Judges 10:8--16:31
10:8 They ruthlessly oppressed
the Israelites that eighteenth year
– that is, all the Israelites living east of the Jordan in Amorite country in Gilead.
10:9 The Ammonites crossed the Jordan to fight with Judah, Benjamin, and Ephraim.
Israel suffered greatly.
10:10 The Israelites cried out for help to the Lord: “We have sinned against you. We abandoned our God and worshiped the Baals.”
10:11 The Lord said to the Israelites, “Did I not deliver you from Egypt, the Amorites, the Ammonites, the Philistines,
10:12 the Sidonians, Amalek, and Midian when they oppressed you? You cried out for help to me, and I delivered you from their power.
10:13 But since you abandoned me and worshiped other gods, I will not deliver you again.
10:14 Go and cry for help to the gods you have chosen! Let them deliver you from trouble!”
10:15 But the Israelites said to the Lord, “We have sinned. You do to us as you see fit, but deliver us today!”
10:16 They threw away the foreign gods they owned and worshiped the Lord. Finally the Lord grew tired of seeing Israel suffer so much.
An Outcast Becomes a General
10:17 The Ammonites assembled and camped in Gilead; the Israelites gathered together and camped in Mizpah.
10:18 The leaders of Gilead said to one another, “Who is willing to lead the charge against the Ammonites? He will become the leader of all who live in Gilead!”
11:1 Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a brave warrior. His mother was a prostitute, but Gilead was his father.
11:2 Gilead’s wife also gave him sons. When his wife’s sons grew up, they made Jephthah leave and said to him, “You are not going to inherit any of our father’s wealth, because you are another woman’s son.”
11:3 So Jephthah left his half-brothers and lived in the land of Tob. Lawless men joined Jephthah’s gang and traveled with him.
11:4 It was some time after this when the Ammonites fought with Israel.
11:5 When the Ammonites attacked, the leaders of Gilead asked Jephthah to come back from the land of Tob.
11:6 They said, “Come, be our commander, so we can fight with the Ammonites.”
11:7 Jephthah said to the leaders of Gilead, “But you hated me and made me leave my father’s house. Why do you come to me now, when you are in trouble?”
11:8 The leaders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “That may be true, but now we pledge to you our loyalty. Come with us and fight with the Ammonites. Then you will become the leader of all who live in Gilead.”
11:9 Jephthah said to the leaders of Gilead, “All right! If you take me back to fight with the Ammonites and the Lord gives them to me, I will be your leader.”
11:10 The leaders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “The Lord will judge any grievance you have against us, if we do not do as you say.”
11:11 So Jephthah went with the leaders of Gilead. The people made him their leader and commander. Jephthah repeated the terms of the agreement before the Lord in Mizpah.
Jephthah Gives a History Lesson
11:12 Jephthah sent messengers to the Ammonite king, saying, “Why have you come against me to attack my land?”
11:13 The Ammonite king said to Jephthah’s messengers, “Because Israel stole my land when they came up from Egypt – from the Arnon River in the south to the Jabbok River in the north, and as far west as the Jordan. Now return it peaceably!”
11:14 Jephthah sent messengers back to the Ammonite king
11:15 and said to him, “This is what Jephthah says, ‘Israel did not steal the land of Moab and the land of the Ammonites.
11:16 When they left Egypt, Israel traveled through the desert as far as the Red Sea and then came to Kadesh.
11:17 Israel sent messengers to the king of Edom, saying, “Please allow us to pass through your land.” But the king of Edom rejected the request. Israel sent the same request to the king of Moab, but he was unwilling to cooperate. So Israel stayed at Kadesh.
11:18 Then Israel went through the desert and bypassed the land of Edom and the land of Moab. They traveled east of the land of Moab and camped on the other side of the Arnon River; they did not go through Moabite territory (the Arnon was Moab’s border).
11:19 Israel sent messengers to King Sihon, the Amorite king who ruled in Heshbon, and said to him, “Please allow us to pass through your land to our land.”
11:20 But Sihon did not trust Israel to pass through his territory. He assembled his whole army, camped in Jahaz, and fought with Israel.
11:21 The Lord God of Israel handed Sihon and his whole army over to Israel and they defeated them. Israel took all the land of the Amorites who lived in that land.
11:22 They took all the Amorite territory from the Arnon River on the south to the Jabbok River on the north, from the desert in the east to the Jordan in the west.
11:23 Since the Lord God of Israel has driven out the Amorites before his people Israel, do you think you can just take it from them?
11:24 You have the right to take what Chemosh your god gives you, but we will take the land of all whom the Lord our God has driven out before us.
11:25 Are you really better than Balak son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he dare to quarrel with Israel? Did he dare to fight with them?
11:26 Israel has been living in Heshbon and its nearby towns, in Aroer and its nearby towns, and in all the cities along the Arnon for three hundred years! Why did you not reclaim them during that time?
11:27 I have not done you wrong, but you are doing wrong by attacking me. May the Lord, the Judge, judge this day between the Israelites and the Ammonites!’”
11:28 But the Ammonite king disregarded the message sent by Jephthah.
A Foolish Vow Spells Death for a Daughter
11:29 The Lord’s spirit empowered Jephthah. He passed through Gilead and Manasseh and went to Mizpah in Gilead. From there he approached the Ammonites.
11:30 Jephthah made a vow to the Lord, saying, “If you really do hand the Ammonites over to me,
11:31 then whoever is the first to come through the doors of my house to meet me when I return safely from fighting the Ammonites – he will belong to the Lord and I will offer him up as a burnt sacrifice.”
11:32 Jephthah approached the Ammonites to fight with them, and the Lord handed them over to him.
11:33 He defeated them from Aroer all the way to Minnith – twenty cities in all, even as far as Abel Keramim! He wiped them out! The Israelites humiliated the Ammonites.
11:34 When Jephthah came home to Mizpah, there was his daughter hurrying out to meet him, dancing to the rhythm of tambourines. She was his only child; except for her he had no son or daughter.
11:35 When he saw her, he ripped his clothes and said, “Oh no! My daughter! You have completely ruined me! You have brought me disaster! I made an oath to the Lord, and I cannot break it.”
11:36 She said to him, “My father, since you made an oath to the Lord, do to me as you promised. After all, the Lord vindicated you before your enemies, the Ammonites.”
11:37 She then said to her father, “Please grant me this one wish. For two months allow me to walk through the hills with my friends and mourn my virginity.”
11:38 He said, “You may go.” He permitted her to leave for two months. She went with her friends and mourned her virginity as she walked through the hills.
11:39 After two months she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. She died a virgin. Her tragic death gave rise to a custom in Israel.
11:40 Every year Israelite women commemorate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite for four days.
Civil Strife Mars the Victory
12:1 The Ephraimites assembled and crossed over to Zaphon. They said to Jephthah, “Why did you go and fight with the Ammonites without asking us to go with you? We will burn your house down right over you!”
12:2 Jephthah said to them, “My people and I were entangled in controversy with the Ammonites. I asked for your help, but you did not deliver me from their power.
12:3 When I saw that you were not going to help, I risked my life and advanced against the Ammonites, and the Lord handed them over to me. Why have you come up to fight with me today?”
12:4 Jephthah assembled all the men of Gilead and they fought with Ephraim. The men of Gilead defeated Ephraim, because the Ephraimites insulted them, saying, “You Gileadites are refugees in Ephraim, living within Ephraim’s and Manasseh’s territory.”
12:5 The Gileadites captured the fords of the Jordan River opposite Ephraim. Whenever an Ephraimite fugitive said, “Let me cross over,” the men of Gilead asked him, “Are you an Ephraimite?” If he said, “No,”
12:6 then they said to him, “Say ‘Shibboleth!’” If he said, “Sibboleth” (and could not pronounce the word correctly), they grabbed him and executed him right there at the fords of the Jordan. On that day forty-two thousand Ephraimites fell dead.
12:7 Jephthah led Israel for six years; then he died and was buried in his city in Gilead.
Order Restored
12:8 After him Ibzan of Bethlehem led Israel.
12:9 He had thirty sons. He arranged for thirty of his daughters to be married outside his extended family, and he arranged for thirty young women to be brought from outside as wives for his sons. Ibzan led Israel for seven years;
12:10 then he died and was buried in Bethlehem.
12:11 After him Elon the Zebulunite led Israel for ten years.
12:12 Then Elon the Zebulunite died and was buried in Aijalon in the land of Zebulun.
12:13 After him Abdon son of Hillel the Pirathonite led Israel.
12:14 He had forty sons and thirty grandsons who rode on seventy donkeys. He led Israel for eight years.
12:15 Then Abdon son of Hillel the Pirathonite died and was buried in Pirathon in the land of Ephraim, in the hill country of the Amalekites.
Samson’s Birth
13:1 The Israelites again did evil in the Lord’s sight, so the Lord handed them over to the Philistines for forty years.
13:2 There was a man named Manoah from Zorah, from the Danite tribe. His wife was infertile and childless.
13:3 The Lord’s angelic messenger appeared to the woman and said to her, “You are infertile and childless, but you will conceive and have a son.
13:4 Now be careful! Do not drink wine or beer, and do not eat any food that will make you ritually unclean.
13:5 Look, you will conceive and have a son. You must never cut his hair, for the child will be dedicated to God from birth. He will begin to deliver Israel from the power of the Philistines.”
13:6 The woman went and said to her husband, “A man sent from God came to me! He looked like God’s angelic messenger – he was very awesome. I did not ask him where he came from, and he did not tell me his name.
13:7 He said to me, ‘Look, you will conceive and have a son. So now, do not drink wine or beer and do not eat any food that will make you ritually unclean. For the child will be dedicated to God from birth till the day he dies.’”
13:8 Manoah prayed to the Lord, “Please, Lord, allow the man sent from God to visit us again, so he can teach us how we should raise the child who will be born.”
13:9 God answered Manoah’s prayer. God’s angelic messenger visited the woman again while she was sitting in the field. But her husband Manoah was not with her.
13:10 The woman ran at once and told her husband, “Come quickly, the man who visited me the other day has appeared to me!”
13:11 So Manoah got up and followed his wife. When he met the man, he said to him, “Are you the man who spoke to my wife?” He said, “Yes.”
13:12 Manoah said, “Now, when your announcement comes true, how should the child be raised and what should he do?”
13:13 The Lord’s messenger told Manoah, “Your wife should pay attention to everything I told her.
13:14 She should not drink anything that the grapevine produces. She must not drink wine or beer, and she must not eat any food that will make her ritually unclean. She should obey everything I commanded her to do.”
13:15 Manoah said to the Lord’s messenger, “Please stay here awhile, so we can prepare a young goat for you to eat.”
13:16 The Lord’s messenger said to Manoah, “If I stay, I will not eat your food. But if you want to make a burnt sacrifice to the Lord, you should offer it.” (He said this because Manoah did not know that he was the Lord’s messenger.)
13:17 Manoah said to the Lord’s messenger, “Tell us your name, so we can honor you when your announcement comes true.”
13:18 The Lord’s messenger said to him, “You should not ask me my name, because you cannot comprehend it.”
13:19 Manoah took a young goat and a grain offering and offered them on a rock to the Lord. The Lord’s messenger did an amazing thing as Manoah and his wife watched.
13:20 As the flame went up from the altar toward the sky, the Lord’s messenger went up in it while Manoah and his wife watched. They fell facedown to the ground.
13:21 The Lord’s messenger did not appear again to Manoah and his wife. After all this happened Manoah realized that the visitor had been the Lord’s messenger.
13:22 Manoah said to his wife, “We will certainly die, because we have seen a supernatural being!”
13:23 But his wife said to him, “If the Lord wanted to kill us, he would not have accepted the burnt offering and the grain offering from us. He would not have shown us all these things, or have spoken to us like this just now.”
13:24 Manoah’s wife gave birth to a son and named him Samson. The child grew and the Lord empowered him.
13:25 The Lord’s spirit began to control him in Mahaneh Dan between Zorah and Eshtaol.
Samson’s Unconsummated Marriage
14:1 Samson went down to Timnah, where a Philistine girl caught his eye.
14:2 When he got home, he told his father and mother, “A Philistine girl in Timnah has caught my eye. Now get her for my wife.”
14:3 But his father and mother said to him, “Certainly you can find a wife among your relatives or among all our people! You should not have to go and get a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines.” But Samson said to his father, “Get her for me, because she is the right one for me.”
14:4 Now his father and mother did not realize this was the Lord’s doing, because he was looking for an opportunity to stir up trouble with the Philistines (for at that time the Philistines were ruling Israel).
14:5 Samson went down to Timnah. When he approached the vineyards of Timnah, he saw a roaring young lion attacking him.
14:6 The Lord’s spirit empowered him and he tore the lion in two with his bare hands as easily as one would tear a young goat. But he did not tell his father or mother what he had done.
14:7 Samson continued on down to Timnah and spoke to the girl. In his opinion, she was just the right one.
14:8 Some time later, when he went back to marry her, he turned aside to see the lion’s remains. He saw a swarm of bees in the lion’s carcass, as well as some honey.
14:9 He scooped it up with his hands and ate it as he walked along. When he returned to his father and mother, he offered them some and they ate it. But he did not tell them he had scooped the honey out of the lion’s carcass.
14:10 Then Samson’s father accompanied him to Timnah for the marriage. Samson hosted a party there, for this was customary for bridegrooms to do.
14:11 When the Philistines saw he had no attendants, they gave him thirty groomsmen who kept him company.
14:12 Samson said to them, “I will give you a riddle. If you really can solve it during the seven days the party lasts, I will give you thirty linen robes and thirty sets of clothes.
14:13 But if you cannot solve it, you will give me thirty linen robes and thirty sets of clothes.” They said to him, “Let us hear your riddle.”
14:14 He said to them,
“Out of the one who eats came something to eat;
out of the strong one came something sweet.”
They could not solve the riddle for three days.
14:15 On the fourth day they said to Samson’s bride, “Trick your husband into giving the solution to the riddle. If you refuse, we will burn up you and your father’s family. Did you invite us here to make us poor?”
14:16 So Samson’s bride cried on his shoulder and said, “You must hate me; you do not love me! You told the young men a riddle, but you have not told me the solution.” He said to her, “Look, I have not even told my father or mother. Do you really expect me to tell you?”
14:17 She cried on his shoulder until the party was almost over. Finally, on the seventh day, he told her because she had nagged him so much. Then she told the young men the solution to the riddle.
14:18 On the seventh day, before the sun set, the men of the city said to him,
“What is sweeter than honey?
What is stronger than a lion?”
He said to them,
“If you had not plowed with my heifer,
you would not have solved my riddle!”
14:19 The Lord’s spirit empowered him. He went down to Ashkelon and murdered thirty men. He took their clothes and gave them to the men who had solved the riddle. He was furious as he went back home.
14:20 Samson’s bride was then given to his best man.
Samson Versus the Philistines
15:1 Sometime later, during the wheat harvest, Samson took a young goat as a gift and went to visit his bride. He said to her father, “I want to have sex with my bride in her bedroom!” But her father would not let him enter.
15:2 Her father said, “I really thought you absolutely despised her, so I gave her to your best man. Her younger sister is more attractive than she is. Take her instead!”
15:3 Samson said to them, “This time I am justified in doing the Philistines harm!”
15:4 Samson went and captured three hundred jackals and got some torches. He tied the jackals in pairs by their tails and then tied a torch to each pair.
15:5 He lit the torches and set the jackals loose in the Philistines’ standing grain. He burned up the grain heaps and the standing grain, as well as the vineyards and olive groves.
15:6 The Philistines asked, “Who did this?” They were told, “Samson, the Timnite’s son-in-law, because the Timnite took Samson’s bride and gave her to his best man.” So the Philistines went up and burned her and her father.
15:7 Samson said to them, “Because you did this, I will get revenge against you before I quit fighting.”
15:8 He struck them down and defeated them. Then he went down and lived for a time in the cave in the cliff of Etam.
15:9 The Philistines went up and invaded Judah. They arrayed themselves for battle in Lehi.
15:10 The men of Judah said, “Why are you attacking us?” The Philistines said, “We have come up to take Samson prisoner so we can do to him what he has done to us.”
15:11 Three thousand men of Judah went down to the cave in the cliff of Etam and said to Samson, “Do you not know that the Philistines rule over us? Why have you done this to us?” He said to them, “I have only done to them what they have done to me.”
15:12 They said to him, “We have come down to take you prisoner so we can hand you over to the Philistines.” Samson said to them, “Promise me you will not kill me.”
15:13 They said to him, “We promise! We will only take you prisoner and hand you over to them. We promise not to kill you.” They tied him up with two brand new ropes and led him up from the cliff.
15:14 When he arrived in Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they approached him. But the Lord’s spirit empowered him. The ropes around his arms were like flax dissolving in fire, and they melted away from his hands.
15:15 He happened to see a solid jawbone of a donkey. He grabbed it and struck down a thousand men.
15:16 Samson then said,
“With the jawbone of a donkey
I have left them in heaps;
with the jawbone of a donkey
I have struck down a thousand men!”
15:17 When he finished speaking, he threw the jawbone down and named that place Ramath Lehi.
15:18 He was very thirsty, so he cried out to the Lord and said, “You have given your servant this great victory. But now must I die of thirst and fall into hands of the Philistines?”
15:19 So God split open the basin at Lehi and water flowed out from it. When he took a drink, his strength was restored and he revived. For this reason he named the spring En Hakkore. It remains in Lehi to this very day.
15:20 Samson led Israel for twenty years during the days of Philistine prominence.
Samson’s Downfall
16:1 Samson went to Gaza. There he saw a prostitute and went in to have sex with her.
16:2 The Gazites were told, “Samson has come here!” So they surrounded the town and hid all night at the city gate, waiting for him to leave. They relaxed all night, thinking, “He will not leave until morning comes; then we will kill him!”
16:3 Samson spent half the night with the prostitute; then he got up in the middle of the night and left. He grabbed the doors of the city gate, as well as the two posts, and pulled them right off, bar and all. He put them on his shoulders and carried them up to the top of a hill east of Hebron.
16:4 After this Samson fell in love with a woman named Delilah, who lived in the Sorek Valley.
16:5 The rulers of the Philistines went up to visit her and said to her, “Trick him! Find out what makes him so strong and how we can subdue him and humiliate him. Each one of us will give you eleven hundred silver pieces.”
16:6 So Delilah said to Samson, “Tell me what makes you so strong and how you can be subdued and humiliated.”
16:7 Samson said to her, “If they tie me up with seven fresh bowstrings that have not been dried, I will become weak and be just like any other man.”
16:8 So the rulers of the Philistines brought her seven fresh bowstrings which had not been dried and they tied him up with them.
16:9 They hid in the bedroom and then she said to him, “The Philistines are here, Samson!” He snapped the bowstrings as easily as a thread of yarn snaps when it is put close to fire. The secret of his strength was not discovered.
16:10 Delilah said to Samson, “Look, you deceived me and told me lies! Now tell me how you can be subdued.”
16:11 He said to her, “If they tie me tightly with brand new ropes that have never been used, I will become weak and be just like any other man.”
16:12 So Delilah took new ropes and tied him with them and said to him, “The Philistines are here, Samson!” (The Philistines were hiding in the bedroom.) But he tore the ropes from his arms as if they were a piece of thread.
16:13 Delilah said to Samson, “Up to now you have deceived me and told me lies. Tell me how you can be subdued.” He said to her, “If you weave the seven braids of my hair into the fabric on the loom and secure it with the pin, I will become weak and be like any other man.”
16:14 So she made him go to sleep, wove the seven braids of his hair into the fabric on the loom, fastened it with the pin, and said to him, “The Philistines are here, Samson!” He woke up and tore away the pin of the loom and the fabric.
16:15 She said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when you will not share your secret with me? Three times you have deceived me and have not told me what makes you so strong.”
16:16 She nagged him every day and pressured him until he was sick to death of it.
16:17 Finally he told her his secret. He said to her, “My hair has never been cut, for I have been dedicated to God from the time I was conceived. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me; I would become weak, and be just like all other men.”
16:18 When Delilah saw that he had told her his secret, she sent for the rulers of the Philistines, saying, “Come up here again, for he has told me his secret.” So the rulers of the Philistines went up to visit her, bringing the silver in their hands.
16:19 She made him go to sleep on her lap and then called a man in to shave off the seven braids of his hair. She made him vulnerable and his strength left him.
16:20 She said, “The Philistines are here, Samson!” He woke up and thought, “I will do as I did before and shake myself free.” But he did not realize that the Lord had left him.
16:21 The Philistines captured him and gouged out his eyes. They brought him down to Gaza and bound him in bronze chains. He became a grinder in the prison.
16:22 His hair began to grow back after it had been shaved off.
Samson’s Death and Burial
16:23 The rulers of the Philistines gathered to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to celebrate. They said, “Our god has handed Samson, our enemy, over to us.”
16:24 When the people saw him, they praised their god, saying, “Our god has handed our enemy over to us, the one who ruined our land and killed so many of us!”
16:25 When they really started celebrating, they said, “Call for Samson so he can entertain us!” So they summoned Samson from the prison and he entertained them. They made him stand between two pillars.
16:26 Samson said to the young man who held his hand, “Position me so I can touch the pillars that support the temple. Then I can lean on them.”
16:27 Now the temple was filled with men and women, and all the rulers of the Philistines were there. There were three thousand men and women on the roof watching Samson entertain.
16:28 Samson called to the Lord, “O Master, Lord, remember me! Strengthen me just one more time, O God, so I can get swift revenge against the Philistines for my two eyes!”
16:29 Samson took hold of the two middle pillars that supported the temple and he leaned against them, with his right hand on one and his left hand on the other.
16:30 Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines!” He pushed hard and the temple collapsed on the rulers and all the people in it. He killed many more people in his death than he had killed during his life.
16:31 His brothers and all his family went down and brought him back. They buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the tomb of Manoah his father. He had led Israel for twenty years.