Judges 15 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.
Time Period
Roughly 1090 BC, during the forty years of Philistine rule
Location
The Sorek and Elah valley farmland between the Israelite hills and Philistine territory, and the rock of Etam and Lehi in Judah
Audience
Israelites of a later generation reading the record of the judges
Situation
Finding that his wife has been given to another man, Samson burns the Philistine grain fields, vineyards, and olive groves using foxes with torches tied between their tails. The Philistines retaliate, three thousand men of Judah hand Samson over bound, and he breaks loose and kills a thousand with the jawbone of a donkey.
Key Background
Grain, grapes, and olives were the three staples of the whole regional economy, and burning standing crops just before harvest was a recognised act of war that destroyed a year of food, seed, and trade at once. The men of Judah arrest their own champion because they are a subject population living beside a stronger neighbour and fear collective reprisal, which shows how thoroughly the Philistines controlled the lowlands. A fresh donkey jawbone is a plausible weapon in the sense that the tooth row makes a heavy serrated club, and the account plays on the sound of the Hebrew words for donkey and heap in Samson's victory taunt.
Some time later, during the Samson went to visit his wife, bringing a as a gift. He said, "I'm going to my wife's room." But her father wouldn't let him go in.
Her father said, "I was sure you completely despised her, so I gave her to your But her younger sister is even more beautiful — take her instead."
Samson said to them, "This time I'm in getting back at the — I'm going to cause them real damage."
So Samson went out and caught three hundred He took tied the tail to tail in pairs, and fastened a torch between each pair of tails.
He lit the torches and released the foxes into the of the Philistines. He burned up the stacked the and even the
The Philistines asked, "Who did this?" They were told, "Samson, the son-in-law of the man from — because the man took Samson's wife and gave to his best man." So the Philistines went up and and to
Samson said to them, "If this is how you act, then I swear I won't stop until I've my on you."
He them with a massive slaughter. Then he went down and stayed in a cave in the of
The Philistines marched up and set up camp in spreading out near
The men of Judah asked, "Why have you come up against us?" They answered, "We've come to capture Samson — to do to him what he did to us."
So three thousand men from Judah went down to the cave in the rock of Etam and said to Samson, "Don't you realize the us? What have you done to us?" He answered, "I only did to them what they did to me."
They told him, "We've come to tie you up and hand you over to the Philistines." Samson said, "Swear to me that you won't kill me yourselves."
"We won't," they assured him. "We'll only tie you up securely and hand you over to them. We absolutely won't kill you." So they tied him up with two and brought him up from the rock.
When he reached Lehi, the Philistines came shouting to meet Then the of The ropes on his arms became like burned-through and the bindings melted off his hands.
He found a of a donkey, reached out and grabbed it, and struck down a with it.
Then Samson declared: "With a donkey's jawbone — heaps With a donkey's jawbone — I've struck down a thousand men!"
When he finished speaking, he threw the jawbone away. And that place was called
He was desperately thirsty and called out to saying, "You've given this incredible victory through Am I now going to die of thirst and fall into the hands of the
So the hollow place at Lehi, and water flowed out of it. When Samson drank, his strength returned and he revived. That's why it's called En — it's still there in Lehi today.
Samson for twenty years the of the