Samson’s New Clothes
Samson’s New Clothes
Judges 14:14b-16a & 17b
And in three days they could not solve the riddle. On the fourth day they said to Samson’s wife, “Entice your husband to tell us what the riddle is, lest we burn you and your father’s house with fire. Have you invited us here to impoverish us?” And Samson’s wife wept over him … the seven days that their feast lasted, and on the seventh day he told her, because she pressed him hard.
Just when it seemed like Samson might make Time Magazine’s cover for the most self-serving, pompous, erratic man of his era, here come a group of deviant Philistine thugs to take the cake. Next to these baddies, Samson looks like a choir boy.
Parse this debacle out with me, friend, and see if there’s any wisdom in it. Here come friends of the bride, wanting to save their blushes, bursting through the bridal chamber and threatening to burn the girl and her family alive if she fails to get the answer out of her husband before the clock runs out. But why such an extreme and inhumane response? It’s just a riddle, isn’t it? It’s just thirty pairs of clothes—it’s not like they’re crowning Samson king at the end of the week! Goodness—even if they’d said something like, “Listen young lady, we don’t want your long-haired hubby making a fool of us, so get the answer out of him or else we’re kicking you out of the clan! It’s us or him—make your choice!”, that still would’ve seemed like an overreaction. But to threaten her with such a cruel death, and to hold her parents’ feet over the fire during the honeymoon, is a dive into the dredges of human depravity. Oh, but that’s only part of it. Look how they try to rationalize their response by placing the blame on this poor woman: “Have you invited us here to impoverish us?” Impoverish? Losing thirty pairs of clothes will lead to bankruptcy? Get a grip! They aren’t even haggling over donkeys and cattle and grain fields. Instead, they’ve got their torches blazing over blue jeans and flannels.
But back to Samson though, how can he put his own bride through seven days of torment just to keep his little gag going? How can he watch her weep from day to day, yet sell out her happiness for thirty new shirts? If he keeps living and loving like this, he won’t have either before long.