Judges 13:1–14:20

April 5th, 2023| Topic: aBeLOG, Judges | 2

Though God remains gracious, a devotionless rejection of divine interests in favor of selfish passions leads only to disaster.

Samson is the last judge in the book, and his story gets the most space—four whole chapters and ninety-six verses. The account begins, as usual, with a statement that the sons of Israel did evil in the sight of God (13:1–2). And so they are given over to the Philistines for forty years—the longest oppression on record in Judges.

And, heeeeere’s Samson!

Samson seems to have been blessed with every advantage right off the block: God-appointed conception (13:2–6), God-ordained dedication (as a Nazirite: no consuming alcohol, no eating unclean things, no contact with corpses, an no cutting of hair; 2:7–14), God-planned destiny (as Israel’s judge-deliverer; 2:5), God-given blessing (the only judge in the book explicitly said to have been blessed by God; 13:24), God-conferred Spirit (13:25; and, uniquely, the Spirit shows up three more times in his life: 14:6, 19; 15:14). But there are ominous signs already …

The naming of the child is curious—his mother calls him “Samson,” shimshon, from shemesh, “sun” (13:24). I.e., “Sunny Boy.” What a name to give a deliverer of Israel, called by God, blessed by the Spirit!

Another bad sign: God is never shown to be speaking to his chosen deliverer (though Samson does cry out to him: 15:18; 16:28).

Fast forward now: “Sunny Boy” Samson is grown up. He goes to a Philistine town, sees a woman there, demands her for his wife (14:1–2), Marrying from outside Israel was not just a problem because Samson was a Nazirite. No Israelite was to marry a foreigner. But does he care?

So, Samson goes to Timnah to arrange the wedding, and on his way, we see the guy hanging around a vineyard (14:5). Just smelling the grapes. That’s all I’m doing: just smelling the grapes. Yeah, right!

And later—fast forward again—during his wedding, he puts on a feast for the guests (14:10). “Feast,” in Hebrew is mishteh, which comes from the verb shatah, “to drink.” So this “feast” probably was a boozing session. But what is this Nazirite teetotaler doing, organizing a frat party with flowing beer? There goes his first commitment to God.

Anyhow, on his way to arrange his wedding, Samson is attacked by a lion that he kills with his bare hands. Later, on his way back, he finds honeybees in the lion’s carcass that he scoops up and consumes (14:5–9). (I know—pretty bizarre, but this is one pretty bizarre guy!) OK, so he was intimate with alcohol. Now he proceeds to eat food contaminated by a corpse. There goes his second commitment to God. And this is the deliverer of Israel?

Back to the wedding feast. Samson poses a riddle to his Philistine guests. The bet was that the loser would give the winner a set of thirty clothes. The Philistines, clueless, threaten his wife who inveigles the answer out of Samson. So Samson loses the bet. And he goes to another Philistine city and, just like that, kills thirty of them and grabs their clothes to pay the bet he lost.

Uh, oh! He’s just come into contact with 30 human corpses. Not that this is the first time—he’d already handled a dead lion. In any case, there goes his third commitment to God: alcohol, unclean food, and now corpses.

So much for his dedication to God. This guy is frittering away of his magnificent calling, he’s wasting his supernatural endowment, and he’s sabotaging his heavenly destiny. What will he do next?

[For more details, see my Judges commentary.]