Judges 16:25

_AND WHEN THE PEOPLE SAW HIM, THEY PRAISED THEIR GOD: FOR THEY SAID, OUR GOD HATH DELIVERED INTO OUR HANDS OUR ENEMY, AND THE DESTROYER OF OUR COUNTRY, WHICH SLEW MANY OF US._ No JFB commentary on these verses....

25-31 Nothing fills up the sins of any person or people faster than mocking and misusing the servants of God, even thought it is by their own folly that they are brought low. God put it into Samson's heart, as a public person, thus to avenge on them God's quarrel, Israel's, and his own. That strength which he had lost by sin, he recovers by prayer. That it was not from passion or personal revenge, but from holy zeal for the glory of God and Israel, appears from God's accepting and answering the prayer. The house was pulled down, not by the natural strength of Samson, but by the almighty power of God. In his case it was right he should avenge the cause of God and Israel. Nor is he to be accused of self-murder. He sought not his own death, but Israel's deliverance, and the destruction of their enemies. Thus Samson died in bonds, and among the Philistines, as an awful rebuke for his sins;...

Verse Judges 16:25. _CALL FOR SAMSON, THAT HE MAY MAKE US SPORT_] What the sport was we cannot tell; probably it was an exhibition of his prodigious strength. This seems to be intimated by what is said, Judges 16:22, of the restoration of his _hair_; and the exertions he was obliged to make will account for the _weariness_ which gave him the pretence to ask for leave to _lean_ _against the pillars_. Some think he was brought out to be a _laughing-stock_, and that he was variously _insulted_ by the Philistines; hence the version of the Septuagint: και ερραπιζον αυτον, _and they buffeted him_. Josephus, Antiq. Jud. lib. v., cap. 8, s. 12, says: _He was brought out_, ὁπως ενυβρισωσιν αυτον παρα τον ποτον, _that they might insult him in their cups_....

THAT HE MAY MAKE US SPORT - Rather, “that he may play for us,” i. e. dance and make music. At an idolatrous feast, dancing was always accompanied with vocal and instrumental music....

EXPOSITION JUDGES 16:23 GATHERED THEM, _i.e._ themselves. TO REJOICE. The Hebrew _is for a festivity_,_ _or _merry-making_,_ _or _feast. _There was to be a great feast upon the sacrifices offered to Dagon their God. DAGON (from dag, a fish in Hebrew), the national male god of the Philistines, as _Atergatis_, or _Derceto_,_ _was their goddess. Both the male and female divinities seem to have had the head and breast and hands human, and the rest of the body fish-shaped (see 1 Samuel 5:5). The fish was a natural emblem of fertility and productiveness, especially to a maritime people. The fish-shaped idol is found upon old Phoenician coins, and also on the monument

AND IT CAME TO PASS WHEN THEIR HEARTS WERE MERRY,.... With wine, for which Gaza is famous in many writers w; with eating and drinking, dancing, and music; for it was usual for the Heathens to feast in their temples, and especially no doubt they would on such an occasion as this: AND THEY SAID, CALL FOR SAMSON, THAT HE MAY MAKE US SPORT; by which it seems that what is before said, "when the people saw him", Judges 16:24 is said by anticipation; for as yet he was not in the temple, but in the prison; and therefore a motion was made by some of the great personages, that he might be fetched from thence, and they might have some diversion with him: AND THEY CALLED FOR SAMSON OUT OF THE PRISON HOUSE; sent some messengers to fetch him from thence: AND HE MADE THEM SPORT; not actively, but passively; it cannot well be thought, that a man of

CHAPTER 16 DELILAH, AND SAMSON _ 1. In Gaza (Judges 16:1)_ 2. Delilah and her victory over him (Judges 16:4) 3. The captive of the Philistines (Judges 16:21) 4. The feast of Dagon and Samson's death (Judges 16:22) Down he goes again, and this time to Gaza, the Philistine stronghold. There he unites himself with a harlot. We are here reminded of the history of the Church. The harlot typifies that system which in Revelation is called by the same name, she who seduces to commit fornication, Babylon the great, Rome. Rome is the capital of Philistinism, ritualistic Christendom, as Gaza was the capital of the

THE DEATH OF SAMSON. Dagon, the god of the Philistines, had been worshipped in the Maritime Plain long before their coming. They adopted the god of the district, just as many Israelites learned to worship the Baals of Canaan. One of the Amarna letter-writers was called Dagon-takala. There is still a Beit Dajan near Joppa, and another near Nâ blû s. Judges 16:24. In the Heb. the words Our god. many of us form a rhymed five-line song, each short line ending in _ç nû._ Judges 16:25. The blind giant apparently made sport by harmless exhibitions of his strength. Judges 16:27. And all the lords. women is probably a later insertion to heighten the effect. Codex B of the LXX has 70 instead

MAKE US SPORT. Some codices, with one early printed edition, Septuagint, Syriac, and Vulgate, read "make sport before us". THEM SPORT. sport before them....

_Samson and Delîlah: his ruin and famous end_ 4 _.the valley of Sorek_ Now Wâdi eṣ-Ṣarâr, a broad valley narrowing as it rises towards the Judaean highlands; the railway from Jaffa to Jerusalem ascends the lower part of it. _Soreḳ_denotes a choice kind of vine (Genesis 49:11; Isaiah 5:2; Jeremiah 2:21), which may have given its name to the valley. A ruined site near Ṣar-a (Judges 13:2 _n._) is still called Sûrîk....