Jdg 13:2 There was a certain man of Zorah, of the family of the Danites, whose name was Manoah; and his wife was barren and had borne no children.

Jdg 13:3 Then the angel of the Lord appeared to the woman and said to her, "Behold now, you are barren and have borne no children, but you shall conceive and give birth to a son.

Jdg 13:4 Now therefore, be careful not to drink wine or strong drink, nor eat any unclean thing.

Jdg 13:5 For behold, you shall conceive and give birth to a son, and no razor shall come upon his head, for the boy shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb; and he shall begin to deliver Israel from the hands of the Philistines."

Jdg 13:6 Then the woman came and told her husband, saying, "A man of God came to me and his appearance was like the appearance of the angel of God, very awesome. And I did not ask him where he came from, nor did he tell me his name.

Jdg 13:7 But he said to me, 'Behold, you shall conceive and give birth to a son, and now you shall not drink wine or strong drink nor eat any unclean thing, for the boy shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb to the day of his death.'"

Jdg 13:8 Then Manoah entreated the Lord and said, "O Lord, please let the man of God whom You have sent come to us again that he may teach us what to do for the boy who is to be born."

Jdg 13:9 God listened to the voice of Manoah; and the angel of God came again to the woman as she was sitting in the field, but Manoah her husband was not with her.

Jdg 13:10 So the woman ran quickly and told her husband, "Behold, the man who came the other day has appeared to me."

Jdg 13:11 Then Manoah arose and followed his wife, and when he came to the man he said to him, "Are you the man who spoke to the woman?" And he said, "I am."

Jdg 13:12 Manoah said, "Now when your words come to pass, what shall be the boy's mode of life and his vocation?"

Jdg 13:13 So the angel of the Lord said to Manoah, "Let the woman pay attention to all that I said.

Jdg 13:14 She should not eat anything that comes from the vine nor drink wine or strong drink, nor eat any unclean thing; let her observe all that I commanded."

Jdg 13:15 Then Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, "Please let us detain you so that we may prepare a young goat for you."

Jdg 13:16 The angel of the Lord said to Manoah, "Though you detain me, I will not eat your food, but if you prepare a burnt offering, then offer it to the Lord." For Manoah did not know that he was the angel of the Lord.

Jdg 13:17 Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, "What is your name, so that when your words come to pass, we may honor you?"

Jdg 13:18 But the angel of the Lord said to him, "Why do you ask my name, seeing it is wonderful?"

Jdg 13:19 So Manoah took the young goat with the grain offering and offered it on the rock to the Lord, and He performed wonders while Manoah and his wife looked on.

Jdg 13:20 For it came about when the flame went up from the altar toward heaven, that the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame of the altar. When Manoah and his wife saw this, they fell on their faces to the ground.

Jdg 13:21 Now the angel of the Lord did not appear to Manoah or his wife again. Then Manoah knew that he was the angel of the Lord.

Jdg 13:22 So Manoah said to his wife, "We will surely die, for we have seen God."

Jdg 13:23 But his wife said to him, "If the Lord had desired to kill us, He would not have accepted a burnt offering and a grain offering from our hands, nor would He have shown us all these things, nor would He have let us hear things like this at this time."

Jdg 13:24 Then the woman gave birth to a son and named him Samson; and the child grew up and the Lord blessed him.

Jdg 13:25 And the Spirit of the Lord began to stir him in Mahaneh-dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.

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Jdg 14:1 Then Samson went down to Timnah and saw a woman in Timnah, one of the daughters of the Philistines.

Jdg 14:2 So he came back and told his father and mother, "I saw a woman in Timnah, one of the daughters of the Philistines; now therefore, get her for me as a wife."

Jdg 14:3 Then 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?" But Samson said to his father, "Get her for me, for she looks good to me."

Jdg 14:4 However, his father and mother did not know that it was of the Lord, for He was seeking an occasion against the Philistines. Now at that time the Philistines were ruling over Israel.

Jdg 14:5 Then 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.

Jdg 14:6 The Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily, so that he tore him as one tears a young goat though he had nothing in his hand; but he did not tell his father or mother what he had done.

Jdg 14:7 So he went down and talked to the woman; and she looked good to Samson.

Jdg 14:8 When 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.

Jdg 14:9 So he scraped the honey into 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 scraped the honey out of the body of the lion.

Jdg 14:10 Then his father went down to the woman; and Samson made a feast there, for the young men customarily did this.

Jdg 14:11 When they saw him, they brought thirty companions to be with him.

Jdg 14:12 Then Samson said to them, "Let me now propound a riddle to you; if you will indeed tell it to me within the seven days of the feast, and find it out, then I will give you thirty linen wraps and thirty changes of clothes.

Jdg 14:13 But if you are unable to tell me, then you shall give me thirty linen wraps and thirty changes of clothes." And they said to him, "Propound your riddle, that we may hear it."

Jdg 14:14 So 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 riddle in three days.

Jdg 14:15 Then 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?"

Jdg 14:16 Samson's wife wept before him and said, "You only hate me, and you do not love me; you have propounded 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?"

Jdg 14:17 However she wept before him 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.

Jdg 14:18 So 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."

Jdg 14:19 Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily, and he went down to Ashkelon and killed thirty of them and took their spoil and gave the changes of clothes to those who told the riddle. And his anger burned, and he went up to his father's house.

Jdg 14:20 But Samson's wife was given to his companion who had been his friend.

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Jdg 15:1 But 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.

Jdg 15:2 Her father said, "I really thought that you hated her intensely; so I gave her to your companion. Is not her younger sister more beautiful than she? Please let her be yours instead."

Jdg 15:3 Samson then said to them, "This time I shall be blameless in regard to the Philistines when I do them harm."

Jdg 15:4 Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took torches, and turned the foxes tail to tail and put one torch in the middle between two tails.

Jdg 15:5 When he had set fire to the torches, he released the foxes into the standing grain of the Philistines, thus burning up both the shocks and the standing grain, along with the vineyards and groves.

Jdg 15:6 Then the Philistines said, "Who did this?" And they 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 with fire.

Jdg 15:7 Samson said to them, "Since you act like this, I will surely take revenge on you, but after that I will quit."

Jdg 15:8 He struck them ruthlessly with a great slaughter; and he went down and lived in the cleft of the rock of Etam.

Jdg 15:9 Then the Philistines went up and camped in Judah, and spread out in Lehi.

Jdg 15:10 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."

Jdg 15:11 Then 3,000 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, "As they did to me, so I have done to them."

Jdg 15:12 They said to him, "We have come down to bind you so that we may give you into the hands of the Philistines." And Samson said to them, "Swear to me that you will not kill me."

Jdg 15:13 So they said to him, "No, but we will bind you fast and give you into their hands; yet surely we will not kill you." Then they bound him with two new ropes and brought him up from the rock.

Jdg 15:14 When he came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they met him. And the Spirit of the Lord came upon him mightily so that the ropes that were on his arms were as flax that is burned with fire, and his bonds dropped from his hands.

Jdg 15:15 He found a fresh jawbone of a donkey, so he reached out and took it and killed a thousand men with it.

Jdg 15:16 Then Samson said, "With the jawbone of a donkey, Heaps upon heaps, With the jawbone of a donkey I have killed a thousand men."

Jdg 15:17 When he had finished speaking, he threw the jawbone from his hand; and he named that place Ramath-lehi.

Jdg 15:18 Then he became very thirsty, and he called to the Lord and said, "You have given this great deliverance by the hand of Your servant, and now shall I die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?"

Jdg 15:19 But 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.

Jdg 15:20 So he judged Israel twenty years in the days of the Philistines.