What Does Judges 14:15 Mean in the King James?
And it came to pass on the seventh day, that they said unto Samson’s wife, Entice thy husband, that he may declare unto us the riddle, lest we burn thee and thy father’s house with fire: have ye called us to take that we have? is it not so?
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The threat makes Samson’s wife the instrument of pressure, turning intimacy into a lever to pry a hidden answer into speech.
THE MEANING
Here, the hidden answer is treated as something owed: pressure goes through Samson’s wife, while the threat lands on her and her father’s household. The demand makes another person bear the danger of Samson’s silence so that what is hidden will be spoken.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that pressure becomes persuasion when it is delivered through someone close: a threat against her and her household remains coercion, even when she is told to obtain the answer.
THE ROOT
פַּתִּי
pattî
GROWS FROM
פתה
p-t-h
To persuade or allure; related forms describe being easily persuaded or deceived.
“Entice” in this verse is pattî. This root family includes both the act of alluring and the simple or easily persuaded person, bringing vulnerability into the word’s range. Here, the requested persuasion sits beside a direct threat to burn her and her father’s household, exposing the coercion behind the tactic.
ALSO GROWS
pethî: A simple or easily persuaded person.
פֶּתִי
This related word places susceptibility to persuasion in the same family as the command to entice.
mephatteh: One who persuades or entices.
מְפַתֶּה
This form names the person doing the enticing, showing it as an intentional means of influencing someone.
יַגִּיד
yaggîd
GROWS FROM
נגד
n-g-d
To be conspicuous or made known; in causative forms, to show, declare, or report.
“Declare” in this verse is yaggîd. The verb belongs to a family of making something conspicuous or known. The demand is for what Samson keeps hidden to be brought before them, with the threat of fire attached to refusal.
ALSO GROWS
nāgîd: A leader, ruler, or prominent person.
נָגִיד
This related noun describes prominence, echoing the verb’s sense of making something known or conspicuous.
maggîd: A teller or announcer.
מַגִּיד
This related form names one who reports or makes something known, like the disclosure being demanded here.
THE PATTERN
Power uses threatened bodily harm to compel what another person will do, say, or disclose.
And whoso falleth not down and worshippeth shall the same hour be cast into the midst of a burning fiery furnace.Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men, was exceeding wroth, and sent forth, and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently enquired of the wise men.And to him they agreed: and when they had called the apostles, and beaten them, they commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go.THE THREAD
And the lords of the Philistines came up unto her, and said unto her, Entice him, and see wherein his great strength lieth, and by what means we may prevail against him, that we may bind him to afflict him: and we will give thee every one of us eleven hundred pieces of silver.The same root, פתה (pathah: entice, persuade), appears in the command to Delilah. Again, Samson’s hidden strength is pursued through a close relationship; the repeated verb makes the manipulation itself the through-line.
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