Judges 16–18

Chapter 16

¹Samson went to Gaza, and there he saw a harlot, and he went in to her. ²The Gazites were told, “Samson has come here,” and they surrounded the place and lay in wait for him all night at the gate of the city. They kept quiet all night, saying, “Let us wait till the light of the morning; then we will kill him.” ³But Samson lay till midnight, and at midnight he arose and took hold of the doors of the gate of the city and the two posts, and pulled them up, bar and all, and put them on his shoulders and carried them to the top of the hill that is before Hebron.

⁴After this he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah. ⁵And the lords of the Philistines came to her and said to her, “Entice him, and see wherein his great strength lies, and by what means we may overpower him, that we may bind him to subdue him; and we will each give you eleven hundred pieces of silver.” ⁶And Delilah said to Samson, “Please tell me wherein your great strength lies, and how you might be bound, that one could subdue you.” ⁷And Samson said to her, “If they bind me with seven fresh bowstrings which have not been dried, then I shall become weak, and be like any other man.” ⁸Then the lords of the Philistines brought her seven fresh bowstrings which had not been dried, and she bound him with them. ⁹Now she had men lying in wait in an inner chamber. And she said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” But he snapped the bowstrings, as a string of tow snaps when it touches the fire. So the secret of his strength was not known.

¹⁰And Delilah said to Samson, “Behold, you have mocked me, and told me lies; please tell me how you might be bound.” ¹¹And he said to her, “If they bind me with new ropes that have not been used, then I shall become weak, and be like any other man.” ¹²So Delilah took new ropes and bound him with them, and said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” And the men lying in wait were in an inner chamber. But he snapped the ropes off his arms like a thread.

¹³And Delilah said to Samson, “Until now you have mocked me, and told me lies; tell me how you might be bound.” And he said to her, “If you weave the seven locks of my head with the web and make it tight with the pin, then I shall become weak, and be like any other man.” ¹⁴So while he slept, Delilah took the seven locks of his head and wove them into the web.^w And she made them tight with the pin, and said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” But he awoke from his sleep, and pulled away the pin, the loom, and the web.

¹⁵And she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times, and you have not told me wherein your great strength lies.” ¹⁶And when she pressed him hard with her words day after day, and urged him, his soul was vexed to death. ¹⁷And he told her all his mind, and said to her, “A razor has never come upon my head; for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. If I be shaved, then my strength will leave me, and I shall become weak, and be like any other man.”

¹⁸When Delilah saw that he had told her all his mind, she sent and called the lords of the Philistines, saying, “Come up this once, for he has told me all his mind.” Then the lords of the Philistines came up to her, and brought the money in their hands. ¹⁹She made him sleep upon her knees; and she called a man, and had him shave off the seven locks of his head. Then she began to torment him, and his strength left him. ²⁰And she said, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” And he awoke from his sleep, and said, “I will go out as at other times, and shake myself free.” And he did not know that the Lord had left him. ²¹And the Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes, and brought him down to Gaza, and bound him with bronze fetters; and he ground at the mill in the prison. ²²But the hair of his head began to grow again after it had been shaved.

²³Now the lords of the Philistines gathered to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god, and to rejoice; for they said, “Our god has given Samson our enemy into our hand.” ²⁴And when the people saw him, they praised their god; for they said, “Our god has given our enemy into our hand, the ravager of our country, who has slain many of us.” ²⁵And when their hearts were merry, they said, “Call Samson, that he may make sport for us.” So they called Samson out of the prison, and he made sport before them. They made him stand between the pillars; ²⁶and Samson said to the lad who held him by the hand, “Let me feel the pillars on which the house rests, that I may lean against them.” ²⁷Now the house was full of men and women; all the lords of the Philistines were there, and on the roof there were about three thousand men and women, who looked on while Samson made sport.

²⁸Then Samson called to the Lord and said, “O Lord GOD, remember me, I pray thee, and strengthen me, I pray thee, only this once, O God, that I may be avenged upon the Philistines for one of my two eyes.” ²⁹And Samson grasped the two middle pillars upon which the house rested, and he leaned his weight upon them, his right hand on the one and his left hand on the other. ³⁰And Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines.” Then he bowed with all his might; and the house fell upon the lords and upon all the people that were in it. So the dead whom he slew at his death were more than those whom he had slain during his life. ³¹Then his brothers and all his family came down and took him and brought him up and buried him between Zorah and Eshta-ol in the tomb of Manoah his father. He had judged Israel twenty years.

Chapter 17

¹There was a man of the hill country of Ephraim, whose name was Micah. ²And he said to his mother, “The eleven hundred pieces of silver which were taken from you, about which you uttered a curse, and also spoke it in my ears, behold, the silver is with me; I took it.” And his mother said, “Blessed be my son by the Lord.” ³And he restored the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother; and his mother said, “I consecrate the silver to the Lord from my hand for my son, to make a graven image and a molten image; now therefore I will restore it to you.” ⁴So when he restored the money to his mother, his mother took two hundred pieces of silver, and gave it to the silversmith, who made it into a graven image and a molten image; and it was in the house of Micah. ⁵And the man Micah had a shrine, and he made an ephod and teraphim, and installed one of his sons, who became his priest. ⁶In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes.

⁷Now there was a young man of Bethlehem in Judah, of the family of Judah, who was a Levite; and he sojourned there. ⁸And the man departed from the town of Bethlehem in Judah, to live where he could find a place; and as he journeyed, he came to the hill country of Ephraim to the house of Micah. ⁹And Micah said to him, “From where do you come?” And he said to him, “I am a Levite of Bethlehem in Judah, and I am going to sojourn where I may find a place.” ¹⁰And Micah said to him, “Stay with me, and be to me a father and a priest, and I will give you ten pieces of silver a year, and a suit of apparel, and your living.”^{w 11}And the Levite was content to dwell with the man; and the young man became to him like one of his sons. ¹²And Micah installed the Levite, and the young man became his priest, and was in the house of Micah. ¹³Then Micah said, “Now I know that the Lord will prosper me, because I have a Levite as priest.”

Chapter 18

¹In those days there was no king in Israel. And in those days the tribe of the Danites was seeking for itself an inheritance to dwell in; for until then no inheritance among the tribes of Israel had fallen to them. ²So the Danites sent five able men from the whole number of their tribe, from Zorah and from Eshta-ol, to spy out the land and to explore it; and they said to them, “Go and explore the land.” And they came to the hill country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah, and lodged there. ³When they were by the house of Micah, they recognized the voice of the young Levite; and they turned aside and said to him, “Who brought you here? What are you doing in this place? What is your business here?” ⁴And he said to them, “Thus and thus has Micah dealt with me: he has hired me, and I have become his priest.” ⁵And they said to him, “Inquire of God, we pray thee, that we may know whether the journey on which we are setting out will succeed.” ⁶And the priest said to them, “Go in peace. The journey on which you go is under the eye of the Lord.”

⁷Then the five men departed, and came to Laish, and saw the people who were there, how they dwelt in security, after the manner of the Sidonians, quiet and unsuspecting, lacking nothing that is in the earth, and possessing wealth, and how they were far from the Sidonians and had no dealings with any one. ⁸And when they came to their brethren at Zorah and Eshta-ol, their brethren said to them, “What do you report?” ⁹They said, “Arise, and let us go up against them; for we have seen the land, and behold, it is very fertile. And will you do nothing? Do not be slow to go, and enter in and possess the land. ¹⁰When you go, you will come to an unsuspecting people. The land is broad; yea, God has given it into your hands, a place where there is no lack of anything that is in the earth.”

¹¹And six hundred men of the tribe of Dan, armed with weapons of war, set forth from Zorah and Eshta-ol, ¹²and went up and encamped at Kiriath-jearim in Judah. On this account that place is called Mahaneh-dan^y to this day; behold, it is west of Kiriath-jearim. ¹³And they passed on from there to the hill country of Ephraim, and came to the house of Micah.

¹⁴Then the five men who had gone to spy out the country of Laish said to their brethren, “Do you know that in these houses there are an ephod, teraphim, a graven…