6:11 The Lord’s angelic messenger 6 came and sat down under the oak tree in Ophrah owned by Joash the Abiezrite. He arrived while Joash’s son Gideon 7 was threshing 8 wheat in a winepress 9 so he could hide it from the Midianites. 10
18:7 So the five men journeyed on 60 and arrived in Laish. They noticed that the people there 61 were living securely, like the Sidonians do, 62 undisturbed and unsuspecting. No conqueror was troubling them in any way. 63 They lived far from the Sidonians and had no dealings with anyone. 64
19:22 They were having a good time, 65 when suddenly 66 some men of the city, some good-for-nothings, 67 surrounded the house and kept beating 68 on the door. They said to the old man who owned the house, “Send out the man who came to visit you so we can have sex with him.” 69
1 tn Heb “Judah said to Simeon, his brother.”
2 tn Heb “Come up with me into our allotted land and let us attack the Canaanites.”
3 tn Heb “I.” The Hebrew pronoun is singular, agreeing with the collective singular “Judah” earlier in the verse. English style requires a plural pronoun here, however.
4 tn The words “the doors” are supplied.
5 tn Heb “See, their master, fallen to the ground, dead.”
6 tn The adjective “angelic” is interpretive.
sn The
7 tn Heb “Now Gideon his son…” The Hebrew circumstantial clause (note the pattern vav [ו] + subject + predicate) breaks the narrative sequence and indicates that the angel’s arrival coincided with Gideon’s threshing.
8 tn Heb “beating out.”
9 sn Threshing wheat in a winepress. One would normally thresh wheat at the threshing floor outside the city. Animals and a threshing sledge would be employed. Because of the Midianite threat, Gideon was forced to thresh with a stick in a winepress inside the city. For further discussion see O. Borowski, Agriculture in Iron Age Israel, 63.
10 tn Heb “Midian.”
11 tn Heb “And Gideon came, and, look, a man was relating to his friend a dream.”
12 tn Heb “he”; the referent (the man mentioned in the previous clause) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
13 tn Heb “Look!” The repetition of this interjection, while emphatic in Hebrew, would be redundant in the English translation.
14 tn Heb “It came to the tent and struck it and it fell. It turned it upside down and the tent fell.”
15 tn The words “to Gideon” are supplied in the translation for clarification.
16 tn Or “Arise.”
17 tn Heb “for as the man is his strength.”
18 tn Heb “arose and killed.”
19 tn Heb “their brother.”
20 tn Heb “so that the violence done to the seventy sons of Jerub-Baal might come, and their blood might be placed on Abimelech, their brother, who murdered them, and upon the leaders of Shechem, who strengthened his hands to murder his brothers.”
21 tn Or “strong.”
22 tn Or “fortress.” The same Hebrew term occurs once more in this verse and twice in v. 52.
23 tn Heb “me.” (Collective Israel is the speaker.)
24 tn Heb “did not listen.”
25 tn Heb “Also to the king of Moab he sent, but he was unwilling.”
26 tn See the note on the word “son” in 13:5, where this same statement occurs.
27 tn Heb “eat anything unclean.” Certain foods were regarded as ritually “unclean” (see Lev 11). Eating such food made one ritually “contaminated.”
28 tn Traditionally “a Nazirite.”
29 tn Heb “on him.”
30 tn Heb “only”; or “simply.”
31 tn Heb “the sons of my people.”
32 tn Heb “Should I tell you?”
33 tn Or “said.”
34 tn Heb “and they said.” The subject of the plural verb is indefinite.
35 tn Heb “he”; the referent (the Timnite) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
36 tn Heb “his”; the referent (Samson) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
37 tn The Hebrew text expands the statement with the additional phrase “burned with fire.” The words “with fire” are redundant in English and have been omitted from the translation for stylistic reasons. Some textual witnesses read “burned…her father’s house,” perhaps under the influence of 14:15. On the other hand, the shorter text may have lost this phrase due to haplography.
38 tn The word translated “basin” refers to a circular-shaped depression in the land’s surface.
39 tn Heb “spirit.”
40 tn Heb “named it”; the referent (the spring) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
41 sn The name En Hakkore means “Spring of the one who cries out.”
42 tc Heb “To the Gazites, saying.” A verb is missing from the MT; some ancient Greek witnesses add “it was reported.”
43 tn Heb “And they surrounded.” The rest of the verse suggests that “the town” is the object, not “the house.” Though the Gazites knew Samson was in the town, apparently they did not know exactly where he had gone. Otherwise, they would could have just gone into or surrounded the house and would not have needed to post guards at the city gate.
44 tn Heb “and they lay in wait for him all night in the city gate.”
45 tn Heb “were silent.”
46 tn Heb “saying.”
47 tn The words “He will not leave” are supplied in the translation for clarification.
48 tn Heb “until the light of the morning.”
49 tn Heb “subdue him in order to humiliate him.”
50 tn Heb “are upon you.”
51 tn Heb “And the ones lying in wait were sitting in the bedroom.”
52 tn Heb “them”; the referent (the ropes) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
53 tn Heb “are upon you.”
54 tc The MT of vv. 13b-14a reads simply, “He said to her, ‘If you weave the seven braids of my head with the web.’ And she fastened with the pin and said to him.” The additional words in the translation, “and secure it with the pin, I will become weak and be like any other man.’ 16:14 So she made him go to sleep, wove the seven braids of his hair into the fabric on the loom,” which without doubt represent the original text, are supplied from the ancient Greek version. (In both vv. 13b and 14a the Greek version has “to the wall” after “with the pin,” but this is an interpretive addition that reflects a misunderstanding of ancient weaving equipment. See G. F. Moore, Judges [ICC], 353-54.) The Hebrew textual tradition was accidentally shortened during the copying process. A scribe’s eye jumped from the first instance of “with the web” to the second, causing him to leave out inadvertently the intervening words.
55 tn The Hebrew adds, “from his sleep.” This has not been included in the translation for stylistic reasons.
56 tn Heb “all his heart.”
57 tn Heb “she sent and summoned.”
58 tc The translation follows the Qere, לִי (li, “to me”) rather than the Kethib, לָהּ (lah, “to her”).
59 tn Heb “all his heart.”
60 tn Or “went.”
61 tn Heb “who were in its midst.”
62 tn Heb “according to the custom of the Sidonians.”
63 tn Heb “and there was no one humiliating anything in the land, one taking possession [by] force.”
64 tc Heb “and a thing there was not to them with men.” Codex Alexandrinus (A) of the LXX and Symmachus read “Syria” here rather than the MT’s “men.” This reading presupposes a Hebrew Vorlage אֲרָם (’aram, “Aram,” i.e., Arameans) rather than the MT reading אָדָם (’adam). This reading is possibly to be preferred over the MT.
65 tn Heb “they were making their heart good.”
66 tn Heb “and look.”
67 tn Heb “the men of the city, men, the sons of wickedness.” The phrases are in apposition; the last phrase specifies what type of men they were. It is not certain if all the men of the city are in view, or just a group of troublemakers. In 20:5 the town leaders are implicated in the crime, suggesting that all the men of the city were involved. If so, the implication is that the entire male population of the town were good-for-nothings.
68 tn The Hitpael verb form appears to have an iterative force here, indicating repeated action.
69 tn Heb “so we can know him.” On the surface one might think they simply wanted to meet the visitor and get to know him, but their hostile actions betray their double-talk. The old man, who has been living with them long enough to know what they are like, seems to have no doubts about the meaning of their words (see v. 23).