The big picture
Samson, an unusually strong judge, leads Israel, God's people. He returns to the wife he left in anger. Her father has given her to another man. The Philistines, the people ruling Israel, become targets of Samson's rage, and they answer with more violence. His own people seek to hand him over rather than challenge their rulers. God gives him strength against his enemies, but after the fighting the strong man faces a need he cannot meet himself.
In this chapter
- A Broken Marriage Sparks Wider Revenge Judges 15:1-8
Samson brings a young goat to visit his wife, but her father refuses him entry.
- Strength in Battle Does Not End Need Judges 15:9-20
Three thousand men from Judah, an Israelite tribe, come to bind Samson for the Philistines.
Central truth
Samson's revenge draws more violence, yet after a great victory his thirst reveals that his life still depends on God's help.
Scripture beside the summary
Judges · King James Version · 20Judges 15:1-8
A Broken Marriage Sparks Wider Revenge
Samson brings a young goat to visit his wife, but her father refuses him entry. Believing Samson hated her, he gave her to his companion. He offers a younger daughter instead. Samson retaliates against the Philistines by tying burning torches between pairs of foxes. He releases them into crops, vineyards and olive groves. The Philistines learn the cause and burn his wife and her father to death. Samson vows further revenge and kills many of them. He then withdraws to the rock Etam. Each act draws fresh harm.
In everyday life
The insurance assessor walks through a burned orchard after a feud between two families spreads across a village. Growers who took no part stand beside ruined trees. She hears each side explain its latest act by pointing to the previous one. The losses keep growing. Samson's feud includes deliberate killings as well as the destruction of crops.
Notice
Judges 15:6 The threatened burning from the wedding dispute now becomes an actual killing. Samson's wife and her father die as others seek revenge for the crop fires.
Judges 15:1-8
King James Version1But it came to pass within a while after, in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his wife with a kid; and he said, I will go in to my wife into the chamber. But her father would not suffer him to go in.
2And her father said, I verily thought that thou hadst utterly hated her; therefore I gave her to thy companion: is not her younger sister fairer than she? take her, I pray thee, instead of her.
3And Samson said concerning them, Now shall I be more blameless than the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure.
4And Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took firebrands, and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst between two tails.
5And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines, and burnt up both the shocks, and also the standing corn, with the vineyards and olives.
6Then the Philistines said, Who hath done this? And they answered, Samson, the son in law of the Timnite, because he had taken his wife, and given her to his companion. And the Philistines came up, and burnt her and her father with fire.
7And Samson said unto them, Though ye have done this, yet will I be avenged of you, and after that I will cease.
8And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter: and he went down and dwelt in the top of the rock Etam.
Judges 15:9-20
Strength in Battle Does Not End Need
Three thousand men from Judah, an Israelite tribe, come to bind Samson for the Philistines. They fear the rulers he has angered. Samson agrees if they will not kill him themselves. When the enemy shouts, God's spirit comes on him and the ropes fall away. He uses a donkey's jawbone to kill a thousand men. Then he is desperately thirsty and cries to God. He credits God with rescue but fears dying now. God opens a hollow place in the jaw, bringing water. Samson revives and judges Israel twenty years.
In everyday life
A marathon runner crosses the line ahead of the field, then needs help to drink and stand. The medal does not remove the body's urgent need. A medic attends to the person beneath the result, and the runner accepts help. Strength in one moment does not secure the next. Samson receives miraculous water after a battle enabled by God.
Notice
Judges 15:18 Samson calls the victory God's gift while admitting that thirst may kill him. His cry joins a vast public triumph to a small but urgent bodily need.
Judges 15:9-20
King James Version9Then the Philistines went up, and pitched in Judah, and spread themselves in Lehi.
10And the men of Judah said, Why are ye come up against us? And they answered, To bind Samson are we come up, to do to him as he hath done to us.
11Then three thousand men of Judah went to the top of the rock Etam, and said to Samson, Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us? what is this that thou hast done unto us? And he said unto them, As they did unto me, so have I done unto them.
12And they said unto him, We are come down to bind thee, that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines. And Samson said unto them, Swear unto me, that ye will not fall upon me yourselves.
13And they spake unto him, saying, No; but we will bind thee fast, and deliver thee into their hand: but surely we will not kill thee. And they bound him with two new cords, and brought him up from the rock.
14And when he came unto Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him: and the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and the cords that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands loosed from off his hands.
15And he found a new jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand, and took it, and slew a thousand men therewith.
16And Samson said, With the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jaw of an ass have I slain a thousand men.
17And it came to pass, when he had made an end of speaking, that he cast away the jawbone out of his hand, and called that place Ramath-lehi.
18And he was sore athirst, and called on the LORD, and said, Thou hast given this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant: and now shall I die for thirst, and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised?
19But God clave an hollow place that was in the jaw, and there came water thereout; and when he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived: wherefore he called the name thereof En-hakkore, which is in Lehi unto this day.
20And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years.
Details worth noticing
The opening image
Judges 15:1 begins with “But it came to pass within a while after, in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his wife with a kid; and he said, I will go in to my wife into…”
Where the chapter turns
Judges 15:10 forms a natural hinge: “And the men of Judah said, Why are ye come up against us? And they answered, To bind Samson are we come up, to do to him as he hath done to us.”
The final note
Judges 15:20 leaves the reader with “And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years.”
A word trail through the chapter
The words Philistines, Samson, hand, Lehi, bind, burnt help reveal the chapter’s repeated concerns.
KJV words made clear
- unto
- to
- thee
- you
- thou
- you
- thy
- your
- hath
- has
Music and video connected to the passage
Related media appears when its Scripture reference overlaps this study. Music and video can illuminate a theme while the biblical text remains the foundation.
