Samson

³² And what more shall I say? Time will not allow me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the prophets,

³³ who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised; who shut the mouths of lions,

So the woman gave birth to a son and named him Samson. The boy grew, and the LORD blessed him.

¹ One day Samson went down to Timnah, where he saw a young Philistine woman.

² So he returned and told his father and mother, “I have seen a daughter of the Philistines in Timnah. Now get her for me as a wife.”

³ But his father and mother replied, “Can’t you find a young woman among your relatives or among any of our people? Must you go to the uncircumcised Philistines to get a wife?” But Samson told his father, “Get her for me, for she is pleasing to my eyes.”

⁴ (Now his father and mother did not know this was from the LORD, who was seeking an occasion to move against the Philistines; for at that time the Philistines were ruling over Israel.)

⁵ Then Samson went down to Timnah with his father and mother and came to the vineyards of Timnah. Suddenly a young lion came roaring at him,

⁶ and the Spirit of the LORD came powerfully upon him, and he tore the lion apart with his bare hands as one would tear a young goat. But he did not tell his father or mother what he had done.

Then Samson continued on his way down and spoke to the woman, because she was pleasing to his eyes.

¹⁰ Then his father went to visit the woman, and Samson prepared a feast there, as was customary for the bridegroom.

¹¹ And when the Philistines saw him, they selected thirty men to accompany him.

¹² “Let me tell you a riddle,” Samson said to them. “If you can solve it for me within the seven days of the feast, I will give you thirty linen garments and thirty sets of clothes.

¹⁵ So on the fourth day they said to Samson’s wife, “Entice your husband to explain the riddle to us, or we will burn you and your father’s household to death. Did you invite us here to rob us?”

¹⁶ Then Samson’s wife came to him, weeping, and said, “You hate me! You do not really love me! You have posed to my people a riddle, but have not explained it to me.” “Look,” he said, “I have not even explained it to my father or mother, so why should I explain it to you?”

¹⁹ Then the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and he went down to Ashkelon, killed thirty of their men, took their apparel, and gave their clothes to those who had solved the riddle. And burning with anger, Samson returned to his father’s house,

²⁰ and his wife was given to one of the men who had accompanied him.

¹ Later on, at the time of the wheat harvest, Samson took a young goat and went to visit his wife. “I want to go to my wife in her room,” he said. But her father would not let him enter.

² “I was sure that you thoroughly hated her,” said her father, “so I gave her to one of the men who accompanied you. Is not her younger sister more beautiful than she? Please take her instead.”

³ Samson said to them, “This time I will be blameless in doing harm to the Philistines.”

⁴ Then Samson went out and caught three hundred foxes. And he took torches, turned the foxes tail-to-tail, and fastened a torch between each pair of tails.

⁵ Then he lit the torches and released the foxes into the standing grain of the Philistines, burning up the piles of grain and the standing grain, as well as the vineyards and olive groves.

⁶ “Who did this?” the Philistines demanded. “It was Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite,” they were told. “For his wife was given to his companion.” So the Philistines went up and burned her and her father to death.

And Samson told them, “Because you have done this, I will not rest until I have taken vengeance upon you.”

¹⁰ “Why have you attacked us?” said the men of Judah. The Philistines replied, “We have come to arrest Samson and pay him back for what he has done to us.”

¹¹ In response, three thousand men of Judah went to the cave at the rock of Etam, and they asked Samson, “Do you not realize that the Philistines rule over us? What have you done to us?” “I have done to them what they did to me,” he replied.

¹² But they said to him, “We have come down to arrest you and hand you over to the Philistines.” Samson replied, “Swear to me that you will not kill me yourselves.”