Verse-by-Verse Commentary
The Book of Judges
Chapter 15: The Well of Him That Cried
Samson's private feud with the Philistines escalates: foxes and firebrands, a great slaughter, and his own tribe of Judah handing him over bound. Then the Spirit rushes on him, the cords melt, and a thousand fall by a jawbone. But the greatest moment comes after, when the strong man, faint and thirsty, cries to the LORD, and God opens a well called 'the well of him that cried.'
About This Commentary
This is a verse-by-verse study of Judges chapter 15. For each section you will find the KJV text, the Hebrew words that sharpen the meaning, plain explanation, and a Gospel Focus. Chapter 15 shows Samson's mightiest feats, but its heart is the moment he learns his strength is not his own and cries to God for help. Every Scripture quotation is from the King James Version.
The Cycle of Revenge (Judges 15:1-8)
Denied his wife, Samson burns the Philistines' harvest, they burn his wife, and he strikes back, a spiral of vengeance that God nonetheless uses against Israel's oppressors.
As They Did Unto Me
"But it came to pass within a while after, in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his wife with a kid; and he said, I will go in to my wife into the chamber. But her father would not suffer him to go in. And her father said, I verily thought that thou hadst utterly hated her; therefore I gave her to thy companion: is not her younger sister fairer than she? take her, I pray thee, instead of her. And Samson said concerning them, Now shall I be more blameless than the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure. And Samson went and caught three hundred foxes, and took firebrands, and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst between two tails. And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the standing corn of the Philistines, and burnt up both the shocks, and also the standing corn, with the vineyards and olives. Then the Philistines said, Who hath done this? And they answered, Samson, the son in law of the Timnite, because he had taken his wife, and given her to his companion. And the Philistines came up, and burnt her and her father with fire. And Samson said unto them, Though ye have done this, yet will I be avenged of you, and after that I will cease. And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter: and he went down and dwelt in the top of the rock Etam."
Word Study
"avenged," Hebrew naqam (נָקַם), "to avenge, take vengeance." The word drives the whole passage: injury answered by injury, vengeance breeding vengeance. Samson burns their harvest; they burn his wife; he vows, "yet will I be avenged of you," and smites them "hip and thigh." It is the endless spiral that human retaliation always becomes, each side sure it is only paying back the other. Yet Scripture reserves vengeance to God alone: "To me belongeth vengeance and recompence" (Deuteronomy 32:35), the noun form of naqam, quoted in the New Testament, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord... Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good" (Romans 12:19, 21). Samson's private war shows the misery of taking vengeance into our own hands. God can overrule it for His purposes, He used it to strike the Philistines, but the way of the flesh is a fire that consumes everything it touches.
Explanation
Samson comes to reconcile with his wife, only to learn her father has given her to another. Enraged, he catches three hundred foxes (or jackals), ties them tail to tail with firebrands, and looses them through the ripe grain fields, destroying the Philistines' harvest, shocks, standing corn, vineyards, and olives all at once. The Philistines retaliate by burning his wife and her father alive, the very fate she had betrayed the riddle to avoid. Samson answers with a "great slaughter," smiting them "hip and thigh," then withdraws to the rock Etam. The feud has grown from a wedding wager to open warfare. There are no clean hands here, only the churning cycle of revenge, and yet God's larger purpose, to deliver Israel from Philistia, moves forward through it all.
Gospel Focus
The lesson of the cycle is plain: vengeance never ends of itself; it only escalates. Every blow demands another, and the fire spreads. This is why God claims vengeance as His own and calls His people to a different way: "Recompense to no man evil for evil... avenge not yourselves" (Romans 12:17-19). The gospel breaks the cycle not by returning the blow but by absorbing it, as Christ, "when he was reviled, reviled not again" (1 Peter 2:23), and prayed for His executioners. Samson's whole tragedy is a man of God's Spirit driven by personal revenge. We are called to overcome evil with good, and to leave the settling of accounts to the God who judges righteously.
The Jawbone of an Ass (Judges 15:9-17)
Fearful Judah binds its own deliverer to appease the enemy, but the Spirit rushes on Samson, the cords melt, and a thousand fall.
The Cords Became as Flax Burnt with Fire
"Then the Philistines went up, and pitched in Judah, and spread themselves in Lehi. And the men of Judah said, Why are ye come up against us? And they answered, To bind Samson are we come up, to do to him as he hath done to us. Then three thousand men of Judah went to the top of the rock Etam, and said to Samson, Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us? what is this that thou hast done unto us? And he said unto them, As they did unto me, so have I done unto them. And they said unto him, We are come down to bind thee, that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines. And Samson said unto them, Swear unto me, that ye will not fall upon me yourselves. And they spake unto him, saying, No; but we will bind thee fast, and deliver thee into their hand: but surely we will not kill thee. And they bound him with two new cords, and brought him up from the rock. And when he came unto Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him: and the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and the cords that were upon his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands loosed from off his hands. And he found a new jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand, and took it, and slew a thousand men therewith. And Samson said, With the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jaw of an ass have I slain a thousand men. And it came to pass, when he had made an end of speaking, that he cast away the jawbone out of his hand, and called that place Ramathlehi."
Word Study
"came mightily," Hebrew tsalach (צָלַח) again, the Spirit "rushing" upon Samson. The same verb from chapter 14 returns at the decisive moment: bound with "two new cords," surrounded by shouting enemies, Samson is helpless, until "the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him," and the strong new ropes "became as flax that was burnt with fire." The Spirit's inrush turned cords into ash. There is a beautiful gospel picture here: the bonds that hold a man are nothing to the Spirit of the LORD. What no human strength could break, the Spirit dissolves in an instant. So the Lord came "to preach deliverance to the captives... to set at liberty them that are bruised" (Luke 4:18), and "where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty" (2 Corinthians 3:17). Samson's melting cords preach that God's Spirit is the great loosener of every bondage.
Explanation
The Philistines invade Judah demanding Samson, and, tragically, the men of Judah, three thousand of them, come not to fight the oppressor but to bind their own deliverer and hand him over. It is a bitter picture of a people so beaten down they would rather betray their champion than resist their enemy: "Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over us?" Samson, remarkably, submits, asking only that his own countrymen not kill him. But when the Philistines shout in triumph, the Spirit rushes upon him, the new cords burn away like scorched flax, and with a fresh donkey's jawbone he slays a thousand men. He names the place Ramath-lehi, "the hill of the jawbone." God's deliverer would not stay bound.
Gospel Focus
There is deep sorrow in a people who bind their own deliverer. It happened again, and greater, when the Lord of glory came to His own and "his own received him not" (John 1:11), when the nation He came to save handed Him over bound to the Gentiles. But where Samson broke his cords and slew his enemies, Christ let Himself remain bound and gave His life, and by that death conquered the true enemy. And God still delights to use the despised and unlikely: "the jawbone of an ass," a dead beast's bone, became the instrument of a great victory, just as God chooses "the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty" (1 Corinthians 1:27). The Spirit that melted Samson's cords is the same Spirit that sets every captive free.
En-hakkore, the Well of Him That Cried (Judges 15:18-20)
Victorious but fainting with thirst, Samson learns his strength is not his own and cries to God, who opens a well and revives him.
His Spirit Came Again, and He Revived
"And he was sore athirst, and called on the LORD, and said, Thou hast given this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant: and now shall I die for thirst, and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised? But God clave an hollow place that was in the jaw, and there came water thereout; and when he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived: wherefore he called the name thereof Enhakkore, which is in Lehi unto this day. And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years."
Word Study
"Enhakkore," Hebrew En ha-qore (עֵין הַקּוֹרֵא), "the spring (or well) of him that cried, or called." Having slain a thousand, the mighty Samson is undone by simple thirst, and for the first time in the chapter he prays: "Thou hast given this great deliverance... and now shall I die?" He calls the LORD's victory a gift ("thou hast given") and himself God's "servant." God answers by opening a spring, and Samson names it "the well of him that cried." What a name for the source of his rescue, not "the well of the strong man" or "the well of the jawbone," but the well of him who cried. His strength could kill a thousand but could not make a drop of water; that came only by crying to God. The name preaches forever that the LORD is "nigh unto all them that call upon him... in truth" (Psalm 145:18), and that "whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Romans 10:13). Our deliverance flows from crying out, not from our own might.
Explanation
The moment of Samson's greatest triumph exposes his greatest need. He has slain a thousand men, but now he is "sore athirst" and afraid he will die and fall into enemy hands after all. For once, instead of boasting, he prays, acknowledging that the victory was God's gift and he is God's servant. God graciously answers, splitting open a hollow place so that water flows, and Samson drinks, "his spirit came again, and he revived." He names the spring En-hakkore. The chapter ends with the summary that he "judged Israel... twenty years", the longest judgeship yet, and the only place where his years of service are recorded. His mightiest deeds and his humblest prayer stand together.
Gospel Focus
En-hakkore is the sweetest spot in Samson's story: the strong man on his knees. God let him triumph, then let him thirst, so he would learn that even the mightiest servant is utterly dependent on his God. The same lesson runs through Scripture: God brings us low that we may cry out and know His salvation is a gift. And the water-from-the-rock that revived Samson points to the greater Rock: "they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ" (1 Corinthians 10:4). To the thirsty soul the Lord still says, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink" (John 7:37). Whatever strength you have is God's gift; whatever you lack, cry to Him for it. The well of him that cried never runs dry.
Chapter 15 in Review
Judges 15 carries Samson's private war with the Philistines to its height: foxes and firebrands in the harvest, a wife burned in revenge, a great slaughter, and his own tribe of Judah binding him to hand him over. When the enemy shouts in triumph, the Spirit of the LORD rushes on him, the new cords melt like scorched flax, and a thousand fall by a donkey's jawbone. Then, at the peak of victory, the strong man faints with thirst, cries to the LORD for the first time, and God opens the well En-hakkore, "the well of him that cried."
For the Apostolic reader, this chapter warns against the endless cycle of private vengeance and mourns a people who would bind their own deliverer, a shadow of the greater Deliverer whose own received Him not. But its crown is En-hakkore: the mightiest servant learning that his strength is God's gift, and that deliverance flows not from human power but from crying to God. "Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved."
- Private vengeance only escalates; God reserves vengeance to Himself and calls us to overcome evil with good.
- Judah binding its own deliverer foreshadows the nation that handed over the Lord who came to save it.
- The Spirit melts every cord; "where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."
- En-hakkore, "the well of him that cried", the mighty man learned his strength was God's gift.
Questions for Reflection
- Are you caught in a cycle of returning injury for injury, or leaving vengeance to God?
- Samson learned his strength was a gift only when he thirsted. What has God used to bring you low?
- Do you cry to the LORD in your need, or trust your own strength until it fails?
References & Sources
Scripture is quoted from the King James Version (KJV). The Hebrew terms are standard and can be checked in any Hebrew lexicon. Supporting passages are listed so every claim can be verified in its own setting. If anything here does not look right, a verse, a reference, or a wording, please tell us at info@FruitBearers.net. Thank you for helping us keep Bible Learning error free.
- The cycle of revenge; vengeance is the Lord's: Judges 15:1-8; Deuteronomy 32:35; Romans 12:17-21; 1 Peter 2:23.
- Judah binds its deliverer; the Spirit melts the cords: Judges 15:9-17; John 1:11; Luke 4:18; 2 Corinthians 3:17; 1 Corinthians 1:27.
- En-hakkore, the well of him that cried; the Rock is Christ: Judges 15:18-20; Psalm 145:18; Romans 10:13; 1 Corinthians 10:4; John 7:37.