Lesson 29a - From Crook to Leader
1)
Material
skipped
a)
Chapter 9
story of Abimelech - a disinherited son of Gideon who
seizes the royal throne that Gideon rejected.
His reign is very short.
b)
Judges Tola and Jair get honorable mention
c)
Chapter 10
i)
The people
worship the Baals and God gives them into the hands
of the Ammonites
ii)
They repent
and pray for a new leader.
2)
Reading the
scripture Judges 11
a)
Why do you
think that Jephthah took the job?
b)
What do you
think of God using a bandit as a Judge?
c)
Do you think
that just because a country wins a war that it is a sign of Gods intent or
approval?
d)
Do you think
the American Indian tribes have any claim to land that was stolen from them
through violence, deceit or the breaking of treaties? Or, does their loss infer
God's approval?
e)
What do you
think of Jephthah's deal with God?
i)
Should he
have reneged?
ii)
What would
you have done?
f)
What do you
think about the tribes of Ephraim fighting against the
Article on Samson
N=narrator, E=elders J=Jephthah M=messenger,
K=King D=daughter
N: Now Jephthah the
Gileadite, the son of a prostitute, was a mighty warrior.
Then Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the
After a time the Ammonites made war against
They said to Jephthah,
E: "Come and be our
commander, so that we may fight with the Ammonites."
N: But Jephthah said to the
elders of
J: "Are you not the
very ones who rejected me and drove me out of my father's house? So why do you
come to me now when you are in trouble?"
E: "Nevertheless, we
have now turned back to you, so that you may go with us and fight with the
Ammonites, and become head over us, over all the inhabitants of
N: Jephthah said to the
elders of
J: "If you bring me
home again to fight with the Ammonites, and the LORD gives them over to me, I
will be your head."
E: "The LORD will be
witness between us; we will surely do as you say."
N: So Jephthah went with the elders of
Then Jephthah sent messengers to the king of the Ammonites and said,
M: "What is there
between you and me, that you have come to me to fight
against my land?"
N: The king of the Ammonites
answered the messengers of Jephthah,
K: "Because
N: Once again Jephthah sent
messengers to the king of the Ammonites and said to him:
J: "Thus says Jephthah:
Israel did not take away the land of Moab or the land of the Ammonites, but when they came up from Egypt, Israel went
through the wilderness to the Red Sea and came to Kadesh.
Then they journeyed through the wilderness, went around the
They occupied all the territory of the Amorites from the Arnon
to the Jabbok and from the wilderness to the
So now the LORD, the God of Israel, has conquered the Amorites for the benefit
of his people
Now are you any better than King Balak son of Zippor of Moab? Did he ever enter into conflict with
While
It is not I who have sinned against you, but you are the one who does me wrong
by making war on me. Let the LORD, who is judge,
decide today for the Israelites or for the Ammonites."
N: But the king of the
Ammonites did not heed the message that Jephthah sent him.
Then the spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah, and he passed through
And Jephthah made a vow to the LORD, and said,
J: "If you will give
the Ammonites into my hand, then
whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return victorious
from the Ammonites, shall be the Lord's, to be offered up by me as a burnt
offering."
N: So Jephthah crossed over
to the Ammonites to fight against them; and the LORD gave them into his
hand.
He inflicted a massive defeat on them from Aroer to
the neighborhood of Minnith, twenty towns, and as far
as Abel-keramim. So the Ammonites were subdued before
the people of
Then Jephthah came to his home at Mizpah; and there
was his daughter coming out to meet him with timbrels and with dancing. She was
his only child; he had no son or daughter except her.
When he saw her, he tore his clothes, and said,
J: "Alas, my daughter!
You have brought me very low; you have become the cause of great trouble to me.
For I have opened my mouth to the LORD, and I cannot take back my
vow."
N: She said to him,
D: "My father, if you
have opened your mouth to the LORD, do to me according to what has gone out of
your mouth, now that the LORD has given you vengeance against your enemies, the
Ammonites." And she said to her
father, "Let this thing be done for me: Grant me two months, so that I may
go and wander on the mountains, and bewail my virginity, my companions and
I."
J: "Go,"
N: he said and sent her away
for two months. So she departed, she and her companions, and bewailed her
virginity on the mountains. At the end
of two months, she returned to her father, who did with her according to the
vow he had made. She had never slept with a man. So there
arose an Israelite custom that for four days every year the daughters of
sam'sun [@w`m`,
solar or sun's man; Ugar. špšyn; Samyw"n (Heb. 11:32)]. Hero or "judge" of the tribe of Dan, famous for
his superhuman strength associated with his uncut hair as a Nazirite
and for his exploits against the Philistines (Judg. 13:1-16).
1. Name
2. Narrative
3. Historical importance
4. The story as myth and folklore
5. Religious significance
Bibliography
1. Name. The Hebrew name Samson is clearly from the Hebrew root `m`, "sun," but it is uncertain whether with the
-on ending the
word is to be understood as diminutive, hence "sun's child," or, more
likely, simply as "solar," "sunny," or perhaps "sun's
man." The ending -on may have
originally been from the -yanu
ending, frequent in Ugaritic personal names, and the
form shmshn occurs as a
Syrian place name. Josephus' derivation of the word as from @m`,
"robust," and hence "strong," and its explanation as from !m`,
"be devastated," are probably attempts to avoid connecting the name
with the sun.
Thus Samson seems clearly to have been a Canaanite
personal name. Whether or not Samson is to be regarded as originally the hero
of a sun myth (see § 4 below),
the connection of his name with the sun is indubitable. His birthplace was
across the
2. Narrative. The biblical account of Samson is a cycle of stories based
on Hebrew folklore, doubtless told and retold orally for generations. While
there are some inconsistencies in the narrative, the stories are probably all
part of the earliest stratum in the book of Judges, perhaps an extension of the
J document of the Hexateuch. There is here no
so-called E material and remarkably little Deuteronomic
or later editing (only 13:1;
The present collection of Samson stories may have
been included in the book of Judges in the following order: (a) the stories of his exploits in connection with or
immediately following his intended marriage (chs.
14-15, ending with the brief editorial conclusion of 15:20); (b) another cycle of stories, also drawn from the earliest
source, but perhaps deliberately omitted by the previous editor because based
upon his nonmarital amours and culminating in his
tragic death (ch. 16, with the editorial conclusion
of 15:20 repeated in vs. 31b); (c)
the story of the annunciation and birth of Samson, to account for his
superhuman feats and his being worthy of inclusion among the "judges"
(ch. 13).
The antiquity of these stories, in which is Hebrew
storytelling at its best, is indicated not only by their character as true
folklore, but also by their inclusion of bits of Hebrew poetry such as riddles
and taunts (14:14, 18; 15:16; and probably 14:3, 16; 16:6, 15, 17, 23-24).
The successive events of the story are as follows:
a) Samson was born as the child of promise to a
long-time barren woman who kept the vows of a Nazirite
after an angel's appearance to her and her husband, MANOAH
(ch. 13). The theme of the barren woman's at last
giving birth to a promised son is common (cf. Sarah [ Gen. 16:1; 18:1-15; 21:1-3]; Rebekah
[ Gen. 25:21-26]; Rachel [ Gen. 30:1-2, 22-24]; Hannah I Sam. 1:1]; Elizabeth [ Luke 1:5-25, 57-80]). Unlike the similar
appearance of Yahweh or his angel to Abraham (Gen. 18:1) or to Gideon (Judg. 6:11-24), it was not Manoah,
but his wife, who played the chief human role in the event. The messenger spoke
first to the woman, and it was by her logical reply that she calmed her
husband's fears of death at having seen God. As the host, Manoah
presented the sacrifice and asked about the divine name, but he received no
answer (cf. Jacob [ Gen. 32:29]). Yahweh, present in his angel in
the miracle at the holy rock, disappeared in the ascending flame.
The whole experience was understood as promising
divine power to the boy to be born. As he was to be a "Nazirite
to God from birth," his mother was to prepare by carefully keeping the
vows concerning food and drink: eat nothing unclean; have nothing to do with
any product of the vine; drink no liquor of any kind (cf. Amos 2:11-12). As for the son him-self from
birth to death no razor dare touch his head (cf. the vow concerning Samuel II Sam. 1:11], who is stated to be a Nazirite in a Dead Sea Scroll MS; for comparison of these
lifelong vows, hair sacrifice, etc., in the later law, Num. 6:1, see NAZIRITE). In the subsequent story of Samson only
the vow concerning uncut hair was observed, for wine flowed freely at the
marriage feast, and the honey from the lion's carcass was hardly clean food, as
the greatest source of uncleanness was any contact with a dead body. That, as
expected, the son of promise had divine endowment was seen when, while he was
yet at home, "the Spirit of the LORD
began to stir him" (from ![p, "be or feel
disturbed," especially by dreams; Judg. 13:25; cf. Gen. 41:8; Ps. 77:4—H 77:5; Dan. 2:1, 3). What this inner disturbance meant
is told only in the subsequent episodes.
b) Samson's first adventures occurred in connection with his
intended marriage with the Philistine woman at Timnah:
after she had coaxed out of him the secret of his lion-and-honey riddle and he
had paid his debt with the clothes of thirty Philistine victims, Samson
discovered that she had been given to his best man and took prompt revenge by
igniting Philistine crops with 150 live-fox-tail torches and by slaughtering
many more Philistines (14:1-15:8).
Samson's would-be marriage was opposed by his parents
as an undesirable union with "uncircumcised" pagans (cf. Esau [ Gen. 26:34-35; 27:46]), but excused by the
writer as Yahweh's scheme to discomfit the enemy (Judg. 14:3-4). It is obvious that, despite some
confusion in the narrative, neither parent would have anything to do with the
proposed marriage. Contrary to custom, then, Samson had to go after his own
wife, procure-Philistine instead of Israelite friends of the bridegroom (cf.
Song of S. 3:7), and hold the feast in the bride's, rather than the groom's,
home. Some think he intended the unique type of marriage in which the husband
occasionally visited the wife in her father's household (sadiqâ; cf. Gen. 2:24; see MARRIAGE § 1f), but more
likely he planned to bring his bride home after the week's ceremonies were
over. He had not intended to leave in a rage (Judg. 14:19).
The RIDDLE is an
age-old form of mind-stretching and merrymaking suitable for the long hours of
the festivities (cf. Ps. 19:l-4a—H
19:2-5a, based upon a riddle; 49:4—H 49:5; Prov. 1:6; Ezek. 17:2). Samson's riddle (Judg. 14:14) may have been an ancient one rephrased.
If gastronomical, the expected answer: "Vomit," would have brought
loud guffaws from the male drinking party. If astronomical, the answer:
"The Lion sky constellation bringing the harvest," would have closely
fitted the experience which had brought the riddle to Samson's mind. The reply
given by the Philistines (vs. 18a) may have been
another riddle whose answer only enraged Samson the more, for love,
"sweeter than honey, stronger than a lion," had weakened him before
his sweetheart's tears—and it was to bring his final destruction!
That the story tells of no reprisals against
Samson for killing thirty men of
According to Canaanite law based upon earlier
Sumerian and Babylonian legislation, the father had a right to give his
daughter to someone else in order to save face when the bridegroom left the
wedding festivities, but she should not have been given to the best man, for
the latter's responsibility was to look after the groom's interests. Therefore,
Samson's revenge was "blameless," with the law on his side, and the
Philistines dealt with the bride and her father as with an adulterer (15:6b). Foxes with blazing torches attached to their tails were
ceremonially hunted in the Roman circus centuries later, according to Ovid—a
custom which had begun when grain-fields had been set afire by such a fox
firebrand escaped from a farmer's boy. Samson's feat of catching three hundred
such animals is another superhuman tale. This time Philistine anger forced him
to find refuge in a cave.
c) Samson's next two exploits provide two etiological
legends for place names: Ramath-lehi, the "Hill
of the Jawbone," possibly originally so called because of its peculiar
formation; and En-hakkore, the "Spring of Him
Who Called," really "Partridge-Spring," named for a bird
distinguished by its clear call-note (15:9-20).
Testimonial to fellow Judeans' fear both of
Samson's mysterious power and of their Philistine overlords is the story that
three thousand of them came and, humorously to Samson, bound him with new ropes
to hand him over to the enemy. There is a bloody play on words in Samson's song
of victory over his thousand Philistine victims—literally: "With the
jawbone of a red ass I have reddened them bright red" (vs. 16). Afterward
by a miracle God provided water for his thirsty hero (vss.
18-19; cf. Exod. 17:1-7).
d) The sheer strength of a superhuman giant is the point of
the story of Samson's interrupting his night with a harlot at Gaza, the
southernmost strong city of the Philistine pentapolis,
pulling up the heavy city gates under the noses of sleeping guards, and
striding off nearly forty miles to deposit them on a hilltop near Hebron
(16:1-3).
e) The foolish weakness of the physical giant is the theme
of the story of how, enslaved by passion in another illicit love, he toyed with
his sacred vow and, sleeping on Delilah's lap, lost successively his hair, his
power, his eyes, and his freedom (16:4-22). So valuable would Samson's capture
be that the Philistine overlords offered Delilah a then enormous price, perhaps
nearly four thousand dollars. Although she was deceived in turn by seven
snapped bowstrings, broken new ropes, and an uprooted loom hanging to the seven
locks of Samson's uncut hair, the woman readily recognized that her nagging had
at last succeeded when he lay bare the essence of his being, "told her all
his mind" (vss. 17-18). The Philistines inflicted
customary revenge in gouging out his eyes (cf. the Ammonite threat I Sam. 11:2] and Zedekiah's fate II Kings 25:7]) and setting him to the hard
labor of an ox or an ass, ironically for him, at previously gateless
f) Samson's career ended in a final act of desperate
heroism: his strength returning with his growing hair, brought into the temple
of DAGON to provide amusement for the
festival, uttering a prayer for vengeance for just one of his eyes, with a last
surge of strength he pulled the supporting temple pillars and death down upon
his head, but in this one deed accomplished more deliverance from the
Philistines than in his whole life before (16:23-30). Thus he was rewarded with
rest in the family tomb (vs. 31a).
3. Historical importance. The locale of the Samson stories was the border between
the tribes of Dan and Judah, perhaps in the period after the migration of most
of the Danites to their N home (Judg. 1:34; 18), only the remnants remaining in the
S territory (see DAN).
This was also the border between these Israelite tribes and the great
Philistine plain to the SW. Samson's home at Zorah
was some fourteen miles W of Jerusalem at the E end of the
Therefore, unlike Othniel
or Gideon or Jephthah at the head of an Israelite
army, Samson is never described as "deliverer" from the enemy. He was
only to "begin to deliver
Thus the historical significance of the Samson
stories lies not in his defeat of Philistines, for this became necessary only
in the later era of Samuel and Saul I Sam. 4:1-6; 13). It lies rather in its frank
and colorful picture of life on the Philistine border in the period of the
judges—wedding festivities and procedure and relationships with women, village
heroism in feats of muscular strength and witty repartee, alternate free
communication and sporadic clashes between Israelites and Philistines. Here is
extraordinarily instructive sociological material, of more value to the historian, it has been suggested, than a list of conquered
cities on such a significant monument as the Moabite Stone.
4. The story as myth and
folklore. Samson's name, his home
opposite the shrine to the sun-god at Beth-shemesh,
and his adventures have given rise, beginning even with early Christian
interpreters, to comparison with sun heroes of Greek, Phoenician, or Babylonian
mythology—Hercules, Melkart, or Gilgamesh. His
slaying of the lion, in method more marvelous than the similar deeds of David I Sam. 17:34-36) or Benaiah
II Sam. 23:20), resembled that of such
mythological persons. Striking parallels of features of Samson's career with the
various roles of the sun have been enumerated: benevolently, his hair was the
sun's rays giving daily agricultural life, but cut off by sleep-producing night
(the name DELILAH, hlyld, may be a pun on Hebrew hlyl, "night"); malevolently, the fox-tail
firebrands were the sun-withering blight on agricultural crops; Samsoh's solitary life, blinding, imprisonment, and hair regrowth were the sun's solo role in its annual waning and
return in the season cycle, comparable to the death and resurrection of the god
of vegetation (cf. the sun as bridegroom in Ps. 19:4b-6—H 19:5b-7). Some have interpreted Samson's adventures as
numbering twelve, comparable to the twelve labors of mythical Hercules. Others
have compared his career, from his slaying of the lion, his having seven locks
of hair, and his fate at the hands of a woman, to that of Gilgamesh.
Such mythological parallels possibly indicate that
certain of Samson's adventures originated from the heroes of mythology. His
total career, however, is so earthy that he may better be interpreted as a
folklore hero like a Paul Bunyan or a Peer Gynt.
Samson is the rustic hero of frontier days. Although never described as a giant
in stature, he was possessed of enormous muscular strength and given to selfish
passion and feats of vengeance to restore injured honor. He was humorous
trickster par excellence and conqueror of women, wild beasts, and warriors sent
to capture him. The deeds of a historical Samson were probably enlarged to
giant proportions by centuries of village storytelling.
5. Religious significance. Fortunately this primarily folklore hero was on the right
side of the ethnological fence. Unlike Goliath, he was Israelite, not
Philistine. His moral virtues and vices were those of the rough day in which he
lived. But what gives the Samson cycle of stories religious significance is the
fact that the story is tragedy. His selfish and uncontrolled passion, forgetful
of sacred vows, brought him to disaster, even though in grim heroic climax.
Thus he was a negative religious hero—an example of what God's charismatic
individual should not be.
It is possible that in an earlier form of the
story Samson's power lay only in the magic of seven unshorn locks of hair (cf.
similarly Gilgamesh), and that the biblical account, by its addition of the Nazirite vow, partially transforms a folklore hero into a
religious savior. In any case, the clear emphasis of the Samson stories as they
stand is the working of Yahweh's spirit in his chosen hero, evident in his
childhood (Judg. 13:24), exhibited in mighty feats of strength
(14:6, 19; 15:14), withdrawn when in pursuit of his own passions he forgot his
vow (16:20), but surging back again in response to prayer (16:28).
It was the interpretation of Samsoh's
uniqueness in being devoted to God before birth and possessor of God's
indwelling Spirit which inspired a gospel writer to write in language similar
to that about Samson in the announcement of John the Baptist's birth (cf. Judg. 13:4-5 with Luke 1:15) and in the report of the growth of
the child Jesus (cf. Judg. 13:24 with Luke 2:40). Thus Samson became one of the heroes
of faith in the Letter to the Hebrews (
Bibliography. G.
F. Moore, Judges, ICC (1895), pp. 312-65. P. Carus, The Story of Samson and Its Place in the Religious Development of
Mankind (1907). A. Smythe Palmer, The Samson-Saga
and Its Place in Comparative Religion (1913). P. Haupt,
"Samson and the Ass's Jaw," JBL, XXXIII
(1914), 296-98. M. Noth, Die israelitischen Personnenamen
(1928). pp. 38, 223. C. F. Burney, Judges
(1930), pp. 335-408. J.
C. F. KRAFT