With Judges 13 begins the story of Samson. The name is very familiar to Christians and in fact Samson commonly appears in Bible stories for children. People have the vague idea that he had superhuman strength as long as he didn't cut his hair, and that his girlfriend Delilah betrayed him by having his hair cut, and he was screwed until it grew back. That's about all people know, I'll venture. We'll see the real story in the coming days, and it ain't pretty.
In this chapter, the story of his birth, Christians will likely find a great deal that is familiar. In fact, there might be something of a copyright violation here. I insert commentary at various places.
3 Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord, so the Lord delivered them into the hands of the Philistines for forty years.
Groundhog day.
2 A certain man of Zorah, named Manoah, from the clan of the Danites, had a wife who was childless, unable to give birth. 3 The angel of the Lord appeared to her and said, “You are barren and childless, but you are going to become pregnant and give birth to a son. 4 Now see to it that you drink no wine or other fermented drink and that you do not eat anything unclean. 5 You will become pregnant and have a son whose head is never to be touched by a razor because the boy is to be a Nazirite, dedicated to God from the womb. He will take the lead in delivering Israel from the hands of the Philistines.”
Recall that "Nazirites" are introduced in Numbers 6. They are somehow dedicated to Yahweh although the precise meaning of being a Nazirite and what they are supposed to do is not explained. One restriction is that they are not allowed to touch dead bodies. Believe me, Samson is going to violate thta one!
6 Then the woman went to her husband and told him, “A man of God came to me. He looked like an angel of God, very awesome. I didn’t ask him where he came from, and he didn’t tell me his name. 7 But he said to me, ‘You will become pregnant and have a son. Now then, drink no wine or other fermented drink and do not eat anything unclean, because the boy will be a Nazirite of God from the womb until the day of his death.’”
8 Then Manoah prayed to the Lord: “Pardon your servant, Lord. I beg you to let the man of God you sent to us come again to teach us how to bring up the boy who is to be born.”
9 God heard Manoah, and the angel of God came again to the woman while she was out in the field; but her husband Manoah was not with her. 10 The woman hurried to tell her husband, “He’s here! The man who appeared to me the other day!”
11 Manoah got up and followed his wife. When he came to the man, he said, “Are you the man who talked to my wife?”
“I am,” he said.
12 So Manoah asked him, “When your words are fulfilled, what is to be the rule that governs the boy’s life and work?”
13 The angel of the Lord answered, “Your wife must do all that I have told her. 14 She must not eat anything that comes from the grapevine, nor drink any wine or other fermented drink nor eat anything unclean. She must do everything I have commanded her.”
15 Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, “We would like you to stay until we prepare a young goat for you.”
16 The angel of the Lord replied, “Even though you detain me, I will not eat any of your food. But if you prepare a burnt offering, offer it to the Lord.” (Manoah did not realize that it was the angel of the Lord.)
17 Then Manoah inquired of the angel of the Lord, “What is your name, so that we may honor you when your word comes true?”
18 He replied, “Why do you ask my name? It is beyond understanding.[a]” 19 Then Manoah took a young goat, together with the grain offering, and sacrificed it on a rock to the Lord. And the Lord did an amazing thing while Manoah and his wife watched: 20 As the flame blazed up from the altar toward heaven, the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame. Seeing this, Manoah and his wife fell with their faces to the ground. 21 When the angel of the Lord did not show himself again to Manoah and his wife, Manoah realized that it was the angel of the Lord.
As I noted before, the tabernacle and the priesthood have disappeared. Do-it-yourself sacrifice is now okay, although according to the Torah it is absolutely abomination. These people should have been struck dead, instead God accepts the sacrifice.
22 “We are doomed to die!” he said to his wife. “We have seen God!”
23 But his wife answered, “If the Lord had meant to kill us, he would not have accepted a burnt offering and grain offering from our hands, nor shown us all these things or now told us this.”
24 The woman gave birth to a boy and named him Samson. He grew and the Lord blessed him, 25 and the Spirit of the Lord began to stir him while he was in Mahaneh Dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.
Footnotes
- Judges 13:18 Or is wonderful
3 comments:
If I’m not mistaken, there cannot be any copyright violation since the story of Samson was written — at least, verbally authored — before the Christian Bible.
I meant it the other way around, that the JC birth story is a copyright violation. Of course it had expired by then.
Right. Got it. Good point. When it comes to copyright infringement, the entire lie of the Christian religion is based on pagan stories and religions that came before. But of course, most Christians probably don’t know that.
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