1. One day Samson traveled to Gaza. While there, he saw a prostitute and had sex with her.
2. The word spread among the people of Gaza, "Samson has come here!" So they circled around and waited in ambush for him all night at the city gate. They kept quiet all night long, thinking, We’ll kill him at the first light in the morning.
3. But Samson slept only half the night. He got up in the middle of the night, grabbed the doors of the city gate and the two gateposts, and pulled them up with the bar still across them. He put them on his shoulders and carried them up to the top of the hill that is beside Hebron.
4. Some time after this, in the Sorek Valley, Samson fell in love with a woman whose name was Delilah.
5. The rulers of the Philistines confronted her and said to her, "Seduce him and find out what gives him such great strength and what we can do to overpower him, so that we can tie him up and make him weak. Then we’ll each pay you eleven hundred pieces of silver."
6. So Delilah said to Samson, "Please tell me what gives you such great strength and how you can be tied up and made weak."
7. Samson replied to her, "If someone ties me up with seven fresh bowstrings that aren’t dried out, I’ll become weak. I’ll be like any other person."
8. So the rulers of the Philistines brought her seven fresh bowstrings that weren’t dried out, and she tied him up with them.
9. While an ambush was waiting for her signal in an inner room, she called out to him, "Samson, the Philistines are on you!" And he snapped the bowstrings like a thread of fiber snaps when it touches a flame. So the secret of his strength remained unknown.
10. Then Delilah said to Samson, "You made a fool out of me and lied to me. Now please tell me how you can really be tied up!"
11. He replied to her, "If someone ties me up with new ropes that haven’t been used for work, I’ll become weak. I’ll be like any other person."
12. So Delilah took new ropes and tied him up with them. Then she called out to him, "Samson, the Philistines are on you!" Once again, an ambush was waiting in an inner room. Yet he snapped them from his arms like thread.