Study Desk

And he told her all his heart, and said unto her: 'There hath not come a razor upon my head; for I have been a Nazirite unto God from my mother's womb; if I be shaven, then my strength will go from me, and I shall become weak, and be like any other man.'

And when Delilah saw that he had told her all his heart, she sent and called for the lords of the Philistines, saying: 'Come up this once, for he hath told me all his heart.' Then the lords of the Philistines came up unto her, and brought the money in their hand.

And she made him sleep upon her knees; and she called for a man, and had the seven locks of his head shaven off; and she began to afflict him, and his strength went from him.

And she said: 'The Philistines are upon thee, Samson.' And he awoke out of his sleep, and said: 'I will go out as at other times, and shake myself.' But he knew not that the LORD was departed from him.

And the Philistines laid hold on him, and put out his eyes; and they brought him down to Gaza, and bound him with fetters of brass; and he did grind in the prison-house.

Howbeit the hair of his head began to grow again after he was shaven.

And Samson took fast hold of the two middle pillars upon which the house rested, and leaned upon them, the one with his right hand, and the other with his left.

And Samson said: 'Let me die with the Philistines.' And he bent with all his might; and the house fell upon the lords, and upon all the people that were therein. So the dead that he slew at his death were more than they that he slew in his life.

Then his brethren and all the house of his father came down, and took him, and brought him up, and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the burying-place of Manoah his father. And he judged Israel twenty years.

And he said unto his mother: 'The eleven hundred pieces of silver that were taken from thee, about which thou didst utter a curse, and didst also speak it in mine ears, behold, the silver is with me; I took it.' And his mother said: 'Blessed be my son of the LORD.'

And he restored the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother, and his mother said: 'I verily dedicate the silver unto the LORD from my hand for my son, to make a graven image and a molten image; now therefore I will restore it unto thee.'

And when he restored the money unto his mother, his mother took two hundred pieces of silver, and gave them to the founder, who made thereof a graven image and a molten image; and it was in the house of Micah.

And the man Micah had a house of God, and he made an ephod, and teraphim, and consecrated one of his sons, who became his priest.

In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did that which was right in his own eyes.

And the Levite was content to dwell with the man; and the young man was unto him as one of his sons.

And Micah consecrated the Levite, and the young man became his priest, and was in the house of Micah.

And he said unto them: 'Thus and thus hath Micah dealt with me, and he hath hired me, and I am become his priest.'

And they turned aside thither, and came to the house of the young man the Levite, even unto the house of Micah, and asked him of his welfare.

And the children of Dan went their way; and when Micah saw that they were too strong for him, he turned and went back unto his house.

And the children of Dan set up for themselves the graven image; and Jonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Manasseh, he and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land.