Judges 14:1

Chapter 14 Samson's Activities Begin.

This chapter deals with the commencement of Samson's life's work, with his courtship and marriage of a Philistine woman, his meeting with a young lion as he went courting, his killing of it with his bare hands, and afterwards of his finding honey in it. It speaks of a riddle which he framed out of this incident and put to his companions at his pre-marriage feast to solve as a bet, giving them seven days to solve it; of their solving it by means of his wife, who extracted the secret from him, which led him to slay thirty Philistines in order to make good his promise of thirty linen cloths and changes of raiment, and then to leave his newly married wife for a while, only to discover that she was then given to his companion.

Judges 14:1

‘ And Samson went down to Timnah, and saw a woman in Timnah, of the daughters of the Philistines.'

There can be no doubt that Samson was to some extent a womaniser, something which he had to battle with all his life. He found it difficult to leave women alone. (Most men of his day married the woman chosen for them by their parents). Timnah was in Judah (Joshua 15:57), in the lowlands (the lower hill country), but was under the control of the Philistines, and on a trip there he saw a Philistine woman who took his fancy. The woman would be fairly high born for she was of the ruling class, the Philistines. Thus in seeking occasion against the Philistines he was able to combine business with pleasure.