Study Desk

And the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, so that he tore it apart as one tears apart a young goat, though he had nothing in his hand; but he did not tell his father or mother what he had done.

So he went down and talked to the woman; and she looked pleasing to Samson.

So he took out the honey on 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 taken the honey out of the body of the lion.

"But if you are unable to tell me, then you shall give me thirty linen wraps and thirty outfits of clothes." And they said to him, "Propose your riddle, so that we may hear it."

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 answer to the riddle in three days.

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?"

So Samson's wife wept in front of him and said, "You only hate me, and you do not love me; you have proposed 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?"

However she wept before him for 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.

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."

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

Then the Philistines said, "Who did this?" And some 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 to death with fire.

So he struck them ruthlessly with a great slaughter; and afterward he went down and lived in the cleft of the rock of Etam.

So 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."

Then three thousand 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, "Just as they did to me, so I have done to them."

Then they said to him, "We have come down to bind you so that we may hand you over to the Philistines." And Samson said to them, "Swear to me that you will not kill me."

So they said to him, "No, but we will bind you tightly and give you into their hands; but we certainly will not kill you." Then they bound him with two new ropes, and brought him up from the rock.

When he came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they met him. And the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him so that the ropes that were on his arms were like flax that has burned with fire, and his restraints dropped from his hands.

Then he found a fresh jawbone of a donkey, so he reached out with his hand and took it, and killed a thousand men with it.

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.

So he judged Israel for twenty years in the days of the Philistines.