Then Samson’s father accompanied him to Timnah for the marriage. ¹  Samson hosted a party ²  there, for this was customary for bridegrooms ³  to do.

Samson went to Gaza. There he saw a prostitute and went in to have sex with her. ¹ 

After this Samson fell in love with a woman named Delilah, who lived in the Sorek Valley.

The Israelites had taken an oath in Mizpah, saying, “Not one of us will allow his daughter to marry a Benjaminite.”

Do this: ¹  exterminate every male, as well as every woman who has had sexual relations with a male. ²  But spare the lives of any virgins.” So they did as instructed. ³ 

But his father and mother said to him, “Certainly you can find a wife among your relatives or among all our ¹  people! You should not have to go and get a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines.” ²  But Samson said to his father, “Get her for me, ³  because she is the right one for me.” ⁴ 

Sometime later, during the wheat harvest, ¹  Samson took a young goat as a gift and went to visit his bride. ²  He said to her father, ³  “I want to have sex with my bride in her bedroom!” ⁴  But her father would not let him enter.

Caleb said, “To the man who attacks and captures Kiriath Sepher I will give my daughter Acsah as a wife.”

When Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother, ¹  captured it, Caleb ²  gave him his daughter Acsah as a wife.

Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a brave warrior. His mother was a prostitute, but Gilead was his father. ¹ 

The Lord’s angelic ¹  messenger appeared to the woman and said to her, “You ²  are infertile and childless, ³  but you will conceive and have a son.

God answered Manoah’s prayer. ¹  God’s angelic messenger visited ²  the woman again while she was sitting in the field. But her husband Manoah was not with her.

The woman ran at once and told her husband, ¹  “Come quickly, ²  the man who visited ³  me the other day has appeared to me!”

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. ¹ 

As the flame went up from the altar toward the sky, the Lord’s messenger went up in it ¹  while Manoah and his wife watched. They fell facedown ²  to the ground.

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. ¹ 

The woman arrived back at daybreak and was sprawled out on the doorstep of the house where her master ¹  was staying until it became light. ² 

When her master ¹  got up in the morning, opened the doors of the house, and went outside to start on his journey, there was the woman, his concubine, sprawled out on the doorstep of the house with her hands on the threshold.

The Levite, ¹  the husband of the murdered woman, spoke up, “I and my concubine stopped in ²  Gibeah in the territory of Benjamin ³  to spend the night.

She said, “I will indeed go with you. But you will not gain fame ¹  on the expedition you are undertaking, ²  for the Lord will turn Sisera over to a woman.” ³  Deborah got up and went with Barak to Kedesh.