being invited was to plunder them, and that Samson's wife was an accomplice in the plot for impoverishing her own countrymen, and she shall suffer for it. A vivid picture of the unscrupulousness, barbarous cruelty, and covetousness of the Philistines]. (16) 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 [my countrymen], 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? (17) And she wept before him the seven days [see note on ver. 14], while their feast lasted; and it came to pass on the seventh day, that he told her, because she lay sore upon him [see Prov. xxvii. 15]: and she told the riddle to the children of her people. (18) And the men of the city [the thirty young men, 'companions' invited, ver. 11], said unto him on the seventh day before the sun went down, What (is) sweeter than honey? and what (is) stronger than a lion? [they answer in a shrewd style, as if they had guessed it]. And he said unto them, If ye had not plowed with my heifer, ye had not found out my riddle. [His proverbial and smart reply (mashal) intimates, that they had not the wit to solve his enigma till he had disclosed it to his wife, who, he sees, had divulged it to them, probably through the friend of the bridegroom who supplanted Samson from the place which he ought to have had in her heart (ver. 20)] (19) And the Spirit of the LORD [JEHOVAH] came upon him [see note ch. xiii. 25). The impulses of the Holy Spirit came at intervals. The prophets had not the Spirit of prophecy always, nor apostles the power of working miracles (2 Tim. iv. 20)], and he went down to Askelon, and slew thirty men of them [of the wealthy Philistines; so that what the enemy had devised for Samson's hurt and loss (ver. 11, 15-18) ended in their own. The Septuagint (Alexandrine MS.) and Josephus read in (ver. 11), "when they were afraid (D, from 7 instead of ni?, from 7, "when they saw him ") that they brought thirty companions to watch him"], and took their spoi ['apparel,' 'clothes,' Chalitzoth (2 Sam. ii. 21)], and gave chang of garments unto them which expounded the riddle [Ps. xv. 4, end] and his anger was kindled [against his wife for treachery; h therefore did not return to her for some time. That the natural impulse of anger did not arise until after the exploit was achieved, shows that the moving impulse had not been carnal revenge, but "the Spirit of Jehovah " (ver. 19). Moreover, his anger was not against the Philistines to whom he had to pay the garments, but against her], and he went up to his father's house [at Zorea, without her]. (20) But Samson's wife was (given) to his companion, whom he had used as his friend [the one of the thirty companions whom he had made "the 'friend' of the bridegroom" (John iii. 29), at the marriage feast, -the bride's escort to the bridegroom. Perhaps too, as Samson's reply may hint (ver. 18), she already loved him too well. The faithlessness of the Philistines,-their laxity as to the sanctity of marriage, and the sad results of alliances of believers with unbelievers, appear in this history. Samson, though justly angry, had never repudiated his wife (ch. xv. 1, 2). The parents, instead of trying to atone for the wrong done to him by their daughter, made the evil irreparable by giving her to another, and that other the one of all men most bound to mainain the honour of the bridegroom and the bride]. CHAPTER XV. SAMSON'S FURTHER EXPLOITS WITH WEAK INSTRUMENTS, IN THE (1) But it came to pass within a while after, in the time of wheat harvest [the time suitable for Samson's device, ver. 5], that Samson visited his wife with a kid [a customary present (Gen. xxxviii. 17)]; and he said, I will go into my wife into the chamber [the woman's apartment. His impulsive generosity appears in his so readily forgiving his wife's falseness to him, after the first ebullition of his anger at it]: but her father would not suffer him to go in. (2) 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 [Lev. xviii. 18, an incestuous union forbidden by God, (see Song Sol. viii. 8, 9); Christ redeems the younger as well as the elder sister: the Gentiles as well as the Jews]? take her ["let her be thine"], instead of her [the elder sister]. (3) And Samson said concerning [or to] them, [her father and the surrounding Timnathites], Now shall I be more blameless than [rather, "I shall be blameless before" (as in Numb. xxxii. 22), literally, from (?), i.e., in respect to] the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure [they have themselves to blame for it. This wrong which the Timnathite Philistines have done me relieves me from any obligation that I was under to them because of my marriage to a Timnathite. That obligation was what had made him go off to Ashkelon on a raid (xiv. 19), now he is free in respect to all Philistines everywhere; so he takes his revenge on the spot, appearing to avenge a private wrong, he was really avenging the oppression of his people]. (4) And Samson went out and caught three hundred foxes [Shualim, akin to the Persian Schaghal; from Shaal, "to burrow." The Hebrew includes also 'jackals'; gregarious animals, and easily caught. They have been seen in a flock to the number of two hundred (Bellonius, quoted by Maurer), and are found still in the neighbourhood of the Philistine Gaza. That they abounded in Palestine, appears from the names of places compounded with Shual, as Hazar-Shual, Shaalbim, our own Foxhayes: Shual. The fox is solitary, and therefore unsuitable for Samson's purpose. Jackals, as herding together, would readily run in couples, tied by a cord two or three yards long. Samson being the recognised judge of Israel, probably had helpers to catch and let them loose from different places, so as to consume the more of the Philistines' corn. The jackals shrinking from the flame, swift of foot, and proverbially oblique in their course, would carry destruction in various quarters, without compromising or injuring the Israelites with their masters, the Philistines; nay, it would be relieving his countrymen of a noxious animal], and took firebrands [torches], and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst between two tails. (5) 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 [the cut and bound-up sheaves], and also the standing corn [if he had attached the torches to the jackals singly, they would soon have been extinguished; but when bound together in couples, they rushed wildly in different directions, and then together carried the flame into the standing corn, retarding one another by their struggles till the corn took ire], with the vineyards [that region was famed for "the hoicest vine," called Sorek (Heb., Isa. v. 2; Gen. xlix. 11), hich gave its name to the valley (Judg. xvi. 4). Eshcol was ear (Numb. xiii. 23). Foxes and jackals like young grapes, nd would resort to them (Song Sol. ii. 15)] (and) olives. (6) hen the Philistines said, Who hath done this? And they nswered, Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite [i.e., Timnathite], cause he [the Timnathite] had taken his wife, and given her to s companion. And the Philistines came up [incensed at their avy losses, owing to the faithlessness of the Timnathite and s daughter], and burnt her and her father with fire [probably burning the house to the ground with its occupants. Burning was sometimes the penalty of adultery (Gen. xxxviii. 24); though stoning was the more merciful mode of death under the Mosaic law (Deut. xxii. 21). The vexation of the Philistines for their crops was overruled unto making them God's executioners of wrath on their own guilty countryman and his daughter. Treachery recoils on the treacherous (Isa. xxxiii. 1). The very evil which she had sought to avert by betraying her husband's secret, she brought on herself by that very treachery (ch. xiv. 15)]. (7) And Samson said unto them, Though ye have done this, yet will I be avenged of you [DN DN," As surely as ye have done like this (Kazoth), so surely I will not cease till I be avenged of you." Or else, as English version, "Though ye have done in such a cruel way as this, and hope that I am appeased by the vengeance you have taken on those who wronged me, yet I will be further avenged," &c.], and after that I will cease. (8) And he smote them hip and thigh [Heb., "leg upon thigh," Shoqu 'al yareek. He cut them in pieces, so that their legs and thighs were scattered one upon another, ie., he totally destroyed them (Gesenius). He smote them on the leg and thigh: proverbial for a great wound (Maurer): a cruel, unsparing slaughter (Keil): the German proverb "arm and leg:” the French "back and belly:" not as Speaker's Commentary, a proverbial expression drawn from the joints of the sacrifices, the choice pieces, the thigh and shoulder (Exod. xxix. 22, so translates the Hebrew for 'hip'), representing the great and mighty but there is no allusion to sacrifices in the context: and no need for so far-fetched an explanation], with a great slaughter: and he went down and dwelt in the top [rather, "the cleft"] of the rock Etam [he avoided towns, lest he should endanger his countrymen with the Philistines. Etam, now Beit 'Atab, a steep, stony, bare knoll, standing in the midst of the narrow valleys, itself without a blade of corn, but having olive groves and three abundant springs at its feet. Not far from Manoah's patrimony, from which Samson "went down to it, there is a singular rock tunnel, 250 feet long, 7 or 8 feet high, and 18 feet wide, answering to the 'cleft' of Etam rock, roughly hewn in the stone, running from the midst of the |