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¹Then Samson went down to Timnah, and he saw a woman in Timnah, one of the daughters of the Philistines.

²So he came back and told his father and mother, “I saw a woman in Timnah, one of the daughters of the Philistines; so now, get her for me as a wife.”

³But his father and his mother said to him, “Is there no woman among the daughters of your relatives, or among all our people, that you go to take a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines?” Yet Samson said to his father, “Get her for me, because she is right for me.”

⁴However, his father and mother did not know that this was of the LORD, for He was seeking an occasion against the Philistines. And at that time the Philistines were ruling over Israel.

⁵Then Samson went down to Timnah with his father and mother, and came as far as the vineyards of Timnah; and behold, a young lion came roaring toward him.

⁶And the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, so that he tore it apart as one tears apart a young goat, though he had nothing in his hand; but he did not tell his father or mother what he had done.

⁷So he went down and talked to the woman; and she looked pleasing to Samson.

⁸When he returned later to take her, he turned aside to look at the carcass of the lion; and behold, a swarm of bees and honey were in the body of the lion.

⁹So he took out the honey on his hands and went on, eating as he went. When he came to his father and mother, he gave some to them and they ate it; but he did not tell them that he had took the honey out of the body of the lion.

¹⁰Then his father went down to the woman; and Samson held a feast there, for the young men customarily did this.

¹¹When they saw him, they brought thirty companions to be with him.

¹²Then Samson said to them, “Let me now propose a riddle for you; if you actually tell me the answer within the seven days of the feast, and solve it, then I will give you thirty linen wraps and thirty outfits of clothes.

¹³But if you are unable to tell me, then you shall give me thirty linen wraps and thirty outfits of clothes.” And they said to him, “Propose your riddle, so that we may hear it.”

¹⁴So he said to them, “Out of the eater came something to eat, And out of the strong came something sweet.” But they could not tell the answer to the riddle in three days.

¹⁵Then it came about on the fourth day that they said to Samson’s wife, “Entice your husband, so that he will tell us the riddle, or we will burn you and your father’s house with fire. Have you invited us to impoverish us? Is this not so?”

¹⁶So Samson’s wife wept in front of him and said, “You only hate me, and you do not love me; you have proposed a riddle to the sons of my people, and have not told it to me.” And he said to her, “Behold, I have not told it to my father or mother; so should I tell you?”

¹⁷However she wept before him for seven days while their feast lasted. And on the seventh day he told her because she pressed him so hard. She then told the riddle to the sons of her people.

¹⁸So the men of the city said to him on the seventh day before the sun went down, “What is sweeter than honey? And what is stronger than a lion?” And he said to them, “If you had not plowed with my heifer, You would not have found out my riddle.”

¹⁹Then the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, and he went down to Ashkelon and killed thirty men of them and took what they were wearing and gave the outfits of clothes to those who told the riddle. And his anger burned, and he went up to his father’s house.

²⁰But Samson’s wife was given to his companion who had been his friend.

¹But after a while, in the time of wheat harvest, Samson visited his wife with a young goat, and said, “I will go in to my wife in her room.” But her father did not let him enter.

²Her father said, “I really thought that you hated her intensely; so I gave her to your companion. Is her younger sister not more beautiful than she? Please let her be yours instead.”

³Samson then said to them, “This time I will have been blameless regarding the Philistines when I do them harm.”

⁴And Samson went and caught three hundred jackals, and took torches, and turned the jackals tail to tail and put one torch in the middle between two tails.

⁵When he had set fire to the torches, he released the jackals into the standing grain of the Philistines and set fire to both the bundled heaps and the standing grain, along with the vineyards and olive groves.

⁶Then the Philistines said, “Who did this?” And some said, “Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because he took his wife and gave her to his companion.” So the Philistines came up and burned her and her father to death with fire.

⁷Then Samson said to them, “If this is how you act, I will certainly take revenge on you, and only after that will I stop.”

⁸So he struck them ruthlessly with a great slaughter; and afterward he went down and lived in the cleft of the rock of Etam.

⁹Then the Philistines went up and camped in Judah, and spread out in Lehi.

¹⁰So the men of Judah said, “Why have you come up against us?” And they said, “We have come up to bind Samson in order to do to him as he did to us.”

¹¹Then three thousand men of Judah went down to the cleft of the rock of Etam and said to Samson, “Do you not know that the Philistines are rulers over us? What then is this that you have done to us?” And he said to them, “Just as they did to me, so I have done to them.”

¹²Then they said to him, “We have come down to bind you so that we may hand you over to the Philistines.” And Samson said to them, “Swear to me that you will not kill me.”

¹³So they said to him, “No, but we will bind you tightly and give you into their hands; but we certainly will not kill you.” Then they bound him with two new ropes, and brought him up from the rock.

¹⁴When he came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they met him. And the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him so that the ropes that were on his arms were like flax that has burned with fire, and his restraints dropped from his hands.

¹⁵Then he found a fresh jawbone of a donkey, so he reached out with his hand and took it, and killed a thousand men with it.

¹⁶And Samson said, “With the jawbone of a donkey, Heaps upon heaps, With the jawbone of a donkey I have killed a thousand men.”

¹⁷When he had finished speaking, he threw the jawbone from his hand; and he named that place Ramath-lehi.

¹⁸Then he became very thirsty, and he called to the LORD and said, “You have handed this great victory over to Your servant, and now am I to die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?”

¹⁹But God split the hollow place that is in Lehi so that water came out of it. When he drank, his strength returned and he revived. Therefore he named it En-hakkore, which is in Lehi to this day.

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

¹Now Samson went to Gaza and saw a prostitute there, and had relations with her.

²When it was reported to the Gazites, saying, “Samson has come here,” they surrounded the place and lay in wait for him all night at the gate of the city. And they kept silent all night, saying, “Let’s wait until the morning light, then we will kill him.”

³Now Samson lay asleep until midnight, and at midnight he got up and took hold of the doors of the city gate and the two doorposts, and pulled them up along with the bars; then he put them on his shoulders, and carried them up to the top of the mountain which is opposite Hebron.

⁴After this it came about that he was in love with a woman in the Valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah.

⁵So the governors of the Philistines came up to her and said to her, “Entice him, and see where his great strength lies and how we can overpower him so that we may bind him to humble him. Then we will each give you 1,100 pieces of silver.”

⁶So Delilah said to Samson, “Please tell me where your great strength lies, and how you can be bound to humble you.”

⁷And Samson said to her, “If they bind me with seven fresh animal tendons that have not been dried, then I will become weak and be like any other man.”

⁸Then the governors of the Philistines brought up to her seven fresh animal tendons that had not been dried, and she bound him with them.

⁹Now she had men prepared for an ambush in an inner room. And she said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” But he tore the tendons to pieces just like a thread of flax is torn apart when it comes too close to fire. So his strength was not discovered.

¹⁰Then Delilah said to Samson, “Behold, you have toyed with me and told me lies; now please tell me how you may be bound.”

¹¹Then He said to her, “If they bind me tightly with new ropes which have not been used, then I will 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!” For the men in the ambush were waiting in the inner room. But he tore the ropes from his arms like thread.

¹³Then Delilah said to Samson, “Up to now you have toyed with me and told me lies; tell me how you may be bound.” And he said to her, “If you weave the seven locks of my hair with the web [and fasten it with the pin, then I will be weak like any other man.”

¹⁴So while he slept, Delilah wove the seven locks of his hair with the web]. And she fastened it with the pin and said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” But he awoke from his sleep and pulled out the pin of the loom and the web.

¹⁵Then she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when your heart is not with me? You have toyed with me these three times and have not told me where your great strength is.”

¹⁶And it came about, when she pressed him daily with her words and urged him, that his soul was annoyed to death.

¹⁷So he told her all that was in his heart and said to her, “A razor has never come on my head, for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. If I am shaved, then my strength will leave me and I will become weak and be like any other man.”

¹⁸When Delilah saw that he had told her all that was in his heart, she sent word and called the governors of the Philistines, saying, “Come up once more, for he has told me all that is in his heart.” Then the governors of the Philistines came up to her and brought up the money in their hands.

¹⁹And she made him sleep on her knees, and called for a man and had him shave off the seven locks of his head. Then she began to humble him, and his strength left him.

²⁰She 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.” But he did not know that the LORD had departed from him.

²¹Then the Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes; and they brought him down to Gaza and restrained him with bronze chains, and he became a grinder in the prison.

²²However, the hair of his head began to grow again after it was shaved off.

²³Now the governors of the Philistines assembled to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god, and to celebrate, for they said, “Our god has handed Samson our enemy over to us.”

²⁴When the people saw him, they praised their god, for they said, “Our god has handed our enemy over to us, Even the destroyer of our country, Who has killed many of us.”

²⁵It so happened when they were in high spirits, that they said, “Call for Samson, that he may amuse us.” So they called for Samson from the prison, and he entertained them. And they made him stand between the pillars.

²⁶Then Samson said to the boy who was holding his hand, “Let me feel the pillars on which the house rests, so that I may lean against them.”

²⁷Now the house was full of men and women, and all the governors of the Philistines were there. And about three thousand men and women were on the roof looking on while Samson was entertaining them.

²⁸Then Samson called to the LORD and said, “Lord GOD, please remember me and please strengthen me just this time, O God, that I may at once take vengeance on the Philistines for my two eyes.”

²⁹Then Samson grasped the two middle pillars on which the house rested, and braced himself against them, the one with his right hand and the other with his left.

³⁰And Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines!” And he pushed outwards powerfully, so that the house fell on the governors and all the people who were in it. And the dead whom he killed at his death were more than those whom he killed during his lifetime.

³¹Then his brothers and all his father’s household came down and took him, and brought him up and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the tomb of his father Manoah. So he had judged Israel for twenty years.