Judges 13:24–16:31

²⁴The woman gave birth to a boy and named him Samson.^c He grew^d and the Lord blessed him,^{e 25}and the Spirit of the Lord began to stir^f him while he was in Mahaneh Dan,^g between Zorah and Eshtaol.

Samson’s Marriage

14Samson^h went down to Timnahⁱ and saw there a young Philistine woman. ²When he returned, he said to his father and mother, “I have seen a Philistine woman in Timnah; now get her for me as my wife.”^j

³His father and mother replied, “Isn’t there an acceptable woman among your relatives or among all our people?^k Must you go to the uncircumcised^l Philistines to get a wife?^m”

But Samson said to his father, “Get her for me. She’s the right one for me.” ⁴(His parents did not know that this was from the Lord,ⁿ who was seeking an occasion to confront the Philistines;^o for at that time they were ruling over Israel.)^p

⁵Samson went down to Timnah together with his father and mother. As they approached the vineyards of Timnah, suddenly a young lion came roaring toward him. ⁶The Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon him^q so that he tore the lion apart^r with his bare hands as he might have torn a young goat. But he told neither his father nor his mother what he had done. ⁷Then he went down and talked with the woman, and he liked her.

⁸Some time later, when he went back to marry her, he turned aside to look at the lion’s carcass, and in it he saw a swarm of bees and some honey. ⁹He scooped out the honey with his hands and ate as he went along. When he rejoined his parents, he gave them some, and they too ate it. But he did not tell them that he had taken the honey from the lion’s carcass.

¹⁰Now his father went down to see the woman. And there Samson held a feast,^s as was customary for young men. ¹¹When the people saw him, they chose thirty men to be his companions.

¹²“Let me tell you a riddle,^t” Samson said to them. “If you can give me the answer within the seven days of the feast,^u I will give you thirty linen garments and thirty sets of clothes.^{v 13}If you can’t tell me the answer, you must give me thirty linen garments and thirty sets of clothes.”

“Tell us your riddle,” they said. “Let’s hear it.”

¹⁴He replied,

“Out of the eater, something to eat;

out of the strong, something sweet.”^w

For three days they could not give the answer.

¹⁵On the fourth^a day, they said to Samson’s wife, “Coax^x your husband into explaining the riddle for us, or we will burn you and your father’s household to death.^y Did you invite us here to steal our property?”

¹⁶Then Samson’s wife threw herself on him, sobbing, “You hate me! You don’t really love me.^z You’ve given my people a riddle, but you haven’t told me the answer.”

“I haven’t even explained it to my father or mother,” he replied, “so why should I explain it to you?” ¹⁷She cried the whole seven days^a of the feast. So on the seventh day he finally told her, because she continued to press him. She in turn explained the riddle to her people.

¹⁸Before sunset on the seventh day the men of the town said to him,

“What is sweeter than honey?

What is stronger than a lion?”^b

Samson said to them,

“If you had not plowed with my heifer,

you would not have solved my riddle.”

¹⁹Then the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon him.^c He went down to Ashkelon,^d struck down thirty of their men, stripped them of everything and gave their clothes to those who had explained the riddle. Burning with anger,^e he returned to his father’s home. ²⁰And Samson’s wife was given to one of his companions^f who had attended him at the feast.

Samson’s Vengeance on the Philistines

15Later on, at the time of wheat harvest,^g Samson^h took a young goatⁱ and went to visit his wife. He said, “I’m going to my wife’s room.”^j But her father would not let him go in.

²“I was so sure you hated her,” he said, “that I gave her to your companion.^k Isn’t her younger sister more attractive? Take her instead.”

³Samson said to them, “This time I have a right to get even with the Philistines; I will really harm them.” ⁴So he went out and caught three hundred foxes^l and tied them tail to tail in pairs. He then fastened a torch^m to every pair of tails, ⁵lit the torchesⁿ and let the foxes loose in the standing grain of the Philistines. He burned up the shocks^o and standing grain, together with the vineyards and olive groves.

⁶When the Philistines asked, “Who did this?” they were told, “Samson, the Timnite’s son-in-law, because his wife was given to his companion.^p”

So the Philistines went up and burned her^q and her father to death.^{r 7}Samson said to them, “Since you’ve acted like this, I swear that I won’t stop until I get my revenge on you.” ⁸He attacked them viciously and slaughtered many of them. Then he went down and stayed in a cave in the rock^s of Etam.^t

⁹The Philistines went up and camped in Judah, spreading out near Lehi.^{u 10}The people of Judah asked, “Why have you come to fight us?”

“We have come to take Samson prisoner,” they answered, “to do to him as he did to us.”

¹¹Then three thousand men from Judah went down to the cave in the rock of Etam and said to Samson, “Don’t you realize that the Philistines are rulers over us?^v What have you done to us?”

He answered, “I merely did to them what they did to me.”

¹²They said to him, “We’ve come to tie you up and hand you over to the Philistines.”

Samson said, “Swear to me^w that you won’t kill me yourselves.”

¹³“Agreed,” they answered. “We will only tie you up and hand you over to them. We will not kill you.” So they bound him with two new ropes^x and led him up from the rock. ¹⁴As he approached Lehi,^y the Philistines came toward him shouting. The Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon him.^z The ropes on his arms became like charred flax,^a and the bindings dropped from his hands. ¹⁵Finding a fresh jawbone of a donkey, he grabbed it and struck down a thousand men.^b

¹⁶Then Samson said,

“With a donkey’s jawbone

I have made donkeys of them.^ac

With a donkey’s jawbone

I have killed a thousand men.”

¹⁷When he finished speaking, he threw away the jawbone; and the place was called Ramath Lehi.^bd

¹⁸Because he was very thirsty, he cried out to the Lord,^e “You have given your servant this great victory.^f Must I now die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?” ¹⁹Then God opened up the hollow place in Lehi, and water came out of it. When Samson drank, his strength returned and he revived.^g So the spring^h was called En Hakkore,^c and it is still there in Lehi.

²⁰Samson led^d Israel for twenty yearsⁱ in the days of the Philistines.

Samson and Delilah

16One day Samson^j went to Gaza,^k where he saw a prostitute.^l He went in to spend the night with her. ²The people of Gaza were told, “Samson is here!” So they surrounded the place and lay in wait for him all night at the city gate.^m They made no move during the night, saying, “At dawnⁿ we’ll kill him.”

³But Samson lay there only until the middle of the night. Then he got up and took hold of the doors of the city gate, together with the two posts, and tore them loose, bar and all. He lifted them to his shoulders and carried them to the top of the hill that faces Hebron.^o

⁴Some time later, he fell in love^p with a woman in the Valley of Sorek whose name was Delilah.^{q 5}The rulers of the Philistines^r went to her and said, “See if you can lure^s him into showing you the secret of his great strength^t and how we can overpower him so we may tie him up and subdue him. Each one of us will give you eleven hundred shekels^a of silver.”^u

⁶So Delilah^v said to Samson, “Tell me the secret of your great strength and how you can be tied up and subdued.”

⁷Samson answered her, “If anyone ties me with seven fresh bowstrings that have not been dried, I’ll become as weak as any other man.”

⁸Then the rulers of the Philistines brought her seven fresh bowstrings that had not been dried, and she tied him with them. ⁹With men hidden in the room,^w she called to him, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!”^x But he snapped the bowstrings as easily as a piece of string snaps when it comes close to a flame. So the secret of his strength was not discovered.

¹⁰Then Delilah said to Samson, “You have made a fool of me;^y you lied to me. Come now, tell me how you can be tied.”

¹¹He said, “If anyone ties me securely with new ropes^z that have never been used, I’ll become as weak as any other man.”

¹²So Delilah took new ropes and tied him with them. Then, with men hidden in the room, she called to him, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!”^a But he snapped the ropes off his arms as if they were threads.

¹³Delilah then said to Samson, “All this time you have been making a fool of me and lying to me. Tell me how you can be tied.”

He replied, “If you weave the seven braids of my head into the fabric on the loom and tighten it with the pin, I’ll become as weak as any other man.” So while he was sleeping, Delilah took the seven braids of his head, wove them into the fabric ¹⁴and^b tightened it with the pin.

Again she called to him, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!”^b He awoke from his sleep and pulled up the pin and the loom, with the fabric.

¹⁵Then she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’^c when you won’t confide in me? This is the third time^d you have made a fool of me and haven’t told me the secret of your great strength.^e” ¹⁶With such nagging she prodded him day after day until he was sick to death of it.

¹⁷So he told her everything.^f “No razor has ever been used on my head,” he said, “because I have been a Nazirite^g dedicated to God from my mother’s womb. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me, and I would become as weak as any other man.”

¹⁸When Delilah saw that he had told her everything, she sent word to the rulers of the Philistines^h, “Come back once more; he has told me everything.” So the rulers of the Philistines returned with the silver in their hands.^{i 19}After putting him to sleep on her lap, she called for someone to shave off the seven braids of his hair, and so began to subdue him.^c And his…