Tomorrow morning when the sun is up, get up early and attack the city. When Gaal and his army come out to fight you, do whatever you can to them."

So Abimelech and his entire army got up that night and waited in ambush against Shechem in four separate companies.

Ebed's son Gaal went out and stood in the entrance to the city gate while Abimelech and his army were creeping out of their ambush.

When Gaal saw the army, he observed to Zebul, "Look there! People are coming down from the top of the mountains." But Zebul replied to him, "You're looking at morning shadows cast by the mountains. They just look like men to you."

So Gaal went out in full view of the "lords" of Shechem and fought Abimelech.

Afterwards, Abimelech remained at Arumah, but Zebul expelled Gaal and his family so they couldn't remain in Shechem.

So he took his army, divided it into three separate companies, and laid in ambush out in the field. When Abimelech noticed the people coming out from the city, his army attacked them and killed them.

Then Abimelech and the soldiers who were with him rushed forward and commandeered the entrance to the city gate while the other two companies ran out to kill everyone who was in the field.

Abimelech fought against the city all that day, captured the city, killed the people in it, then tore the city to the ground and sowed it with salt.

When all the "lords" at the tower of Shechem heard what had happened, they retreated into the inner chamber of the temple of El-berith.

So he went up to Mount Zalmon, accompanied by his entire army. Abimelech had an axe in his hand, so he cut down a branch from a tree, lifted it up, and laid it on his shoulder. Then he told the army that had accompanied him, "You've seen what I just did. Hurry up! Do the same thing!"

Later on, Abimelech went to Thebez, set up a siege encampment there, and captured it.

But there was a fortified tower in the center of the city, and all the men, women, and leaders of the city escaped to it, shut themselves in, and went up to the roof of the tower.

But a certain woman threw an upper millstone down on Abimelech's head, fracturing his skull.

So he cried out to his young armor bearer and ordered him, "Draw your sword and kill me, so no one will say about me that "A woman killed him.'" So the young man pierced him through, and he died.

When the men of Israel noticed that Abimelech was dead, they each left for home.

A man from the tribe of Issachar, Puah's son Tola, grandson of Dodo, arose to save Israel. He lived in Shamir, in the mountainous region of Ephraim.

He governed Israel for 23 years and then died. He was buried in Shamir.

His 30 sons rode on 30 donkeys, controlling 30 cities in the territory of Gilead named Havvoth-jair to this day.

Jair died and was buried in Kamon.

Later on, the Israelis again practiced what the LORD considered to be evil by serving the Baals, the stars, the gods of Aram, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the descendants of Ammon, and the gods of the Philistines. In doing so, they ignored the LORD and wouldn't serve him.

In his burning anger against Israel, he sold them into domination by the Philistines and the Ammonites,

who trampled and troubled the Israelis during that year eighteen years for the Israelis who lived east of the Jordan River in Gilead, the land occupied by the Amorites.

And when the Sidonians, the Amalekites, and the Maonites harassed you, you cried out to me, and I delivered you from under their domination.

Go and cry out to the gods that you have chosen for yourselves. Let them deliver you in your time of trouble."

The Israelis replied to the LORD, "We have sinned, so do to us anything that's right to do in your opinion, just please deliver us right now."

When they put away their foreign gods and served the LORD, he brought Israel's misery to an end.

The Ammonites were summoned and they encamped in Gilead. The Israelis assembled together and encamped in Mizpah.

The people and Gilead's officials inquired among themselves, "Who will begin our attack against the Ammonites? He'll become head over everyone who lives in Gilead."

Gilead's wife bore two sons through him, but when his wife's sons grew up, they expelled Jephthah and declared to him, "You won't have an inheritance in this house, since you're the son of a different woman."

So Jephthah escaped from his brothers and lived in the territory of Tob, where worthless men gathered themselves around him and went out on raiding parties with him.

Later on, the Ammonites attacked Israel.

When this happened, the elders of Gilead went to the territory of Tob to find Jephthah.

But Jephthah replied to the elders of Gilead, "Weren't you the ones who hated me and drove me out of my father's house? And you come to me now that you're in trouble?"

Then Jephthah asked the elders of Gilead, "If you all send me to fight against the Ammonites and the LORD hands them over right in front of me, will I really become your head?"

So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people appointed him head and military commander over them. Jephthah uttered everything he had to say with the solemnity of an oath in the LORD's presence at Mizpah.

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,

"But the king of Edom wouldn't listen. So they also sent word to the king of Moab, but he wouldn't consent, either. So Israel stayed at Kadesh. Then they went through the desert, circumventing the territory belonging to Edom and Moab. They encamped on the other side of the Arnon River, but never entered the territory of Moab because the Arnon River is the border of Moab.

But Sihon didn't trust Israel to pass through his territory, so he assembled his entire army, encamped in Jahaz, and fought against Israel.

The LORD God of Israel handed Sihon and his entire army into the control of Israel, and defeated them. As a result, Israel took control over the entire land of the Amorites, who were living in that country.

"Now then, since the LORD God of Israel expelled the Amorites right in front of his people Israel, are you going to control their territory?

Don't you control what your god Chemosh gives you? In the same way, we'll take control of whomever the LORD our God has driven out in front of us.

Also ask yourselves: do you have a better case than Zippor's son Balak, king of Moab? Did he ever have a quarrel with Israel or ever win a fight against them?

When Israel was living in Heshbon and its surrounding villages, in Aroer and its surrounding villages, and in all the cities that line the banks of the Arnon River these past three hundred years, why didn't you retake them during that time?

I haven't sinned against you, but you are acting wrongly against me by declaring war on me. May the LORD, the Judge, sit in judgment today between the Israelis and the Ammonites.'"

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.

He attacked them from Aroer to the entrance of Minnith twenty cities in all even as far as Abel-keramim. As a result, the Ammonites were subdued right in front of the Israelis.

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.

When he saw her, he ripped his clothes and cried out, "Oh no! My daughter! You have terribly burdened me! You've joined those who are causing me trouble, because I've given my word to the LORD, and I cannot go back on it.

She told him, "My father, you have given your word to the LORD. Do to me according to what has come out of your own mouth, considering that the LORD has paid back your enemies, the Ammonites."

So he said, "Go!" He sent her away for two months. She left with her friends and cried there on the mountains because she would never marry.

Later, after the two months were concluded, she returned to her father, and he fulfilled what he had solemnly vowed and she never married. That's how the custom arose in Israel

that for four days out of every year the Israeli women would go to mourn the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite in commemoration.

But Jephthah replied to them, "My army and I were engaged in a serious fight with the Ammonites. I called for you, but you didn't deliver me from their control.

When I saw that you wouldn't be delivering me, I took my own life in my hands, crossed over to fight the Ammonites, and the LORD gave them into my control. So why have you come here today to fight me?"

Then Jephthah mustered all the men of Gilead, fought the tribe of Ephraim, and defeated them, because they had been claiming, "You descendants of Gilead are fugitives in the midst of the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh."

The descendants of Gilead seized control of the Jordan River's fords along the border of Ephraim's territory. Later on, when any fugitive from Ephraim asked them, "Let me cross over," the men from Gilead would ask him, "Are you an Ephraimite?" If he said "No,"

Jephthah governed Israel for six years. Then Jephthah died and was buried somewhere in the cities of Gilead.

He had 30 sons and 30 daughters, but he gave his daughters in marriage to outsiders and brought in 30 outsiders for his sons. He governed Israel for seven years,

then he died and was buried in Bethlehem.

Then Elon the Zebulunite died and was buried in Aijalon within the territory of Zebulun.

He had 40 sons and 30 grandsons who rode on 70 donkeys. He governed Israel for eight years.

Then he died and was buried at Pirathon in the territory of Ephraim, in the mountainous region of the Amalekites.

There was one man from Zorah, from the family of the descendants of Dan, whose name was Manoah. Since his wife was infertile, she hadn't borne children.

One day the angel of the LORD presented himself to the woman. "Hello!" he greeted her. "Though you are infertile at this time and haven't borne a child, you're about to conceive and give birth to a son.

So be sure that you don't drink wine or anything intoxicating, and don't eat anything unclean

Then the woman went to tell her husband. She said, "A man of God appeared to me. He looked like what an angel of God would look like very frightening. I didn't ask him where he had come from and he didn't tell me his name.

He told me, "Surprise! you're going to conceive and give birth to a son!' and as for you, "Be sure that you don't drink wine or anything intoxicating, and don't eat anything unclean,' "because the young man will be a Nazirite dedicated to God from inside the womb' until the day he dies."

So Manoah prayed to the LORD, "Please, Lord, have the man of God whom you sent before come again so he can instruct us what to do on behalf of the child who is to be born."

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 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."

Manoah asked, "Now, when what you've said occurs, what is to be the young man's way of life and work?"

She must not consume anything extracted from grape vines, including wine or anything intoxicating, and she must not eat anything unclean, doing everything that I commissioned her to do."

The angel of the LORD answered Manoah, "If you detain me, I won't be eating your food, but if you prepare a burnt offering, you'll be making a sacrifice to the LORD." The angel of the LORD said this because Manoah didn't know that he was the angel of the LORD.

Manoah asked the angel of the LORD, "What's your name, because when what you've said happens, we'll glorify you?"

So Manoah prepared a young goat and a grain offering and offered it on a boulder to the LORD, who kept on performing miracles while Manoah and his wife watched continually.

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.

Later on, the woman gave birth to a son and named him Samson. The child grew strong and the LORD blessed him.

A while later, Samson went down to Timnah and observed a woman in Timnah who was of Philistine origin.

Then he returned and told his father and mother, "In Timnah I saw a woman of Philistine origin." He ordered them, "Get her for me as a wife. Now!"

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!

The Spirit of the LORD rushed upon him, and he ripped the lion apart as one might dissect a young goat, even though he carried nothing in his hand. But he didn't tell his father and mother what he had done.

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 scraped some out into his hands and went on his way, eating all the while. When he met his father and mother, he gave some to them, and they ate it, too. But he didn't inform them that he had scraped the honey from the carcass of the lion.

Later on, when his father went down to visit the woman, Samson threw a party there, since young men customarily did this.

When they saw him, they brought 30 companions to accompany him.

The next day, they told Samson's wife, "Coax your husband to explain the riddle or we'll set fire to your father's house with you in it! You've invited us here to make us paupers, haven't you?"

So Samson's wife cried in front of him and accused him, "You only hate me. You don't love me. You've told a riddle to my relatives, but you haven't told the solution to me." Samson responded, "Look, I haven't told my parents, either. Why should I tell you?"

So she kept on crying in front of him for the entire seven days of the wedding party. On the seventh day he told the solution to her because she nagged him, and then she told the solution to the riddle to her relatives.

Then the men of the city answered him just before sunset on the seventh day: "What is sweeter than honey? What are stronger than lions?" Samson responded, "If you hadn't plowed with my heifer, you wouldn't have solved my riddle."

A while later during the wheat harvest, Samson visited his wife, bringing along a young goat, and told his father-in-law, "I'm going into my wife's room." But her father wouldn't give permission for him to go.

Her father said, "Because I honestly thought that you hated her deeply, I gave her in marriage to your best man. Isn't her younger sister better than she? Please then, let her be yours instead."

Samson replied to them, "This time I'll be blameless when I do something evil to the Philistines."

So Samson went out, caught 300 foxes, grabbed some torches, tied the foxes together in pairs at their tails, and fastened a torch between each pair of tails.

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.

So he attacked them ruthlessly in a massive slaughter, then left to live in the caves of Etam.

In response, the Philistines went up, encamped in the territory of Judah, and raided Lehi.

In response, 3,000 soldiers from the tribe of Judah went down to the caves of the rock of Etam and asked Samson, "Don't you know that the Philistines have us in their control? What have you done to us?" "I did to them what they did to me," he answered.

They responded, "We've come here to arrest you and transfer you to the custody of the Philistines." Samson told them, "Promise me that you won't kill me."