Judges 15:12
And they said unto him, We are come down to bind thee, that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines. And Samson said unto them, Swear unto me, that ye will not fall upon me yourselves. And they said unto him, We are come down to bind thee, that we may deliver thee into the hand of the Philistines. And Samson said unto them, Swear unto me, that ye will not fall upon me yourselves.
Judges 15:12 belongs to the history of Samson, the promised son given to Manoah to serve as judge and deliverer of Israel. His extraordinary physical strength did not come from well-knit sinews but from his condition as a Nazarite from birth, of which his unshorn hair was the symbol. Had he obeyed the divine commands as faithfully as his parents had, his destiny would have been nobler and happier, but association with idolaters corrupted him. Living at Zorah near the Philistines, he mingled with them on friendly terms and formed intimacies in his youth that darkened his whole life. That course began just as he entered manhood and should have executed his divine mission, when he determined to marry the Philistine woman of Timnath against his God-fearing parents' dissuasion.
In alarm, three thousand men of Judah went up to the rock Etam to bind Samson and hand him over to the Philistines. Even at such odds, his own countrymen dared approach him only because they were assured he would not harm his own people. Samson consented to be bound and delivered to the Philistines, but first required the men of Judah to swear they would not fall upon him themselves, so he would not be compelled to destroy them. He then permitted them to bind him with two new ropes to lead him to his enemies.
His peril arose from his own choices: unlike Joseph, who resisted temptation by relying on God, Samson let his passions rule and did not take hold of God's strength. The contrast shows he could choose obedience or sin, but his path of ungoverned passion led to shame, disaster, and death.