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Judges 14:8
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6 And athe Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and he tore the lion apart as one would have torn apart a young goat, though he had nothing in his hand. But he did not tell his father or his mother what he had done.  
7 Then he went down and talked with the woman; and she pleased Samson well.
8 After some time, when he returned to get her, he turned aside to see the carcass of the lion. And behold, a swarm of bees and honey were in the carcass of the lion.
9 He took some of it in his hands and went along, eating. When he came to his father and mother, he gave some to them, and they also ate. But he did not tell them that he had taken the honey out of the acarcass of the lion.  
10 So his father went down to the woman. And Samson gave a feast there, for young men used to do so.
11 And it happened, when they saw him, that they brought thirty companions to be with him.
Commentaries:
Adam Clarke
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Judges 14:8

After a time - Probably about one year; as this was the time that generally elapsed between espousing and wedding.

A swarm of bees and honey in the carcass - By length of time the flesh had been entirely consumed off the bones, and a swarm of bees had formed their combs within the region of the thorax, nor was it an improper place; nor was the thing unfrequent, if we may credit ancient writers; the carcasses of slain beasts becoming a receptacle for wild bees. The beautiful espisode in the 4th Georgic of Virgil, beginning at ver. 317, proves that the ancients believed that bees might be engendered in the body of a dead ox: -

Pastor Aristaeus fugiens Peneia Tempe -

Quatuor eximios praestanti corpore tauros

Ducit, et intacta totidem cervice juvencas.

Post, ubi nona suos Aurora induxerat ortus.

Inferias Orphei mittit, lucumque revisit.

Hic ver o subitum, ac dietu mirabile monstrum

Adspiciunt, liquefacta bourn per viscera toto

Stridere apes utero, et ruptis effervere costis;

Immensasque trahi nubes, jamque arbore summa

Confluere, et lentis uvam demittere ramis .

Virg. Geor. lib. iv., ver. 550.

"Sad Aristaeus from fair Tempe fled,

His bees with famine or diseases dead -

Four altars raises, from his herd he culls

For slaughter four the fairest of his bulls;

Four heifers from his female store he took,

All fair, and all unknowing of the yoke.

Nine mornings thence, with sacrifice and prayers,

The powers atoned, he to the grove repairs.

Behold a prodigy! for, from within

The broken bowels, and the bloated skin,

A buzzing noise of bees his ears alarms,

Straight issuing through the sides assembling swarms!

Dark as a cloud, they make a wheeling flight,

Then on a neighboring tree descending light,

Like a large cluster of black grapes they show,

And make a large dependance from the bough.

Dryden.




Other Adam Clarke entries containing Judges 14:8:

Joshua 15:57
Matthew 1:18

 

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