The descendants of the Kenites, the tribe from which Moses' father-in-law came, accompanied the descendants of Judah from the city of the palms to the Judean wilderness, which is in the desert area south of Arad, and lived with the people there.

Some time later, the angel of the LORD came up from Gilgal to Bochim and announced to Israel, "I brought you up from Egypt and led you into the land that I promised to your ancestors. I had told them, "I'll never breach my covenant with you.

After he left, Eglon's attendants came to look, but the doors to the cool chamber were locked! So they said, "He must be relieving himself in the inner part of the cool chamber."

New gods were chosen, then war came to the city gates, but there wasn't a shield or spear to be seen among 40,000 soldiers of Israel.

Some came from Ephraim who had been harassed by Amalek, followed by Benjamin with your people. Some commanders came from Machir, along with some from Zebulun who carry a badge of office.

"Kings came to fight, then battled the kings of Canaan at Taanach near the waters of Megiddo. They took no silver as the spoils of war.

""Meroz is cursed!' declared the angel of the LORD. "Utterly and totally cursed are its inhabitants, because they never came to the aid of the LORD, to the aid of the LORD against the valiant warriors!'"

They would invade with their livestock and tents, swooping in as numerous as locusts. It was impossible to count them or their camels and they came into the land to destroy it.

Then all the Midianites, Amalekites, and certain groups from the east gathered together, crossed the Jordan River, and set up camp in the Jezreel Valley.

Gideon arrived just as a soldier was talking to a friend about a dream. "Look!" he was saying. "I had a dream that went like this: A loaf of barley bread rolled into the Midianite encampment, came to a tent, and collided with it. The loaf of bread fell down, turned upside down, and the tent collapsed!"

Meanwhile, Gideon and the 300 soldiers with him came to the Jordan, exhausted but continuing their pursuit.

The "lords" of Shechem sent out men to ambush him on the mountain tops, and they robbed everyone who came by them along the roads, and this was reported to Abimelech.

God also repaid the men of Shechem for their wickedness, and the curse of Jerubbaal's son Jotham came true for them.

The king of the Ammonites answered the messengers of Jephthah, "We're here because Israel took away my land from the Arnon River as far as the Jabbok River and as far as the Jordan River when they came up from Egypt! So restore it as a gesture of good will."

"Israel didn't seize the land of Moab nor the land of the Ammonites. Here's what happened: When Israel came up from Egypt, passed through the desert to the Red Sea, and arrived at Kadesh,

The Spirit of the LORD came on Jephthah, so he swept through Gilead and the territory of Manasseh, then swept through Mizpah in Gilead, and from Mizpah in Gilead he proceeded toward where the Ammonites were encamped.

When Jephthah arrived at his home in Mizpah surprise! it was his daughter who came out to meet him, playing tambourines and dancing. She was his one and only child. Except for her, he had no other son or daughter.

God listened to Manoah's request, and the angel of God came again to the woman as she was sitting out in the pasture. But her husband Manoah wasn't with her,

so the woman ran quickly to tell her husband, "Look! The man who came the other day appeared to me!"

So Manoah got up quickly and followed his wife, and when he came to the man he told him, "Are you the man who spoke to my wife?" He replied, "I am."

When the burnt offering was engulfed in flames that sprang up from the altar toward heaven, the angel of the LORD ascended in the flame that came from the altar. When Manoah and his wife observed this, they collapsed on their faces to the ground.

Then Samson went down in the direction of Timnah with his father and mother and arrived as far as the vineyards of Timnah. And surprise! a young lion came roaring at him!

When he came back later to marry her, he turned aside to observe the lion's carcass. Amazingly, there was a swarm of bees in the body of the lion, complete with honey.

So he told them: From the eater came something edible; from the strong something sweet. For three days they couldn't solve the riddle.

Then the Philistines demanded, "Who did this?" Someone said, "Samson, son-in-law of the Timnite, because his father-in-law took Samson's wife and gave her to the best man at Samson's wedding." In retaliation, the Philistines came up and burned her and her father to death.

When Samson arrived at Lehi, the Philistines came shouting to meet him. Then the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, so that the ropes that bound him were like flax that's been burned by fire, and his bonds dissolved.

Afterwards, his brothers and his father's household servants came down, took him, brought him back, and buried him in his father Manoah's tomb between Zorah and Eshtaol. He had governed Israel for 20 years.

So the tribe of Dan sent from their families five valiant men of their number from Zorah and Eshtaol to scout the land and search through it. Following their orders, which were "Go and scout the land," they came to the mountainous region of Ephraim, arrived at Micah's home, and stayed there.

While they were enjoying themselves, all of a sudden certain ungodly men who lived in the city surrounded the house, pounded on the door, and ordered the old man who owned the home, "Bring out the man who came to visit your home so we can have sex with him."

As dawn was breaking, the woman approached the door of the man's home where her master was and collapsed. Eventually, full daylight came.

All the witnesses said, "Nothing has happened or has been seen like this from the day the Israelis came here from the land of Egypt to this day! Think about it, get some advice about it, and then speak up about it!"

Then the entire Israeli nation from Dan to Beer-sheba, including the territory of Gilead came out for war. The army assembled as one united force to God at Mizpah.

So the descendant of Levi, the husband of the murdered woman, spoke up and replied, "I came to spend the night at Gibeah, which is part of Benjamin, along with my mistress.

That's how the army of Israel came to be gathered together to attack the city, united as a single unit.

The descendants of Benjamin came out of Gibeah, and 22,000 soldiers of Israel fell in battle that day.

As 10,000 of Israel's best soldiers came to fight Gibeah, the battle became fierce, but the army of Benjamin didn't know that disaster was close at hand.

So they turned tail and ran away from the army of Israel toward the wilderness, but they were overtaken in battle when soldiers came out from the cities to destroy them.