"The Futility of the Flesh: Samson II”
Judges 13
July 2, 2006
by C.W. Powell
It may be important to note that the history that we just read is probably roughly contemporary with the events recorded in 1Samuel concerning the early life of Samuel and the revelation through him to Eli the high priest concerning the wickedness of Hophni and Phinehas, the sons of Eli. Samuel predicted the deaths of Hophni and Phinehas, which took place in a battle with the Philistines, in which the Ark of the Covenant was captured. When the news of the capture of the Ark reached Eli, the old man fell backward off his bench and died.
The deaths of Eli and his two sons were probably a few years after the marriage of Samson. We will see that his marriage provoked his first encounter with the Philistines. I suspect that the activities of Samson, who is said to begin to deliver Israel from the Philistines, militarily weakened the Philistines and made possible the great victory of Samuel and Israel of the Philistines some twenty years later. The events are recorded with some clarity according to the purpose of God, but the dates cannot be stated with too much certainty, but I am confi-dent that this chronology is in the ball park. The Philistines continued to be a major threat to Israel until they were subjugated by David, but even down to the Babylonian period, they are found as enemies of Israel and al-lied at various times with Egypt and other nations.
A few other preliminary things should be said.
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1. Israel had again done evil in the sight of the Lord after Jephthah and the judges who lived after him. God brought a new enemy upon them, the Philistines, or the Sea-People. These were probably immi-grants from Asia Minor that were displaced by other great movements of men out of Asia and Eastern Europe. These Philistines as they are called in the Bible settled along the coast in what is now the Gaza Strip and gained ascendancy over Israel, whose strongholds were in the mountains. It seems that the worst aspect of the Philistines was that they easily assimilated Israel and Israel was content to worship along with them, intermarry, and to give up the exclusivity to which they had been called by the Law of Moses. From the account of Samson’s marriage, there seems to have been some uneasy familiarity be-tween the two peoples. The name Palestine is derived from the old name Philistia, which comes from these people.
2. It is also true that it was a time of the corruption of the worship in Israel. Hophni and Phinehas, the sons of the high priest Eli, were wicked before the Lord and forced women who came to worship the Lord into fornication. As a result, people quit coming to the worship of the Lord. Hophni and Phinehas also forcefully extorted offerings from the people, contrary to the law of the Lord. Eli was strongly rebuked by the Lord through the child Samuel, who predicted the deaths of Hophni and Phinehas and the end of the line of Eli in the office of the High Priest. This end came in the first years of the reign of Solomon when another line from Aaron was put into this office by Solomon.
3. I think that Samson would have been a few years older than Samuel, judging from the recorded events. But they lived far apart and Samson did his exploits as a solitary champion far to the north. But ac-counts of his deeds would have trickled into the rest of Israel. Samson did not lead a popular uprising. He had little popular support and no attempt was made by Israel to rescue him from the horrid captivity that he was subjected to by the Philistines. I suspect that his marriage that provoked his first conflict with the Philistines happened a few years before the death of Hophni and Phinehas and Eli and the cap-ture of the Ark of the Covenant.
4. Dan was the least likely tribe of Israel to produce a champion. Near the end of this book we have re-corded the history of the apostasy of Dan, events that are probably before the life of Samson. Jacob on his death bed had predicted that Dan would be “Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall backward.” Dan is not included in the list of the tribes in the Revelation of St. John, suggesting that his apostasy was final. But God does as He pleases, and even among Dan there were righteous people, and Jacob had also prophesied that Dan “shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Israel.” At least one of the judges came from Dan. Dan does have a gate in the Temple described by Ezekiel.
5. We have seen that God raised up judges according to His own will and way. Not all men are given wis-dom and understanding. In Samson’s case, his gift seemed to be limited to his great strength. I do not know for certain whether Samson had an extraordinary physique and muscular power, or whether this was a super-natural strength that was given to him at times. I think there is evidence in the narrative to suppose the later, that his strength did not come from natural power, but by the power of God.
“1 And the children of Israel did evil again in the sight of the LORD; and the LORD delivered them into the hand of the Philistines forty years. 2 And there was a certain man of Zorah, of the family of the Danites, whose name [was] Manoah; and his wife [was] barren, and bare not. 3 And the angel of the LORD appeared unto the woman, and said unto her, Behold now, thou [art] barren, and bearest not: but thou shalt conceive, and bear a son. 4 Now therefore beware, I pray thee, and drink not wine nor strong drink, and eat not any unclean [thing]: 5 For, lo, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son; and no razor shall come on his head: for the child shall be a Nazarite unto God from the womb: and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines. 6 Then the woman came and told her husband, saying, A man of God came unto me, and his countenance [was] like the countenance of an angel of God, very terrible: but I asked him not whence he [was], neither told he me his name: 7 But he said unto me, Behold, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son; and now drink no wine nor strong drink, neither eat any unclean [thing]: for the child shall be a Nazarite to God from the womb to the day of his death.”
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1. Again the Lord shows what is the power of the flesh. Deliverance would come from a family that had no children. Why would Israel suppose that Messiah would come from the natural seed, when there were so many illustrations to the contrary in the Bible: Isaac and Jacob; Samuel, John the Baptist; the Virgin Mary. God is not impressed with the strength of man.
2. As if to make this point, the angel appears to Manoah’s wife, and the first revelation is given to her.
3. He would be a Nazarite, dedicated to God for all his life; He was never to cut his hair or drink anything from the grapevine, nor eat any forbidden food. The restriction on meats and drinks applied to the woman also.
4. Most Nazarite vows were for a limited period of time of fasting and prayers to encourage piety and de-votion to God. They could be taken by either men or women.
“8 Then Manoah intreated the LORD, and said, O my Lord, let the man of God which thou didst send come again unto us, and teach us what we shall do unto the child that shall be born. 9 And God hearkened to the voice of Manoah; and the angel of God came again unto the woman as she sat in the field: but Manoah her hus-band [was] not with her. 10 And the woman made haste, and ran, and shewed her husband, and said unto him, Behold, the man hath appeared unto me, that came unto me the [other] day. 11 And Manoah arose, and went after his wife, and came to the man, and said unto him, [Art] thou the man that spakest unto the woman? And he said, I [am]. 12 And Manoah said, Now let thy words come to pass. How shall we order the child, and [how] shall we do unto him? 13 And the angel of the LORD said unto Manoah, Of all that I said unto the woman let her beware. 14 She may not eat of any [thing] that cometh of the vine, neither let her drink wine or strong drink, nor eat any unclean [thing]: all that I commanded her let her observe.”
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1. Manoah prays to the Lord and the angel then appears to the woman again, and she gets her husband.
2. The instructions are repeated to Manoah.
“15 And Manoah said unto the angel of the LORD, I pray thee, let us detain thee, until we shall have made ready a kid for thee. 16 And the angel of the LORD said unto Manoah, Though thou detain me, I will not eat of thy bread: and if thou wilt offer a burnt offering, thou must offer it unto the LORD. For Manoah knew not that he [was] an angel of the LORD. 17 And Manoah said unto the angel of the LORD, What [is] thy name, that when thy sayings come to pass we may do thee honour? 18 And the angel of the LORD said unto him, Why askest thou thus after my name, seeing it [is] secret? 19 So Manoah took a kid with a meat offering, and offered [it] upon a rock unto the LORD: and [the angel] did wondrously; and Manoah and his wife looked on. 20 For it came to pass, when the flame went up toward heaven from off the altar, that the angel of the LORD ascended in the flame of the altar. And Manoah and his wife looked on [it], and fell on their faces to the ground. 21 But the angel of the LORD did no more appear to Manoah and to his wife. Then Manoah knew that he [was] an angel of the LORD. 22 And Manoah said unto his wife, We shall surely die, because we have seen God. 23 But his wife said unto him, If the LORD were pleased to kill us, he would not have received a burnt offering and a meat offering at our hands, neither would he have shewed us all these [things], nor would as at this time have told us [such things] as these.”
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1. Manoah recognizes something very special about this messenger, or angel, and prepares a gift for him. It would be a gift if it were an angel; an offering if this were a manifestion of God, the Angel of the Lord.
2. They recognized that it was the latter, the Angel of the Lord, and Manoah superstitiously thought that they would die because they had seen God. The woman sees more clearly. Why would he come to us and tell us these things if He would slay us?
“24 And the woman bare a son, and called his name Samson: and the child grew, and the LORD blessed him. 25 And the Spirit of the LORD began to move him at times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Eshtaol."
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1. The woman did have a son, and his name was Samson. We do not know why he was named this, but he was early given a blessing of great strength.
2. “The Spirit of the LORD began to move him at times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Esh-taol.” I believe that this is a summary statement of the events that are recorded in the next chapters.
Application:
1. We should strive after perfection. This is another way of saying that we are to strive to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, to which we have been predestined. We know that we will not attain this in this life, but our love for Christ should move us to seek to be more and more like Him. It is also true that God has used some most imperfect servants to build and guard His church.
2. This shows that we do not expect to attain perfection in order to be useful to the Lord and a blessing to the church. Shall we say to the Holy Spirit that He defiled Himself by moving Samson against the Philistines. That would be blasphemy. Hebrew says that Samson was moved by faith along with others of the Judges. This means that he believed the promise of Christ and was justified by faith. He certainly was no example of holy living and the events of his life are no pattern for us; Samson was one of a kind, and nothing in his life should be a pattern for ours, except his faith.
3. There is no evidence at all that Manoah and his wife were anything extraordinary in Israel. They came from a tribe steeped in idolatry and compromise. There is no evidence that the angel was sent in re-sponse to their prayers and devotion. Rather, it was in terms of the promise that God had made to Abra-ham, Isaac, and Jacob that the angel was sent and Samson was raised up.
4. Samson had no children that we know of and left no permanent heritage. He flashes across the pages of the Bible, showing the wondrous power of God and leaving a very imperfect type of our great hero, the Lord Jesus Christ, who was separate from sinners and without spot and blemish. In the blemishes and spots of Samson, we see magnified the marvelous grace of our Lord Jesus, who can forgive and restore those who have gone astray. Besides this, Samson’s exploits no doubt weakened the Philistines to pre-pare for the great victory under Samuel after his death.
5. The victory always come by the power of God, not by the strength of the instrument. Many years after these events, Jonathan, the son of Saul, when walking with his armorbearer came upon a band of the Philistines. Jonathan said to his armorbearer, “It is nothing to God, to save by many or by few.” The two then encounted the band of Philistines, slew a hundred of them in one field and sparked a great vic-tory that day by the armies of Israel over the Philistines. I like to think that Jonathan knew the history of Samson, who had lived only a few decades before. It is not by the strenghth of our arms or the number of our arms that victory comes, but by the power of God.
So we come to the Lord’s Supper this morning. Let us rejoice in the power of our Lord who forgives us our sins freely and calls us by His spirit. We have better promises than those of the Old Testament; we have a better and perfect mediator, and we commune at a better sacrifice, that of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen and Amen. May God bless you.