Judges 15-16: Samson (Part II)

Judges 15: Samson Defeats the Philistines
Judges 16: Samson and Delilah / Samson's Death

Today's reading is a continuation of the Samson story line. Read Part I here. Samson is a strong nazirite who can speak in riddles and poetry and has a huge temper problem. But it is his temper that defines his Chuck Norris-like awesomeness, as he slays hundreds of men with the slightest provocation.

But Samson is only a vehicle for God's actions against the Philistines. Samson is able to engineer situations in which the Philistines wrong him, and then fights them as the spirit of the Lord is upon him.

Samson Defeats the Philistines: Judges 15
At the time of the wheat harvest Samson returns to Timnah in order to see his wife. The woman's father refuses on the grounds that Samson had seemed to reject her. Instead the man offers her sister instead, which to an ancient audience would not seem as strange as it might today.

But all this is simply more pretext to wreak havoc on the Philistines. Samson catches 300 foxes and ties them all tail to tail, with a lit torch in each pair of tails. He then lets them run wild in the grain, vineyards, and olive groves of the Philistines.

As evidenced in yesterday's reading, Samson is very good at having the Philistines get each other killed. This continues today, as the Philistines burn Samson's wife and her father for their relation with Samson.That doesn't make Samson any happier, and he strikes down all the men in vengeance and goes to stay in the cleft of the rock of Etam.

After the Philistines make a raid on Lehi searching for Samson, 3,000 men of Judah come to Samson at Etam and tell him not to bother the ruling Philistines. (3,000 men are sent to bind one - a testament to Samson's might.) Samson replies simply that he is repaying them for what they did to him. Nevertheless, the men of Judah bind Samson and give him to the Philistines.

When the Philistines rush at Samson, a new chapter of awesomeness begins as the spirit of the Lord comes upon him. The ropes holding Samson melt away, and then slays 1,000 men with the jawbone of a donkey.

After that Samson is very thirsty and calls to the Lord. God splits open a hollow place and water bursts forth. Samson drinks and continues to be awesome. He judges Israel 20 years.

Samson and Delilah: Judges 16.1-22
A feat of wit and strength: Samson goes down to Gaza and sleeps with a prostitute. When the Gazites hear of it, they wait at the city gate all night until the morning, when they plan to kill him. However, Samson rises at midnight, pulls up the city gate, and carries them 35 miles to the top of the hill in front of Hebron. This story serves as a prelude to the machinations of the Philistines ahead.

Samson falls in love with a Philistine woman named Delilah. When the lords of the Philistines hear this, they offer her 1,100 pieces of silver each if she can discover why his strength is so great.

When she asks how he might be bound, Samson responds that he can be bound with seven fresh bowstrings. Delilah binds him, and as the Philistines wait nearby, say to him, "The Philistines are upon you, Samson!" But Samson breaks free.

The scene repeats two more times, the bowstrings replaced by new ropes and then by having seven locks of Samson's hair woven into a loom (which at least gives away a piece of the puzzle). But neither of these is successful, and Delilah continues to nag her husband. Finally Samson informs her that he is a nazirite, and that his strength will leave him if his head is shaved.

This time Delilah waits until Samson is asleep, has a man shave seven locks from his hair, and wakes him with the familiar cry, "The Philistines are upon you, Samson!" But with his hair gone, the Lord has abandoned Samson. The Philisitnes seize him and gouge his eyes out. They imprison him in Gaza, where he grinds at a mill.

Soon, though, the hair begins to grow back.

Samson's Death: Judges 16.23-31
The Philistines gather a sacrifice for their god Dagon because they have finally captured Samson - and Samson is the source of entertainment at the affair. He performs between two pillars of a house full of men and women, with 3,000 on the roof alone. The blind Samson asks the attendant if he could lean against the pillars, as a way to judge their strength. Then he asks the Lord for the strength to pay back the Philistines - though he recognizes he too will die. In one last feat of strength, Samson strains against the pillars, causing the house to collapse and killing all who are inside it. "So those he killed at his death were more than those he had killed during his life."

Samson's family come to bury the hero, who through his own personal dealings with the Philistines was able to kill many of them for God and for Israel.