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The theme is reused often in many religions, but the Jewish story itself is a little bit more macabre and irrationally violent than the theme itself would have you expect.
I agree. There are methods to the madness, though. It's a fascinating cycle of stories and really highlights the dangers of being infused with the "spirit/breath of Yahweh" - it makes you do craaaaazy things! But even before that, Samson was always a little bit feral to begin with, having long wild hair, tearing lions apart and having the ability to catch a bunch of jackals and tie their tails together. He even makes his mark as being a frequenter of prostitutes, only to meet his doom at the hands of Delilah. What is striking, in relation to the theme that Ozzy has suggested, is that YHWH is not present for Samson's final triumph. He must do it alone.
Samson the Wild Man
The suggestion has been capably made that Samson (technically Šimšōn, pronounced Shim-shōn, Hebrew שִׁמְשׁוֹן) is related to the ancient Near Eastern sun deity Šamaš, pronounced Sha-mash, with the deity being found as Šemeš (שֶׁמֶשׁ) in Hebrew: (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shamash). The point is that the consonantal root is the exact same: šmš (sh-m-sh). Shamash is associated with lions, like Samson. I do wonder if Delilah hadn't served as a sort of Ishtar in opposition to Samson, much like in the Epic of Gilgamesh one has the wild animalistic man Enkidu who is tamed by a prostitute and finally undone by the jealous goddess Ishtar. I think there are good arguments for seeing such mythic themes in the various folktales that have accrued around Samson's character.
"Sigh... just another day in the fields...."
Divine Inspiration - literally, the "Breath of YHWH"
The most interesting aspect of Samson, for me however, is his experience with the Israelite god's powerful "breath" or "spirit" driving him into a frenzy, or berserk mode - the so-called "breath of Yahweh" that infused him, and other heroes in the Book of Judges. In many myths, the gods propel warriors to great deeds of power and strength - inhuman at times - through various means. Ishtar was said to have driven men to berserk mode by cracking a jumping rope, and Yahweh was said to have breathed into heroes his divine breath.
Samson is "possessed" by this breath several times, when he tears the lion apart (Judg 14:6), when he kills thirty men (Judg 14:19), and when he literally melts the rope off of himself and uses a jawbone to slay a large amount of men (Judg 15:14-15). Other characters in the Hebrew Bible are infused with God's breath - with bad results at times: Othniel (Judg 3:10), Jephthah makes a rash vow in which he ends up sacrificing his daughter alive (11:29), Gideon (Judg 6:34), Saul raves (I Sam 10:10; 11:6), David (I Sam 16:13). Other references to the power of Yahweh being infused into a particular human can be found - and when such "breath" is directly inspired into a being, they are barely able to contain it. This is where the idea of divine inspiration comes from - not the later belief that you find in Biblical authorship.
Saul "among the Prophets", the breath of YHWH is so hot ya' just gotta strip down:
Quote:
Originally Posted by granpa
Samson = Jonathan = Jonah = Jesus
I'm surprised, with all your this = this = this, you haven't heard of the above equation with Shamash and Enkidu.
But not if you take the assumption that many of the New Testament writers were using a symbolic interpretation of the Hebrew scriptures. In fact, I am absolutely certain that they were. Whatever the meaning was, I have to believe that it would have all fallen under psychology by today's definition.
There isn't anything in the New Testament that is not from the Old Testament and the Book of Revelation has parts of the Talmud in it. Revelation should be named,'' Rosh Hashanah,'' on every single page you can write Rosh Hashanah because there isn't a page of Revelation not talking about Rosh Hashanah. Revelation has over 700 references from the old Testament.
The story of Samson is the best illustration for what I think is the repeated theme throughout the entire Bible. In this story, a man grows stronger and stronger. Then he becomes arrogant. Then he becomes quickly humbled. It is his state of HUMILITY that eventually leads him back to his strength again.
That is what I think the message throughout the Bible is. If you are so ABOVE everyone else that you become arrogant and proud, then this will eventually lead to your downfall. But in that valley you will find strength again. It's a book of psychology, using all kinds of wild supernatural stories as illustrations of the psychology.
"The first will be last. The last will be first." (Jesus)
What do you think about this theme?
Nice thoughts. And I would add: be careful who you marry. But Samson marrying her was of the Lord (Judges 14:4). This marriage would be the downfall for many Philistines.
And I would add: be careful who you marry. But Samson marrying her was of the Lord (Judges 14:4). This marriage would be the downfall for many Philistines.
Whew - as long as it "was of the Lord"!
"Be careful who you marry", but not who you have sex with - I would add. Samson wasn't the kind of guy who worried whether his sexual activities were "of the Lord" or not, as seen in his frequenting of a prostitute and his later dalliance with Delilah. Basically, most of Samson's problems had to do with women! He had poor decision making skills, that is to be sure.
In Judges 15, Samson had been infused with the "Breath of Yahweh" and slain about a thousand men with the jawbone of a donkey:
He had come as far as Lehi,
when the Phillistines shouted [in triumph] meeting him;
YHWH's spirit advanced upon him,
and the ropes which were on his arms became
like [threads of] flax which are ignited with fire;
his bonds melted off his hands.
(Judges 15:14 SB Fox)
There is some humor here with the spirit of Yahweh burning so hot that the ropes literally melt off of Samson (not to mention the fact that he uses the jawbone of a donkey to kill a bunch of men!). After he slays the Philistines, he is extremely hot and thirsty (from the exertion and a reference to the heat of God's spirit upon him) and God provides miraculous water for him to drink. He then immediately decides to visit a prostitute, only one of his thirsts having been slaked. And as if it isn't bad enough that he can't keep it in his pants, out of all the cities he could have visited to find a prostitute he decides to find one in a major Philistine city: Gaza!
Shimshon [Samson] went to Gaza;
he saw there a who..re woman, and came in to her.
Among the Gazites it was said:
Shimshon has come here!
They circled about and set an ambush for him the whole night at the town gate,
and they plotted the whole night, saying:
Until the light of daybreak - then we will kill him! (1-2)
Shimshon lay until the middle of the night;
he arose in the middle of the night
and seized the doors of the town gate, along with the two posts,
and pulled them up, together with the bolt
and put them on his shoulders
and brought them up to the top of the hill that faces Hebron. (3)
(Judges 16:1-3 SB Fox)
This is another humorous story in the Samson cycle, and the ancient listeners probably chuckled with delight at the wild man Samson getting into trouble yet again due to his sexual desires, and managing to escape what appears to be a trap (much like the next part of the cycle, the trap with Delilah) by acting impulsively yet again. The patient Philistines, lying in wait throughout the night, get to watch Samson rip the gates of the city out of the ground (and these gates would have been enormous!) and proceed to march many miles with them - not a care in the world apparently. It was enough to give the Philistines pause in this case. But who can blame them?
Of course, the next story in the Samson cycle once again finds our wild hero listening to the wrong head (if you'll excuse the expression) and getting led into his ultimate doom this time.
Now it was [some time] after this
that he fell in love with a woman in the Wadi of Sorek/Vines;
her name was Delila.
The Philistine overlords went up to her and said to her:
Seduce him and see
whereby his might is so great,
whereby we can overcome him,
so that we can bind him, to subdue him,
and we ourselves, each one, will give you a thousand and a hundred pieces of silver!
(Judges 16:4-5 SB Fox)
And we all know how this ended for silly ol' Samson.
"Oh geez, right in my eye!"
Moderator cut: deleted
Samson's cycle is full of ancient and bawdy humor that would have had Israelites chuckling with glee. It's a shame when modern people try to sanitize this fascinating character into some sort of faithful religionist who only acted "with the Lord", when it's more accurate to say that Samson was occasionally an unwitting tool of the Israelite God's active force. He was a wild man through and through, and his impulsive behavior ended up costing him his life in the end.
He calls out to God in the end, but Yahweh withholds his "Spirit" from him - if we are to follow the text of Judges - and Samson must "bring down the house" with his own titanic strength. It is a fitting end to the cycle of "Judges", and illustrates the utter failure of these human agents of God to bring peace to the land - and sets up the dark end of the Book of Judges and the apologetic for a God-sanctioned monarchy.
Last edited by june 7th; 11-01-2015 at 11:16 AM..
Reason: Copyright violation.
Samson's cycle is full of ancient and bawdy humor that would have had Israelites chuckling with glee. It's a shame when modern people try to sanitize this fascinating character into some sort of faithful religionist who only acted "with the Lord", when it's more accurate to say that Samson was occasionally an unwitting tool of the Israelite God's active force. He was a wild man through and through, and his impulsive behavior ended up costing him his life in the end.
He calls out to God in the end, but Yahweh withholds his "Spirit" from him - if we are to follow the text of Judges - and Samson must "bring down the house" with his own titanic strength. It is a fitting end to the cycle of "Judges", and illustrates the utter failure of these human agents of God to bring peace to the land - and sets up the dark end of the Book of Judges and the apologetic for a God-sanctioned monarchy.
Yes, God does inspire "his people" to do destructive things. It is no different today.
It's the "inspiration" (apart from the Ban) that can be the most personally destructive, that "Breath of Yahweh" inspiring crazy acts. Another Judge (a very misleading English translation) is inspired by God to make quite the rash vow in exchange for victory:
Now there came upon Yiftah [English traditionally Jephthah] the rushing-spirit of YHWH;
he crossed over to Gil'ad and Menashe,
and he crossed over to Mitzpe of Gil'ad, and from Mitzpe of Gil'ad he crossed over to the Children of Ammon. (29)
And Yiftah vowed a vow to YHWH and said:
If you will give, yes, give the Children of Ammon into my hand,
it will be: the one going out who goes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the Children of Ammon
shall be YHWH's
and shall be offered up by me as an offering-up!
(Judges 11:29-31 SB Fox)
He vows to make a sacrificial offering of the first person who comes to greet him after his victory, and unfortunately the first person to come meet him turns out to be his daughter.
Yiftah came back to Mitzpa, to his house,
and here, his daughter was going out to meet him, with timbrels and with dancing -
yet she was a lone child, he had no son or daughter beside her.
It was, when he saw her,
that he tore his garments
and said:
Alas, my daughter! You have cast, yes, cast me down,
you have become my disaster -
for I myself opened my mouth to YHWH,
and I am not able to turn it back!
(Judges 11:34-35)
Nonetheless, when one reads on to the gruesome end, Yahweh is perfectly content to have Jephthah keep his vow, made under Divine Inspiration via that terrible destructive "Breath of Yahweh", and thus his daughter (after a time to bewail her virginity) is offered up as a human sacrifice. Though the Biblical text does not explicitly condemn him for his actions, it cannot bring itself to speak the result except in idiom and referring to his original vow (thus giving sects like the Jehovah's Witnesses a chance to say she became a nun!) and we are left with a disturbing image of what it was like to have been "inspired" by God.
I wonder how many people can imagine the original connotations of being Inspired, with a capital I?
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No, the Bible is the history of the Hebrew people and the lineage of Adam to Yahshua (Jesus).
He had poor decision making skills, that is to be sure. 
