1But it chanced within a while after, even in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his wife with a Kid. And when he supposed to have gone in unto his wife into the chamber, her father would not suffer him to go in:
2But said: I thought that thou hadst hated her, and therefore gave I her unto one of thy companions. Howbeit her younger sister is fairer than she. Take her instead of the other.
3Then said Samson unto them: Now I am blameless concerning the Philistines though I do them evil.
4And Samson went out and caught three hundredth foxes, and took firebrands, and fastened tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst between two tails.
5And he set the firebrands on fire, and put them into the corn of the Philistines, and burnt up both the reaped corn and also the standing, with vine and olives.
6Then the Philistines asked, who had done that? And it was told them that Samson the son-in-law of the Thamnite, because he had taken his wife and given her to one of his companions. And the Philistines came and burnt her and her father with fire.
7And Samson said unto them: should ye do so? for I will surely be avenged of you, and then I will cease.
8And he smote them leg and thigh with a mighty plague. And then he went and dwelt in the cave of the rock Etam.
9Then the Philistines came up and pitched against Juda, and lay in Lehi.
10And the men of Juda said; Why are ye come against us? And they answered to bind Samson are we come, even to do him as he hath done to us.
11Then three thousand men of Juda went down to the cave of the rock Etam, and said to Samson: wotest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us? Wherefore then hast thou served us thus? And he answered them, as they served me, so have I served them.
12And they said unto him, we are come to bind thee and to deliver thee into the hands of the Philistines. And Samson said unto them: sware unto me, that ye shall not hurt me yourselves.
13And they said, we will not hurt thee, save only bind thee and deliver thee unto their hands: But we will not kill thee. And so they bound him with two new cords and brought him up from the rock.
14And when he come to Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him. And the spirit of the LORD came upon him, and the cords that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire and the bands lowsed from his hands.
15And he found a Jaw bone of a ratten ass, and put forth his hand and caught it, and slew a thousand men therewith.
16And Samson said: with the Jaw of an ass, have I made heaps: with the Jaw of an ass have I slain a thousand men.
17And when he had left speaking he cast away the Jaw out of his hand and called the place Ramath Lehi.
18And he was sore a thirst, and called on the LORD and said: Thou LORD hath given this great victory, thorow the hand of thy servant. And now I must die for thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised.
19But God brake a great tooth that was in the Jaw, and there came water thereout. And when he had drunk his spirit came again, and he was refreshed, wherefore the name thereof was called the well of the caller on, which is in Lehi unto this day.
20And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty year.