The Danites Take Their Own Inheritance: The road to chaos winds its way through Judges 18 but now widens increasingly (cf. Matt. 7:13–14) to encompass an entire Israelite tribe. The Danites were a small tribe who were never able to secure their allotment of territory in the land of Israel. Judges 1 describes their containment by the Amorites (1:34; cf. Josh. 19:40–46) and the Joseph tribe’s encroachment into their territory. The story of their migration from the area originally allotted to them to a new place of their own choosing reveals a degree of social and moral chaos that we have not met before in Judges.

18:1–2a The story begins with the refrain that appeared in 17:6, although the second part is absent. We have seen that the phrase “there was no king in Israel” was intended as a doub…