Samson said to her, “If they bind me with seven fresh bowstrings that are not dried out, then I shall become weak, and be like anyone else.”
Then the lords of the Philistines brought her seven fresh bowstrings that had not dried out, and she bound him with them.
While men were lying in wait in an inner chamber, she said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” But he snapped the bowstrings, as a strand of fiber snaps when it touches the fire. So the secret of his strength was not known.
10 Then Delilah said to Samson, “You have mocked me and told me lies; please tell me how you could be bound.”
He said to her, “If they bind me with new ropes that have not been used, then I shall become weak, and be like anyone else.”
So Delilah took new ropes and bound him with them, and said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” (The men lying in wait were in an inner chamber.) But he snapped the ropes off his arms like a thread.
13 Then Delilah said to Samson, “Until now you have mocked me and told me lies; tell me how you could be bound.” He said to her, “If you weave the seven locks of my head with the web and make it tight with the pin, then I shall become weak, and be like anyone else.”
So while he slept, Delilah took the seven locks of his head and wove them into the web,[55 (#ulink_085732d6-5e1d-5daa-ab89-43558bc24717)] and made them tight with the pin. Then she said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” But he awoke from his sleep, and pulled away the pin, the loom, and the web.
15 Then she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me three times now and have not told me what makes your strength so great.”
Finally, after she had nagged him with her words day after day, and pestered him, he was tired to death.
So he told her his whole secret, and said to her, “A razor has never come upon my head; for I have been a nazirite[56 (#ulink_e95160b0-f647-5442-857b-820913b4f53b)] to God from my mother’s womb. If my head were shaved, then my strength would leave me; I would become weak, and be like anyone else.”
18 When Delilah realized that he had told her his whole secret, she sent and called the lords of the Philistines, saying, “This time come up, for he has told his whole secret to me.” Then the lords of the Philistines came up to her, and brought the money in their hands.
She let him fall asleep on her lap; and she called a man, and had him shave off the seven locks of his head. He began to weaken,[57 (#ulink_7a3703ea-45c3-575d-96df-84daaccf24d1)] and his strength left him.
Then she said, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” When he awoke from his sleep, he thought, “I will go out as at other times, and shake myself free.” But he did not know that the LORD had left him.
So the Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes. They brought him down to Gaza and bound him with bronze shackles; and he ground at the mill in the prison.
But the hair of his head began to grow again after it had been shaved.
For reflection: Judges 16:15–18
Virtue—even attempted virtue—brings light; indulgence brings fog.
—from Mere Christianity
23 Now the lords of the Philistines gathered to offer a great sacrifice to their god Dagon, and to rejoice; for they said, “Our god has given Samson our enemy into our hand.”
When the people saw him, they praised their god; for they said, “Our god has given our enemy into our hand, the ravager of our country, who has killed many of us.”
And when their hearts were merry, they said, “Call Samson, and let him entertain us.” So they called Samson out of the prison, and he performed for them. They made him stand between the pillars;
and Samson said to the attendant who held him by the hand, “Let me feel the pillars on which the house rests, so that I may lean against them.”
Now the house was full of men and women; all the lords of the Philistines were there, and on the roof there were about three thousand men and women, who looked on while Samson performed.
28 Then Samson called to the LORD and said, “Lord GOD, remember me and strengthen me only this once, O God, so that with this one act of revenge I may pay back the Philistines for my two eyes.”[58 (#ulink_25dabdeb-9cc4-5112-b3e5-5ec55c8943dc)]
And Samson grasped the two middle pillars on which the house rested, and he leaned his weight against them, his right hand on the one and his left hand on the other.
Then Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines.” He strained with all his might; and the house fell on the lords and all the people who were in it. So those he killed at his death were more than those he had killed during his life.
Then his brothers and all his family came down and took him and brought him up and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the tomb of his father Manoah. He had judged Israel twenty years.
17 There was a man in the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Micah.
He said to his mother, “The eleven hundred pieces of silver that were taken from you, about which you uttered a curse, and even spoke it in my hearing,—that silver is in my possession; I took it; but now I will return it to you.”[59 (#ulink_e9d046c1-baf9-5d31-9a35-b70a5c531ad5)] And his mother said, “May my son be blessed by the LORD!”
Then he returned the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother; and his mother said, “I consecrate the silver to the LORD from my hand for my son, to make an idol of cast metal.”
So when he returned the money to his mother, his mother took two hundred pieces of silver, and gave it to the silversmith, who made it into an idol of cast metal; and it was in the house of Micah.
This man Micah had a shrine, and he made an ephod and teraphim, and installed one of his sons, who became his priest.
In those days there was no king in Israel; all the people did what was right in their own eyes.
THE PEOPLE DID WHAT WAS RIGHT IN THEIR OWN EYES
There can be no moral motive for entering a new morality unless that motive is borrowed from the traditional morality. . . . All the specifically modern attempts at new moralities are contractions. They proceed by retaining some traditional precepts and rejecting others: but the only real authority behind those which they retain is the very same authority which they flout in rejecting others. . . . You can attack the concept of justice because it interferes with the feeding of the masses, but you have taken the duty of feeding the masses from the worldwide code. You may exalt patriotism at the expense of mercy; but it was the old code that told you to love your country. You may vivisect your grandfather in order to deliver your grandchildren from cancer: but, take away traditional morality, and why should you bother about your grandchildren?
—from “On Ethics,” Christian Reflections
For reflection
Judges 17:6
7 Now there was a young man of Bethlehem in Judah, of the clan of Judah. He was a Levite residing there.
This man left the town of Bethlehem in Judah, to live wherever he could find a place. He came to the house of Micah in the hill country of Ephraim to carry on his work.[60 (#ulink_fd521788-5eaf-5df8-a1fb-2ff8a9c22751)]
Micah said to him, “From where do you come?” He replied, “I am a Levite of Bethlehem in Judah, and I am going to live wherever I can find a place.”
Then Micah said to him, “Stay with me, and be to me a father and a priest, and I will give you ten pieces of silver a year, a set of clothes, and your living.”[61 (#ulink_cd628f9d-d6aa-5b72-8d6a-292d27edbcbc)]
The Levite agreed to stay with the man; and the young man became to him like one of his sons.
So Micah installed the Levite, and the young man became his priest, and was in the house of Micah.
Then Micah said, “Now I know that the LORD will prosper me, because the Levite has become my priest.”
18 In those days there was no king in Israel. And in those days the tribe of the Danites was seeking for itself a territory to live in; for until then no territory among the tribes of Israel had been allotted to them.
So the Danites sent five valiant men from the whole number of their clan, from Zorah and from Eshtaol, to spy out the land and to explore it; and they said to them, “Go, explore the land.” When they came to the hill country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah, they stayed there.
While they were at Micah’s house, they recognized the voice of the young Levite; so they went over and asked him, “Who brought you here? What are you doing in this place? What is your business here?”
He said to them, “Micah did such and such for me, and he hired me, and I have become his priest.”
