Explained 444, about the Levites, and in Doctrine of Life 39 about priests.)

As well as indicating the extent of the spiritual fall of Israel into idolatry and wrong practices, this chapter representatively describes our own scope for moving away from a genuine worship of the Lord into a worship of ourselves and of the world, and the change that comes within us in doing this. It often changes very gradually and inexorably so that it is imperceptible even to ourselves. This is a danger, and the reason for our self-examination and vigilant care.

The name Micah means, “Who is like Jehovah God?” which is an ironical name for someone who turns away from God to substitute an idol made from silver money, in a completely false worship. In genuine repentance, we may ask, “Who is like Jehovah God?” implying that no one is like God, including ourselves, because we are all involved in wrong feelings, thinking and actions, and we know our need of and dependence on the Lord. (Apocalypse Revealed 531)

It is important to note the mother’s first words, “May you be blessed by the Lord, my son!” saying this for his confession and return of the money. She begins her part in the story with the truest of statements, i.e. that the Lord wants to bless us, even while she may just be glad to have all her money back.

“Silver” in the Word can mean truths, truths of faith and truth of good, but in an opposite sense, when used dishonestly, it means falsities. (Arcana Caelestia 1551)

1094. 'A slave of slaves will he be to his brothers' means the lowest thing in the Church. This is clear from the nature of external worship separated from internal. That external worship regarded in itself is nothing at all unless internal worship exists to sanctify it may become clear to anyone. What is external adoration without adoration of the heart but a mere gesture of the body? What is prayer on the lips if the mind is not in it but a meaningless babble? And what is any activity if there is no intention within it but a kind of nothing? Consequently everything external is in itself something soulless, living solely from that which is internal.

[2] The character of external worship separated from internal has been made clear to me from many experiences in the next life. The sorceresses and witches there attended church and the sacraments during their lifetime as frequently as any others did. The deceitful likewise, indeed more often than others; and so also those who delighted in robbery, as well as the avaricious. Yet they are in hell where they utterly hate the Lord and the neighbour intensely. With them internal worship had been present in the external either to the intent that the world might see it, or so that they might gain possession of the worldly, earthly, and bodily things they coveted, or so that they might mislead by an outward show of holiness. Or it may have been out of an acquired habit. That such people are very prone to worshipping whichever god or idol favours them and their own evil desires is quite clear. This is especially clear from the Jews who, because they made worship consist in nothing except external things, fell away so many times into idolatry. The reason is that such worship in itself is altogether idolatrous, for they are worshipping what is external.

[3] The external worship of the nations in the land of Canaan, who worshipped the baals and other gods, was very similar. They had not only temples and altars but also sacrifices, so that their external worship differed little from the worship of the Jews. The only difference was that the name they had for their god was Baal, Ashtaroth, or some other, whereas the Jews had the name Jehovah. As they also do even today, the Jews imagined that merely the naming of Jehovah made them holy and chosen people, when in fact that led rather to greater condemnation of them than of others. For that naming made them capable of profaning what was holy, which the gentiles could not do. Such is the worship called 'Canaan', who is referred to as 'a slave of slaves'. That 'a slave of slaves' means the lowest thing in the Church may be seen in the next verse.