Judges 15
1 Some time later when the wheat was being harvested, Samson went to pay his wife a visit, taking with him a young goat as a present. “I want to go to my wife in her bedroom,” he said when he arrived, but her father would not let him go in.
But it came to pass within a while after, in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his wife with a kid; and he said, I will go in to my wife into the chamber. But her father would not suffer him to go in.
2 “I thought you must totally hate her, so I gave her to your best man,” he told Samson. “But her younger sister is even more attractive—why don't you marry her instead?”
And her father said, I truly thought that you had utterly hated her; therefore I gave her to your companion: is not her younger sister fairer than she? take her, I pray you, instead of her.
3 “This time I can't be blamed for the trouble I'm going to cause the Philistines,” Samson declared.
And Samson said concerning them, Now shall I be more blameless than the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure.
4 He went and caught three hundred foxes and tied their tails together, two by two.
And Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took firebrands, and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the middle between two tails.
5 He attached a torch to each of the tied tails and set them on fire. Then he let them loose in the grain fields of the Philistines, setting fire to all the grain, harvested and unharvested, as well as the vineyards and olive groves.
And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines, and burnt up both the shocks, and also the standing corn, with the vineyards and olives.
6 “Who did this?” the Philistines asked. “It was Samson, the son-in-law of the man from Timnah,” they were told. “That man gave Samson's wife to Samson's best man.” So the Philistines went and burned her and her father to death.
Then the Philistines said, Who has done this? And they answered, Samson, the son in law of the Timnite, because he had taken his wife, and given her to his companion. And the Philistines came up, and burnt her and her father with fire.
7 Samson told them, “If this is the way you're going to act, then I won't stop until I take my revenge on you!”
And Samson said to them, Though you have done this, yet will I be avenged of you, and after that I will cease.
8 He attacked them violently, killing them, and then left to go and live in a cave at the rock of Etam.
And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter: and he went down and dwelled in the top of the rock Etam.
9 So the Philistine army came and camped in Judah, drawn up for battle near Lehi.
Then the Philistines went up, and pitched in Judah, and spread themselves in Lehi.
10 The people of Judah asked, “Why have you invaded us?” “We've come to capture Samson, to do to him what he's done to us!” they replied.
And the men of Judah said, Why are you come up against us? And they answered, To bind Samson are we come up, to do to him as he has done to us.
11 Three thousand men of Judah went to the cave at the rock of Etam and asked Samson, “Don't you understand that the Philistines rule over us? What do you think you're doing to us?” “I only did what they did to me,” he replied.
Then three thousand men of Judah went to the top of the rock Etam, and said to Samson, Know you not that the Philistines are rulers over us? what is this that you have done to us? And he said to them, As they did to me, so have I done to them.
12 “Well, we've come to take you prisoner and hand you over to the Philistines,” they told him. “Just swear to me that you're not going to kill me yourselves,” Samson answered.
And they said to him, We are come down to bind you, that we may deliver you into the hand of the Philistines. And Samson said to them, Swear to me, that you will not fall on me yourselves.
13 “No, we won't,” they assured him. “We'll only tie you up and hand you over to the Philistines. We certainly aren't going to kill you!” They tied him using two new ropes and led him up from the rock.
And they spoke to him, saying, No; but we will bind you fast, and deliver you into their hand: but surely we will not kill you. And they bound him with two new cords, and brought him up from the rock.
14 When Samson got close to Lehi, the Philistines ran towards him, shouting at him. But the Spirit of the Lord swept over him, and the ropes tying his arms together became as weak as burnt flax, and his hands broke free.
And when he came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him: and the Spirit of the LORD came mightily on him, and the cords that were on his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands loosed from off his hands.
15 He grabbed the fresh jawbone of a donkey, using it to kill a thousand Philistines.
And he found a new jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand, and took it, and slew a thousand men therewith.
16 Then Samson declared, “With a donkey's jawbone I have piled the dead into heaps. With a donkey's jawbone I have killed a thousand men.”
And Samson said, With the jawbone of an ass, heaps on heaps, with the jaw of an ass have I slain a thousand men.
17 After Samson had finished his speech, he threw away the jawbone, and he named the place Hill of the Jawbone.
And it came to pass, when he had made an end of speaking, that he cast away the jawbone out of his hand, and called that place Ramathlehi.
18 He was now extremely thirsty, and he Samson called out to the Lord, saying, “You have achieved this amazing victory through your servant, but now do I have to die of thirst and be captured by the heathen?”
And he was sore thirsty, and called on the LORD, and said, You have given this great deliverance into the hand of your servant: and now shall I die for thirst, and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised?
19 So God split open a rock seam in Lehi, and water came out of it. Samson drank and his strength returned—he felt much better. That's why he named it the Spring of the Caller, and it's still there in Lehi to this very day.
But God split an hollow place that was in the jaw, and there came water out of there; and when he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived: why he called the name thereof Enhakkore, which is in Lehi to this day.
20 Samson led Israel as judge for twenty years during the time of the Philistines.
And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years.
