And they (the Danites) had taken what Micah had made, i.e., his idols and his priest, and they fell upon Laish (על כּוא, to come over a person, to fall upon him, as in Genesis 34:25), a people living quietly and free from care (vid., Judges 18:7), smote them with the edge of the sword (see at Genesis 34:26), and burned down the city (cf. Joshua 6:24), as it had no deliverer in its isolated condition (Judges 18:28; cf. Judges 18:7). It was situated "in the valley which stretches to Beth-rehob." This valley is the upper part of the Huleh lowland, through which the central source of the Jordan (Leddan) flows, and by which Laish-Dan, the present Tell el Kadi, stood (see at Joshua 19:47). Beth-rehob is most probably the same place as the Rehob mentioned in Numbers 13:21, and the Beth-rehob of 2 Samuel 10:6, which is there used to designate a part of Syria, and for which Rehob only is also used in Judges 18:8. Robinson (Bibl. Res. pp. 371ff.) supposes it to be the castle of Hunin or Honin, on the south-west of Tell el Kadi; but this is hardly correct (see the remarks on Numbers 13:21, Pent. p. 709). The city, which lay in ashes, was afterwards rebuilt by the Danites, and called Dan, from the name of the founder of their tribe; and the ruins are still to be seen, as already affirmed, on the southern slope of the Tell el Kadi (see Rob. Bibl. Res. pp. 391-2, and the comm. on Joshua 19:47).

Judges 19:2 Parallel Commentaries

played

Leviticus 21:9 And the daughter of any priest, if she profane herself by playing the whore, she profanes her father: she shall be burnt with fire.

Deuteronomy 22:21 Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die...

Ezekiel 16:28 You have played the whore also with the Assyrians, because you were insatiable; yes, you have played the harlot with them...

four whole months, or a year and four months. Heb. days, four months.