TEXT [Commentary]

e.   The reversion and redemption of Samson (16:1-31)

1 One day Samson went to the Philistine town of Gaza and spent the night with a prostitute. 2 Word soon spread[*] that Samson was there, so the men of Gaza gathered together and waited all night at the town gates. They kept quiet during the night, saying to themselves, “When the light of morning comes, we will kill him.”

3 But Samson stayed in bed only until midnight. Then he got up, took hold of the doors of the town gate, including the two posts, and lifted them up, bar and all. He put them on his shoulders and carried them all the way to the top of the hill across from Hebron.

4 Some time later Samson fell in love with a woman named Delilah, who lived in the valley of Sorek. 5 The rulers of the Philistines went to her and said, “Entice Samson to tell you what makes him so strong and how he can be overpowered and tied up securely. Then each of us will give you 1,100 pieces[*] of silver.”

6 So Delilah said to Samson, “Please tell me what makes you so strong and what it would take to tie you up securely.”

7 Samson replied, “If I were tied up with seven new bowstrings that have not yet been dried, I would become as weak as anyone else.”

8 So the Philistine rulers brought Delilah seven new bowstrings, and she tied Samson up with them. 9 She had hidden some men in one of the inner rooms of her house, and she cried out, “Samson! The Philistines have come to capture you!” But Samson snapped the bowstrings as a piece of string snaps when it is burned by a fire. So the secret of his strength was not discovered.

10 Afterward Delilah said to him, “You’ve been making fun of me and telling me lies! Now please tell me how you can be tied up securely.”

11 Samson replied, “If I were tied up with brand-new ropes that had never been used, I would become as weak as anyone else.”

12 So Delilah took new ropes and tied him up with them. The men were hiding in the inner room as before, and again Delilah cried out, “Samson! The Philistines have come to capture you!” But again Samson snapped the ropes from his arms as if they were thread.

13 Then Delilah said, “You’ve been making fun of me and telling me lies! Now tell me how you can be tied up securely.”

Samson replied, “If you were to weave the seven braids of my hair into the fabric on your loom and tighten it with the loom shuttle, I would become as weak as anyone else.”

So while he slept, Delilah wove the seven braids of his hair into the fabric. 14 Then she tightened it with the loom shuttle.[*] Again she cried out, “Samson! The Philistines have come to capture you!” But Samson woke up, pulled back the loom shuttle, and yanked his hair away from the loom and the fabric.

15 Then Delilah pouted, “How can you tell me, ‘I love you,’ when you don’t share your secrets with me? You’ve made fun of me three times now, and you still haven’t told me what makes you so strong!” 16 She tormented him with her nagging day after day until he was sick to death of it.

17 Finally, Samson shared his secret with her. “My hair has never been cut,” he confessed, “for I was dedicated to God as a Nazirite from birth. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me, and I would become as weak as anyone else.”

18 Delilah realized he had finally told her the truth, so she sent for the Philistine rulers. “Come back one more time,” she said, “for he has finally told me his secret.” So the Philistine rulers returned with the money in their hands. 19 Delilah lulled Samson to sleep with his head in her lap, and then she called in a man to shave off the seven locks of his hair. In this way she began to bring him down,[*] and his strength left him.

20 Then she cried out, “Samson! The Philistines have come to capture you!”

When he woke up, he thought, “I will do as before and shake myself free.” But he didn’t realize the LORD had left him.

21 So the Philistines captured him and gouged out his eyes. They took him to Gaza, where he was bound with bronze chains and forced to grind grain in the prison.

22 But before long, his hair began to grow back.

23 The Philistine rulers held a great festival, offering sacrifices and praising their god, Dagon. They said, “Our god has given us victory over our enemy Samson!”

24 When the people saw him, they praised their god, saying, “Our god has delivered our enemy to us! The one who killed so many of us is now in our power!”

25 Half drunk by now, the people demanded, “Bring out Samson so he can amuse us!” So he was brought from the prison to amuse them, and they had him stand between the pillars supporting the roof.

26 Samson said to the young servant who was leading him by the hand, “Place my hands against the pillars that hold up the temple. I want to rest against them.” 27 Now the temple was completely filled with people. All the Philistine rulers were there, and there were about 3,000 men and women on the roof who were watching as Samson amused them.

28 Then Samson prayed to the LORD, “Sovereign LORD, remember me again. O God, please strengthen me just one more time. With one blow let me pay back the Philistines for the loss of my two eyes.” 29 Then Samson put his hands on the two center pillars that held up the temple. Pushing against them with both hands, 30 he prayed, “Let me die with the Philistines.” And the temple crashed down on the Philistine rulers and all the people. So he killed more people when he died than he had during his entire lifetime.

31 Later his brothers and other relatives went down to get his body. They took him back home and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol, where his father, Manoah, was buried. Samson had judged Israel for twenty years.

NOTES

16:1 One day. This story (16:1-3) seems to float in time. The chronological note in 15:20 marks the end of that narrative. The Delilah story, beginning in 16:4, is introduced with a chronological break as well. In between comes this curious little story of Samson in Gaza. The author introduces Gaza, where the story will finally end. The move to Gaza also pre­sents, rather abruptly, a reminder of Samson’s tendency to violate the sacred boundaries marking off God’s people from pagans. Twenty years had elapsed since Samson’s triumph of the Philistines at Lehi, during which time he apparently presided as chief over his people without incident, though the Philistines were still present. The story now moves to the end of Samson’s career, revisiting the issues treated in chs 14–15, namely, the cultural and religious boundaries between Israel and the Philistines, the pivotal role of Samson’s love for women, and the place of vengeance. Like the beginning of Samson’s exploits, the Philistines would seek to discover a secret by conniving with the object of Samson’s affections. In the early story, the secret had to do with a feat of strength, but now the heart of Samson’s very identity will be at stake.

the Philistine town. “Philistine town” is lacking in Hebrew, but is supplied to give the reader essential context that would be self-evident to the ancient reader. As noted below, Gaza not only was Philistine, but would have been perhaps the major city of the Philistines. Claims that the Philistine identity of Gaza or the prostitute are uncertain (Schneider 2000:217-218) seem unfounded.

Gaza. The mound that covers ancient Gaza stands in the northeast corner of the modern city of Gaza. The sea on the west and the desert on the east force all traffic moving between Egypt in the south and Canaan, Syria, and Mesopotamia in the north into a narrow strip that provided the perfect strategic location for a fortified town, which was blessed as well with fertile soil and copious freshwater wells. The Egyptian pharaoh Thutmose III reports possessing Gaza c. 1468 BC. Gaza marked the south boundary of Canaan and served its capital under the Egyptians until c. 1200–1150 BC. Gaza is mentioned in the Amarna correspondence of the mid-1300s BC, as Jerusalem’s city ruler complained that the pharaoh had not cared for Jerusalem’s defense as attentively as he had Gaza’s (Moran 1992:332-333; 338-339). When the Sea Peoples, among whom were the Philistines and possibly the Danites (see note on 13:2), settled the coast, Gaza became a major city in the five-city Philistine coalition (ABD 2.912-915; NIDB 2.527-529). Gaza might have slipped out of Egyptian control before their arrival. Ancient art depicts Gaza with towers and fortified gates. Following typical routes, the trip from Zorah to Gaza was about 45 miles, making it the farthest major Philistine city from Samson’s home.

spent the night with a prostitute. The NLT’s rendering obscures the similarity between 16:1 and 14:1. In both cases, the text says Samson traveled to a city and “saw a woman,” typically linked in the OT to irregular sexual unions (see note on 14:1). But in ch 14, Samson pursued marriage in a neighboring town within the Danite inheritance; here Samson merely fornicates far afield. The narrative of Samson’s debacle thus begins with a similar episode as the story of his triumph: He sees a Philistine woman. The construction here is literally “a woman, a prostitute,” (’ishah zonah [TH2181B, ZH2390]). Hebrew often places “man” or “woman” or other very general words before terms denoting more specific roles (Waltke and O’Connor 1990:226-230). Thus, Deborah (4:4) is a “woman, prophet” (’ishah nebi’ah [TH5031, ZH5567]) and in response to Israel’s cry in 6:7-8 is to send a “man-prophet” (’ish nabi’ [TH5030, ZH5566]). Jephthah’s mother, like the woman of Gaza, was ’ishah zonah, “a woman, prostitute.” This normal, appositional function of the words “man” and “woman” should not be stressed unduly, as though the author intended to emphasize gender (cf. Schneider 2000:217).

16:2 Word soon spread. The NLT follows the LXX here. The phrase, one word in Hebrew, is lacking in the MT, likely due to a copyist’s error.

gathered together. The term ’arab [TH693, ZH741] explicitly refers to waiting in ambush.

the town gates. Modern scholars rightly note the complex structure of city gates, which were more than just big doors (Block 1999:450). But the Israelite/Canaanite gate might not be the best parallel. If the gate of nearby Philistine Ashdod offers an analogy, the Gaza gate featured a roadway about 45 feet long and 14 feet wide, with a turn at the end and chambers on either side, like the Canaanite gates. In Ashdod, however, one end of the gate passage constricted to a narrow opening set at a sharp angle (Stern 1993–2008:1.98-99). City gates served as places of business, legal disputation, and even religious observance. The chambers also served for defense. An invader would be exposed to flanking fire from the side-chambers. Thus, the gate offered a natural point of ambush for assassins.

They kept quiet. Lit., “they were silent,” a comical image of enough men of Gaza to take on Samson skulking in the city gate, shushing one another to silence as they await the strongman’s groggy emergence from taking his sensual pleasure all night. Alternatively, perhaps they watched all day and, assuming the gate was closed, slept at night, giving Samson his chance (Burney 1920:376).

during the night. In these three short verses, the Hebrew word “night” appears four times. Tellingly, the term in Hebrew, laylah [TH3915A, ZH4326], resonates with the name of Samson’s ultimate femme fatale, Delilah, which could be construed to mean “the one of the night.”

16:3 But Samson stayed in bed. The NLT correctly translates, but misses the innuendo in the Hebrew, which says Samson “lay until midnight.” The verb shakab [TH7901, ZH8886] (to lie) appears in euphemisms for sexual intercourse.

midnight. No reason for Samson’s midnight departure appears, but his enemies certainly counted on him enjoying his full night of pleasure and being complacent and slow as he departed, easy bait for an ambush.

Then he got up, took hold of the doors of the town gate, including the two posts, and lifted them up, bar and all. The actual doorways of the gate would be heavy wooden doors, often plated with metal, that turned on pivots seated in sockets in the roadway (Soggin 1981:253). Thus, they could be “popped” out with sufficient force. A crossbar secured the double doors. Samson apparently unseated the large pivots and lifted the whole doorway out of its assembly with the crossbar. The gates of the city embodied the entire civic and cultural life of the town, as well as providing security. The gate was the opening in the boundary between the safety of civilization inside, and the threats of disorder on the outside. In desecrating the gates, Samson violated the city’s vision of itself as a place of security and order.

the top of the hill across from Hebron. We need not imagine Samson carrying the gates all the way to Hebron itself: No point between Gaza and Hebron stands higher than Hebron itself, so any hilltop between Gaza and Hebron could be identified as a hilltop “facing Hebron.” Keil (1863:418-419) notes a site near Gaza traditionally considered the hilltop in question, though later commentators scoff at the identification (e.g., Moore 1895:349-350). Hebron sits 38 miles east of Gaza and over 3,000 feet above it, high atop a geological uplift known as the “Judean Arch,” which runs from Bethlehem south for about 25 miles. This ridge dominates the view westward from any point in the Shephelah. Perhaps it was no accident that Samson took the gates into the territory of his Judean brethren who had earlier betrayed him to the Philistines.

16:4 Some time later. Heb., wayehi ’akhare ken [TH310/3651A, ZH339/4027] (and it was, afterwards), which marks a notable pause in time, and often marks major episode divisions, such as in the latter part of the story of David (cf. 2 Sam 2:1; 8:1; 10:1; 13:1; 15:1; Matthews 2004:158).

Samson fell in love. Lit., “he loved a woman.” Contrary to claims that “love” was Samson’s weakness, it is not stated that Samson loved any woman prior to Delilah. The text is also silent about whether Samson married in the 20 years he led Israel. Assuming he did not, the book of Judges remarkably presents a series of heroes: Gideon, Jephthah, and Samson, who ultimately have no offspring to continue their line. In the ancient society, to die with no offspring was a horrible fate.

a woman named Delilah. Scholars debate the meaning of her name. Some suggest a tie to a word meaning “a thin thread,” which makes little sense, except that Delilah did possess a loom. Another suggestion links the word to dangling curls or loose hair, a plausible connection to the story. Yet another possibility, the most popular one, is a word meaning “flirtation” (HALOT 1.222, s.v. delilah [TH1807, ZH1935]). No reader of the Hebrew, however, could miss the aural resonance between Delilah’s name and the Hebrew word for “night” (laylah [TH3915A, ZH4326]), which appears four times in 16:1-3. Though most interpreters presume Delilah was a Philistine, the narrator never names her as such, and does not even name her town. Her name has a Northwest Semitic form, so she might well have been a Canaanite—or perhaps even an Israelite. What if Samson was ultimately betrayed by an Israelite woman who, like Samson, had engaged in Philistine liaisons?

the valley of Sorek. The Sorek valley brings the story back to Samson’s home area, near Timnah, Zorah, and Beth-shemesh. Due to several phonetic shifts among the Semitic languages, several variant meanings attach to the Hebrew root, s-r-q (cf. soreq [TH7796, ZH8604]), which can be difficult to sort out. The various uses of the word also seem to function ironically in this account. The term can denote a foxy-red or sorrel color; it comes from the color of the red soil washed into the valley from the hard limestone hills. “Sorek” is also the name of a very fine and famous strain of dark red grapes used for wine making, potentially ironizing on a wine-refusing Nazirite meeting his match in the Sorek. Again, the connection with Samson’s fate provokes a rueful smile from the alert reader of the Hebrew text. “Sorek” also denotes women’s cosmetics, also resonating with our story featuring a woman who captures Samson’s affection (HALOT 2.1314, 1361-1362; NIDOTTE 3.1293-1294; Matthews 2004:159). Although the valley is named, Delilah’s town is not named. Timnah remains a possibility, of course, but Ekron or even Beth-shemesh would also serve the story’s purpose. Although the central narrative occurs in the Sorek valley, it is framed by events in Gaza (16:1-3, 23-30; cf. “General Orientation to the Samson Story” in commentary on ch 13, and note on 14:1).

16:5 rulers of the Philistines. “Rulers” translates the plural of seren [TH5633A, ZH6249], which seems to be a loan word from the Philistine language. Only Philistine city rulers receive this title in the OT. The term derives either from the Greek turannos or the Hittite sarawanas, both denoting a ruler. Scholars incline toward one or the other depending on their views of the origin of the Philistines, either Greece or Anatolia. Both have a military connotation befitting the appearance in the OT that the Philistine cities were ruled by a military aristocracy (NIDOTTE 3.295-298). That now the Philistine city elites, rather than mere disgruntled town elders, sought Samson’s destruction signals the higher stakes of this game. Moreover, the only previous reference in Judges to the “rulers of the Philistines” specifically names them as functioning to test Israel’s faithfulness to Yahweh (3:3). Their appearance here likely implies the testing of Samson, a test he will fail miserably.

Entice Samson. See note on 14:15, and note the parallel with that story: Powerful men came to Samson’s beloved with an appeal to seduce him into betraying an important secret.

to tell you what makes him so strong. The parallel with chs 14–15 here presents a contrast. Before, the Philistines simply sought to embarrass Samson as he tried to marry one of their women. Here, the goal was Samson’s destruction. The Philistines thought some amulet, object, or “trick” lay behind Samson’s strength (Keil 1863:419). Samson might not have appeared muscular, the way artists often portray him, otherwise “working out every day” would have been a sufficient answer to the secret of his strength! But his strength seemed incongruous somehow, demanding a “secret” or magical cause. This story brings the larger theme of knowing and not knowing to a climax.

how he can be overpowered. The NLT presents no equivalent for a word in this verse that also appears in 16:6 and 19. The rulers’ request includes three verbs: to overpower, to bind, and to “afflict.” This last word (‘anah [TH6031, ZH6700]) goes beyond mere physical defeat. In the Qal stem, the verb denotes cringing humiliation and wretchedness. Twice it describes women who have been raped and thus humiliated before their community: Dinah (Gen 34:2) and Tamar (2 Sam 13:22, 32; NIDOTTE 3.449-452; Niditch 2008:165). In the honor-shame-oriented culture of the ancient Near East (especially in the chaotic, liminal era of Iron Age I), the Philistines’ desire not simply to defeat, but to humiliate and shame Samson assumes paramount importance. Samson had shamed the Philistines when he paid off his wager despite their guessing his riddle. He shamed them again by winning the vendetta feud of ch 15. His 20 years of leadership, apparently unimpeded by the Philistines, would have shamed their military elites by frustrating their ambitions to expand from the coastal plain into the Israelite heartland. Being held at bay by someone they viewed as a backwards, hill-country strongman rankled their honor, so they sought to even the score.

tied up securely. The repeated reference to “binding” in this exchange (’asar [TH631, ZH673]) resonates with the promise of the Judeans only to bind Samson (cf. 15:10-13). This root is a leitmotif in this story, appearing in 16:5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 21, 25, ranging in use from references to tying up Samson, to fetters of bronze, to the prison where he was ­confined.

then each of us will give you 1,100 pieces of silver. Previously, the men intimidated Samson’s wife with threats of violence; the Philistine lords here appeal to Delilah’s greed. Boling (1975:248-249) suggests scribes and translators misrendered the phrase, which originally read “[from] each unit, one hundred.” Here the Hebrew term “thousand” bears its other sense, namely a unit of military command tied to a town, region, or clan (see note on 8:10). The resultant 500 shekels would still be rich payment for her betrayal of Samson.

16:6 what it would take to tie you up securely. Again, the expression, “to humiliate you” (cf. note on 16:5), is omitted from the NLT’s rendering. Delilah clearly states her game: What is required to defeat Samson? The interpretation of the story must account for the fact that Samson cannot have been deceived about what Delilah sought: his utter defeat and open humiliation. The two subsequent episodes also show her utter ruthlessness in acting on the information Samson gave her. Samson could not have doubted her intent.

16:7 Samson replied, “If I were tied up with seven.” Samson, in each of his teasing replies, betrays a clue to the truth. This first ruse actually contains more than one. Here the number seven matches the number of braids of his hair.

new bowstrings that have not yet been dried. “New” (lakhim [TH3892, ZH4300], “fresh, moist”) aurally evokes the word for “jawbone” (lekhi [TH3895, ZH4305]), yet another link between the narrative in chs 14–15 and 16. Samson’s use of the “fresh” jawbone violated his vow, as would his contact with “moist” bowstrings, which were typically made from the intestines or tendons of animals. Contact with them would violate the Nazirite prohibition on contact with dead bodies. Especially strings that had “not yet been dried” might retain a stronger association with the dead body of the animal (Soggin 1981:254). Thus, Samson hints already at his devoted condition and how violation of it would compromise his strength (Block 1999:457-458). Since no previous contact with the dead—eating from the lion or handling the donkey’s jawbone—had diminished his strength, Samson presumed himself safe.

I would become as weak as anyone else. This expression (ke’akhad ha’adam [TH120, ZH132], meaning “like one of humanity” or “like anyone else,” recurs three more times (16:11, 13, 17). The underlying question is not simply Samson’s strength. The issue resides in what makes Samson different from every other person, i.e., it is a question of boundaries. His strength derives from his distinctive identity, not from any magical properties or mana that might be staunched by some special technique or maneuver. Only the destruction of Samson’s unique relationship with Yahweh would make him “like other men” and allow him to be humiliated.

16:9 She had hidden some men in one of the inner rooms of her house. “Some men” is lit., “the ambush”; it could refer to several persons. Like Rahab in Josh 2, Delilah maintained her own house independently, a house large enough to conceal Samson’s would-be captors in another room during the proceedings of the entire evening. In a patriarchal society, a woman presiding over such a house would be wealthy and influential (Matthews 2004:159). She certainly had an easy rapport with the Philistine military urban elites.

the secret of his strength was not discovered. Lit., “his strength was not known.” More importantly, Samson had once again violated his Nazirite vow with no ill effects, reinforcing his apparent belief that nothing could rob him of his strength.

16:10 You’ve been making fun of me. The charge appears also in 16:13, 15, Delilah’s principle complaint against Samson. The verb employed (talal [TH2048A, ZH9438]) has close affinities with a root attested in Arabic, dalla, which has the same consonants as “Delilah” and means “to flirt.” While the verb can mean “to mock, to trifle,” the overarching sense conveyed is one of deception or cheating, even reneging on a promise. A power or status differential also figures in the word’s usage, in which one gains superiority over another by cunning and deception (NIDOTTE 4.298-299; TDOT 15.672-681). For Delilah to speak this way rhetorically puts her in the weaker position: “you are gaining superiority over me by deceit,” when in fact, she was the one who would bring down Samson through deceit (cf. 16:19b). “Making fun of me” thus seems to miss the sinister connotations of the term.

16:11 If I were tied up with brand-new ropes. Note the echo with 15:13. The ruse shares with the bowstrings the idea of something that is utterly unused, as though such an item possessed a unique power. Rope seems to have been a weave of plant fibers. Flax, acacia fibers, and those from the date-palm were used to make rope (ABD 2.804, 807). In connection with Samson’s name, some interpreters note the Babylonian custom where the “rope of Shamash” was draped over the naditu priestess’s arm when she entered into the temple service of the sun god as his daughter-in-law or bride (ABD 6.949-950). This Mesopotamian ceremony likely was far from our author’s mind. Niditch (2008:165) notes that the “braids” of Samson might well have looked like woven ropes or “dreadlocks,” and thus this ruse could gesture indirectly to his hair. Most importantly, the reader already knows, of course, that new ropes could not bind Samson since Samson’s great victory with the jawbone began with his being bound in “new ropes.” So this ruse points to its own falsehood by repeating a strategy known to be ineffective.

16:13 If you were to weave the seven braids of my hair. Here Samson betrays part of the truth about his strength. Only here does the reader learn that Samson’s hair formed seven braids. Whether Delilah had to unbraid or unbind Samson’s seven locks in order to weave them into her fabric remains unclear, but seems likely. Burney (1920:379-380) notes how ancient art portrays the Mesopotamian hero Gilgamesh, like most Mesopotamian heroes, with curled locks of hair.

into the fabric on your loom. The text in 16:13-14 has been disrupted. The Hebrew of 16:13 closes 16:13 with this clause and resumes in 16:14 with Delilah already fastening Samson’s hair with a peg (NLT, “shuttle”). A fuller text appears in the ancient Greek translations. While some think the shorter Hebrew simply has an ellipsis (Keil 1863:421), it seems more likely that the longer text in the LXX (followed by NLT, NIV, NASB, et al.) is original and was omitted by a Hebrew copyist due to repetition.

16:14 she tightened it with the loom shuttle. If Delilah was a Philistine, the reference to her loom evokes one of the most distinctive aspects of Philistine material culture. In the Sorek valley, the excavation of the site of Timnah (Tel Batash) revealed many household looms, particularly the type featuring two upright pieces and a crossbar from which the vertical strands, the warp, hung, steadied by loom weights tied to the ends of the threads. The cross-strands, the woof/weft, were pushed through the warp repeatedly to create the fabric. Periodically the cross-woven strands were packed together by a batten inserted into the warp and used to ram the woven threads tightly together. This flat piece of wood was not the “shuttle” the NLT mentions, which was the leader for the cross-woven threads. So Samson noted that his hair must be woven into the fabric and rammed tight with the batten (Moore 1895:353). The text, in using the noun yathed [TH3489, ZH3845] (peg, stick) and the verb taqa‘[TH8628, ZH9546] (thrust, ram), also evokes Jael’s murder of Sisera (4:21) and possibly Ehud’s murder of Eglon (3:21). Several different types of loom weights, often of a distinctively Philistine type, have been excavated, often deposited on the floors of houses in a tidy row right where they fell from the threads when the house was burned. Egyptian art portrays this sort of loom and allows us rather easily to imagine the scene (Barber 1991:79-125; King and Stager 2001:152-158).

Samson woke up, pulled back the loom shuttle, and yanked his hair away from the loom. If Delilah in fact wove Samson’s hair into the fabric on the loom and compacted it, he probably did not simply “yank” his hair free. His rising probably destroyed the loom, pieces of which would be in his hair, still woven into the cloth, dragging along behind him. The image is quite dramatic and even comical.

16:15 Delilah pouted. The NLT expands on the Hebrew, which simply reads “and she said.” Translators often inject a color or tone into the text’s often bland wording to make explicit something they think is implicit in the text, based on their larger impression of the narrative. “Pouted” suggests one possible demeanor of Delilah; she might also have “cooed” or spoken angrily, protested, or even used a calm tone that threatened perhaps the end of the relationship.

How can you tell me, “I love you.” Delilah’s appeal echoes that of Samson’s Timnite wife, except that the narrator has made a point of telling us that Samson, in fact, loved Delilah (16:4).

16:16 until he was sick to death of it. Lit., “his soul (nepesh [TH5315, ZH5883]) became short unto death.” The idiom of exasperation, “the nepesh was/is short,” appeared in 10:16 (see note).

16:17 Finally, Samson shared his secret with her. Samson’s strength would have been rather obviously associated with his Nazirite status, whose most obvious feature was unshorn hair. The text rather emphasizes “he declared to her his whole heart.” In what follows, Samson does not merely note that a haircut will drain his potency. He explicitly unfolds the full connection between his hair, his vow, and his devotion to Yahweh. He thus makes clear that his hair functions sacramentally via his vow as a marker of his relationship with Yahweh, showing in fact it is not a “secret” such as a magical trick. Rather, his devotion with Yahweh, signaled by the hair, is the key. The link between a hero’s powers and hair appears frequently in popular traditions (Soggin 1981:257-259).

My hair has never been cut . . . I was dedicated to God as a Nazirite from birth. For the very first time the story ties Samson’s great strength to his Nazirite status and his uncut hair. In chs 14–15, his Nazirite status and hair go without notice as his strength derives from Yahweh’s enabling. This statement arcs back to ch 13 and the vow over Samson’s life, though even there, supernatural strength is not stated to result from Samson’s vow. Samson clearly states the connection between his devotion and his strength. Even here, though, Samson does not name Yahweh as his God, but describes himself as “dedicated [a Nazirite] to God,” using the term ’elohim [TH430, ZH466]. Did Samson discern in the name of Israel’s God at least one boundary he dare not desecrate? The irony of Samson’s “testimony” in this setting should not be missed.

16:18 his secret. Lit., “his heart,” as also in 16:15. The NLT shifts the emphasis to the content of the betrayal, but the Hebrew focuses on its character. A man had given his heart to the wrong person, and would pay the price.

16:19 Delilah lulled Samson to sleep with his head in her lap. Lit., “on her knees,” but ancient Greek versions also read ana meson [TG3319, ZG3545] (between) her knees, which would render Heb. bayin [TH996, ZH1068], a sexual reference. Indeed, from a comparative literature standpoint, all of the “recurring acts of tying” appear to be “subversive play in an erotic context” (Niditch 2008:166-169). Samson, after making love, promptly dropped into a deep sleep. This was especially unwise when his lover was in possession of a razor.

she called in a man to shave off. The Hebrew text is confusing. It reads lit., “she called a man, and she shaved off.” The fem. verbal form is indisputable; it was Delilah who did the shaving. She also performed the previous actions intended to debilitate Samson, so suddenly expecting someone else to do the deed violates the context. Most translations fix this by interpreting the Piel wattegallakh [TH1548, ZH1662] (she shaved) as though it were a Hiphil: “she called a man and [made him] shave.” The causal sense of the Piel, however, is not agental, but factitive; the subject causes a condition, not an event, thus the Piel often sounds resultative or intensive, e.g., “shaved off.” Moreover, the verb never appears in the OT in the Qal, and in all its other occurrences simply means “shaved,” not “caused [someone] to shave [someone else].” Short of speculation, we can only assume she wanted the man present while she shaved Samson’s head.

the seven locks of his hair. Since the OT sets certain limits on the cutting of the hair (e.g., Lev 19:27; 21:5 [priests]; Deut 14:1), any shaving of the head indicated a noteworthy change in a person’s status. Whether signifying separation or reintegration, shaving the head betokened the crossing of a vital boundary and was surrounded by taboo and ritual (Olyan 1998). The shaving of a Nazirite’s head carried even more significance. The contrast with the way the Nazirite’s hair should have been cut could not be stronger. The Nazirite, upon completion of the period of devotion, presented himself or herself to the priest. With appropriate offerings, the Nazirite shaved the hair, which was then burned on the altar (Num 6:18). The Nazirite then rejoined the ordinary, day-to-day life of every Israelite, the shaved head being a testimony to everyone of a devotion freely chosen and brought to sacred, triumphant completion. Samson, however, was not to know a victorious conclusion to his life of devotion. As he slept, his treacherous lover sheared his locks. We hear nothing of the disposal of the hair, but the image of Samson slumbering in his treacherous lover’s arms while his sacred hair lies on the floor of his lover’s bedchamber, perhaps to be swept out into the street (rather than burned on Yahweh’s altar), powerfully conveys the betrayal of his status.

she began to bring him down. Again, the verb is “to humiliate,” as in 15:5, 6, likely referring to some overt abuse or shaming action by Delilah.

and his strength left him. The series of verb tenses likely here conveys not sequence, but concurrency: She humiliated him as his strength left him. The text almost suggests one could observe the power draining from Samson. Readers perennially wonder how Samson could have been so foolish. Did he not know, based on the last three episodes, that she would in fact cut his hair? Rather than attribute Samson’s revelation to stupidity or ­love-blindness, the key likely remains arrogance. Nowhere in the story has Samson’s strength suffered, despite repeated violations of his vow and of Yahweh’s moral law.

16:20 When he woke up, he thought, “I will do as before and shake myself free.” Samson here expresses the presumption that is his undoing. Three previous times she acted immediately upon his divulging his secret, albeit in deceit. When he told her the whole truth, he had to know she would act on it. But, amazingly, he expected no consequences.

But he didn’t realize the LORD had left him. This statement portends much more than merely the Spirit of Yahweh no longer rushing upon Samson. The claim that Yahweh is “with” someone in the OT implies the full blessing of God’s presence and power not only within them, but providentially working around them to order their way, as in the case of Joseph (e.g., Gen 39:1-6). For Yahweh to turn away from Samson meant not simply the failure of his blessing, but his rejection by Yahweh as his servant. Samson became like any other man, and even worse. Others can claim to be Yahweh’s weak and humble servant; Samson was abandoned by God.

16:21 So the Philistines captured him and gouged out his eyes. The same fate befell the last king of Judah, Zedekiah (2 Kgs 25:7). Assyrian palace reliefs depict the gouging out of war-prisoners’ eyes (Bleibtreu 1991). Most striking is the oft-reproduced image of the mutilated bronze head of a prominent Mesopotamian, possibly the king Sargon the Great, featuring shattered eye-sockets, broken-off ears, and mutilated nose (Frankfort 1996:84; Nylander 1980). A typical account from the Assyrian king Ashurnasirpal II reads: “In strife and conflict I besieged (and) conquered the city. I felled 3,000 of their fighting men with the sword. I carried off prisoners, possessions, oxen, (and) cattle from them. I burnt many captives from them. I captured many troops alive; others I cut off their noses, ears, (and) extremities. I gouged out the eyes of many troops. I made one pile of the living (and) one of heads. I hung their heads on trees around the city” (Grayson 1991:201). More than mere savagery, such mutilation subjected the victims to shame (Lemos 2006).

They took him to Gaza. This phase of Samson’s life began at Gaza (16:1-3), where Samson carelessly took his liberty with a prostitute and found his strength equal to the escape. His return to Gaza, especially his passage through the city gate, with which he was intimately familiar, accentuates the depth to which Samson’s presumption brought him. The Philistines also imprisoned Samson as far as possible from his home territory. Readers familiar with the deportations by the Assyrians in 721 BC or by the Babylonians in 597 and 586 would find the image compelling.

he was bound with bronze chains and forced to grind grain. Artists universally portray Samson pushing the beam on a large, circular grinder like an ox. But this style of mill seems a late Iron Age development. However poignant this image, Samson likely used a hand grinder, in which a “rider” stone was pushed up and down, back and forth, over a “saddle stone” by a worker kneeling in front—work normally reserved for women and slaves in ancient societies (ABD 4.831-832). King and Stager (2001:94) note, “It was common practice to humiliate prisoners of war by forcing them to grind with a handmill.” Ironically, since the term “grind” in Hebrew was thought also to have sexual connotations, medieval rabbinic interpreters suggested Samson did not grind grain, but, due to his virtuosic physicality, served as a kind of breeding stud for the Philistines, who sent their women to him (ABD 1.720-725; Niditch 2008:166, 171).

16:22 But before long, his hair began to grow back. From a more advanced point in the process of divine revelation, Christian readers might recoil from what appears to be a crude association between Samson’s mere external appearance, i.e., his hair’s growth, and the return of God’s blessing on his life. But the Nazirite vow centered on the hair. Whatever other rules applied, the “sacred head” of the Nazirite figured centrally in this intensified devotion to Yahweh. Likewise, the text uses Samson’s hair as a visible literary marker for Samson’s devotion to God. Thus, in noting Samson’s hair regrowing, the author signals that God is not finished using Samson. In fact, God had declared Samson a Nazirite until the day of his death. Even in sin and failure, even in prison, Samson was not released from his vow (contra Boling 1975:248-253). The author signals that Samson remains under the mercy of God. The revival of the symbol of his devotion points to the renewal of the devotion itself. Ironically, what was originally a secret the Philistines connived and paid richly to learn, now plays out right before their eyes, and they do not even see it. They are as blind to the danger posed by the regrown hair as Samson has become by losing it.

16:23 great festival . . . praising their god, Dagon. While readers normally imagine Samson’s last act occurring in Gaza, ancient sources testify to a place known as Beth Dagan north of Gaza on the coast, near Joppa (Moore 1895:359). Interpreters since David Kimchi have seen Dagon as a hybrid fish-human image, based on the Heb. word dag [TH1709, ZH1834], meaning “fish” (Keil 1863:424; Moore 1895:358), but a lack of hard evidence leaves an enigma (ABD 2.1-3). Block (1999:465) suggests Dagon was most likely an agricultural deity (cf. Heb., dagan [TH1715, ZH1841], “grain”). Dagon figured in ancient Near Eastern worship as early as the third millennium BC, and he appeared in the Levant as early as the 1300s BC. Evidently, he was not the Philistines’ native god but was adopted by them upon arrival. The “ark narrative” (1 Sam 4–6) mocks Dagon, who falls on his face before the captured Ark.

16:24 Our god has delivered our enemy to us! The one who killed so many of us is now in our power! The Philistines describe Samson as (lit.) “our enemy . . . the destroyer of our land . . . who multiplied our slain.” While he had not delivered Israel from the Philistines, the harm Samson did to the oppressor cannot be minimized. The lines quoted from the Philistine shout contain a fivefold rhyme that suggests a poetic form. Many of the claims made about their deity, Dagon, would be applied by the Israelites to Yahweh. Likewise, similar claims are found in the claims of Mesha king of Moab in his inscription praising his god Chemosh. Samson here fulfills the third step of decline set out by the author of Judges in 3:5-6, where the reader was warned that Israel would fraternize with pagans, then intermarry with pagans, and, finally, be made to serve their gods. Samson clearly engaged in the first two boundary violations, and here, as with the final requirement of his Nazirite vow, the final violation occurs against his will.

16:25 to amuse them. The precise nature of the amusements offered by Samson remain unsaid. Some imagine feats of (reduced) strength in which Samson the divine hero was reduced to a circus strongman. Ancient translations suggest dancing, but the Hebrew also has sexual connotations (Gen 26:8; 2 Sam 6:5, 21-23; 1 Chr 15:29; Niditch 2008:167, 171), possibly suggesting some lewd or humiliating action, perhaps a reenactment of Samson’s downfall?

between the pillars supporting the roof. Excavations of a series of Philistine temples at Tel Qasile, within the city limits of modern Tel Aviv, reveal in the stratum X level two stone column bases about six feet apart upon which would have stood massive cedar columns, of which carbonized remains were found, to support the roof (Mazar 1992:317-323; Bierling 1992:113-119). Dislodging them might indeed have compromised the structure of the building, especially if it were already burdened with spectators on the roof (cf. 16:27). No one, of course, claims this temple as the one destroyed by Samson. Tel Qasile stratum X is somewhat late for Samson and, of course, is not located in Gaza. Still, its existence confirms in the Iron I period a Philistine temple design previously known only from ch 16. The three successive temples at Tel Qasile, covering the entire period of Philistine occupation, document an impressive diversity of architecture and floor plan, suggesting scholars should not expect uniformity in Philistine cult centers.

16:28 Samson prayed to the LORD, “Sovereign LORD.” Samson addresses God in perhaps the most formal manner possible, combining the term “master” (’adonay [TH136, ZH151]) with the divine name, yhwh [TH3068, ZH3378].

remember me again. “Again” does not appear in the Hebrew. The cry for God to “remember” carries deep connotations. For humans, to remember God and his saving actions involves those actions having a continuing impact—that is, one orders one’s life around the reality of God’s actions in a concrete way. Israel’s whole problem resided in its tendency to forget Yahweh and his actions. Likewise, for Yahweh to “remember” his servant means he acts decisively on his servant’s behalf. Since remembrance also implies a forgetting, possibly Samson here acknowledged his past alienation from Yahweh and the justice of Yahweh’s departure from him, and called now for Yahweh to return to his servant.

O God, please strengthen me. For the first time, Samson actually appeals to God for strength rather than presuming on Yahweh’s presence. Since the vow that was the secret of his strength literally fell to the floor in Delilah’s boudoir, Samson’s only hope lay in a direct appeal to Yahweh, whose honor had been impugned by the Philistine festival.

just one more time. The core of this expression, happa‘am [TH6471, ZH7193], recapitulates the “just this once” of 15:3. The particle ’ak [TH389, ZH421] expresses unambiguously that Samson knew this would be the final act.

With one blow . . . for the loss of my two eyes. Lit., “let me have vengeance for one of my two eyes.” The idea could be that Samson did not even ask complete vengeance, just enough for one of his eyes (Moore 1895:362).

let me pay back the Philistines. The NLT’s “pay back” seems to reduce Samson’s vengeance to mere payback, simply revenge. But Mendenhall (1973:69-104) demonstrated that the term naqam [TH5358, ZH5933] refers to a distinctive situation in which the necessities of justice cannot be satisfied by the normal social institutions and require executive action, not judicial. The legitimacy of this executive use of force derives from divine authority. The context has clearly aligned the humiliation of Samson with the exaltation of Philistine gods, so that Samson’s vindication would entail Yahweh’s vengeance as well. Claiming that Samson’s prayer is purely self-centered (Schneider 2000:225-226; Block 1999:467-468; Younger 2002:322-323) misses this point and ignores the solidarity that existed between a tribal people, their deity, and their hero; it judges him by a standard of modern, Western, middle-class piety. Samson cried out to the divine author of justice, whose own honor was at stake in the Philistine temple, for more than revenge; he cried for “the reckoning.” To nitpick Samson’s prayer, count the first-person pronouns (an equal proportion of which occur in “acceptable” prayers), or charge him with narcissism also misses the horror and anguish, admittedly self-inflicted, that Samson had experienced. With his sense of mission, however narrow, renewed, his vengeance would provide some opportunity for God to be vindicated since the destruction of a pagan temple in the midst of a pagan festival results. Ironically, Samson did fulfill a central obligation of the Israelite occupation of Canaan: He destroyed a pagan cult site.

16:30 Let me die with the Philistines. Contrast this statement with Samson’s prayer in 15:18, where he protested that he would fall into the hands of the uncircumcised. His words here are not an affiliation with the Philistines, but articulate some degree of acceptance of the consequences of his actions.

the temple crashed down on the Philistine rulers and all the people. The ancient historian Tacitus reports the collapse of a wooden amphitheater that buried 50,000 victims (cf. Moore 1895:363). Nothing prevents the temple in this story from featuring wooden structures such as bleachers.

he killed more people when he died than he had during his entire lifetime. This line could be a commendation or a wry criticism affirming the best thing Samson ever did for Israel was to die (Stone 1988:346; 1992:343; Block 1999:469; Younger 2002:327). If the suggestion that 15:20 and 16:31b imply 20 years of relative safety from the Philistines under Samson, perhaps such a harsh judgment is not warranted. Indeed, Boling (1975:253) well observes that Samson “ran afoul because of his own lusty self-interest, [but] the consequent suffering evoked a new confession from him and he died honorably in the act of effecting Yahweh’s justice toward Philistia.” Niditch (2008:171-172) observes how, in Iron Age literary conventions, Samson’s death was heroic, his burial noble. The last word on this very mixed character is, in fact, heroic. Samson’s story could be seen as a time of deviation (14:1–15:19) followed by honorable service (15:20) yielding again to deviation (16:1-22) followed by an honorable end (16:22-31). In this respect, perhaps Samson’s death in battle, killing thousands of Philistines, improves somewhat upon Gideon and Jephthah, whose careers end under a cloud of misguided and even tragic choices. While his repeated violations of his vow did not seem to diminish its effects until the cutting of his hair, and while his hair regrew and restored the vow and his strength, his death here frees him from his obligation: Samson was called as a Nazirite until the day of his death (13:7).

16:31 his brothers and other relatives went down to get his body. Samson’s relatives traveled unhindered to the Philistine city to recover his body, which the Philistines apparently had not mutilated or abused as would happen later to the body of Saul (1 Sam 31:8-13). Both facts possibly testify to Samson’s impact.

buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol. Samson’s remains were laid to rest where the Spirit of Yahweh first stirred him (13:25).

Samson had judged Israel for twenty years. The NLT rightly reflects the Hebrew in using a pluperfect tense. The author leaves as his final note a reminder not of Samson’s unsavory exploits, but the 20 years in which he judged Israel without incident. In effect, ch 16 constitutes a large elaboration of the concluding elements of the standard judge framework structure. The story concludes by noting the duration of the judge’s rule and his death. Here we have an extended death narrative inserted after the notation in 15:20 of Samson’s 20-year rule. This is because Samson’s death was so noteworthy and exemplary of much of the author’s main argument, namely that violation of the boundaries defining Israel as Yahweh’s people had catastrophic consequences despite the fact that in his mercy Yahweh can still do much through the life of his servant.

COMMENTARY [Text]

Judges 14–15 presented the reader with a vexing conflict between the hero’s behavior and the moral vision presented in the book thus far. On the one hand, Samson’s marriage provided Yahweh with an occasion against the Philistines, Yahweh’s Spirit repeatedly empowered Samson to smite the Philistines, and at the end, Yahweh miraculously revived Samson with water from a rock, reminiscent of Moses. On the other hand, Samson violated vital boundaries that defined Yahweh’s people over against the Philistines by pursuing marriage to a Philistine woman and by utterly ignoring his Nazirite vow. Indeed, nothing in chapters 14–15 even recognizes Samson is a Nazirite. Nonetheless, at the end of chapter 15, all seems well. Samson fully avenged himself on the Philistines. He stymied any ambitions they had of expanding up the Sorek valley from Timnah, and he finally seems to acknowledge his separation from the “uncircumcised” (15:18). He then judged Israel, apparently without untoward incident, for 20 years (15:20). But the questions remain: Can vital boundaries of the faith be violated with impunity? Does sin not have any consequences? Can one dance on the edge of unbelief and play with the power of God and remain safe? May one sin if one repents just in time? Apart from chapter 16, chapters 13–15 might seem to say “Yes.”

The question presses hard. The contemporary church, in reacting against the judgmental legalism of past generations, has opened its arms to the lost and unbelieving. Many churches admirably declare their acceptance of all persons regardless of their moral failures and brokenness, rightly declaring that the gospel is a message of free grace for broken, bankrupt sinners. They see the church as a trauma center for those shattered by sin. At the same time, the same Christian community in North America seems increasingly to struggle with corruption, immorality, abuse of power, materialism, divorce, child abuse, spouse abuse, and addiction. In stressing God’s grace to sinners, have we lost the vital balancing message that sin harms persons deeply? More than simply an offense to God, sin actually rips at the fabric of our humanity, leaving us weaker and less able to fulfill God’s plan for our lives. Have we accepted sinners in such a way that the shattering impact of sin is disregarded, creating an environment in which those who avoid sin feel marginalized, and a kind of “permission” to sin is felt? After all, God forgives and receives the worst sinners who come to him. Why not sin, then come back to God and be restored? Or as Paul wrote, “should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace?” (Rom 6:1).

The book of Judges has relentlessly linked Israel’s sin to consequent oppression by pagan powers, stressing that sin has consequences—a point so far absent from Samson’s story. He seems to violate divine boundaries with impunity, at least until chapter 16, which picks up this theme. The ambivalence of chapters 14–15 breaks down unambiguously in 16:1-31. The structure of this section runs sufficiently parallel to chapters 14–15 to prompt readers to compare and contrast them. The triumphalist note of those two chapters is countered by Samson’s plunge to tragedy in chapter 16.

Both units begin with Samson’s relationship with a Philistine woman. In chapter 14, the relationship was marital, even though the union was with a Philistine. In 16:1-3 the liaison is fornication. Samson goes to Gaza and spots a prostitute, spending the night with her. Not only is there a contrast with his earlier action, but also a progression that sends us back to the introduction, specifically 3:5-6. There Israel’s decline from compromise to apostasy was summarized in three stages: coexistence with the inhabitants of the land, intermarriage with them, and serving their gods. Samson began with intermarriage; now he consorts with a prostitute. Recall that in 2:17; 8:27 and 33, harlotry is an image for apostasy. And yet, harlotry itself is rare in Judges. So 16:1-3 strike the reader hard. Moreover, later in chapter 16, Samson will be the cause for the Philistines’ glorifying—albeit briefly—their god, Dagon. Samson embodies the diagnosis given in 3:5-6.

Some years ago I saw a poem, the source of which is lost to me, that encapsulates this process:

IMAGINE MOSES SAYING:

“We will camp right here,

and send our little ones to Canaanite day-care centers.

IN JUST A FEW YEARS WE WILL

laugh at the same jokes,

sleep in the same beds

worship the same gods,

THEN WE CAN DRIFT ACROSS

the Jordan River,

and not be noticed at all.”

What is probably most significant about the short story in 16:1-3, however, is that Samson’s sojourn with a prostitute in no way diminished his strength, as his midnight transport of the gates of Gaza to a new location in the Shephelah clearly demonstrates. Notably, no reference appears to the Spirit of Yahweh, but neither did the Spirit appear every time he used his strength before. He experienced no consequences for his actions, and was perhaps confirmed in the blind assumption, already evident earlier (15:7), that he was in full control of his life. Even when he slept in the arms of a harlot, his strength did not abandon him, and the Philistines could not touch him. This, however, only continues the theme noted earlier, that Samson had been wantonly violating his Nazirite status, without apparent consequences. The delay of consequences, or rather, the silent and invisible nature of moral consequences, had caused many a person to think that God’s word, especially the word of demand and warning, somehow does not apply.

After his encounter with the prostitute in Gaza, Samson took a lover in the Sorek valley. Like chapters 14–15, 16:4-22 depicts Samson, now in a second immoral relationship, divulging a secret to a persistent paramour. Far from being an intimidated fiancée threatened by her townsmen and moved by fear for her own life and that of her family, Delilah was crassly in the hire of Samson’s enemies, and was motivated by greed. Unlike Samson’s earlier love, Delilah played for keeps, probing not for the answer to a party puzzle, but for the key to Samson’s destruction.

Another contrast lies in the fact that Samson is not duped by his lover in chapter 16 as he was earlier. Judges 14–15 revealed Samson’s intelligence, articulate wit, and shrewdness. He was a formidable riddler and toastmaster, no less clever with women. Samson was not reduced to a quivering mound of jelly by a beautiful woman. In chapter 14, he appears honestly overwhelmed, not by fluttering eyelashes, but by the constant, anguished importunity of his beloved, and was surprised and outraged that she divulged his secret. Not so in chapter 16. Samson is not deceived by Delilah, who clearly signals her intentions: “How can I really hurt you?” And moreover, by the time he divulged his secret, Delilah had acted on what he said three times, even readying a Philistine ambush in the house (16:9, 12)!

Faced with an attractive and dangerous lady, Samson played along with her deadly game, behaving as though he was totally in control, the master of his strength. Consider the incongruity of 16:17: In the house of his deceitful lover, who has three times showed herself fully willing to rob Samson of his strength, Samson gave his testimony, made love with the woman, then went to sleep, probably between her knees! As he betrayed the core reality of his life, he seemed oddly out of touch with the outrageous incongruity of his actions. His actions had not so far meant the loss of his divinely given strength. Did he think that, despite his own explanation, he would not really lose his strength? Like all the great heroes of the Late Bronze and Iron Age epics, his weakness is neither stupidity nor lust, but hubris (Niditch 2008:168-169). Wine had not snapped his vitality, nor had contact with the dead, nor even raw fornication. Could it be that he thought his strength, in the end, was really his own after all? Perhaps Samson’s addiction was not to sensual lust, but to risk; he loved the edge of disaster and believed he could turn back at any point. No, Samson is not blinded by love, nor even lust. Samson is first numbed, desensitized to the word of God and its significance in his life, and then blinded by pride and power as he handed his soul over to Delilah. The physical blindness inflicted by the Philistines only ratified outwardly what had already occurred inwardly.

How wrong he was! Ironically, Samson willfully, even enthusiastically, violated the first two provisions of his vow when he ate from a lion’s carcass (14:8-9) and presided over a banquet, which likely involved the fruit of the vine (14:10), on top of violating his solidarity with his own people by marrying a Philistine. His encounter with the prostitute of Gaza seemed to validate his continued ability to defy God’s boundaries for his life with impunity. The last provision of his vow, however, was broken as he slept in Delilah’s lap. Such is the fragility of human spiritual freedom. The first coins in the bank of freedom are spent willfully, carelessly—the last one is always stolen while we sleep. We are free to choose actions, but never free to choose the consequences. Sin’s fruit is not born instantly, but it does bear fruit. Shorn of his strength, Samson woke, expecting to defeat the Philistines in the sudden energy of his God-given strength, as always. But Samson, who thought he could stop the cycle of recrimination begun by his actions, “didn’t realize the LORD had left him” (16:20b). It is difficult to imagine a more tragic statement in the Bible than this. Tragic it is, and yet the only thing surprising about it is its lateness. The word of God, earlier violated by Samson with seeming impunity, now renders its verdict. The judgment of the word does not come through some direct action of God. No bolt of lightning strikes. Rather, the matrix of human relationships created by Samson’s actions forms the context in which the violated word shows itself ultimately inviolate.

Did Samson die in this self-willed alienation from God? This is not a question of Samson’s eternal destiny. The text does not address these issues. Rather, the question for the ancient audience would be whether this was a good death. Did Samson finally die in solidarity with Yahweh and with Yahweh’s people, however poorly Samson understood those things? The text provides one sign of hope. The direct connection between his uncut hair and his status as one devoted to Yahweh triggered his downfall. The author used the literal cutting of his hair to signal the loss of Yahweh’s presence and power. So, as Samson labored in the Philistine prison, powerless and blind, the author observed that his hair began to return (16:22). If the author’s linkage of the hair with Yahweh’s blessing holds, then the regrowth of Samson’s hair prepares the reader for a renewal of ­Samson’s Nazirite status and the return of his strength. The word of God spoken over ­Samson (13:5, 7) held firm when he violated it; this word will still have the last word. In the midst of the consequences of his sin, Samson will provide Yahweh with one last occasion against the Philistines. May we say more? Would the author have pointed out the regrowth of Samson’s hair, so portentous in the story, if that meant nothing? Samson cannot ultimately stand again as he did at Lehi, triumphant in divine strength and defiant over the Philistines. But might he appeal to God one last time, in the only idiom of justice, divine or human, he understands? In his cry for vengeance, might we hear a call to Yahweh to show himself mighty over the Philistines and their gods?

The final scene (16:23-30) parallels the scene in 15:18-19 where Samson, suffering from thirst and exhaustion, called upon God to save his life. No longer a triumphant charismatic warrior, Samson had become an occasion for the praise of a pagan god. Abandoned by Yahweh, he did what Israel failed to do at the beginning of this story (13:1): He cried out to Yahweh. While there is certainly a nobility about Samson’s death that provokes awe in readers, some suggest he nevertheless stays strictly in character, and appeals to God only for vengeance for his eyes. To the end, they say, Samson champions not God, but himself. The best thing the last charismatic judge does for Israel is die (16:30). And yet, the author points to the regrown hair, reports Samson’s prayer, presents his honorable burial by a loving family, and reminds the reader of two decades of leadership. Not exactly the epitaph of the unredeemed. Samson indeed marks the end of a steady decline in the institution of the charismatic judge. Still, the book of Judges has shown time and again that even the depths of apostasy and oppression do not foreclose divine mercy. Nor does the fact of that mercy diminish the gravity of the sin.

Historically, interpreters struggle over whether Samson’s death properly may be seen as a suicide (cf. Keil 1863:425-426; Gunn 2005:222-227). In the end, most see his death as a self-sacrifice in the service of God’s warfare against the Philistines, much as a soldier risks death entering battle. Yet Samson causes his own death quite intentionally. The issue remains relevant, as some contemporary Christian preachers of Palestinian heritage have appealed to Samson’s example as a warrant for the practice of “suicide” bombing. Contemporary performances of, for example, Handel’s oratorio, based on Milton’s Samson Agonistes, and other dramatizations of the story periodically feature Samson bringing down the Philistine temple with a suicide bomber’s vest (Carey 2002). On the other side, some Israeli political observers have spoken of the “Samson solution” in which Israel, under attack by its Arab enemies and abandoned by the West, detonates all its nuclear weapons. Barth (1961:3/1.410), in a probing and nuanced discussion of suicide as “self-murder,” hauntingly comments on the implications of the Samson story. Barth has observed how self-murder constitutes the quintessential expression of one who has made themselves their own god. He then suggests:

Not every act of self-destruction is as such suicide in this sense. Its meaning and intention might well be a definite if extreme form of the self-offering required of man. . . . Who can say that it is absolutely impossible for the gracious God Himself to help a man in affliction by telling him to take this way out? In some cases perhaps a man can and must choose and do this in the freedom given him by God and not therefore in false sovereignty, in despair at the futility of his existence, or in final, supreme and masterful self-assertion, but in obedience. Who can really know whether he might not occasionally ask back from man in this form the life which belongs to Him? Who can deny that, if such should be the case, man must surrender it with his own hands no less gratefully and joyfully than he may keep it until further notice if this is the will of God? Can we, therefore make a simple equation of self-destruction with self-murder? Have we not to take into account the possibility that suicide might not be committed as a crime and therefore as Murder, but in faith and therefore in peace with God?

Barth continues in a note:

Obviously these are dangerous questions. Do they not open again a door which ought to be finally closed? . . . According to Jud. 16:30 Samson deliberately killed himself along with the Philistines. But only a very curious exegesis would classify him with Saul, Ahithophel and Judas. By our standards Samson was certainly a very dubious saint. Yet the Old Testament sets him in the light rather than the shadows, and according to Heb. 11:32 he and other rather uncouth figures from the Book of Judges are given a place with Abraham, Moses, David and Samuel in the “cloud of witnesses” (Heb. 12:1) for New Testament faith. As seen by the Bible, he was certainly not a suicide.

Resuming his main discussion, Barth reasons:

If the possibility of Samson has sometimes to be considered, it can be only at the extreme limit when others have first been examined with final seriousness and there can be no doubt whatever that this is the will of God and is therefore to be adopted. Can we exclude it? Can we be sure that among thousands and thousands there is not just one perhaps who may be genuinely and legitimately called to take this strange action?

The point, of course, is not to legitimate suicide, but perhaps to place a question mark over the easy tendency to condemn those whose inner pain and hard choices remain permanently beyond our understanding.

Whether a final suicide of total self-assertion, or a ruined and partly redeemed hero of faith making his final choice to “mortify the flesh” literally, Samson stands as an engaging, but terrifying image of a self-will that denies its addiction to lust, revenge, and power, facing its own bondage, if at all, only so late that little can be done even in redemption. In spiritual blindness and pride this self-will played with the power, frittered away its freedom, forfeited the promise, and paid the price. Whether that comes sooner or later, it comes. The wages of sin is death (Rom 6:23). Still, this story reminds us that the ruined servant, consigned to his dark prison of humiliation, remains the object of a divine mercy that hears his cry, even if it be misshapen. However much the servant’s capacity for fruitful service might be cut short by his sin and shame, God remains open to the cry of one who wanted to serve again, even if only briefly and poorly.