And Samson said concerning them, Now shall I be more blameless than the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure.
The declaration stands just as Samson was entering manhood, the time when he must execute his divine mission as judge and deliverer of Israel, the time above all others when he should have been true to God. Instead of that faithfulness he had connected himself with the enemies of Israel by mingling with the Philistines near Zorah and by following his affection for the young woman of Timnath into marriage against the dissuasion of his God-fearing parents. On its immediate occasion he had left his Philistine wife for a time, and on returning found her given to another man, and in answer to that loss he held himself blameless for doing harm to the Philistines.
His wasting of all their fields and vineyards was deliberate revenge for that wrong. That revenge then provoked the Philistines to murder the woman. The declaration thus exposes a self-pleasing course of giving free rein to passion instead of asking how to better glorify God and fulfill the purpose to be accomplished by life and instead of governing self by God's strength, a course to which God gives no promise of wisdom. Such a course ends in shame, disaster, and death.
The declaration stands just as Samson was entering manhood, the time when he must execute his divine mission as judge and deliverer of Israel, the time above all others when he should have been true to God. Instead of that faithfulness he had connected himself with the enemies of Israel by mingling with the Philistines near Zorah and by following his affection for the young woman of Timnath into marriage against the dissuasion of his God-fearing parents. On its immediate occasion he had left his Philistine wife for a time, and on returning found her given to another man, and in answer to that loss he held himself blameless for doing harm to the Philistines.
His wasting of all their fields and vineyards was deliberate revenge for that wrong. That revenge then provoked the Philistines to murder the woman. The declaration thus exposes a self-pleasing course of giving free rein to passion instead of asking how to better glorify God and fulfill the purpose to be accomplished by life and instead of governing self by God's strength, a course to which God gives no promise of wisdom. Such a course ends in shame, disaster, and death.