15Then she said to him, “How can you say you love me, when you don’t confide in me? This makes three times that you’ve deceived me and haven’t told me what makes you so strong.” 16Finally, after she had nagged him and pressed him constantly, he was wearied to death 17and he confided everything to her. He said to her, “No razor has ever touched my head, for I have been a nazirite to God since I was in my mother’s womb. If my hair were cut, my strength would leave me and I should become as weak as an ordinary man.”
18Sensing that he had confided everything to her, Delilah sent for the lords of the Philistines, with this message: “Come up once more, for he has confided everything to me.” And the lords of the Philistines came up and brought the money with them. 19She lulled him to sleep on her lap. Then she called in a man, and she had him cut off the seven locks of his head; thus she weakened himg and made him helpless: his strength slipped away from him. 20She cried, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!” And he awoke from his sleep, thinking he would break loosef and shake himself free as he had the other times. For he did not know that the LORD had departed from him. 21The Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes. They brought him down to Gaza and shackled him in bronze fetters, and he became a mill slave in the prison. 22After his hair was cut off, it began to grow back.
23Now the lords of the Philistines gathered to offer a great sacrifice to their god Dagon and to make merry. They chanted,
“Our god has delivered into our hands
Our enemy Samson.”
24hWhen the people saw him, they sang praises to their god, chanting,
“Our god has delivered into our hands
The enemy who devastated our land,
And who slew so many of us.”
25As their spirits rose, they said, “Call Samson here and let him dance for us.” Samson was fetched from the prison, and he danced for them. Then they put him between the pillars. 26And Samson said to the boy who was leading him by the hand, “Let go of me and let me feel the pillars that the temple rests upon, that I may lean on them.” 27Now the temple was full of men and women; all the lords of the Philistines were there, and there were some three thousand men and women on the roof watching Samson dance. 28Then Samson called to the LORD, “O Lord GOD! Please remember me, and give me strength just this once, O God, to take revenge of the Philistines, if only for one of my two eyes.” 29He embraced the two middle pillars that the temple rested upon, one with his right arm and one with his left, and leaned against them; 30Samson cried, “Let me die with the Philistines!” and he pulled with all his might. The temple came crashing down on the lords and on all the people in it. Those who were slain by him as he died outnumbered those who had been slain by him when he lived.
31His brothers and all his father’s household came down and carried him up and buried him in the tomb of his father Manoah, between Zorah and Eshtaol. He had led Israel for twenty years.
17 There was a man in the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Micah.a 2He said to his mother, “The eleven hundred shekels of silver that were taken from you, so that you uttered an imprecationb which you repeated in my hearing—I have that silver; I took it.” “Blessed of the LORD be my son,” said his mother.c 3He returned the eleven hundred shekels of silver to his mother; but his mother said, “I herewith consecrate the silver to the LORD, transferring it to my son to make a sculptured image and a molten image. I now return it to you.” 4So when he gave the silver back to his mother, his mother took two hundred shekels of silver and gave it to a smith. He made of it a sculptured image and a molten image, which were kept in the house of Micah.
5Now the man Micah had a house of God; he had made an ephod and teraphim and he had inducted one of his sons to be his priest. 6In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did as he pleased.
7There was a young man from Bethlehem of Judah, from the clan seat of Judah; he was a Levite and had resided there as a sojourner. 8This man had left the town of Bethlehem of Judah to take up residence wherever he could find a place. On his way, he came to the house of Micah in the hill country of Ephraim. 9“Where do you come from?” Micah asked him. He replied, “I am a Levite from Bethlehem of Judah, and I am traveling to take up residence wherever I can find a place.” 10“Stay with me,” Micah said to him, “and be a father and a priest to me, and I will pay you ten shekels of silver a year, an allowance of clothing, and your food.” d-The Levite went.-d 11The Levite agreed to stay with the man, and the youth became like one of his own sons. 12Micah inducted the Levite, and the young man became his priest and remained in Micah’s shrine. 13“Now I know,” Micah told himself, “that the LORD will prosper me, since the Levite has become my priest.”
18 In those days there was no king in Israel, and in those days the tribe of Dan was seeking a territory in which to settle; for to that day no territory had fallen to their lot among the tribes of Israel. 2The Danites sent out five of their number, from their clan seat at Zorah and Eshtaol— valiant men—to spy out the land and explore it. “Go,” they told them, “and explore the land.” When they had advanced into the hill country of Ephraim as far as the house of Micah, they stopped there for the night. 3While in the vicinity of Micah’s house, they recognized the speecha of the young Levite, so they went over and asked him, “Who brought you to these parts? What are you doing in this place? What is your business here?” 4He replied, “Thus and thus Micah did for me—he hired me and I became his priest.” 5They said to him, “Please, inquire of God; we would like to know if the mission on which we are going will be successful.” 6“Go in peace,” the priest said to them, “the LORD views with favor the mission you are going on.” 7The five men went on and came to Laish. They observed the people in it dwelling carefree, after the manner of the Sidonians, a tranquil and unsuspecting people, with no one in the land to molest them and b-with no hereditary ruler.-b Moreover, they were distant from the Sidonians and had no dealings with anybody.
8When [the men] came back to their kinsmen at Zorah and Eshtaol, their kinsmen asked them, “How did you fare?” 9They replied, “Let us go at once and attack them! For we found that the land was very good, and you are sitting idle! Don’t delay; go and invade the land and take possession of it, 10for God has delivered it into your hand. When you come, you will come to an unsuspecting people; and the land is spacious and nothing on earth is lacking there.”
11They departed from there, from the clan seat of the Danites, from Zorah and Eshtaol, six hundred strong, girt with weapons of war. 12They went up and encamped at Kiriath-jearim in Judah. That is why that place is called “the Camp of Dan” to this day; it lies west of Kiriath-jearim. 13From there they passed on to the hill country of Ephraim and arrived at the house of Micah. 14Here the five men who had gone to spy out the Laish region remarked to their kinsmen, “Do you know, there is an ephod in these houses, and teraphim, and a sculptured image and a molten image? Now you know what you have to do.” 15So they turned off there and entered the home of the young Levite at Micah’s house and greeted him. 16The six hundred Danite men, girt with their weapons of war, stood at the entrance of the gate, 17while the five men who had gone to spy out the land went inside and took the sculptured image, the ephod, the teraphim, and the molten image. The priest was standing at the entrance of the gate, and the six hundred men girt with their weapons of war, 18while those men entered Micah’s house and took c-the sculptured image, the molten image, the ephod, and the household gods.-c The priest said to them, “What are you doing?” 19But they said to him, “Be quiet; put your
