Judges 16 · WEB
Samson and Delilah
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Samson went to Gaza and saw there a prostitute, and went in to her.
2The Gazites were told, "Samson has come here." They surrounded him and waited for him all night in the gate of the city, and were quiet all the night, saying, "Wait until morning light. Then we will kill him."
3Samson lay until midnight, then arose at midnight and took hold of the doors of the gate of the city and the two posts, and plucked them up, bar and all, and put them on his shoulders and carried them up to the top of the mountain that is before Hebron.
4After this, he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah.
5The lords of the Philistines came up to her and said to her, "Entice him and see in what his great strength lies, and by what means we may prevail against him, that we may bind him to afflict him; and we will each give you eleven hundred pieces of silver."
6Delilah said to Samson, "Please tell me where your great strength lies, and with what you might be bound to afflict you."
7Samson said to her, "If they bind me with seven fresh bowstrings that were never dried, then I will become weak and be as any other man."
8Then the lords of the Philistines brought up to her seven fresh bowstrings which had never been dried, and she bound him with them.
9Now she had men lying in wait in an inner room. She said to him, "The Philistines are on you, Samson!" He broke the bowstrings as a thread of tow is broken when it touches the fire. So his strength was not known.
10Delilah said to Samson, "Behold, you have mocked me and told me lies. Now please tell me with what you might be bound."
11He said to her, "If they only bind me with new ropes with which no work has been done, then I will become weak and be as any other man."
12So Delilah took new ropes and bound him with them, and said to him, "The Philistines are on you, Samson!" The men lying in wait were in the inner room. He broke them off his arms like a thread.
13Delilah said to Samson, "Up to now, you have mocked me and told me lies. Tell me with what you might be bound." He said to her, "If you weave the seven locks of my head with the web and fasten it with the pin, then I will become weak and be as any other man."
14She fastened it with the pin and said to him, "The Philistines are on you, Samson!" He awakened out of his sleep and plucked away the pin of the beam and the web.
15She said to him, "How can you say, 'I love you,' when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times, and have not told me where your great strength lies."
16When she pressed him daily with her words and urged him, his soul was troubled to death.
17He told her all his heart and said to her, "No razor has ever come on my head; for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother's womb. If I am shaved, then my strength will leave me, and I will become weak and be as any other man."
18When Delilah saw that he had told her all his heart, she sent and called for the lords of the Philistines, saying, "Come up this once, for he has told me all his heart." Then the lords of the Philistines came up to her and brought the money in their hand.
19She made him sleep on her knees; and she called for a man and shaved off the seven locks of his head. Then she began to afflict him, and his strength left him.
20She said, "The Philistines are on you, Samson!" He awoke out of his sleep and said, "I will go out as at other times, and shake myself free." But he didn't know that Yahweh had departed from him.
21The Philistines seized him and gouged out his eyes, and they brought him down to Gaza and bound him with fetters of bronze; and he ground grain in the prison.
22However, the hair of his head began to grow again after he was shaved.
23The lords of the Philistines gathered together to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to rejoice; for they said, "Our god has delivered Samson our enemy into our hand."
24When the people saw him, they praised their god; for they said, "Our god has delivered our enemy and the destroyer of our country into our hand, who has slain many of us."
25When their hearts were merry, they said, "Call Samson, that he may entertain us." They called for Samson out of the prison, and he performed before them. They set him between the pillars.
26Samson said to the boy who held him by the hand, "Allow me to feel the pillars on which the house rests, that I may lean on them."
27Now the house was full of men and women, and all the lords of the Philistines were there; and there were about three thousand men and women on the roof watching while Samson performed.
28Samson called to Yahweh and said, "Lord Yahweh, remember me, please, and strengthen me, please, only this once, God, that I may be at once avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes."
29Samson took hold of the two middle pillars on which the house rested, and leaned on them, the one with his right hand, and the other with his left.
30Samson said, "Let me die with the Philistines!" He bowed himself with all his might, and the house fell on the lords and on all the people who were in it. So the dead whom he killed at his death were more than those whom he killed in his life.
31Then his brothers and all the house of his father came down and took him, and brought him up and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the burial site of Manoah his father. He had judged Israel twenty years.
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Summary
Samson's final downfall comes through his relationship with Delilah, a woman in the Sorek Valley who is bribed by the Philistine lords to discover the secret of his strength. After three deceptive answers, Samson finally yields under her persistent pressure and reveals his Nazirite vow — the uncut hair that is the sign of his consecration. His hair is shaved, his strength departs, and he is captured, blinded, and enslaved in Gaza. In his final act, with his hair regrown and his spirit renewed by prayer, Samson pulls down the temple of Dagon on three thousand Philistines, killing more in his death than in his life.
Themes
- The fatal pattern of Samson surrendering his divine secret to an intimate
- The slow erosion of consecration through repeated compromise
- The tragedy of not knowing when God has departed
- Repentance, prayer, and God's willingness to use a broken servant one final time
- The irony that Samson's greatest victory comes in his deepest weakness and blindness
Key verses
- Judg 16:17 — “No razor has ever come on my head; for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother's womb. If I am shaved, then my strength will leave me.”
- Judg 16:20 — “He awoke out of his sleep and said, 'I will go out as at other times, and shake myself free.' But he didn't know that Yahweh had departed from him.”
- Judg 16:28 — “Lord Yahweh, remember me, please, and strengthen me, please, only this once, God.”
- Judg 16:30 — “So the dead whom he killed at his death were more than those whom he killed in his life.”
Context & background
The Sorek Valley (modern Nahal Sorek, running through central Israel from the Judean hills to the Mediterranean coast near modern Tel Aviv) was the exact border zone between Samson's Israelite home territory and Philistine-controlled land — making Delilah's identity and location a constant source of debate. Gaza, where Samson is imprisoned, is in the modern Gaza Strip on the Mediterranean coast, and was one of the five major Philistine city-states. The temple of Dagon was a major cultic center; Dagon was the principal grain and storm deity of the Philistines. Zorah and Eshtaol, where Samson is buried, are in the Sorek Valley in modern central Israel, close to where his story began in chapter 13.
Cross-references
- 1 Sam 5:1-5 — The ark of God in the temple of Dagon: Dagon falls before Yahweh, foreshadowing the ultimate defeat of Philistine religion
- 2 Cor 12:9 — "My power is made perfect in weakness" — Samson's blind, broken final prayer is his most effective act
- Heb 11:32-34 — Samson included in the hall of faith: "whose weakness was turned to strength"
- Judg 13:5 — The Nazirite vow announced at Samson's birth: the uncut hair is the sign whose violation ends his public ministry
- Ps 22:1-2 — "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" — the experience of divine abandonment that Samson embodies in verse 20