Why was there honey inside a dead lion?
In Judges 14, Samson killed a lion with his bare hands. Later, he returned to the animal and discovered something unexpected: bees and honey inside the lion’s carcass.
Below is the passage itself, what the text says and leaves unsaid, and how Bible commentators from three traditions have read it.
Judges 14:1–6
Where was Samson going when the lion attacked?
Samson was on his way to Timnath, a Philistine town, to marry a Philistine woman. His parents questioned the match (Judges 14:1–3), and the narrator adds a note they did not know:
But his father and his mother knew not that it was of the LORD, that he sought an occasion against the Philistines: for at that time the Philistines had dominion over Israel.
Judges 14:4, KJV
In the vineyards of Timnath the lion came at him:
Then went Samson down, and his father and his mother, to Timnath, and came to the vineyards of Timnath: and, behold, a young lion roared against him.
And the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him, and he rent him as he would have rent a kid, and he had nothing in his hand: but he told not his father or his mother what he had done.
Judges 14:5–6, KJV
Two details shape the rest of the story. The text credits “the Spirit of the LORD” for the strength, and Samson “told not his father or his mother what he had done”, so nobody else knew about the lion.
Was Samson allowed to touch a dead animal?
Samson was set apart as a Nazarite from birth (Judges 13:5), and the Nazarite law says:
All the days that he separateth himself unto the LORD he shall come at no dead body.
Numbers 6:6, KJV
John Gill notes that Samson could take the honey “without touching the carcass of the lion, and defiling himself thereby”. The text itself does not comment on it.
Judges 14:8–9
Why was there honey in the lion?
And after a time he returned to take her, and he turned aside to see the carcase of the lion: and, behold, there was a swarm of bees and honey in the carcase of the lion.
And he took thereof in his hands, and went on eating, and came to his father and mother, and he gave them, and they did eat: but he told not them that he had taken the honey out of the carcase of the lion.
Judges 14:8–9, KJV
The text says only that he came back “after a time”. Adam Clarke suggests it was “Probably about one year; as this was the time that generally elapsed between espousing and wedding.” Albert Barnes adds that by then the lion “had now become a mere skeleton, fit for bees to swarm into.”
Ancient readers may have found the scene less strange than we do. Barnes writes that “It was a universal notion among the ancients that bees were generated from the carcass of an ox,” and Clarke points to the same idea in Virgil’s Georgics.
Once again Samson kept the source to himself: he shared the honey with his parents, but “told not them that he had taken the honey out of the carcase of the lion.”
Judges 14:12–18
What was Samson’s riddle?
At his seven-day wedding feast Samson put a riddle to thirty Philistine companions, staking thirty sheets and thirty changes of garments on it (Judges 14:10–12):
And he said unto them, Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness. And they could not in three days expound the riddle.
Judges 14:14, KJV
Without knowing about the lion, nobody could solve it. Clarke calls it “scarcely a fair riddle; for unless the fact to which it refers were known, there is no rule of interpretation by which it could be found out.” The guests threatened Samson’s wife, she pressed him until he told her (verses 15–17), and on the last day they answered:
And the men of the city said unto him on the seventh day before the sun went down, What is sweeter than honey? and what is stronger than a lion? And he said unto them, If ye had not plowed with my heifer, ye had not found out my riddle.
Judges 14:18, KJV
How others have read it
Matthew Henry (1662–1714), a Presbyterian minister, reads the lion and the honey as a picture of victory: “Our Lord Jesus having conquered Satan, that roaring lion, believers, like Samson, find honey in the carcass”.
John Gill (1697–1771), a Baptist theologian, goes further and calls Samson here “a type of Christ, who has destroyed our adversary the devil, compared to a roaring lion”, pointing to 1 Peter 5:8.
Adam Clarke (1762–1832), a Methodist scholar, keeps the focus on where the strength came from: “his strength does not appear to be his own, nor to be at his command”.
These are readings of the story. Judges itself never says what the honey means, which leaves room for more than one reading.
The channel’s reading
The Bible doesn’t directly explain this as the meaning of the honey, but the contrast is certainly worth thinking about.
Your reading
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Sources
- Scripture quotations: King James Version (public domain), checked against the Project Gutenberg KJV.
- Matthew Henry, Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible on Judges 14 (public domain), via Bible Hub.
- John Gill, Exposition of the Entire Bible on Judges 14 (public domain), via Bible Hub.
- Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible on Judges 14 (public domain), via Bible Hub.
- Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible on Judges 14 (public domain), via Bible Hub.
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