Verse Lens · Context pointer
Judges 16:2 Explained in Context
Use this verse as a doorway into the larger passage—not as an isolated saying.
Verse 2. 2And it was told the Gazites, saying, Samson is come hither. And they compassed him in, and laid wait for him all night in the gate of the city, and were quiet all the night, saying, In the morning, when it is day, we shall kill him.
King James Version — public domain in the United States · Bible text and permissions
Role in This Section
This verse describes Gazite surveillance and a dawn plan to kill Samson at the gate.
Read It With
- Judges 16:1–3
Read Judges 16:1–3 together. This verse describes Gazite surveillance and a dawn plan to kill Samson at the gate. Samson's visit to a sex worker, Gaza's ambush plan, his midnight departure, uprooting and carrying of the gate to the Hebron-facing hill form one compact feat; verse 4 opens the Delilah relationship.
Why It Needs Context
This verse describes Gazite surveillance and a dawn plan to kill Samson at the gate. It needs Judges 16:1–3 because The episode displays astonishing strength and humiliation of a fortified city while refusing to turn a woman's occupation into either the cause of Samson's risk or a pretext for stigmatizing sex workers.
Read Judges 16:1–3 together
Why these verses belong together: Samson's visit to a sex worker, Gaza's ambush plan, his midnight departure, uprooting and carrying of the gate to the Hebron-facing hill form one compact feat; verse 4 opens the Delilah relationship.
Verse 1. 1 Then went Samson to Gaza, and saw there an harlot, and went in unto her.
Verse 2. 2 And it was told the Gazites, saying, Samson is come hither. And they compassed him in, and laid wait for him all night in the gate of the city, and were quiet all the night, saying, In the morning, when it is day, we shall kill him.
Verse 3. 3 And Samson lay till midnight, and arose at midnight, and took the doors of the gate of the city, and the two posts, and went away with them, bar and all, and put them upon his shoulders, and carried them up to the top of an hill that is before Hebron.
Continue in Context
The full thought-unit study remains the final contextual authority for this Verse Lens.
Read Judges 16:1–3 — Samson escapes Gaza with its gateSources used for this context pointer
How certain is this explanation? strong
These are the sources used directly for this lens. Language, grammar, disagreements, and the complete source shelf remain attached to the full thought-unit research record.
Biblical text
King James (Authorized) Version — eng-kjv2006
eBible.org and CrossWire Bible Society
USFM archive eng-kjv2006_usfm.zip; source files dated 2026-08-19; downloaded 2026-08-24; archive SHA-256 aec1b3b26c622fd3d963d2bbac963016b9513246ffbfa20da00bb100372ea007; normalized corpus SHA-256 09aef51d90488aa7b9722b3fd9a93f4b25f6bf2064c5fd798fb39673c300ddf2.
Supports: Exact reader-facing Scripture wording, paragraph markers, supplied-word markup, and complete verse coverage.
Exact location: Judges 16:1–3, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM corpus
Open source ↗hebrew text and morphology
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible: Judges
Open Scriptures
Open Scriptures, release 2.2
Supports: Masoretic Hebrew wording, morphology, names, clause relationships, repeated terms, wordplays, and translation control.
Exact location: Open Scriptures MorphHB v.2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/Judg.xml, 16:1–3
Open source ↗