Judges 18:16
And the six hundred men appointed with their weapons of war, which were of the children of Dan, stood by the entering of the gate. And the six hundred men appointed with their weapons of war, which were of the children of Dan, stood by the entering of the gate.
Chapters 17 through 21 record events that occurred in the early part of the history of the judges. The real story of the book ends with chapter 16, with these closing chapters standing outside the main narrative. Within them this verse belongs to the account of the sanctuary being established at Dan, one of the book's two closing episodes outside the stories of the judges.
On their expedition to take Laish, the six hundred men of the children of Dan, appointed with their weapons of war, stood by the entering of the gate. They stood guard outside Micah's gate while the five scouts went inside to take the household's images and objects of worship. The Danites took Micah's idols and images and took his Levite with them, persuading him to serve as priest for a whole tribe rather than for one household. They then destroyed Laish, renamed it Dan, and established idolatrous worship there, which continued until the ten tribes went into captivity.
The chapter, together with Judges 19, shows the moral disorder of Israel when everyone did what seemed right to them. Its events reveal that human judgment without God's revealed standard can make wrong appear right. The verse stands in Israel's record of backsliding into idolatry, which does not show that backsliding can be done with impunity. The men God used to deliver His people in that time were the very best material at hand, sometimes crude and rough as in the case of Samson, and are not set before people as examples to follow. The chapter is the account of Dan's first apostasy, which is suggested as a reason the tribe was nearly lost and was omitted from the tribes listed in the sealing of the 144,000.