Judges 17:3

3 He restored the eleven hundred [pieces] of silver to his mother; and his mother said, I most assuredly dedicate the silver to the LORD from my hand for my son, to make an engraved image and a molten image: now therefore I will restore it to you.

Judges 17:3 Meaning and Commentary

Judges 17:3

And when he had restored the eleven hundred shekels of silver
to his mother
The whole sum, having embezzled none of it:

his mother said, I had wholly dedicated the silver unto the Lord from
my hand, for my son to make a graven image and a molten image;
this she had done either before it was stolen, and it troubled her the more, and caused her the rather to curse the man that had taken it; or after it was stolen, that if it should be recovered again she would appropriate it to such an use; so Abarbinel; and by the Lord, or Jehovah, she doubtless meant the true God; for she had no intention to forsake him, but to worship him in and by these images, and which she designed for the use of her son and his family, that they might not go so far as Shiloh to worship at the tabernacle there:

therefore I will restore it unto thee;
for that use, and so gave him the money again, to be laid out in images, or to make images of it.

Judges 17:3 In-Context

1 There was a man of the hill-country of Efrayim, whose name was Mikhah.

2 He said to his mother, The eleven hundred [pieces] of silver that were taken from you, about which you did utter a curse, and did also speak it in my ears, behold, the silver is with me; I took it. His mother said, Blessed be my son of the LORD.

3 He restored the eleven hundred [pieces] of silver to his mother; and his mother said, I most assuredly dedicate the silver to the LORD from my hand for my son, to make an engraved image and a molten image: now therefore I will restore it to you.

4 When he restored the money to his mother, his mother took two hundred [pieces] of silver, and gave them to the founder, who made of it an engraved image and a molten image: and it was in the house of Mikhah.

5 The man Mikhah had a house of gods, and he made an efod, and terafim, and consecrated one of his sons, who became his Kohen.