12. So Manoah said, “May what you say happen. Tell me, what kind of life will the boy live? What will he do?”
13. The angel of the Lord said to Manoah, “Your wife must do everything I told her.
14. She must not eat anything that grows on a grapevine. She must not drink any wine or strong drink. She must not eat any food that is unclean. She must do everything that I have commanded her to do.”
15. Then Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, “We would like for you to stay a while. We want to cook a young goat for you to eat.”
16. The angel of the Lord said to Manoah, “Even if you keep me from leaving, I will not eat your food. But if you want to prepare something, offer a burnt offering to the Lord.” (Manoah did not understand that the man was really the angel of the Lord.)
17. Then Manoah asked the angel of the Lord, “What is your name? We want to know so that we can honor you when what you have said really happens.”
18. The angel of the Lord said, “Why do you ask my name? It is too amazing for you to believe.”
19. Then Manoah sacrificed a young goat on a rock. He offered the goat and a grain offering as a gift to the Lord and to the One Who Does Amazing Things.
20. Manoah and his wife were watching what happened. As the flames went up to the sky from the altar, the angel of the Lord went up to heaven in the fire. When Manoah and his wife saw that, they bowed down with their faces to the ground.
21. He finally understood that the man was really the angel of the Lord. The angel of the Lord did not appear to Manoah and his wife again.
22. Manoah said to his wife, “We have seen God. Surely we will die because of this.”
23. But his wife said to him, “The Lord does not want to kill us. If he wanted to kill us, he would not have accepted our burnt offering and grain offering. He would not have shown us all these things or told us this.”
24. So the woman had a boy. She named him Samson. He grew and the Lord blessed him.
25. The Spirit of the Lord began to work in Samson while he was in the city of Mahaneh Dan. That city is between the cities of Zorah and Eshtaol.