1 But it happened after a while, in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his wife with a young goat; and he said, "I will go in to my wife into the room." But her father wouldn't allow him to go in. 2 Her father said, "I most certainly thought that you had utterly hated her; therefore I gave her to your companion. Isn't her younger sister more beautiful than she? Please take her, instead." 3 Samson said to them, "This time I will be blameless in regard of the Philistines, when I harm them." 4 Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took torches, and turned tail to tail, and put a torch in the midst between every two tails. 5 When he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing grain of the Philistines, and burnt up both the shocks and the standing grain, and also the olive groves. 6 Then the Philistines said, "Who has done this?" They said, "Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because he has taken his wife, and given her to his companion." The Philistines came up, and burnt her and her father with fire. 7 Samson said to them, "If you behave like this, surely I will be avenged of you, and after that I will cease." 8 He struck them hip and thigh with a great slaughter: and he went down and lived in the cleft of the rock of Etam. 9 Then the Philistines went up, and encamped in Judah, and spread themselves in Lehi. 10 The men of Judah said, "Why have you come up against us?" They said, "We have come up to bind Samson, to do to him as he has done to us." 11 Then three thousand men of Judah went down to the cleft of the rock of Etam, and said to Samson, "Don't you know that the Philistines are rulers over us? What then is this that you have done to us?" He said to them, "As they did to me, so have I done to them." 12 They said to him, "We have come down to bind you, that we may deliver you into the hand of the Philistines." Samson said to them, "Swear to me that you will not fall on me yourselves." 13 They spoke to him, saying, "No; but we will bind you fast, and deliver you into their hand; but surely we will not kill you." They bound him with two new ropes, and brought him up from the rock. 14 When he came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they met him: and the Spirit of Yahweh came mightily on him, and the ropes that were on his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands dropped from off his hands. 15 He found a fresh jawbone of a donkey, and put forth his hand, and took it, and struck a thousand men therewith. 16 Samson said, "With the jawbone of a donkey, heaps on heaps; with the jawbone of a donkey I have struck a thousand men." 17 It happened, when he had made an end of speaking, that he cast away the jawbone out of his hand; and that place was called Ramath Lehi. 18 He was very thirsty, and called on Yahweh, and said, "You have given this great deliverance by the hand of your servant; and now shall I die for thirst, and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised?" 19 But God split the hollow place that is in Lehi, and water came out of it. When he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived: therefore its name was called En Hakkore, which is in Lehi, to this day. 20 He judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years.
Samson, going to visit his wife, finds her bestowed on another, Judges 15:1, Judges 15:2. He is incensed, vows revenge, and burns the corn of the Philistines, Judges 15:3-5. They burn Samson's wife and her father, Judges 15:6. He is still incensed, makes a great slaughter among them, Judges 15:7, Judges 15:8. The Philistines gather together against Israel, and to appease them the men of Judah bind Samson, and deliver him into their hands, Judges 15:9-13. The Spirit of the Lord comes upon him; he breaks his bonds, finds the jaw-bone of an ass, and therewith kills a thousand men, Judges 15:14-16. He is sorely fatigued; and, being thirsty, God miraculously produces water from an opening of the ground in Lehi, and he is refreshed, Judges 15:17-19. He judges Israel in the time of the Philistines twenty years, Judges 15:20.
INTRODUCTION TO JUDGES 15
This chapter relates, that Samson being denied his wife, did by a strange stratagem burn the corn fields, vineyards, and olives of the Philistines, Judges 15:1, and that because of their burning her and her father, he made a great slaughter of them, Judges 15:6, which brought the Philistines against the men of Judah, who took Samson and bound him, to deliver him to the Philistines, when he, loosing himself, slew a thousand of them with the jaw bone of an ass, Judges 15:9 and being athirst, God in a wonderful manner supplied him with water, Judges 15:18.
(Judges 15:1-8) Samson is denied his wife, He smites the Philistines.
(Judges 15:9-17) Samson kills a thousand of the Philistines with a jaw-bone.
(Judges 15:18-20) His distress from thirst.
*More commentary available by clicking individual verses.