Judges 4:6

4:6 She summoned¹ Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali. She said to him, “Is it not true that the Lord God of Israel is commanding you? Go, march to Mount Tabor! Take with you ten thousand men from Naphtali and Zebulun!

Judges 4:21

4:21 Then Jael wife of Heber took a tent peg in one hand and a hammer in the other.² She crept up on him, drove the tent peg through his temple into the ground³ while he was asleep from exhaustion,⁴ and he died.

Judges 7:19

7:19 Gideon took a hundred men to the edge of the camp⁵ at the beginning of the middle watch, just after they had changed the guards. They blew their trumpets and broke the jars they were carrying.⁶

Judges 11:35

11:35 When he saw her, he ripped his clothes and said, “Oh no! My daughter! You have completely ruined me!⁷ You have brought me disaster!⁸ I made an oath to the Lord, and I cannot break it.”⁹

Judges 13:6

13:6 The woman went and said to her husband, “A man sent from God¹⁰ came to me! He looked like God’s angelic messenger – he was very awesome.¹¹ I did not ask him where he came from, and he did not tell me his name.

Judges 15:19

15:19 So God split open the basin¹² at Lehi and water flowed out from it. When he took a drink, his strength¹³ was restored and he revived. For this reason he named the spring¹⁴ En Hakkore.¹⁵ It remains in Lehi to this very day.

Judges 16:9

16:9 They hid¹⁶ in the bedroom and then she said to him, “The Philistines are here,¹⁷ Samson!” He snapped the bowstrings as easily as a thread of yarn snaps when it is put close to fire.¹⁸ The secret of his strength was not discovered.¹⁹

Judges 16:18

16:18 When Delilah saw that he had told her his secret,²⁰ she sent for²¹ the rulers of the Philistines, saying, “Come up here again, for he has told me²² his secret.”²³ So the rulers of the Philistines went up to visit her, bringing the silver in their hands.

Judges 18:14

18:14 The five men who had gone to spy out the land of Laish²⁴ said to their kinsmen,²⁵ “Do you realize that inside these houses are an ephod, some personal idols, a carved image, and a metal image? Decide now what you want to do.”

Judges 20:10

20:10 We will take ten of every group of a hundred men from all the tribes of Israel (and a hundred of every group of a thousand, and a thousand of every group of ten thousand) to get supplies for the army.²⁶ When they arrive in Gibeah of Benjamin they will punish them for the atrocity which they committed in Israel.”²⁷

Judges 21:5

21:5 The Israelites asked, “Who from all the Israelite tribes has not assembled before the Lord?” They had made a solemn oath that whoever did not assemble before the Lord at Mizpah must certainly be executed.²⁸

Judges 21:22

21:22 When their fathers or brothers come and protest to us,²⁹ we’ll say to them, “Do us a favor and let them be,³⁰ for we could not get each one a wife through battle.³¹ Don’t worry about breaking your oath!³² You would only be guilty if you had voluntarily given them wives.’”³³

¹tn Heb “sent and summoned.”

²tn Heb “took a tent peg and put a hammer in her hand.”

³tn Heb “and it went into the ground.”

⁴tn Heb “and exhausted.” Another option is to understand this as a reference to the result of the fatal blow. In this case, the phrase could be translated, “and he breathed his last.”

³tn Heb “Gideon went, along with the hundred men who were with him, to the edge of the camp.”

⁴tn Heb “that were in their hands.”

⁴tn Heb “you have brought me very low,” or “you have knocked me to my knees.” The infinitive absolute precedes the verb for emphasis.

⁵tn Heb “You are among [or “like”] those who trouble me.”

⁶tn Heb “I opened my mouth to the Lord and I am not able to return.”

⁵tn Heb “The man of God.”

⁶tn Heb “His appearance was like the appearance of the messenger of God, very awesome.”

⁶tn The word translated “basin” refers to a circular-shaped depression in the land’s surface.

⁷tn Heb “spirit.”

⁸tn Heb “named it”; the referent (the spring) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

⁹sn The name En Hakkore means “Spring of the one who cries out.”

⁷tn Heb “And the ones lying in wait were sitting for her.” The grammatically singular form וְהָאֹרֵב (vÿha’orev) is collective here, referring to the rulers as a group (so also in v. 16).

⁸tn Heb “are upon you.”

⁹tn Heb “when it smells fire.”

¹⁰tn Heb “His strength was not known.”

⁸tn Heb “all his heart.”

⁹tn Heb “she sent and summoned.”

¹⁰tc The translation follows the Qere, לִי (li, “to me”) rather than the Kethib, לָהּ (lah, “to her”).

¹¹tn Heb “all his heart.”

⁹tc Codex Alexandrinus (A) of the LXX lacks the phrase “of Laish.”

¹⁰tn Heb “brothers.”

¹⁰tn Or “people.”

¹¹tn Heb “to do at their arrival in Geba of Benjamin according to all the disgraceful [thing] which he [collective = “Benjamin”] did in Israel.” Here “Geba” must be an error for “Gibeah.”

¹¹tn Heb “A great oath there was concerning the one who did not go up before the Lord at Mizpah, saying, ‘He must surely be put to death.’”

¹²tc The (original) LXX and Vulgate read “to you.”

¹³tn The words “and let them be” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

¹⁴tn Heb “for we did not take each his wife in battle.”

¹⁵tn This sentence is not in the Hebrew text. It is supplied in the translation to clarify the logic of the statement.

¹⁶tc Heb “You did not give to them, now you are guilty.” The MT as it stands makes little sense. It is preferable to emend לֹא (lo’, “not”) to לוּא (lu’, “if”). This particle introduces a purely hypothetical condition, “If you had given to them [but you didn’t].” See G. F. Moore, Judges (ICC), 453-54.