Irony abounds

The irony here is astounding: Israel’s would-be deliverer is bound by the people he is meant to deliver, and they deliver him over to the oppressors from whom he is meant to deliver them. The hand motif emerges in 15:13, and it reinforces the sense of irony. Elsewhere in the book either Yahweh gives the Israelites into the hand of foreign enemies or gives foreign enemies into the hand of Israelite armies or often the judge/deliverer. Here the men of Judah express twice that they intend to bind Samson and give him “into the hands of the Philistines” (vv. 12a and 13a). Here in the final cycle is the first and only time in the book that Israelites deliver a fellow Israelite (let alone their chosen deliverer) into the hands of their enemies. Moreover, the Judahites’ assertion that the Philistines are ruling Israel should not come as a shock at this point, as the narrator expressed this in 14:4 using almost the exact phrasing as in 15:11. However, that Judah is so willing to accept this reality and will go so far as to deliver Samson to the Philistines to maintain Philistine rule is unthinkable and marks an all-time low in the book of Judges.—David J. H. Beldman, Judges, Two Horizons Old Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, forthcoming)