Bible in One Year Day 93 (Judges 12-15, Psalm 146)

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Day 93:  Strengths and Weaknesses 

 

Agape Bible Study 

Judges 12 - 15 

Judges 12:1-6 ~ War between Ephraim and Gilead

As in the confrontation with Gideon in Judges 8:1-3, the Ephraimites take offense because they say that they were not summoned to join the battle against the Ammonites and threaten Jephthah (verse 1).   It is a charge Jephthah refutes (verse 2).  The Ephraimites are ambitious and hope to gain dominance over the other tribes.   They are alarmed at the wide powers granted to Jephthah and are looking for an excuse to eliminate him.     Unfortunately they are the losers in the civil war that follows.  

Question: To catch any straggling Ephraimites trying to cross the Jordan back into Ephraimite lands, what do the Gileadites do?  
Answer: The Gileadites use a password meaning "ear of wheat" that the Ephraimites pronounce differently.   They execute anyone who cannot pronounce it as a Gileadite would.  

Perhaps this episode demonstrates the distancing linguistically as well as emotionally and spiritually between the tribes on the east and west sides of the Jordan River.   It was not God's plan that any tribes should remain on the east side of the River, but the tribes of Gad and Reuben petitioned Moses to let them occupy the land taken from the Amorite kings and finally Moses agreed (Num 32).   Eventually the tribes in the Transjordan will be completely lost to Israel when the Assyrians conquer the eastern tribes and exile them into pagan lands to the east (1 Chr 5:26).

Have you noticed any similarities between the stories of Gideon and Jephthah and the stories of Abimelech and Jephthah?
Question: How are the stories of the "valiant warrior" Gideon (Judg 6:12) and the "valiant warrior" Jephthah (Judg 11:1) alike?
Answer: As in the story of Gideon, the "valiant warrior" Jephthah started out with much promise but in the end failed both himself and his people with his excessive pride and his cruelty.   Gideon's pride caused him to viciously destroy two Israelite villages who offended him.   It was because of his pride that Jephthah refused to release his daughter from his vow.   His excessive pride also caused the civil war with Ephraim and the failure to secure peace within the tribes of Israel.

Question: Women play a role in both the Abimelech and Jephthah narratives.   What similar role do women play in both narratives?
Answer: Like the Abimelech narrative, a woman comes at both the beginning and near the end of Jephthah's story:

• Abimelech's unnamed Canaanite mother who gave him life and an unnamed Canaanite woman ended it.
• Jephthah's unnamed prostitute mother who gave him life and his unnamed daughter whose life he ended.

Judges 12:7 ~ Conclusion

This verse serves as the seventh part of the Jephthah deliverer sequence which should be the concluding statement of how long peace lasted.   However, this statement only mentions how long Jephthah judged Israel which is evidently the relatively short period of six years of peace.   This becomes the new seventh part statement in the cycle that the judge judged for a certain period of time (see the same statement for the next three judges in Judg 12:9, 11; and 16:31).   As Israelite society grows more spiritually corrupt, so do the judges.

The deliverer cycle for Jephthah:

1. Announcement of Israel's wrong doing (Judg 10:6)
2. Statement of Yahweh's response (Judg 10:7)
3. Notice of how long Israel was oppressed by the enemy (Judg 10:8)
4. Reference to Israel's repentance in "crying out" to God (Judg 10:10)
5. Announcement of God "raising up" a deliver is missing, but God does clothe Jephthah in His spirit (Judg 11:29)
6. Description of how deliverance was achieved (Judg 11:32-33)
7. Concluding statement of how long peace lasted is missing: "Jephthah judged Israel for six years" (Judg 12:7)

Gideon and Jephthah

• Both Gideon and Jephthah are called "valiant warrior" in the text: God addressed Gideon as "valiant warrior" in Judges 6:12 and the inspired writer called Jephthah a "valiant warrior" in Judges 11:1.
• Both men began their careers as judge-deliverers "clothed in the Spirit of Yahweh" (Judges 6:34 and 11:29).
• Although both, through God's intervention, became "valiant warriors," their success was followed by the sins of pride, arrogance, and unnecessary cruelty.
• Both men made war on their own Israelite kinsmen: Gideon destroyed two Israelite towns for refusing food to his men (Judg 8:13-17), and Jephthah began a civil war with the Israelites of Ephraim and killed thousands of men from that tribe (Judg 12:1-6).

Abimelech and Jephthah

• Both Abimelech and Jephthah had Canaanite mothers and the mention of their births begins each narrative (Judg 8:31-32; 11:1b).
• The role of a woman in the life of each man both begins and ends each of their narratives: for Abimelech a Canaanite woman gives him life and a Canaanite woman ends his life (Judg 8:31; 9:52-53), and for Jephthah a Canaanite woman gives him life and in the end he takes the life of his daughter (Judg 11:1b; 11:30-39).
• Both men became the leaders of "empty men" (Judg 9:4; 11:3).
• Both men made war on their own people: Abimelech made war on his mother's town of Shechem and Jephthah made war on the Israelite tribe of Ephraim (Judg 9:39-49; 12:1-6).

The failures of these three men illustrate the moral and spiritual decay of the Israelites as a people in the era of the Judges.

The Minor Judges Ibzan, Elon, and Abdon

The narrative of the major judge Jephthah is followed by the short account of three minor Judges.  After the accounts of the judge-deliverers on the east side of the Jordan River (Jair and Jephthah), the inspired writer returns to the struggles of the tribes on the west side of the Jordan. Judges 12:8-15 completes the account of the minor judges. Their short stories have been distributed across chapters 3-12 in groups of one: Shamgar, two: Tola and Jair, and three: Ibzan, Elon and Abdon, with each minor judge introduced with the word "after" (Judg 3:31; 10:1, 3; 12:8, 11, and 13).

Judges 12:8-10 ~ The Judge Ibzan

It appears Ibzan was the first leader to encourage marriages outside the tribal clan. This does not include marriages outside the tribe; daughters who were their father's heirs when there was no male heirs could only inherit their father's ancestral lands if they married within the tribe (Lev 27:1-11; Num 36:5-9). If they married outside the tribe, the ancestral land passed to the next closest male. The political marriages Ibzan arranged gave his clan more power and prestige.

Judges 12:11-12 ~ The Judge Elon

Elon's tribe is Zebulun in the Galilee. Elon is named as one of the sons of Zebulun who made the migration into Egypt with the family of Jacob-Israel (Gen 46:14), and an Elonite clan is named in the genealogy of the tribe of Zebulun in Numbers 26:26-26. There are two towns called Aijalon: one is located in the south in territory originally assigned to the tribe of Dan before they migrated north (Josh 10:12; 19:42), but this judge's town is obviously the Aijalon located in the land of Zebulun.

Judges 12:13-15 ~ The Judge Abdon

Abdon was an Ephraimite who lived in the highlands of Canaan that was once controlled by the Amalekites, descendants of Amalek the grandson of Esau (Gen 36:15-16). The Amalekites were a nomadic people who inhabited territory assigned to Israel, Judah and the Transjordan states.   

Chapter 13: The Birth of Samson

The great nation of Egypt had been the regional super power for over a thousand years, but political turmoil that began in the mid-14^th century BC finally led in the 12^th century BC to Egypt's collapsed from within and the nation separated into several weak states. The failure of Egypt to maintain its control over its client states including the Levant (Syria, Phoenicia and Canaan) produced a power vacuum that allowed for an unhindered Israelite conquest of Canaan but unfortunately later also allowed Israel's neighboring states the freedom to invade and harass the Israelites. These enemies included the Sea Peoples who had been driven out of Egypt in one last display of power by the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramesses III (1190 BC). The survivors had settled in five city-states along the coast of southern Canaan to become a people known as the Philistines. The Philistines now became the Israelite's greatest enemy and the deliverer God sent was Samson.

The story of the Judge Samson both attracts and repels us. He is the only hero Judge whose birth is foretold by an angel and who is consecrated to God from his mother's womb. He is powerful but he is also flawed. His is hot-blooded, sensual, and violent, but he serves the God of Israel and none other. The Philistines are his enemies, but he is fatally attracted to their women. Samson is, in fact, his own worst enemy. His is the last narrative of a deliverer-judge in the Book of Judges and his story is the longest, spanning four chapters. The narrative begins with another un-named women, the mother of Samson, and ends with the fourth named women in the Book of Judges, the Philistine woman Delilah. Notice how many times women are mentioned in the narrative.

The narrative of Samson can be divided into four parts:

1. Samson's miraculous birth
2. Samson's marriage
3. Samson's one-man war with the Philistines
4. Samson's failure, redemption, and victory

Judges 13:1-7 ~ The Prophecy of Samson's Birth

The Samson narrative begins, like the other major judge narratives, with the formula statement "the Israelites began doing what was evil in Yahweh's eyes." This is the last time the formula statement is used to introduce a judge-deliverer and the eighth time in the Book of Judges. It introduced God's first intervention with Israel in Judges 2:11 and has been repeated eight times: seven times within the section on the history of the Judges (3:7, 12 [twice]; 4:1; 6:1; 10:6 and 13:1). The formula statement reminds us that the root of Israel's problem is maintaining her covenant with Yahweh.

Chapter 13 contains four of the seven statements in the typical judge-deliverer cycle:

1. Announcement of Israel's wrong doing (13:1a)
2. Statement of Yahweh's response (13:1b)
3. Notice of how long Israel was oppressed by the enemy (13:1b)
4. Reference to Israel's repentance in "crying out" to God (absent from the narrative)
5. Announcement of God sending a deliver (13:5, 25)

Perhaps the "crying out" for deliverance is absent because the Israelites dominated by the Philistines had grown so used to Philistine rule they no longer sought autonomy as the incident in Judges 15:9-13 will suggest.

The narrative of Samson begins with information about his background like the other narratives. His father is Manoah, a member of the tribe of Dan from the town of Zorah. Zorah is listed in Joshua 19:40 as one of the towns allotted to the tribe of Dan. It was located eighteen miles due west of Jerusalem in the low hill country adjacent to the coastal plain. Two of the other towns, Eshtaol and Timnah allotted to Dan will also be mentioned in the narrative of Samson. The territory belonging to the tribe of Dan was in central Canaan between the lands of the tribe of Benjamin to the east, the coastal plain to the west, and the tribe of Judah to the south. Unfortunately, the tribe of Dan could not dispossess the Canaanites and the Danites were being squeezed out by them (Judg 1:34-35). Therefore, the clans of Dan from Zorah and Eshtaol migrated and were able to secure lands about ten miles north of Lake Huleh on the northern limits of Israel (Judg 18:1-31).⁽¹⁾ This migration may have already have taken place before Deborah and Barak led the battle against the king of Hazor since the tribe of Dan is mentioned with the tribe of Asher whose tribal lands were also in the north (Judg 5:17). The narrative of Samson concerns those Danites who did not join the migration but remained in the Danite territory now claimed by the Philistines.

Question: The wife of Manoah is one of five barren women in the Bible who, with divine intervention, bear sons who have a mission to fulfill in salvation history. Can you name the other women and the sons who become God's agent? 
Answer:

1. Sarah the wife of Abraham and mother of Isaac.
2. Rebekah wife of Isaac and mother of Jacob-Israel.
3. Hannah the wife of Elkanah and mother of Samuel.
4. Elizabeth wife of Zechariah and mother of John the Baptist.

Question: What other men and women in salvation history receive a divine annunciation of a birth in addition to Manoah's wife?   
Answer:

1. Abraham the husband of Sarah.
2. Zechariah the husband of Elizabeth.
3. Mary of Nazareth.

Question: What is different about the other annunciations by an angelic messenger?
Answer: In the annunciation to Abraham, Zachariah and the Virgin Mary the angel told them what to name the child. In the annunciation to Manoah's wife no name is given and she is free to choose a name.

The mysterious "Suffering Servant" in Isaiah 49:1 was also "called" when he "was in the womb" and "given a name," and the prophet Jeremiah was consecrated from his mother's womb and appointed a prophet (Jer 1:5).

Question: What message does the angel-messenger give the wife of Manoah in this divine annunciation?
Answer:

1. Drink no wine or fermented liquor.
2. Eat nothing unclean.
3. Never cut the child's hair.
4. The child is to be God's Nazirite.
5. He will start rescuing Israel from the Philistines.

The promised child is to be a consecrated Nazirite according to the commands in Numbers chapter 6:1-21. 

1. To abstain from wine, fermented liquor and from any products from the vine including grapes, raisins, grape juice, vinegar; etc.
2. No razor will touch his head until the vow is completed.
3. Avoid a corpse.

In addition it is understood that all other commands and prohibitions of the Sinai Covenant are to be dutifully observed by the Nazirite including the eating of only "clean" animals and the avoidance of all "unclean" foods.

Question: What Nazirite restriction is absent from the Angel's instructions? Why?
Answer: The only requirement that was not mentioned was that a Nazirite could have no contact with the dead, even a dead relative. Since Samson's mission is to be a warrior-judge, perhaps this requirement was not to be enforced in his case.

The mother of a Nazirite from the womb is bound to the same restrictions in ingesting food and drink because the baby in the womb receives nourishment from her. The term Nazirite is related to the verb nazar, "to separate" or "abstain" (Num 6:1-3). Usually to take a Nazirite vow was entirely voluntary and limited to a specific period for a special purpose, but parents could take a vow on behalf of their child and effectively consecrated a child for a period of time or for a lifetime, as in the case of the judge-prophet Samuel (1 Sam 1:11, 24-28). In Samuel's case his parents made the vow for him but in Samson's case the vow is not taken by the parents.   Samson's Nazirite consecration is divinely determined rather than voluntarily assumed and it is for life. During the period of the vow the Nazirite had to observe dietary rules and other disciplines as the outward signs of his separation and consecration to God. He was to be committed to keeping himself ceremonially clean like members of the ministerial priesthood.

The fifth part of the deliverer cycle is God's announcement that He is sending or "raising up" a deliverer to save the Israelites from their enemies.
Question: How are the Angel's words to Samson's mother different from the usual deliverer announcement? See verse 5 and compare it with 13:5 with 3:9; 3:15 and 6:14?
Answer: He tells her that her son will start saving/delivering her people from the Philistines.

The woman immediately ran to share the news with her husband that a person who had the appearance of a "majestic" or "awesome" man came to her. She was in such awe of this person, who she has already determined was a divine person, that she did not ask him any questions for fear of offending him. 

Judges 13:8-18 ~ Manoah's Prayer

Question: What two petitions does Manoah make in his prayer?
Answer:

1. That the man of God should come again and appear to both of them.
2. That they be instructed in how to raise the child.

Question: Why does Manoah want the "man of God" to come to him as well?
Answer: His petition is motivated either by the natural desire to know more, or a nagging doubt that his wife has correctly understood, or he feels any such message should be given to him as the head of the family. His reason is that they do not know what they are to do for the child after he is born.

God's response to Manoah's petition is to send the Angel not to Manoah but instead, for a second time, to his wife.  She brings her husband to the Angel.

Question: Does the Angel answer either of Manoah's petitions in his earlier prayer or Manoah's repeated second petition in the form of a question in verse 12? Why?
Answer: No. It is clear that the woman is God's partner in the birth of His consecrated Nazirite. 

Manoah is prepared to observe the rules of hospitality by inviting the stranger to have a meal with them. He still does not recognize the true identity of the stranger and thinks the "man" is a prophet.
Question: Why does the Angel tell Manoah he cannot eat their food? What does his answer tell us about Jesus who ate with His disciples and Apostles after the Resurrection?
Answer: The Angel is a spiritual being and not human, therefore he cannot consume material food. That Jesus both ate and drank after His Resurrection demonstrates that He was not only resurrected spiritually but also physically.

The Sacrifice of Manoah (Eustache LeSueur)

Judges 13:19-25 ~ Manoah's Offering and the Birth of Samson

Like Gideon's offer of hospitality for his visitor in Judges 6:17-24, Manoah intends to fulfill the duties of hospitality, still unaware of the true identity of his visitor. As with Gideon, the fire theophany erases any doubt as to the identity of the visitor and Manoah is filled with fear like Gideon that he may die for having come into the presence of the divine. His wife comforts his fears. It is the woman's intuition that has been correct twice: first in recognizing the identity of the visitor as a divine personage and second in the assurance that God does not intend to kill them.

It appears that many of the Israelites had reverted back to the practice of worship and sacrifice during the age of the Patriarchs when every father of a family acted as a priest and offered sacrifice wherever and whenever he felt the need. This practice was supposed to change with the ratification of the Sinai Covenant in which an ordained priesthood offered sacrifice at God's one altar at God's one Sanctuary (Lev 17:1-9; Dt 12:5-14).   However, after taking possession of the Promised Land permission was given for animals to be humanely killed and eaten for food but not for sacrifice wherever the people settled (Dt 12:15-16); however, as in the case of Gideon, Yahweh has given His permission for Manoah and his wife to give an offering on a rock.

Samson grew up within the two towns out of the fourteen towns originally assigned to the tribe of Dan (Josh 19:41; 18:11). Zorah and Eshtaol were about seven and a half miles apart. The "Camp of Dan," located between the towns, may have been a militia camp to defend the remaining members of the tribe of Dan living in the two towns from the Philistines, or it may have been the only area remaining to the Danites whose towns are now occupied by Philistines. Samson's story begins and ends between Zorah and Eshtaol like Gideon's story began and ended at Ophrah (Judg 16:31). The Hebrew word issa is used for the fourteenth time in verse 24 since 13:2. It will continue to be a keyword in the Samson saga.

Chapter 14: The Judge Samson

Judges 14:1-11 ~ Samson Takes a Philistine Bride

Timnah was originally one of the fourteen cities given to the tribe of Dan and was about four miles west of Zorah and Eshtaol on the opposite side of the Valley of Sorek. It is now a Philistine city. Samson has reached young adulthood. In going "down" to Timnah, Samson is crossing the line physically and metaphorically between Israel and Philistia and will be blurring the line between love and lust.

What father or mother hasn't feared or experienced the pain of their son or daughter choosing to love someone who was unsuitable? His parents are deeply disappointed. The first thing Samson's parents think to ask is why he hadn't found someone suitable within the tribe of his Danite "brothers"/kinsmen or from one of the other tribes of Israel?

Question: Does their disappointment only stem from the fact that their son wants to marry a woman who is not from their cultural background or traditions? 
Answer: The additional problem is that the Israelites were expressly forbidden to give their sons in marriage with pagan women.

This is an impossible situation for loving future grandparents since any children born of this union will be lost to them. The Israelites are to be a consecrated people set apart from the other peoples of the earth by the sign of circumcision which identifies them as an elect covenant people. In addition, to the Israelites the marital covenant involves the deepest possible union between a man and a woman in which the husband and wife, according to God's command, become "one flesh" (Gen 2:24).   How can their son take a wife from among the uncircumcised without betraying his separation to God as an Israelite; and if his uniqueness as an Israelite is compromised, how can his deeper consecration to God as a Nazirite be maintained? Their deepest fear must be that their special son is betraying his identity as an Israelite and may be jeopardizing his status as God's Nazirite.

Question: What is Samson's response to his parents question in verse 3a? What is his demand and why might he take this course of action concerning his parents?
Answer: There is no response to their question or an apology for their pain. He rejects the objections of his parents and like an insistent child, speaking of the woman as though she were an object, demands that they secure the object of his desire for him despite their concerns.

It is God's plan to move Samson forward in his role as a "deliverer." It is a role he has perhaps been hesitant or too lazy to fulfill now that he is an adult. God will use his attraction for the women of the enemy to move forward his plan. The Philistines had spread inland from the coast and were now dominating the highlands. Soon they would be threatening the whole of Israel. God cannot approve of Samson's desire to marry a pagan woman who is not in covenant with Him since it is a decision that is contrary to His commands. He will, however, use this turn of events to move forward His divine plan to stop the Philistines from dispossessing Israel of the Promised Land.

Samson's Fight with the Lion (Lucas Cranach the Elder)

Samson accompanied his parents to Timnah to make arrangements with the woman's parents, but along the way, as they approach a vineyard, he separates from them (verse 6). The separation on the journey is symbolic of his emotional separation from his parents. Samson comes unexpectedly upon a young lion in the vineyard and kills it. The killing of the young lion in the vineyard is a demonstration of Samson's great strength, but it is also a metaphor for Samson and Israel. In Scripture Israel is described metaphorically as God's vineyard (for example see Is 5:1-17; 27:2-5; Ps 80:8-18), and young Samson is the young lion in the vineyard that is Israel.
Question: What is the metaphorical imagery in this episode? What question does the imagery raise?
Answer: Like the young lion, Samson is wild and unpredictable but also powerful. With help from the Spirit of Yahweh, he conquers the young lion in the vineyard on his journey to Timnah. But the question is will he be able to use the Spirit of Yahweh to conquer his own wildness like he conquered the lion in order to be an effective agent of God in Israel's deliverance from the Philistines?

Do not miss the fact that Samson separates himself from his parents on the journey and then fails to tell them about his adventure.   The symbolic elements of the episode in the vineyard in 14:5-6:

Element	Symbolism
Samson separates from his parents on the journey	Beginning of Samson's emotional distancing himself from his parents
The vineyard	Israel
The young lion	The young Samson
Yahweh's Spirit aids him in conquering the wild and unpredictable lion	The invitation for Samson to use Yahweh's Spirit to conquer his wild and unpredictable human nature
Withholding the event from his parents	Distancing himself from his parents established
Michal E. Hunt Copyright © 2013

There is a lot at stake here. Samson's wild, willful, and out-of-control human nature threatens God's plan for Israel and his own future if he is unable to master himself and submit himself in obedience to God's plan.

Question: Why doesn't he tell his parents about killing the lion?
Answer: He does not tell his parents probably because he does not want them to insist that he undergoes the required ritual purification and a sin sacrifice. Any contact with a dead animal required ritual purification and eating any part of a dead animal or anything that has come in contact with a dead animal was strictly forbidden (Lev 5:1-2, 5-6; 11:24-28).   But he is also distancing himself from his parents' involvement in his life.

Question: When he returns to his parents, he shares the honey with them but why doesn't he tell them where the honey came from? What is his double sin? 
Answer: That he did not tell his parents previously of his condition of ritual uncleanliness was bad enough, but now he makes them ritually unclean as well by giving them unclean food from the carcass of a dead animal. He is guilty of shamelessly manipulating his parents and his sin is both a failure to honor his parents as commanded in the Ten Commandments and in making them a party to his sin.

Samson, like Adam, knew the food was forbidden, but Samson's parents did not know that their son had sinned by violating the laws of ritual purity according to the covenant with Yahweh and had also made them also a party to his sin. The young lion Samson, like a wild beast, wants what he sees regardless of rules or regulations.

Judges 14:12-20 ~ Samson's Wedding Feast

Wedding Feast of Samson (Rembrandt)

It was the custom for a wedding feast to last seven days (Gen 29:27). This is the first of two times that a secret of Samson's will be betrayed by a woman he loved. He may be as strong as a giant and as wild as a lion, but he is also as gullible as a child. It was not uncommon for there to be entertainment during the seven days of wedding feasting and Samson introduces entertainment in the form of a riddle.
Question: What is the problem with Samson's choice of a diversion?
Answer: It is provocative and is bound to cause bad feelings. It is also unfair since the other men have no way of knowing the event that is behind the riddle to allow them to solve it.

Samson's wife was in a difficult position, but instead of trusting her new husband and alerting him to the threat against her and her family it is clear that her loyalties still rest with her people. In his anger at his betrayal by his wife, Samson makes a reference to her that is particularly offensive in verse 18.
Question: How does Samson refer to his wife?
Answer: He refers to her as though she is a domesticated animal he owns that was illegally used by someone else.

Samson's mission is not to marry Philistines and feast with them; his mission is to fight the Philistines and stop their advance into Israelite territory. God's Spirit moved Samson to war; unfortunately he turns what should be a holy war into a personal vendetta and pays his debt to the Philistines groomsmen by murdering and robbing their countrymen. Then he returns to in a rage to his father's house. It will only make matters worse that his Philistine father-in-law has given his wife to the "best man" Philistine attendant who is one of his enemies.

Chapter 15: War with the Philistines

Judges 15:1-8 ~ Samson burns the Philistines' Harvest

Like a child who has behaved badly after a tantrum and then expects to resume life without the consequences for his actions, Samson returns to the home of his wife's father and expects to resume marital relations. His father-in-law explains that his elder daughter has been given to the chief Philistine groomsman at his wedding than then tries to make amends by offering Samson his wife's younger sister.
Question: How does Samson once again turn what should be a holy war into a personal vendetta?
Answer: He destroys the Philistines' crops and vineyards.

Question: Since the Philistines cannot find Samson, how do they get retribution for his crimes against them?
Answer: They burn down the house of Samson's Philistine father-in-law, destroying his entire family.

It is ironic that in her attempt to save her family from the threat of death by fire in 14:15 Samson's wife betrayed him. But her betrayal didn't save her; instead it cost her and her family their lives.

Judges 15:9-13 ~ The Men of Judah give Samson to the Philistines

The Philistines want Samson and since he is hiding in territory controlled by the Israelite tribe of Judah, they attack the city of Lehi and demand that the Judahites turn Samson over to them. The Judahites see this as a crisis that could end in the loss of their land in a war with the more powerful Philistines.
Question: What do they agree to do to resolve the crisis?
Answer: They agree to turn their Israelite kinsman Samson over to their enemies.

Lehi will later be known as Ramath-lehi (Jawbone Hill), a name that recalls the events of this episode. Its exact location is unknown but it must have been located somewhere where the territories of the Philistines and the tribal lands of Judah intersected between the central highlands and the coastal plain. Knowing about Samson's great strength, the Judahite warriors didn't take any changes and came for him with a large number of men, represented by the three thousand, or what is more likely "three contingents of men" which would be seventy-five men.  They are ready to please their Philistine enemies rather than support their God ordained deliverer.   Samson has been betrayed by his wife and now he is betrayed by his own people.

Question: Despite his betrayal, he does not want to fight his own people.  What does he do?
Answer: He negotiates the terms of his surrender: he makes them swear not to attack him and kill him; then he allows them to bind him with "new ropes."

Judges 15:14-20 ~ Samson defeats the Philistines

The men of Judah deliver Samson to the Philistines at Lehi, but as the shouting Philistines came running towards him to seize him, the Spirit of Yahweh came upon him in the same way the Spirit of God came upon him when he was under attack by the lion.

In both episodes it is God who takes charge and moves the events forward toward a conclusion that is a victory for Samson against a powerful enemy. God's spirit rushes upon His deliverer and the bonds that held him are miraculously loosened. Whether he really killed a thousand Philistines with a jawbone of an ass or not is not the point. Samson uses an unconventional weapon at hand like Shamgar used the ox-goad (3:31) and Jael used the tent peg (4:21). It is possible the words elep is do not refer to a thousand men but a "contingent/unit of men," which would be twenty-five men. The point is that this time Samson is God's deliverer fulfilling his mission of a holy war against Israel's enemy and winning victory through God's intervention.

In verse 16 Samson sings a short victory song, then he gives God the credit for the victory and then, like a child again, complains that he is thirsty. In his complaint he expresses the fear that he could fall into the hands of his "uncircumcised" enemy. 

Samson was judge in Israel in the day of the Philistines for twenty years.
This statement should be the conclusion of the Samson narrative. It is a concluding statement like those for the minor judges. Most of the major judges' narratives ended in "the country then had peace for x years":

• Othniel: The country then had peace for forty years (Judg 3:11).
• Ehud: ...and the country had peace for eighty years (Judg 3:30).
• Deborah in: And the country had peace for forty years. Judg 5:31
• Gideon in: ...and the country had peace for forty years... Judg 8:28

However, Samson like the major judge Jephthah does not have the same concluding deliverer statement. Both have the statement ".... judged Israel for x years" (12:7 and 15:20), while the minor judges' short narratives (with the exception of Shamgar, Deborah's contemporary in chapter 3) have a similar statement:

• Tola: He was judge in Israel for twenty-three years (Judg 10:2).
• Jair: ... who judged Israel for twenty-two years (Judg 10:3).
• Ibzan: He was judge in Israel for seven years (Judg 12:9b).
• Elon: He was judge in Israel for ten years (Judg 12:11).
• Abdon: He was judge in Israel for eight years (Judg 12:14b).

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A Daily Defense
DAY 93 Cursing the Fig Tree 

CHALLENGE: “Jesus displayed gratuitous malice when he cursed a fig tree for not having fruit when it wasn’t even the season for figs.” 

DEFENSE: Jesus didn’t display gratuitous malice. He was teaching a lesson.

“Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, [Jesus] went to see if he could find anything on it. When he came to it, he found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs” (Mark 11:13). The fig tree was known to produce fruit before putting forth leaves (Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia 16:49).

Seeing a fig tree in leaf, Jesus had reason to suppose it had put forth figs earlier than usual. By its leaves, the tree made an outward show indicating fruit, but there was none. Jesus therefore used it to teach a lesson. 

On other occasions, Jesus criticized Jewish leaders of making a false, outward show of spirituality (Matt. 23:5–7, 25–28). He also used fruit to symbolize the results of true spirituality (Matt. 7:16 20, 12:33, 13:23, etc.). 

In particular, he indicted the chief priests and Pharisees for failing to produce spiritual fruit, saying: “I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing the fruits of it” (Matt. 21:43). 

By cursing the fig tree and causing it to wither, Jesus symbolized the fate of spiritual hypocrites and the judgment coming upon the Jewish leadership. This is confirmed in Mark’s account. Scholars have noted that Mark often sequences material so that two halves of a story are interrupted by something important that sheds light on them. Places where Mark sandwiches material this way are known as “Markan sandwiches.” 

The cursing of the fig tree is such a case: Jesus first curses the fig tree (Mark 11:12–14), then he clears the temple of those abusing its holiness (11:15–19), and then the disciples return and see the fig tree withered (11:20–21). The Jewish authorities, despite their outward religiosity, had allowed the temple to be corrupted, and juxtaposing Jesus’ judgment on the temple with the cursing of the fig tree reveals the message that the latter teaches. It also foretells the doom of the Jewish authorities and the temple itself (Mark 12:1–12, 13:1–2).

Jimmy Akin, A Daily Defense: 365 Days (Plus One) to Becoming a Better Apologist