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Judges 15
And a while after, when the days of the wheat harvest
were at hand, Samson came, meaning to visit his wife,
and he brought her a kid of the flock. And when he would
have gone into her chamber as usual, her father would
not suffer him, saying:
I thought thou hadst hated her, and therefore I gave
her to thy friend: but she hath a sister, who is younger
and fairer than she, take her to wife instead of her.
And Samson answered him: From this day I shall be blameless
in what I do against the Philistines: for I will do
you evils.
And he went and caught three hundred foxes, and coupled
them tail to tail, and fastened torches between the
tails.
And setting them on fire he let the foxes go, that they
might run about hither and thither. And they presently
went into the standing corn of the Philistines. Which
being set on fire, both the corn that was already carried
together, and that which was yet standing, was all burnt,
insomuch, that the flame consumed also the vineyards
and the oliveyards.
Then the Philistines said: Who hath done this thing?
And it was answered: Samson the son in law of the Thamnathite,
because he took away his wife, and gave her to another,
hath done these things. And the Philistines went up
and burnt both the woman and her father.
But Samson said to them: Although you have done this,
yet will I be revenged of you, and then I will be quiet.
And he made a great slaughter of them, so that in astonishment
they laid the calf of the leg upon the thigh. And going
down he dwelt in a cavern of the rock Etam.
Then the Philistines going up into the land of Juda,
camped in the place which afterwards was called Lechi,
that is, the Jawbone, where their army was spread.
And the men of the tribe of Juda said to them: Why are
you come up against us? They answered: We are come to
bind Samson, and to pay him for what he hath done against
us.
Wherefore three thousand men of Juda, went down to the
cave of the rock Etam, and said to Samson: Knowest thou
not that the Philistines rule over us? Why wouldst thou
do thus? And he said to them: As they did to me, so
have I done to them.
And they said to him, We are come to bind thee and to
deliver thee into the hands of the Philistines. And
Samson said to them: Swear to me, and promise me, that
you will not kill me.
They said: We will not kill thee: but we will deliver
thee up bound. And they bound him with two new cords,
and brought him from the rock Etam.
Now when he was come to the place of the Jawbone, and
the Philistines shouting went to meet him, the spirit
of the Lord came strongly upon him: and as the flax
is wont to be consumed at the approach of fire, so the
bands with which he was bound were broken and loosed.
And finding a jawbone, even the jawbone of an ass which
lay there, catching it up, be slew therewith a thousand
men.
And he said: With the jawbone of an ass, with the jaw
of the colt of asses I have destroyed them, and have
slain a thousand men.
And when he had ended these words singing, he threw
the jawbone out of his hand, and called the name of
that place Ramathlechi, which is interpreted the lifting
up of the jawbone.
Arid being very thirsty, he cried to the Lord, and said:
Thou hast given this very great deliverance and victory
into the hand of thy servant: and behold I die for thirst,
and shall fall into the hands of the uncircumcised.
Then the Lord opened a great tooth in the jaw of the
ass, and waters issued out of it. And when he had drank
them he refreshed his spirit, and recovered his strength.
Therefore the name of that place was called, The Spring
of him that invoked from the jawbone, until this present
day.
And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines
twenty years.
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