Dominic Bnonn Tennant (the B is silent)

Judges 14

1

and1 Shimshon descended to Timnath2 and saw a woman in Timnath from the daughters of the Philistines.

The spirit’s marriage proposal

2

And he ascended and told his father and his mother and said, “A woman I have seen in Timnath, from the daughters of the Philistines; and now, take her for me for ‹my› woman.”3

3

And his father and his mother said to him, “Is there naught in the daughters of thy brothers, and in all my people a woman, that thou goest to take a woman from the foreskinned4 Philistines?” And Shimshon said unto his father, “Her, take for me, in that she is straight in mine eyes.”5

4

And his father and his mother knew not that it was from Yahweh, that he sought an opportunity from6 the Philistines; and in that time the Philistines ruled in Israel.

The lion and the honey

5

And Shimshon descended, and his father and his mother, to Timnath, and came in until the vineyards7 of Timnath, and lo, a youngmane of the lions8 roared to meet him.9

6

And the spirit of Yahweh advanced10 upon him, and he clave11 him as ‹unto› cleaving a kid—and not anything was in his hand—and he told not his father and his mother what he had done.

7

And he descended and spoke to the woman, and she was straight in the eyes of Shimshon.

8

And he turned-back, from ‹some› days, to take her, and turned ‹aside› to see the fallen lion,12 and lo, an assembly of bees13 in the body14 of the lion, and honey,

9

and he vanquished15 it unto his palm16 and went, walking and eating, and went unto his father and unto his mother and gave to them, and they ate, and he told them not that from the body of the lion he had vanquished the honey.

The wedding feast & the riddle

10

And his father descended unto the woman, and Shimshon made there a drinking-party,17 ‹in› that so made the youths;18

11

and it was that they saw him, and took thirty comrades to be with him,19

12

and Shimshon said to them, “I shall riddle,20 pray, to you a riddle; if ye telling tell it to me ‹in› the seven days of the drinking-party, and find ‹it out›, and I will give to you thirty wrappers21 and thirty changes of clothes;

13

and if ye are not able to tell me, and ye shall give to me thirty wrappers and thirty changes of clothes.” And they said to him, “Riddle thy riddle, and we shall hear it.”

14

And he said to them,
“From the eater came-forth eatings22
And from the strong came-forth sweetness.”23
And they were not able to tell the riddle three days.

15

And it was, in the seventh24 day, and they said to the woman of Shimshon, “Guile25 thy man, and he shall tell to us the riddle, lest we burn thee and the house of thy father in fire. To dispossess26 us have ye27 called28 us here?”29

16

And Shimshon’s woman wept upon him and said, “Only thou hatest me, and lovest me not—the riddle thou hast riddled unto the sons of my people, and to me thou hast not told it.” And he said to her, “Lo, to my father and to my mother I have not told it—and to thee should I tell it?”30

17

And she wept upon him the seven days that was their drinking-party, and it was, in the seventh day, and he told her, ‹in› that she pressed31 him. And she told the riddle to the sons of her people.

18

And the men of the city said to him, in the seventh day, before the sun32 came in, “What is sweeter than honey? And what is stronger than a lion?”33 And he said to them,
“Except ye had plowed34 with my heifer
Ye had not found ‹out› my riddle.”

Shimshon humiliates Ashkelon

19

And the spirit of Yahweh advanced upon him, and he descended to Ashkelon,35 and smote from them thirty men, and took their armor, and gave the changes to the tellers of the riddle, and his nose burned36 and he ascended to the house of his father,

20

and the woman of Shimshon was given to his comrade that had been ‹for› his camaraderie.37

Footnotes

  1. and. This is lowercase because the sentence continues between 13:25 and 14:1. ↩

  2. Timnath. “Portion,” a part assigned. ↩

  3. for my woman. Trad. “to wife,” which is a better representation of the terseness of the Hebrew, but loses the word “woman” in favor of “wife,” a word Hebrew does not have. “Woman” is an extremely significant term throughout Shimshon’s narrative, starting in Judges 13#2. ↩

  4. foreskinned. Trad. “uncircumcised,” but this is a circumlocution that I suspect is motivated partly by a lack of imaginative engagement with English grammar, and partly a squeamishness with how directly God likes to speak. Arel really means foreskin; cf. Genesis 17:11, 14, where the word is used three times, not twice as most translations suggest. ↩

  5. straight in mine eyes. Not “she pleases me well,” as the KJV and its close descendants tragically translate it, for this is the same phrase famously repeated later in Judges 17:6; 21:25, where we learn that because there was no king in Israel, “a man did what was straight in his eyes.” Trad. “right,” but while that is the sense, the denotation of yashar is something straight or level; it is also used of plains (Dt 3:10; 4:43 etc). In modern English, “straight” when predicated of people has been twisted to refer to a normal “sexual orientation,” but this is all the more reason to use it correctly in translation: degenerate unbelievers do not control the dictionary; God does, and we must reform language according to his use. ↩

  6. from. Trad. “against,” but the preposition indicates that the source of the opportunity is being sought in the Philistines themselves. ↩

  7. vineyards. An intriguing place for a nazirite to end his journey. The root here, kerem, is similar to the word for “devoted,” cherem. I am not sure how much weight to place on this, but the same word does seem to be used in Judges 11#33 to allude to devotion through wordplay; the same may be true here, given that Shimshon is devoted to God through the vow of the nazir. ↩

  8. youngmane of the lions. Trad. “young lion.” This is accurate in capturing the sense, but does not represent the text, since in Hebrew this is not the word for lion combined with an adjective for young, but rather two nouns: one the plural of “lion,” and the other a word with no English equivalent, k’phir, which is roughly to “lion” as “colt” is to “horse.” It does not denote a whelp—i.e., a cub—as Young has it; these are cute rather than threatening. It indicates a weaned “teenage” lion who has reached sexual maturity and come into his mane, around two or three years of age. Such lions are generally nomads, having been evicted from their prides upon reaching maturity. I have chosen to represent the text by inventing a word that tries to capture the essence of k’phir, which has the root kpr (“cover” = mane). ↩

  9. to meet him. Trad. “against him,” but this verb consistently means to meet; e.g. Judges 4#18; Judges 11#31. ↩

  10. advanced. Or “rushed.” Trad. “came mightily” (Alter, “seized”), but the word does not seem to denote force; e.g., it is used of Abraham’s servant and Joshua “prospering” their ways in Genesis 24:21; Joshua 1#8. ↩

  11. clave. Or “split.” Trad. “rent” or “tore apart,” but this misses the point of the parenthetical remark that there was nothing in Shimshon’s hand; i.e., no blade. The dividing of the lion is likened to the cleaving of an animal in preparation for sacrifice: apart from one other occasion, this word is used exclusively in a sacramental context, first of the cleaving of a pigeon to offer as an ascension (Lev 1:17), and then of those animals that are pure because they “cleave the cleft of the hoof” (Lev 11; Dt 14). ↩

  12. fallen lion. Or “the ruin of the lion;” i.e., its carcass. In Hebrew, “fallen” is a noun meaning a thing fallen down or collapsed. ↩

  13. assembly of bees. Trad. “swarm of bees,” but adat is the term used specifically and ubiquitously of assemblies of God’s people, both men and angels; e.g., Exodus 12:3; Psalm 82#1. It is also worth noting that the Hebrew word for bee is deborah, so this reads, “an assembly of deborahs.” ↩

  14. body. This word, gawiyah, is an extended form of gawah, from which the word goy (“nation”) appears to derive. Understanding that the body of the lion is the “nation” of the lion has considerable import for grasping the meaning of this parable. ↩

  15. vanquished. I have chosen this very idiosyncratic rendering because the root rdh is from Genesis 1#26, where it is traditionally translated “have dominion,” though I translate it there and elsewhere as “hold sway.” It cannot be translated that way here, but “scoop” or “scrape” does not at all capture this connection. The way Judges 14 is written, as in Judges 3, is pointedly symbolic—its theological import can only be discerned if the symbolic language is represented accurately, instead of being “explained” in “normal” English. ↩

  16. palm. Not, as most translations have it, “hands;” the palm has special significance in Judges; e.g., Judges 8#6; Judges 8#15. ↩

  17. drinking-party. I.e., a wedding banquet or feast. However, in English these terms connote specifically food, whereas the Hebrew term used here is derived from the verb to drink, and thus connotes wine and merriment. ↩

  18. youths. The term bachur is the masculine equivalent of betulah, maiden. ↩

  19. that they saw him…to be with him. The LXX (A) assumes a slightly different Hebrew reading: “that they were afraid of him, and they appointed thirty companions for him.” ↩

  20. riddle. The Hebrew term derives from the root meaning to tie a knot, and is the same word used in Proverbs 1:6 of the “words of the wise and their riddles,” i.e., their knotted sayings. ↩

  21. wrappers. This refers to a broad linen sheet which was wrapped around the body under an outer robe, or worn by itself to sleep in at night. What Shimshon is offering here, in other words, is a complete set of clothes for each man, which would have considerable value in a time before industrial manufacturing. ↩

  22. eatings. Or “food;” but I have chosen to translate the noun ma’akal as “eating” or “eatings,” even though it is a strange gerund/nominalization, because its root is the verb akal, “to eat,” which is a connection of crucial import in scripture that should not be obscured. ↩

  23. From the eater…came-forth sweet. Alt. (metrical): “Out of the eater came something to eat / And out of the strong did come forth sweet.” Cf. the ESV, which also does a good job here. ↩

  24. seventh. I am following the received text, on both theological and logical grounds. “Fourth” is attested in the LXX and other ancient sources, and there is only one letter different between “fourth” and “seventh” in Hebrew. But it seems likely to me that these sources have tried to emend the text, reading verse 17, that “she wept upon him the seven days that was their drinking-party,” as meaning that “she wept the whole rest of the time.” I don’t dismiss this option, but I think Jordan is probably correct that the account is elliptical, with events out of sequence, in order to emphasize the symbolic nature of the numbers. The fourth day is associated with luminaries, which does not easily fit the significance of this text; but the seventh day is connected with both judgment and rest; of which the third is a precursor. These clearly are in view, as the marriage (rest) is superseded by judgment. In my view, the best understanding of what transpired is that, from the first day, the Philistines demanded that she discover the riddle—but they doubled down on the seventh, when they became desperate because of the looming deadline. ↩

  25. Guile. Lit. “spread out” or “open,” but almost exclusively used idiomatically of “getting into” a poorly-defended mind, or having a mind that is “too open.” In such cases, I think “guilible” is a suitable neologism—a word which admittedly does not share an etymology with gullible, but may as well. If anyone still knew what gull meant as a verb, I would use that instead, but here we are. This word, patah, is very similar to patach, from which we get the name Yiphtah. ↩

  26. dispossess. The word choice here is pointed; this is the same term used earlier in Judges of how God dispossessed the peoples of the land before Israel. To translate it “impoverish” or “rob” obliterates this thematic connection. The Philistines have dispossessed Israel (v. 4); now they are outraged that one of their own women might help an Israelite to turn the tables on them. The national rivalry is focused into this personal conflict. ↩

  27. ye. I.e., “you two.” They are implying that she is in cahoots with Shimshon to plunder or despoil them of their wealth. ↩

  28. called. I.e., invited; but again, the particular term here has cachet in Judges already; most notably, it is the word used in Judges 8#1 and Judges 12#1 by the Ephraimites to complain that they were not called (mustered) for battle. ↩

  29. here. Or, “No?!” The received text reads halo, “not.” Hence many translations render something like, “Is it not so?” This could be an awkward sputtering on the part of the Philistines, but I think more likely halom, “here,” which is attested in several ancient sources, has been corrupted. ↩

  30. to thee should I tell it? Now we discover why he has not told even his parents. This is a test of his bride’s faith: both of her fidelity to him, and her trust in him to protect her as Yahweh’s savior. Since she is the only person he tells the riddle, only she can tell it to the Philistines. It is also a test of the Philistines’ faith once they discover that he can cleave lions with his bare hands. The question for all parties is whether they will fear Yahweh and his savior above all else. ↩

  31. pressed. Not the same word used in e.g. Judges 10#12. ↩

  32. sun. This is not the word shemesh, upon which Shimshon’s name is based, but rather cheres, a poetic word also used in Judges 8#13. Note the contrasting symbolism there versus here. ↩

  33. What is sweeter than honey? And what is stronger than a lion? There is considerable irony here in that the Philistines, by cheating, discover the “literal” answer to the riddle, but phrase it as a riddle itself, thus demanding a new answer. What is stronger than a lion? God’s savior is. What is sweeter than honey? God’s law is (Ps 19:10). Sadly, this gospel is lost on them. ↩

  34. plowed. The word charash literally means to cut into something (i.e., to carve the land), and is also used of cutting tools (Gen 4:22) and engraving (Ex 28:11). It seems to me, however, that “cut-in with my heifer” fails to balance comprehensibility with accuracy; in fact, the term has such a wide range of meaning that we are forced to translate it with multiple English words. The root can refer to carpentry, smithing, devising, crafting and more. In this context, it has a sexual connotation, which would also be lost without the word “plow.” ↩

  35. Ashkelon. While Timnath was a small town in the lowlands, Ashkelon was one of five chief Philistine cities on the Mediterranean coast. Shimshon essentially invades a fortified garrison to swipe thirty sets of armor from the soldiers wearing it. ↩

  36. burned. Not the same word used in v. 15. ↩

  37. his comrade…for his camaraderie. The Hebrew uses the same root in first noun and then verb form. Translations vary as to what exactly this means; many go for “best man.” I think this is too specific to the (considerably different) nuances of our own culture, but the general idea is right: hospitality required someone to be appointed to ensure the groom was taken care of and enjoyed the festivities. My translation uses a similar etymological connection between the two key terms, to try to emphasize this meaning. ↩