As his father was making final arrangements for marriage, Samson threw a party at Timnah, as was the custom for elite youn men. When the bride’s parents was him, they selected thirty young men from the town to be his companions.
Samson said to them, “Let me tell you a riddle. If you solve my riddle during these seven days of celebration, I will give you thirty fine linen robes and thirty sets of festive clothing.”
“All right,” they said, “let’s hear your riddle.”
So he said: “Our of the one who eats came something to eat; our of the strong came something sweet.”
Three days later they were still trying to figure it out. On the the fourth day, they said to Sampson’s wife, “Entire your husband to explain the riddle to us, or we will burn down your father’s house with you in it. Did you invite us to the party just to make us poor?”
So Samson’s wife cam to him in tears and said, “You don’t love me; you hate me! Your have given my people a riddle, but you haven’t told me the answer.”
I haven’t given the answer to my father or mother, “he replied. “Why should I tell you?” So she cried whenever she was with him and kept it up for the rest of the celebration. At last on the seventh day he told her the answer because she was tormenting him with her nagging. Then she explained the riddle to the you men.
Before sunset of the seventh day, the men in town came to Samson with their answer: “What is sweeter than honey? What is stronger than a lion?”
Samson replied, “If you hadn’t plowed with my heifer, you wouldn’t have solved my riddle!”
Then the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully on him. He went down to the town of Ashkelon, killed thirty men, took their belongings, and gave their clothing to the men who had solved his riddle. But Samson was furious about what had happened, and he went back home to live with his father and mother. So his wife was given in mariage to Samson’s best man at the wedding. (vv. 10-2, NLT)