The Philistines want to deal with Samson, and the sooner the better. The problem, however, is that they do not know where he is. And they have neither the manpower nor sufficient knowledge of the terrain to search out Judah for him. To solve their problem, they come up with a simple method. They will get the Judahites do the heavy lifting for them.1 Hence, their encampment in Judah and raiding of Lehi.
9 Then the Philistines came up and encamped in Judah and made a raid on Lehi.