151 But after a while , in the time of wheat harvest , Samson visited his wife with a young goat , and said , "I will go in to my wife in her room ." But her father did not let him enter . 2 Her father said , "I really thought that you hated her intensely ; so I gave her to your companion . Is not her younger sister more beautiful than she? Please let her be yours instead ." 3 Samson then said to them, "This time I shall be blameless in regard to the Philistines when I do them harm ." 4 Samson went and caught three hundred foxes , and took torches , and turned the foxes tail to tail and put one torch in the middle between two tails . 5 When he had set fire to the torches , he released the foxes into the standing grain of the Philistines , thus burning up both the shocks and the standing grain , along with the vineyards and groves . 6 Then the Philistines said , "Who did this ?" And they said , "Samson , the son-in-law of the Timnite , because he took his wife and gave her to his companion ." So the Philistines came up and burned her and her father with fire . 7 Samson said to them, "Since you act like this , I will surely e take revenge on you, but after that I will quit ." 8 He struck them ruthlessly e e with a great slaughter ; and he went down and lived in the cleft of the rock of Etam .
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Judges 15:1-8
Commentary on Judges 15:1-8
(Read Judges 15:1-8)
When there are differences between relations, let those be reckoned the wisest and best, who are most forward to forgive or forget, and most willing to stoop and yield for the sake of peace. In the means which Samson employed, we must look at the power of God supplying them, and making them successful, to mortify the pride and punish the wickedness of the Philistines. The Philistines threatened Samson's wife that they would burn her and her father's house. She, to save herself and oblige her countrymen, betrayed her husband; and the very thing that she feared, and by sin sought to avoid, came upon her! She, and her father's house, were burnt with fire, and by her countrymen, whom she thought to oblige by the wrong she did to her husband. The mischief we seek to escape by any unlawful practices, we often pull down upon our own heads.