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Samson’s Revenge
Judges 15:1–20 — Samson’s Revenge. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.
1Later on, at the time of the wheat harvest, Samson took a young goat and went to visit his wife. “I want to go to my wife in her room,” he said. But her father would not let him enter.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·hî mî·yā·mîm bî·mê ḥiṭ·ṭîm qə·ṣîr- šim·šō·wn ’eṯ- biḡ·ḏî ‘iz·zîm way·yip̄·qōḏ ’iš·tōw ’ā·ḇō·’āh ’el- ’iš·tî he·ḥā·ḏə·rāh way·yō·mer ’ā·ḇî·hā wə·lō- nə·ṯā·nōw lā·ḇō·w
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-it-was from-days, in-the-days-of wheat-harvest, and-visited Samson his-wife with-a-kid-of-goats, and-he-said: “Let-me-go-in to-my-wife the-chamber-ward.” And-not gave-him her-father to-enter.
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Some time after, Samson visited his wife in the time of the wheat harvest with a kid-a customary present at that time ( Genesis 38:17 )-and wished to go into the chamber (the women's apartment) to her; but her father would not allow him
I will go in to my wife. —Uxoriousness was the chief secret of the weakness and ruin of Samson, as it was afterwards of a very different type of man, Solomon.Ellicott's judgment is moral, not lexical; the Hebrew says only that Samson resolved to enter the chamber.
The custom may have been based on the heathen idea that the goat was sacred to the goddess of love (Ashtôreth);Cambridge offers this cultic origin for the kid as a possibility (“may have been based”), not as an established fact; the text says only that Samson brought a kid.
2“I was sure that you thoroughly hated her,” said her father, “so I gave her to one of the men who accompanied you. Is not her younger sister more beautiful than she? Please take her instead.”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yō·mer ’ā·mōr kî- śā·nō śə·nê·ṯāh ’ā·mar·tî ’ā·ḇî·hā wā·’et·tə·nen·nāh lə·mê·rê·‘e·ḵā hă·lō haq·qə·ṭan·nāh ’ă·ḥō·ṯāh ṭō·w·ḇāh mim·men·nāh nā tə·hî- lə·ḵā taḥ·te·hā
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said her-father: “Saying I-said that hating thou-hatedst-her, so-I-gave-her to-thy-companion. Is-not her-sister the-younger good more-than-she? Let-her-be, pray, to-thee in-her-stead.”
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I gave her. —This must mean I have betrothed her, for otherwise she would not have still been living in her father’s house.
This allegation was a mere sham, a flimsy pretext to excuse his refusal of admittance.
The marrying of a sister while the other was alive was expressly forbidden by the law of Moses: see Leviticus 18:18 . And therefore this offer might probably irritate Samson the more.Benson reads the offer against Leviticus 18:18; the Timnite father, a Philistine, would not have held that law binding, which is part of why the two men cannot even quarrel on the same terms.
3Samson said to them, “This time I will be blameless in doing harm to the Philistines.”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
šim·šō·wn way·yō·mer lā·hem hap·pa·‘am niq·qê·ṯî kî- ’ă·nî ‘im·mām ‘ō·śeh rā·‘āh mip·pə·liš·tîm
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said to-them Samson: “I-am-clean this-stroke from-the-Philistines, for I am-doing with-them evil.”
Where the English smooths the original
Samson regarded the treatment which he had received from his father-in-law as but one effect of the disposition of the Philistines generally towards the Israelites, and therefore resolved to avenge the wrong which he had received from one member of the Philistines upon the whole nation, or at all events upon the whole of the city of Timnath.
i.e. I am resolved to have my revenge on the Philistines, and no one will be able to blame me for it (cf. Numbers 32:22 , 2 Samuel 3:28 ); Samson’s words express a resolve in a tone of exultation.
But although this may look like an act of private revenge, yet it is plain enough that Samson acted as a judge, (for so he was,) and as an avenger of the public injuries and oppressions of his peoplePoole's defence rests on Judges 14:4 (“it was of the LORD”); the text of chapter 15 itself gives Samson only personal motives, and the reader has to decide how much weight that earlier verse carries.
4Then Samson went out and caught three hundred foxes. And he took torches, turned the foxes tail-to-tail, and fastened a torch between each pair of tails.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
šim·šō·wn way·yê·leḵ way·yil·kōḏ šə·lōš- mê·’ō·wṯ šū·‘ā·lîm way·yiq·qaḥ lap·pi·ḏîm way·ye·p̄en zā·nāḇ ’el- zā·nāḇ way·yā·śem ’e·ḥāḏ lap·pîḏ bên- šə·nê haz·zə·nā·ḇō·wṯ bat·tā·weḵ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-went Samson and-caught three hundred jackals, and-took torches, and-he-turned tail to tail, and-set one torch between the-two tails in-the-middle.
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Caught three hundred foxes. —Rather, three hundred jackals. The word Shualim is used for both; but it would be difficult to catch three hundred foxes, whereas the jackals are still heard howling in herds about these very regions at night.
The fox is a solitary animal, and to catch 300 would be impossible for any one but Samson. It seems a pity to lessen the marvel in the interests of prosaic probability by translating jackalsCambridge here argues against the majority of the other commentators in this brief (Ellicott, Barnes, JFB, Pulpit, K&D all read “jackals”); we record the dissent rather than settle it.
It was an artful contrivance of Samson to fix the brands to the foxes in pairs, because their efforts to run different ways, or not directly in the same track, would lessen their speed, and keep them longer in the places where they were to do execution.
5Then he lit the torches and released the foxes into the standing grain of the Philistines, burning up the piles of grain and the standing grain, as well as the vineyards and olive groves.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yaḇ·‘er- ’êš bal·lap·pî·ḏîm way·šal·laḥ bə·qā·mō·wṯ pə·liš·tîm way·yaḇ·‘êr mig·gā·ḏîš wə·‘aḏ- qā·māh wə·‘aḏ- ke·rem zā·yiṯ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-he-kindled fire in-the-torches, and-he-sent-them-loose into-the-standing-grain of-the-Philistines; and-he-burned from-stack and-unto standing-grain and-unto vineyard-of-olive.
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He let them go, to wit, successively at several times, and in divers places, with great care and discretion, so as they might not hinder one another, nor all run into the same field
oliveyards ] lit. vineyard of oliveyard , which cannot be right; read vineyard and oliveyard , with LXX, Vulgate;A text-critical note, not a theological one: Cambridge is emending the Masoretic construct on the authority of the versions.
It is needless to point out that the adoption of these rough, coarse, and cruel expedients must be as little judged by a later and better standard as his thirst for the revenge of personal wrongs.Ellicott's caution cuts both ways: it protects the narrative from anachronistic moralizing, and it also concedes that the acts were “rough, coarse, and cruel.”
6“Who did this?” the Philistines demanded. “It was Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite,” they were told. “For his wife was given to his companion.” So the Philistines went up and burned her and her father to death.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
mî ‘ā·śāh zōṯ p̄ə·liš·tîm way·yō·mə·rū šim·šō·wn ḥă·ṯan hat·tim·nî way·yō·mə·rū kî lā·qaḥ ’eṯ- ’iš·tōw way·yit·tə·nāh lə·mê·rê·‘ê·hū p̄ə·liš·tîm way·ya·‘ă·lū way·yiś·rə·p̄ū ’ā·ḇî·hā ’ō·w·ṯāh wə·’eṯ- bā·’êš
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said the-Philistines: “Who did this?” And-they-said: “Samson, son-in-law of-the-Timnite, because he-took his-wife and-gave-her to-his-companion.” And-went-up the-Philistines and-burned her and-her-father with-the-fire.
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Looking with despair and fury at the blackened fields which but a few days before had been thick with golden corn, it is inconceivable that the Philistines would be in a mood to perform an act of justice for the sake of the deadly enemy who had inflicted this loss upon them.
She, to save herself and oblige her countrymen, betrayed her husband; and the very thing that she feared, and by sin sought to avoid, came upon her!Henry's note is a block comment on Judges 15:1–8 rather than a verse-by-verse gloss; he is reading back to the threat of Judges 14:15.
So the wicked do not punish vice for love of justice, but for fear of danger, which also might come to them.
They therefore avenged themselves by burning her and her father-probably by burning his house down to the ground, with its occupants within it-an act of barbarity and cruelty which fully justified Samson's war upon them.K&D moves from description to verdict (“fully justified”); the Hebrew narrative offers no such evaluation of Samson's war.
7And Samson told them, “Because you have done this, I will not rest until I have taken vengeance upon you.”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
šim·šō·wn way·yō·mer lā·hem ’im- ta·‘ă·śūn kā·zōṯ ’eḥ·dāl kî ’im- niq·qam·tî ḇā·ḵem wə·’a·ḥar
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said to-them Samson: “If ye-do like-this — surely when I-have-avenged-myself on-you, then I-will-cease.”
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It still leaves it uncertain whether the Philistines meant to do Samson justice, or to do him an additional injury, by putting his wife and her father to death.
Samson therefore declared to them, "If ye do such things, truly (כּי) when I have avenged myself upon you, then will I cease," i.e., I will not cease till I have taken vengeance upon you.
Whereby it appears, that it was not his private injuries, but the public, which he did revenge.Poole infers the public character of the revenge from the fact that Samson did not stop when his personal wrong was avenged; the verse itself states only the resolve.
8And he struck them ruthlessly with a great slaughter, and then went down and stayed in the cave at the rock of Etam.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yaḵ ’ō·w·ṯām šō·wq ‘al- yā·rêḵ ḡə·ḏō·w·lāh mak·kāh way·yê·reḏ way·yê·šeḇ bis·‘îp̄ se·la‘ ‘ê·ṭām
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-he-smote them leg upon thigh, a-great blow; and-he-went-down and-dwelt in-the-cleft of-the-rock Etam.
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hip and thigh ] lit. leg upon thigh , so that the limbs of the slain fall one upon another
In the top of the rock Etam. —It should undoubtedly be in a ravine (or cave) of the cliff Etam.
He dwelt in the top of the rock Etam; partly because there he could better defend himself from his enemies; and partly because he would not involve his brethren in the same danger with himself, but, like a worthy magistrate, would secure them even with his own greater hazard.
It appears that Samson had no commission from God to raise an army and make open war, like Gideon, Jephthah, and others, for the deliverance of Israel from the yoke of the Philistines; but was only authorized to weaken them and keep them in aweBenson's limit on Samson's commission is an inference from the narrative's shape, not a statement the text makes; it does square with the angel's word in Judges 13:5 that he would only begin to deliver Israel.
9Then the Philistines went up, camped in Judah, and deployed themselves near the town of Lehi.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
p̄ə·liš·tîm way·ya·‘ă·lū way·ya·ḥă·nū bî·hū·ḏāh way·yin·nā·ṭə·šū bal·le·ḥî
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-went-up the-Philistines and-they-camped in-Judah, and-they-spread-themselves in-the-Lehi.
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The character of the narrative suggests the question whether the name may not have existed previously, and the play on words may not have been adapted by Samson to the incident.Ellicott is proposing, against Josephus, that the name preceded the deed and Samson punned on it; the text of v. 17 says the naming followed the deed.
Spread themselves - An expression used of the Philistine mode of war 2 Samuel 5:18 , 2 Samuel 5:22 , alluding to the compact way in which they came up the wadys, and then distpersed.Quoted verbatim, including the typographical error in the source.
The name = jawbone (LXX Jdg 15:14 Siagôn ) was no doubt suggested by the formation of a prominent rock
10“Why have you attacked us?” said the men of Judah. The Philistines replied, “We have come to arrest Samson and pay him back for what he has done to us.”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
lā·māh ‘ă·lî·ṯem ‘ā·lê·nū way·yō·mə·rū ’îš yə·hū·ḏāh way·yō·mə·rū ‘ā·lî·nū le·’ĕ·sō·wr ’eṯ- šim·šō·wn la·‘ă·śō·wṯ lōw ka·’ă·šer ‘ā·śāh lā·nū
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said the-man of-Judah: “Why have-ye-come-up against-us?” And-they-said: “To-bind Samson we-have-come-up, to-do to-him as he-did to-us.”
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they had not attempted to cast off their yoke, they quietly submitted to their government, and had paid their whole tribute, as Josephus (f) represents them sayingGill is reporting Josephus's expansion of Judah's plea, not the Hebrew text, which records only the question “Why are ye come up against us?”
Samson was not of the tribe of Judah, which seems to have been living in contented servitude.
And so being our prisoner to punish him.A one-line marginal gloss; Geneva is explaining what the Philistines mean by “bind.”
11In response, three thousand men of Judah went to the cave at the rock of Etam, and they asked Samson, “Do you not realize that the Philistines rule over us? What have you done to us?” “I have done to them what they did to me,” he replied.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
šə·lō·šeṯ ’ă·lā·p̄îm ’îš mî·hū·ḏāh way·yê·rə·ḏū ’el- sə·‘îp̄ se·la‘ ‘ê·ṭām way·yō·mə·rū lə·šim·šō·wn hă·lō yā·ḏa‘·tā kî- pə·liš·tîm mō·šə·lîm bā·nū ū·mah- zōṯ ‘ā·śî·ṯā lā·nū ‘ā·śū lā·hem kên ka·’ă·šer ‘ā·śî·ṯî lî way·yō·mer lā·hem
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-went-down three thousand men from-Judah to the-cleft of-the-rock Etam, and-said to-Samson: “Knowest-thou-not that ruling over-us are-the-Philistines? And-what is-this thou-hast-done to-us?” And-he-said to-them: “As they-did to-me, so I-did to-them.”
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Instead of recognising in Samson a deliverer whom the Lord had raised up for them, and crowding round him that they might smite their oppressors with his help and drive them out of the land, the men of Judah were so degraded, that they cast this reproach at Samson
What might not this 3,000 have achieved if they had been like Gideon’s 300?
Why not rather to fight under thy banner? Because sin dispirits men, nay, infatuates them, and hides from their eyes the things that belong to their peace.
It is instructive to read Samson's defence of himself in the very words used by the Philistines in ver. 10. "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth." There is no end to rendering "evil for evil."Pulpit is applying the lex talionis formula (Exodus 21:24) as a criticism, not a commendation, of Samson's answer.
12But they said to him, “We have come down to arrest you and hand you over to the Philistines.” Samson replied, “Swear to me that you will not kill me yourselves.”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yō·mə·rū lōw yā·raḏ·nū le·’ĕ·sā·rə·ḵā lə·ṯit·tə·ḵā bə·yaḏ- pə·liš·tîm šim·šō·wn way·yō·mer lā·hem hiš·šā·ḇə·‘ū lî ’at·tem pen- tip̄·gə·‘ūn bî
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-they-said to-him: “To-bind-thee we-have-come-down, to-give-thee into-the-hand of-the-Philistines.” And-said to-them Samson: “Swear to-me, lest ye fall-upon me yourselves.”
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and rather than they should come into any distress through the Philistines, consented to be bound by them, and delivered into their hands; which he was a type of Christ, who was betrayed by the Jews, and delivered by them into the hands of the RomansGill's typological reading; we keep it in the ⚙ Christ section too, and mark there where the analogy breaks.
Not that he feared them, or could not as easily have conquered them, as he did the whole host of the Philistines; but because he would be free from all obligation or temptation of doing them any harm, though it were in his own just and necessary defence.
It seems as if Samson were parleying with them from some point of vantage which he could easily have defended for a time.
13“No,” they answered, “we will not kill you, but we will tie you up securely and hand you over to them.” So they bound him with two new ropes and led him up from the rock.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
lō way·yō·mə·rū lōw lê·mōr lō nə·mî·ṯe·ḵā wə·hā·mêṯ kî- ’ā·sōr ne·’ĕ·sā·rə·ḵā ū·nə·ṯan·nū·ḵā ḇə·yā·ḏām way·ya·’as·ru·hū biš·na·yim ḥă·ḏā·šîm ‘ă·ḇō·ṯîm way·ya·‘ă·lū·hū min- has·sā·la‘
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-they-said to-him, saying: “No — but binding we-will-bind-thee and-give-thee into-their-hand; but killing we-will-not-kill-thee.” And-they-bound him with-two new ropes and-brought-him-up from-the-rock.
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Thus they would rather betray their brother than use the means that God had given for their deliverance.
Thus was he a type of Christ, who yielded himself to be bound, yea, and led as a lamb to the slaughter. Never were men so infatuated as these men of Judah, except those who thus treated our blessed Saviour.A figural reading, not a claim about the text's own intent; Benson's second sentence is a rhetorical comparison of Judah with the Sanhedrin.
not with one only, lest it should not be sufficient to hold him, knowing his strength, but with two, and these not old worn out ones, but new ones just made, and very strong
14When Samson arrived in Lehi, the Philistines came out shouting against him. And the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him. The ropes on his arms became like burnt flax, and the bonds broke loose from his hands.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
hū- ḇā ‘aḏ- le·ḥî ū·p̄il·šit·tīm hê·rî·‘ū liq·rā·ṯōw rū·aḥ Yah·weh wat·tiṣ·laḥ ‘ā·lāw hā·‘ă·ḇō·ṯîm ’ă·šer ‘al- zə·rō·w·‘ō·w·ṯāw wat·tih·ye·nāh bā·‘ă·rū ḇā·’êš kap·piš·tîm ’ă·šer ’ĕ·sū·rāw way·yim·mas·sū mê·‘al yā·ḏāw
Literal — word-for-word from the original
He came unto Lehi, and-the-Philistines shouted to-meet-him; and-rushed upon-him the-Spirit of-YHWH, and-became the-ropes which were-on his-arms like-flax which burned in-the-fire, and-melted his-bonds from-upon his-hands.
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His bands loosed. —Literally, melted, or flowed off, a highly poetic expression.
The description rises up to a poetical parallelism, to depict the triumph which Samson celebrated over the Philistines in the power of the Spirit of Jehovah.
When the Spirit of the Lord came upon Samson, his cords were loosed: where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty, and those are free indeed who are thus set free.Henry is applying 2 Corinthians 3:17 devotionally; the liberty in Judges 15 is a physical loosing of cords, and Henry's move from one to the other is homiletic, not exegetical.
15He found the fresh jawbone of a donkey, reached out his hand and took it, and struck down a thousand men.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yim·ṣā ṭə·rî·yāh lə·ḥî- ḥă·mō·wr way·yiš·laḥ yā·ḏōw way·yiq·qā·ḥe·hā way·yaḵ- bāh ’e·lep̄ ’îš
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-he-found a-jawbone of-a-donkey, fresh, and-he-sent-out his-hand and-took-it, and-he-smote with-it a-thousand men.
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In this instance, at any rate, Samson might feel himself absolved from the rule of ceremonial cleanness, which forbad him as a Nazarite to touch carcases.Ellicott is granting Samson an exemption the text never mentions; Numbers 6:6 forbids the Nazirite to come near a dead body, and Judges simply records the act without comment.
But doubtless it is chiefly to be ascribed to the power and providence of God, who thus fulfilled his promise to his people, that one of them should chase a thousand
The numbers of course belong to the extraordinary character of the story. Moore notes that, according to Moslem tradition, the first blood in the cause of Islam was drawn with a similar weapon, the jawbone of a camel.Cambridge treats the figure as a mark of legendary style; K&D reaches a similar conclusion by a different route, calling it a round number carried over from the song.
The Philistines, seized with a panic at seeing Samson suddenly burst his cords and rush at them, offered no resistance, but fell an easy prey to the blows of their mighty foe.Barnes reconstructs a rout rather than a pitched battle — an inference the Hebrew supports only indirectly, through the dual “two heaps” of v. 16 that K&D reads as several successive encounters.
16Then Samson said: “With the jawbone of a donkey I have piled them into heaps. With the jawbone of a donkey I have slain a thousand men.”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
šim·šō·wn way·yō·mer bil·ḥî ha·ḥă·mō·wr ḥă·mō·wr ḥă·mō·rā·ṯā·yim bil·ḥî ha·ḥă·mō·wr hik·kê·ṯî ’e·lep̄ ’îš
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said Samson: “With-the-jaw of-the-ass — a-heap, two-heaps! With-the-jaw of-the-ass I-have-smitten a-thousand men.”
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Samson’s exultation over his extraordinary achievement finds vent in a sort of punning couplet, which turns entirely on the identity of sound between chamor, a heap, and chamor, an ass, and the play of meaning between aleph, a thousand, and aleph, an ox.
The inadequacy of the weapon plainly shows this to have been a miraculous feat, "a case of supernatural strength," just as the gift of prophecy is a case of supernatural knowledge [Chalmers].
this he said not in a proud and haughty manner, ascribing it to himself, as Josephus suggests (m), since he takes notice of the mean instrument he usedGill is arguing against Josephus, who took the song as self-praise; Benson and Poole lean the other way. The Hebrew names no agent but Samson.
17And when Samson had finished speaking, he cast the jawbone from his hand; and he named that place Ramath-lehi.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·hî kə·ḵal·lō·ṯōw lə·ḏab·bêr way·yaš·lêḵ hal·lə·ḥî mî·yā·ḏōw way·yiq·rā ha·hū lam·mā·qō·wm rā·maṯ le·ḥî
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-it-was, when-he-finished speaking, and-he-cast-away the-jawbone from-his-hand; and-he-called that place Ramath-Lehi.
Where the English smooths the original
Ramath-lehi ] i.e. the height of Lehi , cf. Ramath-mizpeh Joshua 13:26 , Ramoth-gilead etc. Popular etymology, however, gave it the sense, casting away of the jawbone .
This seems to indicate that the name Lechi in Judges 15:9 is used proleptically, and that the place first received its name from this deed of Samson.
It is singular that the word rendered speaking might also be rendered destroying , as in 2 Chronicles 22:10 .A lexical curiosity, offered by Pulpit as such; the context here plainly means finishing his speech.
18And being very thirsty, Samson cried out to the LORD, “You have accomplished this great deliverance through Your servant. Must I now die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
mə·’ōḏ way·yiṣ·mā way·yiq·rā ’el- Yah·weh way·yō·mar ’at·tāh nā·ṯa·tā haz·zōṯ hag·gə·ḏō·lāh hat·tə·šū·‘āh ḇə·yaḏ- ‘aḇ·də·ḵā ’eṯ- wə·‘at·tāh ’ā·mūṯ baṣ·ṣā·mā wə·nā·p̄al·tî bə·yaḏ hā·‘ă·rê·lîm
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-he-thirsted exceedingly, and-he-called unto YHWH and-said: “Thou hast-given by-the-hand of-thy-servant this great deliverance; and-now shall-I-die of-thirst and-fall into-the-hand of-the-uncircumcised?”
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So little notice did the men of Judah take of their deliverer, that he was ready to perish for want of a draught of water.
From this prayer we may see that Samson was fully conscious that he was fighting for the cause of the Lord.
Samson becomes religious when he is in straits; cf. Jdg 16:28 .Cambridge's assessment is sceptical; Geneva and K&D read the same prayer as evidence of genuine faith. The text gives the prayer without evaluating the man.
and it may also be observed, that it was so ordered in Providence, that he might in this be a type of the Messiah, who on the cross, as he was spoiling principalities and powers, and triumphing over them in it, said, "I thirst", John 19:28 .Gill's typology; he offers it as an additional observation after rejecting Josephus's reading of the thirst as rebuke.
19So God opened up the hollow place in Lehi, and water came out of it. When Samson drank, his strength returned, and he was revived. That is why he named it En-hakkore, and it remains in Lehi to this day.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ĕ·lō·hîm ’eṯ- way·yiḇ·qa‘ ham·maḵ·têš ’ă·šer- bal·le·ḥî ma·yim way·yê·ṣə·’ū mim·men·nū way·yê·šət rū·ḥōw wat·tā·šāḇ way·ye·ḥî ‘al- kên qā·rā šə·māh ‘ên haq·qō·w·rê ’ă·šer bal·le·ḥî ‘aḏ haz·zeh hay·yō·wm
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-Elohim clave the-mortar which is-in-Lehi, and-came-out from-it water; and-he-drank, and-returned his-spirit, and-he-revived. Therefore he-called its-name En-hakkore, which is-in-Lehi unto this day.
Where the English smooths the original
The notion that God made a miraculous fountain in one of the tooth-sockets of the jawbone of the ass is one of the childish misinterpretations with which Scripture exegesis is constantly defaced.Strongly put, but the majority position here: Barnes, Cambridge, Pulpit and K&D reject the tooth-socket reading on independent grounds. Gill and the Targum tradition preserved it.
The hollow place was split by Elohim, although it was to Jehovah that Samson had prayed, to indicate that the miracle was wrought by God as the Creator and Lord of nature.
The spring, which was pointed out in the writer’s day, and therefore could not have had anything to do with a jawbone, was known as En-hakkore, i.e. the Spring of the PartridgeCambridge's derivation treats the name as a pre-existing local place-name (the partridge is literally “the crier”) that the story-tellers attached to Samson's cry; Poole, JFB and Gill read it directly as the well of the man who called on God.
Clave an hollow place, i.e. by cleaving a place , made it hollow
20And Samson judged Israel for twenty years in the days of the Philistines.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yiš·pōṭ ’eṯ- yiś·rā·’êl ‘eś·rîm šā·nāh bî·mê p̄ə·liš·tîm
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-he-judged Israel in-the-days of-the-Philistines twenty years.
Where the English smooths the original
From this place it is manifest, that in the computation of the times of the judges, the years of servitude or oppression are not to be separated from the years of the judges, and added to them, but are comprehended within themA chronological argument (Poole ties it to 1 Kings 6:1); Benson makes the identical point. It is an inference about how the book counts, not a statement of the verse.
he only began to deliver them, but did not completely do it; though he got many advantages over them, and wrought many salvations and deliverances, yet was not the author of perfect salvation
The Dtc. editor’s formula, usually at the close of a judge’s history, comes curiously here before the end; perhaps because the editor felt that the end was not a suitable place for a statement of this kind.A source-critical proposal (Cambridge cites Budde, Moore, Nowack); K&D expressly denies that any conclusion about multiple sources can be drawn from the verse's position.
A possible explanation, however, of this verse being placed here is that it results from the statement in ver. 19, that Samson's spirit came again, and he revived, or came to life again, after being on the very point of death
The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.
AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.
The unit opens on a man with a gift in his hand. בִּגְדִ֣י עִזִּ֔ים — a kid of the goats, which Ellicott, Barnes, Cambridge and K&D all identify as the customary present (Genesis 38:17), and which JFB reads as “not only as a token of civility, but of reconciliation.” Pulpit says plainly that Samson's anger “had now passed away, and his love for his wife had returned. He was little prepared to find her married again to his friend.” The refusal is delivered in the verb of giving: the father gave the bride to the companion (mêrêaʻ, the rare bridal-friend noun of 14:20) and will not give the husband a door. Ellicott judges Samson's fault as uxoriousness; Gill notices something else, that Samson “could easily have pushed him away, and broke open the door, but he did not choose to use such violent methods.” Then comes v. 3, and the strongest man in Israel files a legal plea. נִקֵּ֥יתִי with min is court language — K&D: “to be innocent away from a person, i.e., before him (see Numbers 32:22),” and Pulpit lays the same verse alongside. Cambridge hears the tone exactly: “Samson's words express a resolve in a tone of exultation.” Poole and Gill both insist he speaks as judge and not as jilted husband. The machine's observation (⚙) is only this: the plea and the act are in the same breath, and the act is named rāʻāh, evil, by the man performing it.
Everything in vv. 4–5 is engineered. lâkad is trapping, not hunting (Pulpit); the pairing of tails is deliberate braking, so that the animals “might not dart away so violently as to extinguish the torch” (Ellicott) and “keep them longer in the places where they were to do execution” (Benson); the release is staged in batches and in different places (Poole). The commentators divide on the animals — Ellicott, Barnes, JFB, Pulpit and K&D read jackals; Cambridge refuses, saying “It seems a pity to lessen the marvel in the interests of prosaic probability.” Both Barnes and Poole record the Roman Cerealia, where foxes with lit torches were released in the circus, as a curious parallel; Cambridge goes further and suggests a Canaanite exorcism rite behind the story. The timing is the weapon: JFB notes the grain was “in a most combustible state.” What burns is qâmâh, standing grain, the rare noun of Exodus 22:6, where Israel's own law charges the kindler of such a fire with full restitution. The Philistines answer with a different verb, sâraph, the burning of executions (Barnes, Pulpit, citing Genesis 38:24 and Leviticus 20:14), and Henry draws the moral that the woman met “the very thing that she feared.” Then Samson strikes “leg upon thigh” — Cambridge's literal rendering — and withdraws, not to a summit but into a çâʻîyph, a fissure (Ellicott, Barnes, JFB, Pulpit, all against the older “top”). Poole reads the retreat generously: he would not “involve his brethren in the same danger with himself.”
The chapter's bleakest verse is not a Philistine one. Three thousand men of Judah go down to the cleft, and K&D names what they fail to do: “Instead of recognising in Samson a deliverer whom the Lord had raised up for them, and crowding round him that they might smite their oppressors with his help… the men of Judah were so degraded, that they cast this reproach at Samson.” Ellicott's question is unanswerable: “What might not this 3,000 have achieved if they had been like Gideon's 300?” Cambridge draws the sociological conclusion, that “the Israelites in this part of the country had not yet acquired any sense of national feeling or of a common cause,” and Pulpit sets the scene beside Exodus 2:14 and Acts 7:25–28, where Moses' own people also refuse the deliverer. Their sentence, הֲלֹ֤א יָדַ֙עְתָּ֙ כִּֽי־פְּלִשְׁתִּ֔ים מֹשְׁלִ֥ים בָּ֙נוּ֙, uses the participle of mâshal: the Philistines are ruling, present and ongoing, and Judah has made peace with the participle. Samson's reply is a mirror of their own grammar — as they did to me, so I did to them — and Pulpit puts the finger on it: “There is no end to rendering "evil for evil."” He asks only one thing, that they not fall upon him (pâgaʻ, which K&D notes includes the intention of killing). Gill and Benson both read the binding as a type of Christ's; Geneva reads it as a judgment on Judah: “Thus they would rather betray their brother than use the means that God had given for their deliverance.”
Three sounds collide at Lehi. The Philistines' shout, הֵרִ֣יעוּ, which Ellicott calls “an onomatopœia, like our "hurrah"” and a shout of joy rather than a war cry. Then וַתִּצְלַ֨ח, the Spirit of YHWH rushing upon him — the root tsâlach means to push forward. Then Samson's own couplet. K&D marks the change of register: “The description rises up to a poetical parallelism, to depict the triumph which Samson celebrated over the Philistines in the power of the Spirit of Jehovah.” The bonds do not snap; they melt — mâçaç, “Literally, melted, or flowed off, a highly poetic expression” (Ellicott) — and the simile that undoes them is flax burnt with fire, the same root bâʻar he used on their harvest. The weapon is a fresh jawbone, ṭârîy, a word occurring in only two verses in the canon; Ellicott raises the Nazirite problem of touching a carcase and grants Samson an exemption, which is an inference, not a text. Then the song, built of puns: chămôr the ass against chămôr the heap, and, Ellicott adds, eleph a thousand against eleph an ox. Barnes hears the same riddling instinct as chapter 14: “The spirit of riddle-making… is apparent in this song of triumph.” JFB, quoting Chalmers, calls the feat “a case of supernatural strength,” and Gill defends the singer: he “takes notice of the mean instrument he used.” The name that outlives the battle, Ramath-Lehi, is itself a pun contested between rûm, height, and râmâh, to cast away (Ellicott, Barnes, Cambridge, Gill).
The unit's turn is a man who has just killed a thousand asking for a drink. Henry: “So little notice did the men of Judah take of their deliverer, that he was ready to perish for want of a draught of water.” Poole reads the thirst as sent — “that by the experience of his own impotency he might be forced to ascribe the victory to God only” — and Josephus, whom Gill cites and then declines to follow, reads it as rebuke. In the prayer, Samson names the whole chapter correctly for the first time: הַתְּשׁוּעָ֥ה הַגְּדֹלָ֖ה, this great deliverance, given by the hand of thy servant — K&D: “From this prayer we may see that Samson was fully conscious that he was fighting for the cause of the Lord,” and Geneva: “By which it appears that he did these things in faith.” Cambridge is drier: “Samson becomes religious when he is in straits.” God splits the maktêsh, the mortar — Ellicott, Barnes, Cambridge, K&D and Pulpit all reject the old picture of a spring in a tooth-socket, K&D on the grammatical ground that the phrase reads “the maktesh which is at Lechi.” Water comes out as at Horeb and Kadesh (K&D, Pulpit, citing Exodus 17:6; Numbers 20:8,11), his rûach returns — the same noun that rushed on him in v. 14 now means simply his breath — and the well is named for a crier. Cambridge notes the spring's local name meant Partridge Spring, “lit. the crier,” and that the story-tellers heard Samson's cry in it. Then the formula: twenty years, in the days of the Philistines. Poole and Gill both stress that the years of servitude are counted inside the years of the judge, and Cambridge observes how oddly the closing formula sits before chapter 16.
⚙ Read under Sola Scriptura and offered to be tested: this chapter is a study in what deliverance looks like when nobody wants it. Every party in it acts from injury. The Timnite gives the bride away to protect himself; the Philistines burn a household to protect their harvest; Judah binds its own champion to protect its servitude; Samson himself states his motive twice, both times as reciprocity — as they did to me, so I did to them — and once, in v. 3, names his own act rāʻāh, evil, while pleading that he is clean of it. The narrator never calls Samson righteous. What the narrator does say, and says only once, is that the Spirit of YHWH rushed upon him (v. 14), and that God split the rock (v. 19). Those are the only two divine acts in twenty verses, and neither of them is an endorsement of a motive; they are the securing of an outcome. Judges is honest in a way that is uncomfortable: God's deliverance advances through a man whose reasons are poor, in a nation that would rather hand him over than follow him, and the chapter's own summary is not a victory but an administrative note — he judged Israel twenty years, in the days of the Philistines. The oppression was never lifted. The one thing that changes in Samson is the pronoun in v. 18: Thou hast given this great deliverance by the hand of thy servant. He sang about the jawbone; he prays about the giver. That prayer, not the thousand, is the only line in the chapter that survives into the water, the name, and the twenty years — which is the machine's fallible suggestion that the text measures a judge by what he asks for when the strength is gone, not by what he swings when it is on him.
⚙ Not a verse, an editorial line: he sang about the jawbone, but he prayed about the giver — and it was the prayer, not the thousand, that left a spring behind it.
AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.
The father's excuse in v. 2 and the Philistines' report in v. 6 both turn on מֵרֵעַ (mêrêaʻ, H4828), the bridal companion or best man — a noun the Verifier finds in only 7 verses of the canon. Judges 14:20 used it for the man who received Samson's wife, and our chapter uses it twice more, with Samson's own name (Shimshôwn, H8123) attached. The link is lexical, not thematic guesswork: chapter 15 is narrated as the legal consequence of one sentence in chapter 14.
Judges 14:20
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H4828 mêrêaʻ (rare — in 7 vv) and H8123 Shimshôwn (in 37 vv). A genuine verbal link within one continuous narrative; no quotation is claimed.
The vessel God splits in v. 19 is הַמַּכְתֵּשׁ (maktêsh, H4388), and the Verifier reports it as occurring in only 2 other verses. One is Proverbs 27:22: though you bray a fool in a mortar among crushed grain, his folly will not depart. The other, named by both K&D and Cambridge, is Zephaniah 1:11, where Maktesh is a quarter of Jerusalem. Cambridge derives the noun from a root meaning “to pound,” so that maktçsh is a “pounding place.” The commentators agree that the name here belongs to a mortar-shaped hollow in the hillside, not to a tooth-socket in the jawbone (Ellicott calls that reading one of “the childish misinterpretations with which Scripture exegesis is constantly defaced”). ⚙ The resonance we note, and do not press: at Lehi the pounding-vessel yields water instead of powder, and the man in it is not a fool being ground but a servant being revived.
Proverbs 27:22 · Zephaniah 1:11
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H4388 maktêsh (rare — in 2 vv), with H8432 tâvek (in 390 vv) also shared with Proverbs 27:22. Zephaniah 1:11 is added on the named authority of K&D and Cambridge, not on a Verifier computation. The link is lexical; no quotation is claimed, and the thematic reading is marked as ⚙.
Exodus 22:6: if fire (ʼêsh, H784) breaks out and catches thorns so that stacked or standing grain (qâmâh, H7054 — rare, 8 verses) is consumed (bâʻar, H1197), he that kindled the fire shall surely make restitution. Judges 15:5 uses all three words, twice over for bâʻar, and adds the stacks and the standing grain in the same order. Ellicott reaches for the same verse at this point (“Comp. Exodus 22:6”). The Verifier confirms the three shared lexemes independently. ⚙ The reading we offer as fallible: Israel's judge does to Philistia precisely the tort Israel's law prices, and the restitution is exacted from his own family instead.
Exodus 22:6
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H7054 qâmâh (rare — in 8 vv), H1197 bâʻar (in 90 vv), H784 ʼêsh (in 346 vv). Verbal link only — Judges does not cite the statute, and the moral inference is marked ⚙.
Samson's refuge in vv. 8 and 11 is a סְעִיף (çâʻîyph, H5585), a fissure in the çelaʻ (H5553), the crag. The Verifier finds the same rare noun (6 verses) in Isaiah 2:21 — men going “into the clefts of the rocks… for fear of the LORD” — and Isaiah 57:5, the clefts where the idolaters slay their children. Ellicott and Barnes both cite exactly these verses to establish the translation “cleft” against the older “top.” ⚙ The structural note: in Isaiah 2 the clefts hide men from God's terror; in Judges 15 the cleft hides the man God has raised up, and the people who come down to it come to hand him over.
Isaiah 2:21 · Isaiah 57:5
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H5585 çâʻîyph (rare — in 6 vv) and H5553 çelaʻ (in 52 vv). The lexeme is rare enough to support a verbal tier; we downgrade to structural because the connection we are actually drawing is a shared motif of refuge, not a citation.
Samson catches three hundred animals (lâkad, H3920, v. 4) and is himself tied with אֱסוּרָיו (ʼêçûwr, H612, v. 14) — “a bond, especially manacles of a prisoner,” a noun the Verifier finds in only 3 verses. One is Jeremiah 37:15, the prophet in the house of bonds; the other is Ecclesiastes 7:26, where the woman whose heart is snares has hands that are fetters, and where the verb for being caught is lâkad — both of our unit's words in a single proverb. ⚙ Qoheleth's sentence reads like a caption to Samson's whole life, and chapter 16 will supply the illustration; we offer that as an observation, not as a claim about the author's intent.
Ecclesiastes 7:26 · Jeremiah 37:15
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H612 ʼêçûwr (rare — in 3 vv) and H3920 lâkad (in 112 vv) with Ecclesiastes 7:26; H612 ʼêçûwr with Jeremiah 37:15. Real verbal contact, but the reading drawn from it is thematic, so the tier is set low deliberately.
טְרִיָּה (ṭârîy, H2961, “properly, dripping”) occurs in only two verses of the canon. One is Judges 15:15, the fresh jawbone. The other is Isaiah 1:6, where from the sole of the foot to the head there is no soundness in Israel — wounds and bruises and fresh stripes, “they have not been closed, neither bound up.” Isaiah's verse also carries makkâh (H4347), the very noun used of Samson's “great blow” in Judges 15:8; the Verifier confirms both lexemes as shared. ⚙ The observation, offered to be tested: the two words that arm Israel's judge and measure his slaughter are the two words Isaiah uses of Israel's own untended body. A judge who wounds a thousand does not close his people's wound — which is the same verdict Judges 13:5 already gave in advance, that he would only begin to deliver them.
Isaiah 1:6
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H2961 ṭârîy (rare — in 2 vv) and H4347 makkâh (in 46 vv). The lexical contact is real and rare enough to support a verbal tier; it is deliberately downgraded because Isaiah is not citing Judges and the connection drawn is a motif, not a quotation.
ʻÊyṭâm (H5862) occurs in 5 verses. The Verifier offers 2 Chronicles 11:6 (Rehoboam's fortress between Bethlehem and Tekoa) and 1 Chronicles 4:32 (a Simeonite town). K&D argues for the Simeonite Etam on the strength of the verb “he went down” and against Robinson's identification with Urtas; Cambridge rejects both and follows Schick to ʻAraḳ Ismaʻîn near ʻArtuf; Pulpit and Barnes leave the site unidentified; Benson denies the argument from “went down” altogether, since Hebrew uses up and down loosely. The lexeme is shared and rare; the identification is not settled.
1 Chronicles 4:32 · 2 Chronicles 11:6
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H5862 ʻÊyṭâm (rare — in 5 vv). The name is certainly shared; whether these verses denote the same place as Judges 15:8 is disputed among K&D, Cambridge, Benson, Barnes and Pulpit, so the geographical claim is flagged rather than asserted.
The Verifier's top-ranked candidate, 2 Samuel 23:11, shares only Pᵉlishtîy (H6430), a lexeme in 244 verses — far too common to carry a link by itself. The real proposal is textual: Cambridge notes that the exploit of Shammah, one of David's heroes, “also took place at Lehi, 2 Samuel 23:11 (reading unto Lehi for into a troop),” and Ellicott reports the same, with Josephus and some LXX manuscripts. If the emendation stands, the same jaw-shaped ridge produced two one-man stands against the Philistines in a field of grain. If it does not, there is no link here at all.
2 Samuel 23:11
basis: Verifier's computed basis is H6430 Pᵉlishtîy (in 244 vv) — common, and insufficient on its own. The substantive connection rests on a disputed emendation of 2 Samuel 23:11 (Cambridge, Ellicott, citing Josephus and some LXX mss), so provenance is flagged.
Three thousand men of Judah come down to bind the man God raised up to save them (vv. 11–13). Pulpit sets the scene beside Moses: “it is not very unlike the spirit in which the Hebrews looked upon Moses when he first began to work to rescue them from their Egyptian bondage (Exodus 2:14; Acts 7:25–28),” where Stephen states the pattern outright — his brethren did not understand that God by his hand would deliver them. ⚙ We record the shape and nothing stronger: a deliverer rejected by the people he is sent to, then vindicated by God's act alone.
Exodus 2:14 · Acts 7:25-28
basis: No shared Strong's numbers are possible between a Greek text (Acts) and Hebrew (Judges, Exodus), so no verbal tier is available. The basis is a shared narrative pattern, named by the Pulpit Commentary at this verse and stated explicitly by Stephen in Acts 7:25.
AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.
Samson asks only that his countrymen not kill him themselves; they bind him with two new ropes and give him (nâthan, H5414) into the hand of the Philistines. Gill draws the figure at this verse: Samson “consented to be bound by them, and delivered into their hands; which he was a type of Christ, who was betrayed by the Jews, and delivered by them into the hands of the Romans,” and at v. 13 he presses the parallel to “surely we will not kill thee” against John 18:31 and Acts 2:23. Benson: “Thus was he a type of Christ, who yielded himself to be bound, yea, and led as a lamb to the slaughter.” Geneva turns it on Judah: “Thus they would rather betray their brother than use the means that God had given for their deliverance.” ⚙ The limit we mark: the analogy is in the handing-over, not in the man. Samson is bound because he has burned a harvest; Christ is bound having done no violence. Where Samson says as they did to me, so I did to them, the antitype says Father, forgive them.
Judges 15:12-13 · John 18:12 · Acts 2:23
The ropes do not break; they melt (mâçaç, H4549 — Ellicott: “Literally, melted, or flowed off, a highly poetic expression”), and the Spirit of YHWH is the reason. Benson, quoting Henry, makes the redemptive-historical reading: “This typified the resurrection of Christ, by the power of the Spirit of holiness. In this he loosed the bands of death, it being impossible he should be holden of them. And thus he triumphed over the power of darkness, which had shouted against him.” Henry adds the Philistine shout to the figure — “Thus Christ triumphed over the powers of darkness that shouted against him, as if they had him in their power” — and Gill says the loosing “may be an emblem of Christ's loosing himself from the cords of death, Acts 2:24.” The shout at Lehi (rûwaʻ, H7321) is a shout of premature victory, which is the exact note Acts 2:24 answers.
Acts 2:24 · Romans 1:4 · Colossians 2:15
Samson's cry in v. 18 comes after the victory, not before it, and Gill hears the pattern: “it was so ordered in Providence, that he might in this be a type of the Messiah, who on the cross, as he was spoiling principalities and powers, and triumphing over them in it, said, "I thirst", John 19:28.” The well that answers is named for a crier — ʻÊyn haq-Qôwrêʼ (H5875), “the fountain of him that cried,” which Poole glosses as “the fountain or well which was given in answer to my prayer,” and JFB as “the supplication well.” K&D notes the water came at Lehi as it came at Horeb and Kadesh (Exodus 17:6; Numbers 20:8, 11) — the rock-water of the wilderness which Paul reads christologically in 1 Corinthians 10:4, and which stands behind John 7:37–38. ⚙ Our own line, offered as fallible: here God splits a rock to keep a thirsty deliverer alive; at Calvary the deliverer is not kept alive, and the water comes out of him.
John 19:28 · Exodus 17:6 · 1 Corinthians 10:4 · John 7:37-38
The weapon is a discarded bone from an unclean animal. Henry: “To take the bone of an ass for this, was to do wonders by the foolish things of the world, that the excellency of the power might be of God, not of man. This victory was not in the weapon, was not in the arm; but it was in the Spirit of God, which moved the weapon by the arm.” Gill draws the same line forward: it “may be an emblem of the weak and contemptible means of the Gospel, the foolishness of preaching, by which Christ has conquered and subdued multitudes to himself.” JFB, citing Chalmers, keeps the event itself supernatural rather than symbolic: “a case of supernatural strength.” ⚙ The reading is figural rather than predictive, and we mark it as such; but it is not novel — it is the apostolic principle of 1 Corinthians 1:27 and 2 Corinthians 4:7 applied by two named public-domain expositors to this verse.
1 Corinthians 1:27 · 2 Corinthians 4:7
The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.
Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:
⚙ Honesty notes for this unit. Text. Three places are genuinely unsettled. (1) v. 5: the consonantal text reads כֶּ֥רֶם זָֽיִת, “vineyard of olive,” in the construct; Cambridge says it “cannot be right” and reads “vineyard and oliveyard” with LXX and Vulgate, Pulpit agrees, Ellicott suspects “some slight corruption.” BSB follows the versions. (2) v. 6: Cambridge reads “her father's house” with many Hebrew manuscripts, LXX cod. A and the Peshitto, matching the threat of Judges 14:15; BSB follows the shorter text. (3) v. 19: the older rendering “a hollow place that was in the jaw” (A.V., and Luther's tooth-socket, defended at length by Bochart) is rejected by Ellicott, Barnes, Cambridge, Pulpit and K&D alike, K&D on the grammatical ground that the text says “the maktesh which is at Lechi” and that the spring still existed in the historian's day.
What is uncertain. The sites of Lehi and of the rock Etam are not identified; K&D, Cambridge, Barnes and Pulpit propose different locations and none is secure. The idiom “leg upon thigh” (v. 8) is proverbial and its origin unknown — Ellicott canvasses several guesses and rejects the Targum's. Whether shûwʻâl here means foxes or jackals is disputed (Cambridge against Ellicott, Barnes, JFB, Pulpit, K&D). Whether the Philistines burned the woman and her father as vengeance on Samson or as rough justice for him is left open by Barnes and Pulpit and denied by Ellicott. K&D notes that the thousand of vv. 15–16 “is of course a round number signifying a very great multitude, and has been adopted from the song into the historical account”; Cambridge says the numbers “belong to the extraordinary character of the story.” We record these as the sources give them and take no side the sources do not support.
Sources. BSB text and Berean interlinear with Strong's numbering; commentary quoted verbatim from the public-domain authors named by tag. Matthew Henry's entries here are block comments on 15:1–8, 15:9–17 and 15:18–20 rather than verse-by-verse notes, so his remarks are quoted against the verse they most nearly treat. The Gill entry at v. 5 is capped in the brief; nothing in the capped remainder is relied on. Cambridge's suggestion that a Canaanite fire-rite lies behind the fox episode, and its proposal that Samson “was made to play the part which properly belonged to the Sun-god,” are recorded as that commentator's hypothesis and are not adopted here. Cambridge's and Budde/Moore/Nowack's source-critical account of v. 20 standing before chapter 16 is likewise reported, not endorsed; K&D explicitly denies that any critical conclusion about multiple sources can be drawn from it.
Threads. Every badge basis above is a Verifier-computed shared-lexeme set, quoted with its canon frequency, except where the note says otherwise. Cross-Testament links carry no Strong's basis by definition and are tiered structural. Two links are flagged: the Etam identification and the emended “unto Lehi” reading at 2 Samuel 23:11. The ⚙ layer throughout is fallible synthesis and is marked wherever it moves beyond what a named source or the interlinear states.
✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)