¹¹ Then three thousand men of Judah went down to the cleft of the rock of Etam, and they said to Samson, “Do you not know that the Philistines are rulers over us? What then have you done to us?” He replied, “As they did to me, so I have done to them.”^(A)

⁴ His father and mother did not know that this was from the Lord, for he was seeking a pretext to act against the Philistines. At that time the Philistines had dominion over Israel.^(A)

The Birth of Samson

13 The Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord gave them into the hand of the Philistines forty years.^(A)

⁴⁷ “Because you did not serve the Lord your God joyfully and with gladness of heart for the abundance of everything,^{(A) 48} therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness and lack of everything. He will put an iron yoke on your neck until he has destroyed you.^(B)

¹³ The Lord will make you the head and not the tail; you shall be only at the top and not at the bottom—if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today by diligently observing them,