Judges 16: Samson and Delilah; Samson dies with the Philistines.

In this final chapter about Samson, he becomes involved with two women, and both episodes lead him to fight for his life.

The first woman was a prostitute from Gaza, a Philistine town. When the men of Gaza heard that Samson was visiting this woman, they lay in wait for him all night, so that they could kill him in the morning. Samson foiled their plot by sneaking out at midnight. As he was leaving, he took the gates of the city and its two posts, put them upon his shoulders, and took them to the top of a hill facing Hebron, a town in Israel.

Some time later, Samson began to love an Israelite woman called Delilah, whose name means “lustful pining”. The lords of the Philistines bribed her to find out the source of Samson’s strength, so that they could take him prisoner. After deceiving her three times and evading her almost-daily questions, Samson finally admitted that his strength lay in his hair; if it were cut, he would be like any other man.

Delilah told this to the the lords of the Philistines, and they paid her the bribe. She lulled Samson to sleep, and had a man shave off all of Samson’s hair. She called out as she had the first three times: “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” He awoke, but he was as weak as a normal man. The Philistines took him captive, gouged out his eyes, and forced him to work as a mill grinder in prison. However, while he was in prison, his hair began to grow back.

When the Philistines gathered to make a great sacrifice in the temple of their god, Dagon, to celebrate the capture of Samson, 3000 Philistine men and women were there, plus all of their kings. Samson was brought in as a spectacle to be mocked. He could feel his strength returning, and asked the boy leading him to let him lean against the two central columns of the temple. Samson prayed to the Lord, and pushed the columns until the temple collapsed, killing everyone there. That day, Samson brought about the death of more Philistines than he had in his life. His family took his body, and buried him between Zorah (“stricken”) and Eshtaol (“supplication”) in his father’s tomb.

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This chapter demonstrates the temptations and potential pitfalls of faith-alone spirituality, specifically through the women that Samson was involved with. Both of these episodes - the first with the prostitute from Gaza, and the second with Delilah - highlight Samson’s brazen passions and his apparent faults and weaknesses. Samson represents our determination to overcome the draw of faith alone, which the hells employ in order to ensnare us, and then rule us. The Lord’s teachings through the Word often precipitate a struggle within us between our lusts from the hells and our spiritual intentions (see Swedenborg’s work, Apocalypse Revealed 678[2] and Apocalypse Revealed 798[2]).

Seizing the gates and gateposts stands for changing the focus of our spiritual view. Gates represent the entry and exit points to our hearts and minds, through which we receive the Lord and the Word, but also the influences of hell (see Swedenborg’s work, Divine Providence 119). The top of the hill stands for a mind raised up toward God, and ‘facing Hebron’ is representative of a new focus on the unity between us and the Word, for Hebron means ‘joined, brotherhood, unity’.

After three failed attempts, Delilah discovered that Samson’s strength lay in his hair, which had never been cut. Hair stands for the power and beauty of the Word in its literal sense, and our faithfulness in abiding by its truths (see Swedenborg’s works, Arcana Caelestia 9836[2] and Doctrine of the Lord 15[8]).

Samson’s imprisonment and abuse by the Philistines symbolize a period of spiritual turmoil, during which we are misled by the hells. Blindness corresponds to our inability to see or recognize truths; ‘grinding grain at the mill’ is like molding truths from the Word to support our own purposes - in this case, faith alone spirituality (Arcana Caelestia 10303[5] and Arcana Caelestia 10303[6]). Yet all the while, our ability to follow the Lord will gradually restrengthen, represented by Samson’s hair growing back.

In the last moments of his life, Samson brought down the temple of Dagon, killing three thousand of the Philistines at once. The two supporting columns of the Philistine temple stand for what is evil and what is false; when evil and falsity are toppled, the whole system of belief collapses. In sacrificing his life, Samson demonstrated the highest of all divine and heavenly loves (see Arcana Caelestia 2077[2]).

14. The Lord came into the world to reduce to order everything in heaven and so on earth, and He accomplished this by combats against the hells. The hells at that time were infesting every person coming into the world and departing from the world. By combats against them the Lord became the embodiment of righteousness and saved mankind, without which people could not have been saved. This is foretold in many passages in the Prophets, only some of which will be cited.

[2] In Isaiah:

Who is this who comes from Edom, with red dyed garments from Bozrah? This one honorable in His apparel, traveling in the greatness of His strength?

“I who speak in righteousness, great to save.”

“Why is Your apparel red, and Your garment like one who treads in the winepress?”

“I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the people not a man was with Me. Therefore I have trodden them in My anger, and trampled them in My wrath. Thus their conquest is sprayed upon My garments.... For the day of vengeance is in My heart, and the year of My redeemed has come.... ...My own arm brought salvation for Me.... I have...brought down their conquest to the earth.”

...He said, “Lo, they are My people, children....”

So He became their Savior.... Owing to His love and owing to His mercy He redeemed them.... (Isaiah 63:1-9)

This describes the Lord’s combats against the hells. The apparel in which he appeared honorable and which was red means the Word, to which the Jewish people did violence. The battle itself against the hells and victory over them is described by His having trodden them in His anger and trampled them in His wrath. His battling alone and by His own power is described by His having of the people not a man with Him, by His own arm’s bringing salvation for Him, and by His bringing down their conquest to the earth. His saving and redeeming is described by His becoming the people’s Savior, and by His redeeming them owing to His love and mercy. And that this was the reason for His advent is described by the day of vengeance being in His heart, and the year of His redeemed having come.

[3] Again in Isaiah:

He saw that there was no one, and was dumbfounded that there was no intercessor; therefore His own arm brought Him salvation, and His righteousness sustained Him. Therefore He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head, and He put on the garments of vengeance..., and wrapped Himself in zeal as a cloak.... Then the Redeemer came to Zion.... (Isaiah 59:16-17, 20)

This, too, describes the Lord’s combats against the hells when He was in the world. His battling alone against them by His own power is meant by His seeing that there was no one, so that His own right arm brought Him salvation. His becoming righteousness on that account is meant by His righteousness sustaining Him, so that He put on righteousness as a breastplate. And His becoming the Redeemer is meant by the statement that then the Redeemer came to Zion.

[4] In Jeremiah:

...(they are) dismayed..., their mighty ones are beaten down; they have fled..., and did not look back.... This is the day of the Lord Jehovih of Hosts, a day of vengeance, that He may take revenge on His enemies, and the sword shall devour and be satiated.... (Jeremiah 46:5, 10)

The Lord’s battle with the hells and victory over them is described by the people’s being dismayed, by their mighty ones’ being beaten down and fleeing and not looking back. Their mighty ones and the enemies are the hells, because the inhabitants there all hate the Lord. The Lord’s coming into the world is therefore meant by its being the day of the Lord Jehovih of Hosts, a day of vengeance, that He may take revenge on His enemies.

[5] Again in Jeremiah:

...(the) young men shall fall in (the) streets, and all the men of war shall be cut off in that day.... (Jeremiah 49:26)

In Joel:

Jehovah gave voice before His army.... ...the day of Jehovah is great and very terrible. Who then will endure it? (Joel 2:11)

In Zephaniah:

...in the day of Jehovah’s sacrifice, I will visit judgment upon the princes and the king’s children, upon all clothed with foreign apparel.... This day is a day of...distress..., a day of the trumpet and its sounding.... (Zephaniah 1:8-9, 15-16)

In Zechariah:

Jehovah will go forth and fight against (the) nations, as in the day of His fighting on the day of battle. In that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which faces Jerusalem.... Then you shall flee into the valley of My mountains.... ...in that day there will be no light or illumination.... And Jehovah shall be King over all the earth. In that day it shall be “Jehovah is one, and His name one.” (Zechariah 14:3-6, 9)

In these passages, too, the subject is the Lord’s combats. That day means His advent. The Mount of Olives, which faces Jerusalem, was where the Lord customarily tarried (see Mark 13:3-4, 14:26, Luke 21:37, 22:39, John 8:1, and elsewhere).

[6] In Psalms:

The cords of death surrounded me..., the cords of hell surrounded me; the snares of death came to meet me. He sent out His arrows (therefore) and many bolts of lightning, and threw them into confusion. I will pursue My enemies and capture them, nor will I turn back again till I have consumed them and smitten them so that they cannot rise again.... You shall gird me with strength for the battle..., You shall put My enemies to flight.... I will crush them as fine as dust in the wind, I will spread them like dirt in the streets. (Psalms 18:4-5, 14, 37-40, 42)

The cords and snares of death that surrounded Him and came to meet Him symbolize temptations or trials, which, because they originate from hell, are also called the cords of hell.

This and everything else in this whole Psalm portray the Lord’s battles and victories. Therefore it also says, “You put Me at the head of the nations; a people I have not known shall serve Me” (Psalms 18:43-44).

[7] Again in Psalms:

Gird Your sword upon Your thigh, O Mighty One.... Your arrows are sharp — the peoples will fall under You — from the heart of the king’s enemies. Your throne...is forever and ever.... You love righteousness...; therefore God...has anointed You.... (Psalms 45:3, 5-7)

This, too, portrays combat with the hells and conquest of them, for the entire Psalm has the Lord as its subject, namely His battles, His glorification, and His salvation of the faithful.

Again:

A fire will go before Him, and burn His enemies round about...; the earth will see and be afraid. The mountains will melt like wax at the presence...of the Lord of the whole earth. The heavens will declare His righteousness, and all peoples will see His glory. (Psalms 97:3-6)

This Psalm as well has the Lord as its subject, with similar themes.

[8] Again:

Jehovah said to my Lord, “Sit at My right hand, till I have made Your enemies Your footstool.” ...Rule in the midst of Your enemies! ...The Lord is at Your right hand; He has smitten kings in the day of His wrath.... He has filled with dead bodies, He has smitten the head over a great land. (Psalms 110:1-7)

This is something the Lord said, as is clear from the Lord’s own words in Matthew 22:44, Mark 12:36, and Luke 20:42.

Sitting at the right hand symbolizes omnipotence. Enemies symbolize the hells. The kings there symbolize people caught up in the falsities attendant on evil. Making them a footstool, smiting in the day of wrath, and filling with dead bodies means, symbolically, the destruction of their power, and smiting the head over a great land means, symbolically, the destruction of the whole of it.

[9] Since the Lord overcame the hells and did so alone, without the aid of any angel, therefore in Isaiah 42:13 He is called a hero and a man of war ; in Psalms 24:8, 10 a king of glory, Jehovah the mighty, a hero in battle; in Psalms 132:2 the mighty one of Jacob; and in many other places Jehovah of Hosts, which means “Jehovah of hosts, ” that is, of armies.

His advent, moreover, is also called the day of Jehovah, described as a terrible and cruel one, one of indignation, wrath, anger, vengeance, destruction, and war, accompanied by the sounding of the trumpet, a day of tumult, as may be seen from the passages presented in no. 4 above.

[10] Since the Lord carried out a last judgment when He was in the world by battles with the hells and conquest of them, therefore many places have as their subject the judgment that He would carry out. So, for example, in Psalms:

...(Jehovah) is coming to judge the earth. He shall judge the world in righteousness, and the peoples with His truth. (Psalms 96:13)

And so also in many places elsewhere.

[11] This much comes from the prophetic books of the Word. In the historical books of the Word, too, similar events are represented by the wars of the children of Israel with the various nations. For everything written in the Word, whether prophetic or historical, was written about the Lord. That is what makes the Word Divine.

The rituals of the Israelite Church — for example, its burnt offerings and sacrifices, its sabbaths and feasts, and the priesthood of Aaron and the Levites — contain many arcane secrets of the Lord’s glorification. So likewise everything else in the books of Moses called laws, judgments and statutes. This also is meant by the Lord’s saying to His disciples that He must fulfill all things which were written in the Law of Moses concerning Him (Luke 24:44), and to the Jews that Moses wrote about Him (John 5:46).

[12] It can now be seen from this that the Lord came into the world to conquer the hells and glorify His humanity, and that the suffering of the cross was the final battle by which He fully overcame the hells and fully glorified His humanity.

But more on this subject will be seen in the next short work, The Sacred Scripture, where we will bring together in one place all the passages from the prophetic Word which depict the Lord’s battles with the hells and victories over them, or in other words, which depict the last judgment carried out by Him when He was in the world, and also the suffering of the cross and glorification of His humanity — passages which are so many that, if quoted, would fill pages.