Judges 14:17

_AND SHE WEPT BEFORE HIM THE SEVEN DAYS, WHILE THEIR FEAST LASTED: AND IT CAME TO PASS ON THE SEVENTH DAY, THAT HE TOLD HER, BECAUSE SHE LAY SORE UPON HIM: AND SHE TOLD THE RIDDLE TO THE CHILDREN OF HER PEOPLE._ She wept before him the seven days, while their feast lasted. Three days of the seven had already elapsed before she was asked and had undertaken to do so. But the full week is mentioned, according to the Jewish mode of reckoning, which is followed in Scripture; just as it was foretold that our Lord should be three days and three nights in the grave, although He was not laid in the tomb until late in the first, and He left it very early on the third day. Having gotten the secret, she revealed it to her friends. PLOUGHED WITH MY HEIFER - a metaphor borrowed from agricultural pursuits, in which not only oxen, but cows and heifers, were, and continue to be, employed in dragging th...

10-20 Samson's riddle literally meant no more than that he had got honey, for food and for pleasure, from the lion, which in its strength and fury was ready to devour him. But the victory of Christ over Satan, by means of his humiliation, agonies, and death, and the exaltation that followed to him, with the glory thence to the Father, and spiritual advantages to his people, seem directly alluded to. And even death, that devouring monster, being robbed of his sting, and stripped of his horror, forwards the soul to the realms of bliss. In these and other senses, out of the eater comes forth meat, and out of the strong, sweetness. Samson's companions obliged his wife to get the explanation from him. A worldly wife, or a worldly friend, is to a godly man as an enemy in the camp, who will watch every opportunity to betray him. No union can be comfortable or lasting, where secrets cannot be i...

Verse Judges 14:17. _AND SHE WEPT BEFORE HIM_] Not through any love to him, for it appears she had none, but to oblige her paramours; and of this he soon had ample proof....

EXPOSITION JUDGES 14:10 SO HIS FATHER WENT DOWN. It is not clear what is meant by this mention of his father alone; but it was probably some part of the wedding etiquette that the father should go to the bride first alone; perhaps, as Kimehi says, to give her notice of the bridegroom's approach, that she might get ready. Among the preparations may have been the selection of the thirty young men to be "the children of the bride-chamber'' (Matthew 9:15). As these were all Philistines, the inference is that they were selected by the bride, just as with us the bride has the privilege of choosing the minister who is to officiate at the marriage. Judges 14:11

AND SHE WEPT BEFORE HIM THE SEVEN DAYS, WHILE THE FEAST LASTED,.... Those that remained of the seven days, from the fourth to this time, as Kimchi seems rightly to interpret it; though some think she began to beseech him with tears, on the first day of the feast, to impart the secret to her for her own satisfaction; and then, after the men had urged her on the fourth day to persuade her husband to it, she continued pressing him more earnestly with tears unto the seventh day. Some, as Abarbinel observes, and to whom he seems to incline, think there were fourteen days, seven days before the festival began, on the last of which they importuned her to try to get the secret from him, Judges 14:15, and that she continued pressing all the second seven days; but it seems quite clear that it was at the beginning of the seven days of the feast that the riddle was put, which was to be explained wit...

CHAPTER 14 THE FIRST DEEDS OF SAMSON _ 1. The woman in Timnath (Judges 14:1)_ 2. The killing of the young lion and the honey in the carcass (Judges 14:5) 3. The marriage feast and the riddle (Judges 14:10) 4. The riddle answered (Judges 14:15) 5. Thirty Philistines slain by Samson (Judges 14:19) Samson was called of God to be a true Nazarite, but in his life which was to manifest the Nazarite character he failed. “He went down to Timnath” is a foreboding beginning. It was a step in the wrong direction. He st

SAMSON'S MARRIAGE. As he could not take an unwelcomed bride to his father's house, Samson resolved to contract a marriage in which his wife would remain at her father's house (Judges 9:2 *). Judges 14:5 conveys the idea that his parents after all gave their consent, and even went down with him to the wedding. This in itself is improbable, and there is no indication of their presence at Timnath or of their returning home. Moore plausibly suggests that a later writer, taking offence at the story of an improper marriage, inserted and his father and his mother in order to regularise it. The same applies to Judges 14:10. Judges 14:6. _Cf._ D

_she pressed him sore_ lit. _reduced him to straits_by her importunity; again in Judges 16:16....

_Samson's Feast and Riddle Judges 14:8-20_ 8 And after a time he returned to take her, and he turned aside to see the carcase of the lion: and, behold, there was a swarm of bees and honey in the carcase of the lion. 9And he took thereof in his hands, and went on eating, and came to his father and mother, and he gave them, and they did eat: but he told not them that he had taken the honey out of the carcase of the lion, 10 So his father went down unto the woman: and Samson made there a feast; for so used the young men to do. 11 And it came to pass, when they saw him, that they brought thirty companions to be with him. 12 And Samson said unto them, I will now put forth a riddle unto you: if ye can certainly declare it me within the seven days of the feast, and find it out, then I will give you thirty sheets and thirty change of garments: 13 But if ye cannot declare i

THE MARRIAGE OF SAMSON 1-5. Samson chooses a wife among the Philistines. He and his parents go down to Timnath....