6 When the Philistines asked, “Who has done this?” they were told, “Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because his wife was taken and given to his best man.” So the Philistines went up and destroyed her and her family by fire.
7 Samson said to them, “If this is how you act, I will not stop until I have taken revenge on you.”
8 And he struck them hip and thigh—a great slaughter. Then he went down and stayed in a cleft of the crag of Etam.
9 The Philistines went up and encamped in Judah, deploying themselves against Lehi.
10 When the men of Judah asked, “Why have you come up against us?” they answered, “To take Samson prisoner; to do to him as he has done to us.”
11 Three thousand men of Judah went down to the cleft of the crag of Etam and said to Samson, “Do you not know that the Philistines are our rulers? Why, then, have you done this to us?” He answered them, “As they have done to me, so have I done to them.”
12 They said to him, “We have come down to bind you and deliver you to the Philistines.” Samson said to them, “Swear to me that you will not attack me yourselves.”