⁷ The men pursued them along the road to the fords of the Jordan, and as soon as they left to pursue them, the gate was shut.

² When the Gazites heard that Samson was there, they surrounded the place and waited in ambush for him all that night at the city gate. While they were waiting quietly,^[a] they said, “Let us wait until dawn; then we will kill him.” ³ But Samson stayed in bed until midnight when he got up, took hold of the doors of the city gate along with the two gateposts, and pulled them out, bar and all. He put them on his shoulders and took them to the top of the mountain overlooking Hebron.