makes him so strong, and how we can overpower him, tie him up, and make him helpless; and we’ll each give you eleven hundred shekels of silver.”’
Various works dealing with the story of Samson – in literature, painting, music, film 24 – have tried to represent Delilah as a tragic figure, who had no intention of harming Samson and indeed was anguished over what happened to him after she turned him in. This sort of interpretation may be found, for example, in Van Dyck’s painting The Arrest of Samson , in which Samson casts a heartrending look at Delilah as the Philistines burst into the room, seize him and tear him away from her: Delilah’s face is turned toward him in a curiousmixture of satisfaction over her success, yet pain and tenderness too. Her hand is extended toward his face in a gesture that at the same time suggests a wave of farewell, of renunciation, but also a gesture of compassion, a yearning to caress him one last time, a tender send-off as he embarks on a road of suffering.
But the text as it stands does not lend itself to such a generous reading of Delilah’s deeds and character, indeed rejects it outright. Delilah’s entire behaviour does not even hint of love, and yet it is this cruel, treacherous woman whom Samson loves, and, as we have remarked, it may well be that note of treachery that he loves in her, 25 which forces the reader to broaden and loosen the very definition of love: it is probably Delilah’s cruelty, her almost transparent passion to hurt him – a level of passion that he never found in his other women – which ties him to her with twisted bonds that turn out to be stronger than any that preceded them, and which therefore, for the first time, arouse his love.
But the explanation of the compulsive need for betrayal is, in the end, so depressing, constraining, mechanical – and denying of Samson’s free will – that we seek, alongside it, another explanation, or wait a while and hope that the story itself will lead us to it.
Delilah – motivated by the promise of a handsome payoff by the Philistines – ties Samson up and teases him with a sort of two-faced foreplay. On the surface, she is trying to determine, with Samson’s compliance, the secret to his strength and a means of binding him from which he cannot get himself free: ‘If I were to be tied with seven fresh bowstrings that were never dried, ‘I should become as weak as an ordinary man,’ Samson answers, stretched out to his full length on the mattress, maybe idly stroking his long braids – all seven of them – and suppressing a smile.
Erotic amusements are a matter of taste, and being tied up with fresh tendons that have not been dried is apparently something Samson is into. Delilah at once passes the word about Samson’s fancy to thePhilistine officers. They send the requested accoutrements up to her chamber, and she ties the damp cords around his body. And all the while, remember, ‘an ambush was waiting in her room’, a most glaring example of the confusion and boundary-violation that always attend Samson’s activities, indiscriminately mixing the intimate and the public, love and betrayal.
Delilah finishes wrapping his body with the cords, and then, when he is tied tight, she says to him (in a sudden cry? a confidential whisper in his ear?) ‘Samson, the Philistines are upon you!’ Barely a moment passes, and Samson pops the tendons apart as easily as a ‘strand of tow’ (i.e., a fibre of flax) comes apart at a mere ‘touch of fire’.
You deceived me, declares Delilah, and lied to me. With astonishing coldness, and even as she spins her web of deceit, she accuses him of lying. Her eyes are perhaps flashing toward the ‘ambusher’, then fixing on Samson: ‘Now, tell me true, how can you be tied up and restrained?’
Samson – sprawled on his back? stretching withsatisfaction? – suggests a new method: ‘If I were to be bound with new ropes that had never been used, I would become
Various works dealing with the story of Samson – in literature, painting, music, film 24 – have tried to represent Delilah as a tragic figure, who had no intention of harming Samson and indeed was anguished over what happened to him after she turned him in. This sort of interpretation may be found, for example, in Van Dyck’s painting The Arrest of Samson , in which Samson casts a heartrending look at Delilah as the Philistines burst into the room, seize him and tear him away from her: Delilah’s face is turned toward him in a curiousmixture of satisfaction over her success, yet pain and tenderness too. Her hand is extended toward his face in a gesture that at the same time suggests a wave of farewell, of renunciation, but also a gesture of compassion, a yearning to caress him one last time, a tender send-off as he embarks on a road of suffering.
But the text as it stands does not lend itself to such a generous reading of Delilah’s deeds and character, indeed rejects it outright. Delilah’s entire behaviour does not even hint of love, and yet it is this cruel, treacherous woman whom Samson loves, and, as we have remarked, it may well be that note of treachery that he loves in her, 25 which forces the reader to broaden and loosen the very definition of love: it is probably Delilah’s cruelty, her almost transparent passion to hurt him – a level of passion that he never found in his other women – which ties him to her with twisted bonds that turn out to be stronger than any that preceded them, and which therefore, for the first time, arouse his love.
But the explanation of the compulsive need for betrayal is, in the end, so depressing, constraining, mechanical – and denying of Samson’s free will – that we seek, alongside it, another explanation, or wait a while and hope that the story itself will lead us to it.
Delilah – motivated by the promise of a handsome payoff by the Philistines – ties Samson up and teases him with a sort of two-faced foreplay. On the surface, she is trying to determine, with Samson’s compliance, the secret to his strength and a means of binding him from which he cannot get himself free: ‘If I were to be tied with seven fresh bowstrings that were never dried, ‘I should become as weak as an ordinary man,’ Samson answers, stretched out to his full length on the mattress, maybe idly stroking his long braids – all seven of them – and suppressing a smile.
Erotic amusements are a matter of taste, and being tied up with fresh tendons that have not been dried is apparently something Samson is into. Delilah at once passes the word about Samson’s fancy to thePhilistine officers. They send the requested accoutrements up to her chamber, and she ties the damp cords around his body. And all the while, remember, ‘an ambush was waiting in her room’, a most glaring example of the confusion and boundary-violation that always attend Samson’s activities, indiscriminately mixing the intimate and the public, love and betrayal.
Delilah finishes wrapping his body with the cords, and then, when he is tied tight, she says to him (in a sudden cry? a confidential whisper in his ear?) ‘Samson, the Philistines are upon you!’ Barely a moment passes, and Samson pops the tendons apart as easily as a ‘strand of tow’ (i.e., a fibre of flax) comes apart at a mere ‘touch of fire’.
You deceived me, declares Delilah, and lied to me. With astonishing coldness, and even as she spins her web of deceit, she accuses him of lying. Her eyes are perhaps flashing toward the ‘ambusher’, then fixing on Samson: ‘Now, tell me true, how can you be tied up and restrained?’
Samson – sprawled on his back? stretching withsatisfaction? – suggests a new method: ‘If I were to be bound with new ropes that had never been used, I would become
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