Judges 15:9–19

⁹Then the Philistines went up, camped in Judah, and deployed themselves near the town of Lehi.^b

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.”

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.

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.”

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.

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. ¹⁵He found the fresh jawbone of a donkey, reached out his hand and took it, and struck down a thousand men. ¹⁶Then Samson said:

“With the jawbone of a donkey

I have piled them into heaps.^c

With the jawbone of a donkey

I have slain a thousand men.”

¹⁷And when Samson had finished speaking, he cast the jawbone from his hand; and he named that place Ramath-lehi.^d

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?”

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,^e and it remains in Lehi to this day.