“Then, crying, ‘Let me die with the P’lishtim!’ he pushed with all his might; and the building collapsed on the chiefs and on all the people inside. So he killed more at his death than he had killed during his life.”-Judges 16:30
The Philistine festival was now in full swing.
The people were eating, laughing and drinking tons of alcohol.
And to add even more fun to the festivities, they decided to bring Samson out in the open to make a mockery of him.
Everyone now viewed him as a harmless, broken and defeated man.
But there’s something they couldn’t have predicted or bargained for…
While lingering away in that horrible Philistine prison, Samson finally had the chance to reflect on his life…
During his time of captivity he had come to terms with God to the point where the Lord viewed it as repentance.
As a result, unbeknown to the Philistine partygoers, the Lord had begun to restore his strength.
Samson was brought outside and chained to the two main supporting columns of the temple to Dagon.
Now contrary to popular depictions, the supporting pillars were NOT singular large and solid carved out pieces.
Instead they were tinier cylindrical sections stacked one on top of each other that all together formed a tall pillar.
Think of a huge stack of plates stacked up on top of each other.
When examining temples in the Middle East from this era, archaeologists have discovered a ton of these types of pillars and apparently they’re HUGE!
It was also normal for the common folk to gather on top of the roof.
This afforded them a great view of the ceremonies being carried out below them by the priests and officials.
Now notice that verse 23 says…”The chiefs of the P’lishtim assembled to offer a great sacrifice to their god Dagon“.
In other words, the very same five kings who had paid off Delilah to betray Samson were also in attendance!
And not only that.
The ground floor of the Temple was crammed and jammed to the hilt…
Not to mention the approximately 3000 people gathered on top of the roof.
The scene was set for the now transformed Samson to get his revenge.
Samson told the boy who was holding him by hand to “Let me feel the columns supporting the building, so that I can lean on them.”
Samson got a good hold of the two middle columns supporting the building and leaned on them, one with his right hand and the other with his left.
He then said his final words to the Lord…
“Adonai Elohim, just this once,
please, think of me,
and please, give me strength,
so that I can take revenge on the
P’lishtim for at least one of my two eyes.”
Finally Samson pushed on the columns with all his strength…
What happened next is legendary and has been retold in a thousand bedtime stories to children everywhere.
The building came toppling down and instantly crushed all of the kings, the dignitaries and the people inside.
We’re told Samson killed more in his death than he had ever killed during his entire life up until then.
I’m reminded of Yeshua who also accomplished more in his death than he ever did while alive.
Okay, I’m gonna close here for right now.
But there’s some more sobering lessons here we’d be remiss to overlook.
We’ll get into those the next time we meet.
Over and out.
CONNECTING THIS TEACHING TO THE NEW TESTAMENT
“Very truly I tell you,
unless a kernel of wheat
falls to the ground and dies,
it remains only a single seed.
But if it dies,
it produces many seeds.”
-John 12:24
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