Judges:13-15
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And the children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the LORD ;
and the LORD delivered them into the hand of the Philistines forty years .
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And there was a certain man of Zorah ,
of the family of the Danites ,
whose name was Manoah ;
and his wife was barren ,
and bare not .
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And the angel of the LORD appeared unto the woman ,
and said unto her ,
Behold now ,
thou art barren ,
and bearest not :
but thou shalt conceive ,
and bear a son .
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Now therefore beware ,
I pray thee ,
and drink not wine nor strong drink ,
and eat not any unclean thing :
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For ,
lo ,
thou shalt conceive ,
and bear a son ;
and no razor shall come on his head :
for the child shall be a Nazarite unto God from the womb :
and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines .
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Then the woman came and told her husband ,
saying ,
A man of God came unto me ,
and his countenance was like the countenance of an angel of God ,
very terrible :
but I asked him not whence he was ,
neither told he me his name :
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But he said unto me ,
Behold ,
thou shalt conceive ,
and bear a son ;
and now drink no wine nor strong drink ,
neither eat any unclean thing :
for the child shall be a Nazarite to God from the womb to the day of his death .
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Then Manoah intreated the LORD ,
and said ,
O my Lord ,
let the man of God which thou didst send come again unto us ,
and teach us what we shall do unto the child that shall be born .
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And God hearkened to the voice of Manoah ;
and the angel of God came again unto the woman as she sat in the field :
but Manoah her husband was not with her .
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And the woman made haste ,
and ran ,
and shewed her husband ,
and said unto him ,
Behold ,
the man hath appeared unto me ,
that came unto me the other day .
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And Manoah arose ,
and went after his wife ,
and came to the man ,
and said unto him ,
Art thou the man that spakest unto the woman ?
And he said ,
I am .
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And Manoah said ,
Now let thy words come to pass .
How shall we order the child ,
and how shall we do unto him ?
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And the angel of the LORD said unto Manoah ,
Of all that I said unto the woman let her beware .
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She may not eat of any thing that cometh of the vine ,
neither let her drink wine or strong drink ,
nor eat any unclean thing :
all that I commanded her let her observe .
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And Manoah said unto the angel of the LORD ,
I pray thee ,
let us detain thee ,
until we shall have made ready a kid for thee .
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And the angel of the LORD said unto Manoah ,
Though thou detain me ,
I will not eat of thy bread :
and if thou wilt offer a burnt offering ,
thou must offer it unto the LORD .
For Manoah knew not that he was an angel of the LORD .
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And Manoah said unto the angel of the LORD ,
What is thy name ,
that when thy sayings come to pass we may do thee honour ?
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And the angel of the LORD said unto him ,
Why askest thou thus after my name ,
seeing it is secret ?
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So Manoah took a kid with a meat offering ,
and offered it upon a rock unto the LORD :
and the angel did wondrously ;
and Manoah and his wife looked on .
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For it came to pass ,
when the flame went up toward heaven from off the altar ,
that the angel of the LORD ascended in the flame of the altar .
And Manoah and his wife looked on it ,
and fell on their faces to the ground .
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But the angel of the LORD did no more appear to Manoah and to his wife .
Then Manoah knew that he was an angel of the LORD .
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And Manoah said unto his wife ,
We shall surely die ,
because we have seen God .
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But his wife said unto him ,
If the LORD were pleased to kill us ,
he would not have received a burnt offering and a meat offering at our hands ,
neither would he have shewed us all these things ,
nor would as at this time have told us such things as these .
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And the woman bare a son ,
and called his name Samson :
and the child grew ,
and the LORD blessed him .
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And the Spirit of the LORD began to move him at times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Eshtaol .
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And Samson went down to Timnath ,
and saw a woman in Timnath of the daughters of the Philistines .
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And he came up ,
and told his father and his mother ,
and said ,
I have seen a woman in Timnath of the daughters of the Philistines :
now therefore get her for me to wife .
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Then his father and his mother said unto him ,
Is there never a woman among the daughters of thy brethren ,
or among all my people ,
that thou goest to take a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines ?
And Samson said unto his father ,
Get her for me ;
for she pleaseth me well .
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But his father and his mother knew not that it was of the LORD ,
that he sought an occasion against the Philistines :
for at that time the Philistines had dominion over Israel .
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Then went Samson down ,
and his father and his mother ,
to Timnath ,
and came to the vineyards of Timnath :
and ,
behold ,
a young lion roared against him .
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And the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him ,
and he rent him as he would have rent a kid ,
and he had nothing in his hand :
but he told not his father or his mother what he had done .
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And he went down ,
and talked with the woman ;
and she pleased Samson well .
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And after a time he returned to take her ,
and he turned aside to see the carcase of the lion :
and ,
behold ,
there was a swarm of bees and honey in the carcase of the lion .
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And he took thereof in his hands ,
and went on eating ,
and came to his father and mother ,
and he gave them ,
and they did eat :
but he told not them that he had taken the honey out of the carcase of the lion .
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So his father went down unto the woman :
and Samson made there a feast ;
for so used the young men to do .
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And it came to pass ,
when they saw him ,
that they brought thirty companions to be with him .
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And Samson said unto them ,
I will now put forth a riddle unto you :
if ye can certainly declare it me within the seven days of the feast ,
and find it out ,
then I will give you thirty sheets and thirty change of garments :
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But if ye cannot declare it me ,
then shall ye give me thirty sheets and thirty change of garments .
And they said unto him ,
Put forth thy riddle ,
that we may hear it .
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And he said unto them ,
Out of the eater came forth meat ,
and out of the strong came forth sweetness .
And they could not in three days expound the riddle .
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And it came to pass on the seventh day ,
that they said unto Samson '
s wife ,
Entice thy husband ,
that he may declare unto us the riddle ,
lest we burn thee and thy father '
s house with fire :
have ye called us to take that we have ?
is it not so ?
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And Samson '
s wife wept before him ,
and said ,
Thou dost but hate me ,
and lovest me not :
thou hast put forth a riddle unto the children of my people ,
and hast not told it me .
And he said unto her ,
Behold ,
I have not told it my father nor my mother ,
and shall I tell it thee ?
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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 lay sore upon him :
and she told the riddle to the children of her people .
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And the men of the city said unto 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 unto them ,
If ye had not plowed with my heifer ,
ye had not found out my riddle .
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And the Spirit of the LORD came upon him ,
and he went down to Ashkelon ,
and slew thirty men of them ,
and took their spoil ,
and gave change of garments unto them which expounded the riddle .
And his anger was kindled ,
and he went up to his father '
s house .
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But Samson '
s wife was given to his companion ,
whom he had used as his friend .
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But it came to pass within a while after ,
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 suffer him to go in .
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And her father said ,
I verily thought that thou hadst 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 .
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And Samson said concerning them ,
Now shall I be more blameless than the Philistines ,
though I do them a displeasure .
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And Samson went and caught three hundred foxes ,
and took firebrands ,
and turned tail to tail ,
and put a firebrand in the midst between two tails .
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And when he had set the brands on fire ,
he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines ,
and burnt up both the shocks ,
and also the standing corn ,
with the vineyards and olives .
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Then the Philistines said ,
Who hath done this ?
And they answered ,
Samson ,
the son in law of the Timnite ,
because he had taken his wife ,
and given her to his companion .
And the Philistines came up ,
and burnt her and her father with fire .
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And Samson said unto them ,
Though ye have done this ,
yet will I be avenged of you ,
and after that I will cease .
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And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter :
and he went down and dwelt in the top of the rock Etam .
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Then the Philistines went up ,
and pitched in Judah ,
and spread themselves in Lehi .
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And the men of Judah said ,
Why are ye come up against us ?
And they answered ,
To bind Samson are we come up ,
to do to him as he hath done to us .
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Then three thousand men of Judah went to the top of the rock Etam ,
and said to Samson ,
Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us ?
what is this that thou hast done unto us ?
And he said unto them ,
As they did unto me ,
so have I done unto them .
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And they said unto him ,
We are come down to bind thee ,
that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines .
And Samson said unto them ,
Swear unto me ,
that ye will not fall upon me yourselves .
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And they spake unto him ,
saying ,
No ;
but we will bind thee fast ,
and deliver thee into their hand :
but surely we will not kill thee .
And they bound him with two new cords ,
and brought him up from the rock .
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And when he came unto Lehi ,
the Philistines shouted against him :
and the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him ,
and the cords that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire ,
and his bands loosed from off his hands .
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And he found a new jawbone of an ass ,
and put forth his hand ,
and took it ,
and slew a thousand men therewith .
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And Samson said ,
With the jawbone of an ass ,
heaps upon heaps ,
with the jaw of an ass have I slain a thousand men .
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And it came to pass ,
when he had made an end of speaking ,
that he cast away the jawbone out of his hand ,
and called that place Ramathlehi .
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And he was sore athirst ,
and called on the LORD ,
and said ,
Thou hast given this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant :
and now shall I die for thirst ,
and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised ?
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But God clave an hollow place that was in the jaw ,
and there came water thereout ;
and when he had drunk ,
his spirit came again ,
and he revived :
wherefore he called the name thereof Enhakkore ,
which is in Lehi unto this day .
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And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years .
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Then went Samson to Gaza ,
and saw there an harlot ,
and went in unto her .