And Israel sent messengers to Sihon king of the Amorites, the king of Heshbon. And Israel said to him, Let us pass, we pray thee, through thy land to my place.

But Sihon did not trust Israel to pass through his border, but Sihon gathered all his people together, and encamped in Jahaz, and fought against Israel.

And they possessed all the border of the Amorites, from the Arnon even to the Jabbok, and from the wilderness even to the Jordan.

Will thou not possess that which Chemosh thy god gives thee to possess? So whomever LORD our God has dispossessed from before us, them will we possess.

I therefore have not sinned against thee, but thou do me wrong to war against me. LORD, the Judge, be judge this day between the sons of Israel and the sons of Ammon.

However the king of the sons of Ammon did not hearken to the words of Jephthah which he sent him.

Then the Spirit of LORD came upon Jephthah, and he passed over Gilead and Manasseh, and passed over Mizpeh of Gilead, and from Mizpeh of Gilead he passed over to the sons of Ammon.

And Jephthah vowed a vow to LORD, and said, If thou will indeed deliver the sons of Ammon into my hand,

then it shall be, that whatever comes forth from the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the sons of Ammon, it shall be LORD's, and I will offer it up for a burnt-offering.

So Jephthah passed over to the sons of Ammon to fight against them, and LORD delivered them into his hand.

And he smote them from Aroer until thou come to Minnith, even twenty cities, and to Abelcheramim, with a very great slaughter. So the sons of Ammon were subdued before the sons of Israel.

And Jephthah came to Mizpah to his house, and, behold, his daughter came out to meet him with timbrels and with dances. And she was his only child. Besides her he had neither son nor daughter.

And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he tore his clothes, and said, Alas, my daughter! Thou have brought me very low, and thou are one of those who trouble me, for I have opened my mouth to LORD, and I cannot go back.

And she said to him, My father, thou have opened thy mouth to LORD. Do to me according to that which has proceeded out of thy mouth, inasmuch as LORD has taken vengeance for thee on thine enemies, even on the sons of Ammon.

And she said to her father, Let this thing be done for me: Let me alone two months, that I may depart and go down upon the mountains, and bewail my virginity, I and my companions.

And he said, Go. And he sent her away for two months. And she departed, she and her companions, and bewailed her virginity upon the mountains.

And it came to pass at the end of two months, that she returned to her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed, and she knew no man. And it was a custom in Israel,

that the daughters of Israel went yearly to celebrate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in a year.

And the men of Ephraim were gathered together, and passed northward. And they said to Jephthah, Why did thou pass over to fight against the sons of Ammon, and did not call us to go with thee? We will burn thy house upon thee with f

And Jephthah said to them, I and my people were at great strife with the sons of Ammon, and when I called you, ye did not save me out of their hand.

And when I saw that ye did not save me, I put my life in my hand, and passed opposite the sons of Ammon, and LORD delivered them into my hand. Why then have ye come up to me this day, to fight against me?

And the Gileadites took the fords of the Jordan against the Ephraimites. And it was so, that, when [any of] the fugitives of Ephraim said, Let me go over, the men of Gilead said to him, Are thou an Ephraimite? If he said, No,

then they said to him, Say now Shibboleth, and he said Sibboleth, for he could not frame to pronounce it right, then they laid hold on him, and killed him at the fords of the Jordan. And there fell at that time of Ephraim forty-two

And the agent of LORD appeared to the woman, and said to her, Behold now, thou are barren, and do not bear, but thou shall conceive, and bear a son.

Now therefore beware, I pray thee, and drink no wine nor strong drink, and do not eat any unclean thing,

for, lo, thou shall conceive, and bear a son. And no razor shall come upon his head, for the child shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb. And he shall begin to save Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.

Then the woman came and told her husband, saying, A man of God came to me, and his countenance was like the countenance of the agent of God, very awesome. And I did not ask him from where he was, neither did he tell me his name,

but he said to me, Behold, thou shall conceive, and bear a son. And now drink no wine nor strong drink, and do not eat any unclean thing, for the child shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb to the day of his death.

Then Manoah entreated LORD, and said, Oh, LORD, I pray thee, let the man of God whom thou sent come again to us, and teach us what we shall do to the child that shall be born.

And God hearkened to the voice of Manoah, and the agent of God came again to the woman as she sat in the field, but Manoah her husband was not with her.

And the woman made haste, and ran, and told her husband, and said to him, Behold, the man has appeared to me, who came to me the [other] day.

And Manoah arose, and went after his wife, and came to the man, and said to him, Are thou the man who spoke to the woman? And he said, I am.

And Manoah said, Now let thy words come to pass. What shall be the ordering of the child, and [what] shall we do to him?

And the agent of LORD said to Manoah, Of all that I said to the woman let her beware.

And Manoah said to the agent of LORD, I pray thee, let us detain thee, that we may make ready a kid for thee.

And the agent of LORD said to Manoah, Though thou detain me, I will not eat of thy bread, and if thou will make ready a burnt-offering, thou must offer it to LORD. For Manoah did not know that he was the agent of LORD.

And Manoah said to the agent of LORD, What is thy name, that, when thy words come to pass, we may do thee honor?

And the agent of LORD said to him, Why do thou ask after my name, seeing it is wonderful?

So Manoah took the kid with the meal-offering, and offered it upon the rock to LORD. And [the heavenly agent] did wondrously, and Manoah and his wife looked on,

for it came to pass, when the flame went up toward heaven from off the altar, that the agent of LORD ascended in the flame of the altar. And Manoah and his wife looked on, and they fell on their faces to the ground.

But the agent of LORD appeared no more to Manoah or to his wife. Then Manoah knew that he was the agent of LORD.

And Manoah said to his wife, We shall surely die, because we have seen God.

But his wife said to him, If LORD were pleased to kill us, he would not have received a burnt-offering and a meal-offering at our hand, neither would he have shown us all these things, nor would at this time have told such things a

And the Spirit of LORD began to move him in Mahaneh-dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.

And Samson went down to Timnah, and saw a woman in Timnah of the daughters of the Philistines.

And he came up, and told his father and his mother, and said, I have seen a woman in Timnah of the daughters of the Philistines. Now therefore get her for me to wife.

Then his father and his mother said to him, Is there never a woman among the daughters of thy brothers, or among all my people, that thou go to take a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines? And Samson said to his father, Get her fo

Then Samson went down, and his father and his mother, to Timnah, and came to the vineyards of Timnah. And, behold, a young lion roared against him.

And after a while he returned to take her. And he turned aside to see the carcass of the lion, and, behold, there was a swarm of bees in the body of the lion, and honey.

And he took it into his hands, and went on, eating as he went. And he came to his father and mother, and gave to them, and they ate, but he did not tell them that he had taken the honey out of the body of the lion.

And his father went down to the woman, and Samson made a feast there, for so the young men used to do.

And it came to pass, when they saw him, that they brought thirty companions to be with him.

And Samson said to them, Let me now put forth a riddle to you. If ye can declare it to me within the seven days of the feast, and find it out, then I will give you thirty linen garments and thirty changes of raiment,

but if ye cannot declare it to me, then ye shall give me thirty linen garments and thirty changes of raiment. And they said to him, Put forth thy riddle, that we may hear it.

And he said to them, Out of the eater came forth food, and out of the strong came forth sweetness. And they could not in three days declare the riddle.

And it came to pass on the seventh day, that they said to Samson's wife, Entice thy husband, that he may declare to us the riddle, lest we burn thee and thy father's house with fire. Have ye called us to impoverish us? Is it not [s

And Samson's wife wept before him, and said, Thou do but hate me, and not love me. Thou have put forth a riddle to the sons of my people, and have not told it to me. And he said to her, Behold, I have not told it to my father nor m

And she wept before him the seven days, while their feast lasted. And it came to pass on the seventh day, that he told her because she pressed him greatly. And she told the riddle to the sons of her people.

And the men of the city said to him on the seventh day before the sun went down, What is sweeter than honey? and what is stronger than a lion? And he said to them, If ye had not plowed with my heifer, ye would not have found out my

And the Spirit of LORD came mightily upon him, and he went down to Ashkelon, and smote thirty men of them, and took their spoil, and gave the changes [of raiment] to those who declared the riddle. And his anger was kindled, and he

But Samson's wife was [given] to his companion, whom he had used as his friend.

But it came to pass after a while, 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 allow him to go in.

And her father said, I truly thought that thou had 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.

And Samson said to them, This time I shall be blameless in regard of the Philistines when I do them a mischief.

And Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took firebrands, and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst between every two tails.

Then the Philistines said, Who has done this? And they said, Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because he has taken his wife, and given her to his companion. And the Philistines came up, and burnt her and her father with fire.

And Samson said to them, If ye do after this manner, surely I will be avenged of you, and after that I will cease.

And the men of Judah said, Why have ye come up against us? And they said, We come up to bind Samson, to do to him as he has done to us.

Then three thousand men of Judah went down to the cleft of the rock of Etam, and said to Samson, Know thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us? What then is this that thou have done to us? And he said to them, As they did t

And they said to him, We have come down to bind thee, that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines. And Samson said to them, Swear to me, that ye will not fall upon me yourselves.

And they spoke to him, saying, No, but we will bind thee fast, and deliver thee into their hand, but truly we will not kill thee. And they bound him with two new ropes, and brought him up from the rock.

When he came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they met him. And the Spirit of LORD came mightily upon him, and the ropes that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands dropped from off his hands.

And it came to pass, 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.

And he was very thirsty, and called on LORD, and said, Thou have given this great deliverance by the hand of thy servant, and now shall I die for thirst, and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised.

But God split the hollow place that is in Lehi, and water came out there. And when he had drunk his spirit came again, and he revived. Therefore the name of it was called En-hakkore, which is in Lehi to this day.

And Samson went to Gaza, and saw a harlot there, and went in to her.

And Samson lay till midnight, and arose at midnight, and laid hold of the doors of the gate of the city, and the two posts, and plucked them up, bar and all, and put them upon his shoulders, and carried them up to the top of the mo

And it came to pass afterward, that he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah.

And the lords of the Philistines came up to her, and said to her, Entice him, and see in what his great strength lays, and by what means we may prevail against him, that we may bind him to afflict him. And we will give thee every o

And Delilah said to Samson, Tell me, I pray thee, in what thy great strength lays, and with what thou might be bound to afflict thee.

And Samson said to her, If they bind me with seven green withes that were never dried, then I shall become weak, and be as another man.

Then the lords of the Philistines brought up to her seven green withes which had not been dried, and she bound him with them.

Now she had an ambush abiding in the inner chamber. And she said to him, The Philistines are upon thee, Samson. And he broke the withes, as a string of tow is broken when it touches the fire. So his strength was not known.

And Delilah said to Samson, Behold, thou have mocked me, and told me lies. Now tell me, I pray thee, with what thou might be bound.

And he said to her, If they only bind me with new ropes with which no work has been done, then I shall become weak, and be as another man.

So Delilah took new ropes, and bound him with it, and said to him, The Philistines are upon thee, Samson. And the ambushment was abiding in the inner chamber. And he broke them off his arms like a thread.

And Delilah said to Samson, Until now thou have mocked me, and told me lies. Tell me with what thou might be bound. And he said to her, If thou weave the seven locks of my head with the web.

And she fastened it with the pin, and said to him, The Philistines are upon thee, Samson. And he awoke out of his sleep, and plucked away the pin of the beam, and the web.

And she said to him, How can thou say, I love thee, when thy heart is not with me? Thou have mocked me these three times, and have not told me with what thy great strength lays.

And it came to pass, when she pressed him daily with her words, and urged him, that his soul was vexed to death.

And he told her all his heart, and said to her, There has not come a razor upon my head, for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother's womb. If I be shaven, then my strength will go from me, and I shall become weak, and be lik

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 has told me all his heart. Then the lords of the Philistines came up to her, and broug

And she made him sleep upon her knees, and she called for a man, and shaved off the seven locks of his head. And she began to afflict him, and his strength went 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 grinding in the prison-house.

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

And the lords of the Philistines gathered together to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god, and to rejoice, for they said, Our god has delivered Samson our enemy into our hand.

And it came to pass, when their hearts were merry, that they said, Call for Samson, that he may make sport to us. And they called for Samson out of the prison-house, and he made sport before them. And they set him between the pilla

And Samson said to the lad who held him by the hand, Allow me that I may feel the pillars upon which the house rests, that I may lean upon them.

And Samson called to LORD, and said, O lord LORD, remember me, I pray thee, and strengthen me, I pray thee, only this once, O God, that I may be at once avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes.

And Samson took 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.