Judges 15:3-13

3 Shimshon said to them, "This time I'm through with the P'lishtim! I'm going to do something terrible to them!"
4 So Shimshon went and caught three hundred foxes. Then he took torches, tied pairs of foxes to each other by their tails, and put a torch in the knot of every pair of tails.
5 Then he set the torches on fire and let the foxes loose in wheat fields of the P'lishtim. In this way he burned up the harvested wheat along with the grain waiting to be harvested, and the olive orchards as well.
6 The P'lishtim asked, "Who did this?" They answered, "Shimshon the son-in-law of the man from Timnah, because he took Shimshon's wife and gave her to his best man." Then the P'lishtim came up and burned both her and her father to death.
7 Shimshon said to them, "I will certainly have my revenge on you for doing such a thing; but after I do, I'll stop."
8 Infuriated, he began killing them right and left; it was a massacre. Then he went down and stayed in the cave at the 'Eitam Rock.
9 The P'lishtim went up, pitched camp in Y'hudah and attacked Lechi.
10 The men of Y'hudah said, "Why are you attacking us?" They replied, "To arrest Shimshon, that's why - to treat him the way he treated us."
11 Then 3,000 men from Y'hudah went down to the cave at the Eitam Rock and said to Shimshon, "Don't you know that the P'lishtim are our rulers? What are you doing to us?" He answered, "I've only treated them the way they treated me."
12 They said to him, "We've come down to arrest you and hand you over to the P'lishtim." Shimshon replied, "Swear to me that you won't fall on me yourselves."
13 They said to him, "No, but we will tie you up and hand you over to them. However, we promise not to kill you." So they tied him up with two new ropes and brought him up from the rock.

Judges 15:3-13 Meaning and Commentary

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, Jud 15:1-5, and that because of their burning her and her father, he made a great slaughter of them, Jud 15:6-8, 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, Jud 15:9-17 and being athirst, God in a wonderful manner supplied him with water, Jud 15:18-20.

Complete Jewish Bible Copyright 1998 by David H. Stern. Published by Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.