9. but keep watching it. If it goes up to its own territory, towards Beth Shemesh, then the Lord has brought this great disaster on us. But if it does not, then we shall know that it was not his hand that struck us but that it happened to us by chance.’
10. So they did this. They took two such cows and hitched them to the cart and penned up their calves.
11. They placed the ark of the Lord on the cart and along with it the chest containing the gold rats and the models of the tumours.
12. Then the cows went straight up towards Beth Shemesh, keeping on the road and lowing all the way; they did not turn to the right or to the left. The rulers of the Philistines followed them as far as the border of Beth Shemesh.
13. Now the people of Beth Shemesh were harvesting their wheat in the valley, and when they looked up and saw the ark, they rejoiced at the sight.