1 Samuel 5:1-12
5 And the Philistines had taken the ark of God and brought it from the Help Stone to Ashdod.
2 And the Philistines took the ark of God and brought it into the house of Dagon and placed it beside Dagon.
3 ** And the next morning, the first thing, the Ashdodites came into the house of Dagon and found Dagon down on his face on the ground before the ark of Jehovah. And they lifted Dagon to his feet and put him back in his place.
4 And the first thing in the morning on the next day they found Dagon down on his face on the ground before the ark of Jehovah, and Dagon’s head and both his hands knocked off against the threshold.
5 (This is why the priests of Dagon, and all who go into the house of Dagon, never step on Dagon’s threshold in Ashdod, to this day.)
6 And Jehovah’s hand was heavy on the Ashdodites, and he desolated them and smote them with buboes, Ashdod and its territory.
7 And the men of Ashdod saw that it was so, and went to saying “The ark of the god of Israel must not stay with us, because his hand is hard on us and on our god Dagon”;
8 and they sent and called together to their city all the Sarns of the Philistines and said “What shall we do with the ark of the god of Israel?” and they said “Let the ark of the god of Israel be brought around to Gath.”
9 * And they brought around the ark of the God of Israel; and after it was brought around Jehovah’s hand was upon the city in a prodigious ravage, and he smote the men of the city, great and small, and buboes broke out on them.
10 And they sent the ark of God away to ʽEkron; and when the ark of God came into ʽEkron the ʽEkronites raised an outcry “They have brought the ark of the god of Israel around to me, to kill me and my people”;
11 * and they sent and called together all the Sarns of the Philistines and said “Send the ark of the god of Israel away, so that it may go back to its place and not kill me and my people”; for there was a deadly ravage all through the city, Jehovah’s hand was very heavy there.
12 And the men who did not die were smitten with the buboes, and the city’s clamor went up to the skies.
Footnotes
^ 5:3 Var. omits came into the house of Dagon and
^ 5:3 Var. And they took Dagon and put him
^ 5:9 Or a prodigious disorder
^ 5:11 Or a mortal disorder
