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Samson - part 2: Samson and his riddle

Samson marries a Philistine and sets a riddle.
Contributed by Richard Gunther
Story also available on our translated websites: Spanish, Portuguese, German, French
1
One day Samson went down to the Philistine town of Timnah, – Slide 1
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He noticed a young and attractive Philistine woman. – Slide 2
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He went back home and told his father and mother, ‘There is a Philistine woman down at Timnah who caught my attention. Get her for me as my bride. I want to marry her.’ – Slide 3
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His father and mother protested, ‘Why do you have to go to those heathen Philistines to get a wife? Can't you find someone in our own clan, among all our people?’ <br/>But Samson told his father, ‘She is the one I want to marry.’ <br/>His parents did not know that it was the Lord who was leading Samson to do this, for the Lord looking to overcome the Philistines who were ruling over His people. – Slide 4
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So Samson went down to Timnah with his father and mother. – Slide 5
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As he was going through the vineyards there, he heard a young lion roaring. – Slide 6
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Suddenly the power of the Lord made Samson very strong. – Slide 7
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He tore the lion apart with his bare hands, as if it were a young goat. But he did not tell his parents what he had done. – Slide 8
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Then he went on and talked to the young woman, and he liked her. – Slide 9
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A few days later Samson went back to marry her. On the way he left the road to look at the lion he had killed, and he was surprised to find a swarm of bees and some honey inside the dead body. – Slide 10
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He scraped the honey out into his hands and ate it as he walked along. Then he went to his father and mother and gave them some. They ate it, but Samson did not tell them that he had taken the honey from the dead body of a lion. – Slide 11
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His father went to the woman's house, and Samson gave a banquet there. As was the custom, the Philistines sent thirty young men to stay with him. – Slide 12
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Samson said to them, ‘Let me tell you a riddle. I'll bet each one of you a piece of fine linen and a change of fine clothes that you can't tell me its meaning before the seven days of the wedding feast are over.’ – Slide 13
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‘Tell us your riddle,’ they said. ‘Let's hear it.’ <br/>Samson replied, ‘Out of the eater came something to eat - out of the strong came something sweet.’ – Slide 14
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Three days later they had still not figured out what the riddle meant. <br/>On the fourth day they said to Samson's wife, ‘Trick your husband into telling us what the riddle means. If you don't, we'll set fire to your father's house and burn you with it. You only invited us so that you could rob us, didn't you?’ – Slide 15
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So Samson's wife went to him in tears and said, ‘You don't love me! You just hate me! You told my friends a riddle and didn't tell me what it means!’ <br/>He said, ‘Look, I haven't even told my father and mother. Why should I tell you?’ <br/>She cried about it for the whole seven days of the feast and kept nagging Samson to explain the riddle. On the seventh day Samson gave in and told her. – Slide 16
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She immediately told the Philistines and the thirty men of the city went to Samson with the answer to his riddle. – Slide 17
18
‘What could be sweeter than honey? What could be stronger than a lion?’ they said gleefully. <br/>Samson was furious. ‘If you hadn't been told this by my wife you would never have come up with the answer.’ Now he owed them 30 outfits of fine clothes. – Slide 18
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Suddenly the power of the Lord made him strong, and he went down to the Philistine city of Ashkelon, where he killed thirty men. – Slide 19
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He stripped them of their clothes, and gave them to the men who had solved the riddle. – Slide 20
21
After that, Samson went back home, still angry about what had happened. His wife was given to the man who had been his best man at the wedding. <br/>To find out what happened next go to part 3 – ‘Samson’s revenge on the Philistines’ which can be found at FreeBibleimages.org. – Slide 21
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