John Wesley

Then the men of Ephraim assembled and crossed the Jordan to Zaphon. They said to Jephthah, “Why have you crossed over to fight the Ammonites without calling us to go…

“Northward - Over Jordan, where Jephthah was, in the northern part of the land beyond Jordan. And said - Through pride and envy, contending with him as they did before with Gideon.”

Jephthah then gathered all the men of Gilead and fought against Ephraim. And the men of Gilead struck them down because the Ephraimites had said, “You Gileadites are fugitives in…

“Ye Gileadites - These words are a contemptuous expression of the Ephraimites concerning the Gileadites, whom they call fugitives of Ephraim; the word Ephraim being here taken largely, as it comprehends the other neighbouring tribes, of which Ephraim was the chief; and especially their brethren…”

they told him, “Please say Shibboleth.” If he said, “Sibboleth,” because he could not pronounce it correctly, they seized him and killed him at the fords of the Jordan.

“Could not frame - Or rather, he did not frame to speak right; so as he was required to do it.”

Then Manoah took a young goat and a grain offering and offered them on a rock to the LORD.

“Meal-offering - Which were generally joined with the chief sacrifices. A Rock - The angel's presence and command being a sufficient warrant for the offering of sacrifice by a person who was no priest, and in a place otherwise forbidden.”

When the flame went up from the altar to the sky, the angel of the LORD ascended in the flame.

“The altar - That is, from that part of the rock which served instead of an altar, upon which the sacrifice was laid. Ascended - To manifest his nature and essence to be spiritual.”

But his wife replied, “If the LORD had intended to kill us, He would not have accepted the burnt offering and the grain offering from our hands, nor would He…

“Nor would, &c. - This expression seems to have some emphasis in it, to enhance God's mercy to them, as being afforded them in a time of such grievous calamity; and in a time when the word of the Lord was precious; and there was…”

When Samson returned later to take her, he left the road to see the lion’s carcass, and in it was a swarm of bees, along with their honey.

“After a time - Hebrew. after days; that is, either after some days: or, rather, after a year, as that word often signifies; when the flesh of the lion, (which by its strong smell is offensive to bees) was wholly consumed, and nothing was left…”

So on the fourth day they said to Samson’s wife, “Entice your husband to explain the riddle to us, or we will burn you and your father’s household to death.

“Seventh day - They had doubtless spoken to her before this time, but with some remissness, supposing that they should find it out; but now their time being nigh slipped, they put her under a necessity of searching it out.”

Before sunset on the seventh day, the men of the city said to Samson: “What is sweeter than honey? And what is stronger than a lion?”

“If ye had not &c. - If you had not employed my wife to find it out, as men plough up the ground with an heifer, thereby discovering its hidden parts; he calls her heifer, because she was joined with him in the same yoke.”

Later on, at the time of the wheat harvest, Samson took a young goat and went to visit his wife.

“Wheat harvest - Which was the proper season for what follows. With a kid - As a token of reconciliation. Into the chamber - Into her chamber, which the women had separate from the mens.”

Samson said to them, “This time I will be blameless in doing harm to the Philistines.”

“Now shall I, &c. - Because they have first provoked me by an irreparable injury: but although this may look like an act of private revenge; yet it is plain Samson acted as a judge (for so he was) and as an avenger of the…”

When Samson arrived in Lehi, the Philistines came out shouting against him. And the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him.

“Shouted - Because they had now their enemy, as they supposed, in their hands. Loosed - Hebrew. were melted; that is, were dissolved, as things which are melted in the fire. This typified the resurrection of Christ, by the power of the Spirit of holiness.”

And being very thirsty, Samson cried out to the LORD, “You have accomplished this great deliverance through Your servant.

“And perhaps there was the hand of God therein, to chastise him for not making mention of God in his song, and to keep him from being proud of his strength.”

And Samson judged Israel for twenty years in the days of the Philistines.

“He judged - That is, he pleaded their cause, and avenged them against the Philistines. Of the Philistines - That is, whilst the Philistines had the power and dominion, from which he was not fully to deliver, but only to begin to deliver them.”

However, the hair of his head began to grow back after it had been shaved.

“The hair - This circumstance, though in itself inconsiderable, is noted as a sign of the recovery of God's favour, and his former strength, in some degree, upon his repentance, and renewing his vow with God, which was allowed for Nazarites to do.”

Now a man named Micah from the hill country of Ephraim

“There was, &c. - The things mentioned here, and in the following chapters, did not happen in the order in which they are put; but much sooner, even presently after the death of the elders that over-lived Joshua, as appears, because Phinehas the son of…”

And when he had returned the eleven hundred shekels of silver to his mother, she said, “I wholly dedicate the silver to the LORD for my son’s benefit, to make…

“The Lord - In the Hebrew it is, Jehovah, the incommunicable name of God. Whereby it is apparent, that neither she, nor her son, intended to forsake the true God; as appears from his rejoicing when he had got a priest of the Lord's appointment…”

So he returned the silver to his mother, and she took two hundred shekels of silver and gave them to a silversmith, who made them into a graven image and…

“Restored - Though his mother allowed him to keep it, yet he persisted in his resolution to restore it, that she might dispose of it as she pleased.”

And there was a young Levite from Bethlehem in Judah who had been residing within the clan of Judah.

“Bethlehem-judah - So called here, as Matt. ii, 1, 5, to difference it from Bethlehem in Zebulun. There he was born and bred.”

Micah ordained the Levite, and the young man became his priest and lived in his house.

“Consecrated - To be a priest, for which he thought a consecration necessary, as knowing the Levites were no less excluded from the priest's office than the people.”

So the five men departed and came to Laish, where they saw that the people were living securely, like the Sidonians, tranquil and unsuspecting.

“Put to shame - Or, that might rebuke or punish any thing, that is, any crime. Putting to shame seems to be used for inflicting civil punishment, because shame is generally the effect of it.”

When you enter, you will come to an unsuspecting people and a spacious land, for God has delivered it into your hand.

“Given - This they gather partly from God's promise which they supposed they had from the Levite's mouth; and partly from his providence, which had so disposed them, that they would be an easy prey.”

Then the five men who had gone to spy out the land of Laish said to their brothers, “Did you know that one of these houses has an ephod, household…

“Answered - That is, spake, the word answering being often used in scripture of the first speaker. These houses - That is, in one of these houses. What to do - Whether it be not expedient to take them for your farther use.”

So the priest was glad and took the ephod, the household idols, and the graven image, and went with the people.

“Was glad - Being wholly governed by his own interest. The midst - Both for the greater security of such precious things, and that Micah might not be able to come at him, to injure or upbraid him; and, it may be, because that was…”

He replied, “You took the gods I had made, and my priest, and went away. What else do I have?

“I made - So far was he besotted with superstition and idolatry, that he esteemed those gods, which were man's work.”