Judges 15

Later on, at the time of the wheat harvest, Samson went to visit his wife, bringing a young goat as a gift. He said, "I am going into my wife's room." But her father would not let him go in.

1But 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.

NoteThis kind of marriage left the wife living in her father's household, with the husband visiting her there; a young goat was a normal gift to bring on such a visit. Samson had stormed out during the wedding feast (chapter 14), which her father had taken as a permanent break.

2Her father said, "I was certain you completely hated her, so I gave her to the friend who stood with you at your wedding. Isn't her younger sister better looking? Please take her instead."

2And her father said, I verily thought that thou hadst utterly hated her; therefore I gave her to thy companion: is not her younger sister fairer than she? take her, I pray thee, instead of her.

NoteAt the wedding feast in chapter 14, thirty local men had been assigned to Samson as companions; the one meant here filled roughly the role of a best man. Handing the bride to him was a legal act by the father, who assumed the marriage was over.

3Samson said about them, "This time no one can blame me for the harm I do to the Philistines."

3And Samson said concerning them, Now shall I be more blameless than the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure.

NoteThe Philistines were a people settled on the coastal plain to the southwest of Israel, organized around five cities (Gaza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Ekron, and Gath). In this period they controlled the neighboring Israelite territory.

4So Samson went out and caught three hundred foxes. He took torches, tied the foxes together in pairs by their tails, and fastened a torch between each pair of tails.

4And Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took firebrands, and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst between two tails.

NoteThe Hebrew word covers both foxes and jackals. Jackals run in packs and were common in the region, which is why many translators prefer them here; foxes hunt alone and would be nearly impossible to trap three hundred of.

5Then he set the torches on fire and let the foxes loose into the standing grain of the Philistines. He burned up the piles of cut grain and the grain still standing, and the vineyards and olive trees too.

5And 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.

NoteWheat harvest was around May or June. The cut grain lay stacked in the fields waiting to be threshed, and the standing grain had not yet been cut, so a fire took the whole year's food supply. Burning vineyards and olive trees was worse still: both take years to grow back, so the loss ran well beyond one season.

6The Philistines asked, "Who did this?" They were told, "Samson, the son-in-law of the man from Timnah, because his wife was taken from him and given to his wedding companion." So the Philistines went up and burned her and her father to death.

6Then the Philistines said, Who hath 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.

NoteBurning was used as a form of execution. The Philistines kill the woman and her father to turn Samson's anger away from themselves, and it is the exact fate her countrymen had threatened her with in chapter 14 to make her get the answer to Samson's riddle out of him.

7Samson said to them, "Since this is what you have done, I will not stop until I have paid you back. After that I will stop."

7And Samson said unto them, Though ye have done this, yet will I be avenged of you, and after that I will cease.

8He attacked them hard and killed a great many of them. Then he went down and stayed in a cave in the rock of Etam.

8And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter: and he went down and dwelt in the top of the rock Etam.

NoteThe King James "hip and thigh" translates a Hebrew phrase, literally "leg upon thigh," whose precise sense is no longer known. It is generally understood as a stock expression for a thorough and brutal beating.

9Then the Philistines went up, camped in the land of Judah, and spread out near the town of Lehi.

9Then the Philistines went up, and pitched in Judah, and spread themselves in Lehi.

NoteLehi is the Hebrew word for "jawbone." The name is introduced here before the events that the chapter later connects it to.

10The men of Judah asked, "Why have you come to attack us?" They answered, "We have come to tie up Samson and do to him what he did to us."

10And the men of Judah said, Why are ye come up against us? And they answered, To bind Samson are we come up, to do to him as he hath done to us.

11Then three thousand men of Judah went to the cave at the rock of Etam and said to Samson, "Don't you know that the Philistines rule over us? What have you done to us?" He answered, "I only did to them what they did to me."

11Then three thousand men of Judah went to the top of the rock Etam, and said to Samson, Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us? what is this that thou hast done unto us? And he said unto them, As they did unto me, so have I done unto them.

NoteJudah was the largest of the Israelite tribes, and at this time was living under Philistine domination. The three thousand men are not coming to rescue Samson; they treat him as a private troublemaker whose feud endangers them all.

12They said to him, "We have come to tie you up and hand you over to the Philistines." Samson said to them, "Swear to me that you yourselves will not attack me."

12And they said unto him, We are come down to bind thee, that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines. And Samson said unto them, Swear unto me, that ye will not fall upon me yourselves.

13They answered, "No, we will only tie you up tightly and hand you over to them. We promise we will not kill you." So they bound him with two new ropes and brought him up from the rock.

13And they spake unto him, saying, No; but we will bind thee fast, and deliver thee into their hand: but surely we will not kill thee. And they bound him with two new cords, and brought him up from the rock.

NoteNew ropes were unused and therefore at full strength, the point of mentioning them is that these were not worn or frayed.

14When Samson came to Lehi, the Philistines came shouting toward him. Then the Spirit of the LORD came on him with great power. The ropes on his arms became like burnt threads, and the ties fell off his hands.

14And when he came unto Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him: and the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and the cords that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands loosed from off his hands.

Note"Came on him with great power" translates a Hebrew verb meaning to rush or burst upon someone. Throughout Judges it marks a sudden surge of physical strength for a particular act, not a permanent condition. Flax is the plant fiber spun into linen thread and cord; a thread of flax that has been burned falls apart at a touch.

15He found a fresh jawbone of a donkey, reached out his hand and picked it up, and killed a thousand men with it.

15And he found a new jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand, and took it, and slew a thousand men therewith.

NoteA fresh jawbone was still moist rather than dried out, so it would not shatter on impact. Picking up part of a carcass also broke the terms of the Nazirite vow described in chapter 13, which forbade contact with anything dead.

16Then Samson said, "With the jawbone of a donkey I have piled them in heaps. With the jawbone of a donkey I have killed a thousand men."

16And Samson said, With the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jaw of an ass have I slain a thousand men.

NoteThe saying is a pun in Hebrew that cannot survive translation: the word for donkey (chamor) sounds almost identical to the word for a heap or pile (chomer). "With the jawbone of a donkey, a heap, two heaps."

17When he finished speaking, he threw the jawbone out of his hand, and he named that place Ramath-lehi.

17And 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.

NoteRamath-lehi means "the height of the jawbone" or "the throwing of the jawbone", the Hebrew allows both, since the same root can mean to cast something away.

18He was very thirsty, so he called out to the LORD, "You have won this great victory through me, your servant. Must I now die of thirst and fall into the hands of these uncircumcised men?"

18And he was sore athirst, and called on the LORD, and said, Thou hast given this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant: and now shall I die for thirst, and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised?

NoteCircumcision was practiced by the Israelites and by several neighboring peoples, but not by the Philistines. "The uncircumcised" therefore worked as a standard Israelite label, and insult, for them specifically.

19But God split open the hollow place at Lehi, and water came out of it. When Samson drank, his strength came back and he felt alive again. So he named that spring En-hakkore, and it is still in Lehi today.

19But God clave an hollow place that was in the jaw, and there came water thereout; and when he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived: wherefore he called the name thereof Enhakkore, which is in Lehi unto this day.

NoteThe Hebrew is deliberately ambiguous: the same word, lehi, is both the place name and the word for "jawbone," which is why the King James has God splitting open a hollow in the jaw itself. The word for the hollow place means a mortar, a bowl-shaped basin in rock. En-hakkore means "spring of the one who called," pointing back to Samson's cry for help. "His strength came back" is literally "his breath returned to him."

20Samson led Israel as a judge for twenty years, during the time the Philistines ruled.

20And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years.

NoteA judge in this book is not a court official but a leader raised up to free Israel from an oppressor and then lead the people. Chapter 13 says the Philistine domination lasted forty years, so Samson's twenty years fall inside that period rather than ending it.