Then the lords of the Philistines brought up to her seven fresh cords which had not been dried, and she bound him with them.
Samson is living with Delilah in the valley of Sorek. The Philistine rulers have paid her to find the source of his strength. Here they act at once on the false answer he gave her.
Samson does not hand over his secret here. He plays with the question, and borrows his answer from his own past.
He first tells her an untruth when she asks the secret of his strength and how he might be bound. It is clearly said in fun. He apparently has no intention of letting her know the real secret. He says, if they bind me with seven green cords that were never dried, then I shall be as weak as any other man. I have thought that Samson had this in mind: the men of Judah once bound him with cords and handed him over to the Philistines. No doubt he remembered how he snapped those cords like a strand of flax.
Behind the lie sits a boast, and the boast tied him tighter than the cords did.
Have you boasted of some past victory in such a way that it has become the start of a fresh trap? Samson here is thinking of his past victory over the Philistines, how he snapped the cords. And so he did have that power. But he had a fresh cord around his soul. It was boasting about a past victory in front of someone who had no business knowing about it. And he had no business being with her at all.
Delilah did not supply the cords. The Philistine rulers brought them, and they had already paid her. Their method had changed since the last time they went after Samson.
They offer this woman pay. Philistines are not too troubled about right and wrong in the way they do things. The first time, they went to one of Samson's friends with a threat: they would burn her and her father's house with fire. Now they come to this one with silver — 1,100 pieces of it. She has only to draw out of him what he had never yet disclosed: the secret of his strength.
While Delilah tied him, armed men waited out of sight. Grant asks why they did not kill him where he lay.
When he was asleep Delilah tied him up with these cords while Philistine men were waiting. Then she called his name, telling him that the Philistines were upon him. We may wonder why the Philistines did not simply go in while he slept and kill him. But it seems they wanted to take him alive, to gloat over him in front of the crowd. Samson broke the cords as though they were mere strands of yarn.
The cords gave way, but the Philistines were after something ropes cannot reach.
The fortress of his heart was still unbreached. It seems strange, almost unthinkable. A man who had failed as openly as Samson still had a heart whose fortress was on the right side. It was not in the hands of the enemy, although it had been unfaithful again and again. But the stronghold, the innermost soul of the man, was still for God... Now Delilah lays siege to that fortress of his heart. She wants the key, so that the enemy may rush in and take full possession.
Delilah is hunting for a weakness in his body. Samson was a Nazarite — a man set apart to God, marked out by uncut hair.
The face of the true Nazarite had to be the face of a man: he had to be brave and unflinching in front of the enemy. But he also had to wear the long hair, like the hair of a woman, because all his power lay in dependence on God. This had to be the clearest of all the marks on him, even though it shamed him in the eyes of others. If he lost it, he became as weak as other men.
His reasons for refusing never changed. What wore down was his endurance.
Satan was working on the weakness of the human heart. He knew that souls are often betrayed by persistence. It was so with Samson. There was as much reason to refuse at the end as at the start. But Delilah pressed him daily with her words and urged him, until his soul was troubled to death and he told her all his heart.
- Bought. The cords came from the Philistine rulers. They had learned that silver worked where threats of fire had failed.
- Borrowed. Samson's lie recycled an old victory. Showing it off to someone with no right to hear it was the first binding.
- Besieged. The ropes were never the target. Delilah laid siege to the one thing still held for God — his heart.
- Bound to God. His strength lay in dependence on God, marked by uncut hair. Lose that mark and he was as weak as other men.
- Broken down. Delilah did not argue the secret out of him. She wore it out of him by daily pressure.
Now she had liers in wait abiding in the chamber; and she said to him, The Philistines are upon thee, Samson! And he broke the cords, as a thread of tow is broken when it touches the fire; and his strength was not known.
A bedroom becomes a trap. Men wait in the inner room, and Delilah shouts a warning she arranged herself. Samson snaps his bonds and never learns that she betrayed him. The verse leaves us with a puzzle — Samson lied, yet his strength held. Why did God still stand by him?
The ESV calls the cords "fresh bowstrings." An older translation calls them "green withs." One reference book explains the word:
Slender twigs twisted into a rope. Judges 16:7-9.
The men in the inner room were not there to kill him but to capture him, and they had to run for it:
We may wonder why the Philistines did not simply go in while he slept and kill him. But it seems they wanted to take him alive to gloat over him before the crowd. Samson broke the cords as though they were mere strands of yarn. Of course the men would quickly get out of there!
Samson's answer reached back to an earlier escape from cords. That memory cost him.
Have you boasted of some past victory in such a way that it has become the beginning of a fresh snare? Samson here is thinking of his past victory over the Philistines, how he snapped the cords. He says, I will do it over again... And so he did — he broke the cords, but he had a fresh cord around his soul. It was just that boasting in a past victory in the presence of one who had no business to know anything about it, and in whose presence he had no business at all.
Lies bought Samson time. They did not get him out of the room.
There was no excuse for Samson in giving in to Delilah's charms. He did not want to tell her his secret. But he could not give up his pleasures, so he used one dodge after another to keep it. His fatal mistake was that he played with the temptress instead of resisting her. So she drove him out of his refuge of lies again and again. At last she found the way into his strong fortress. Then, without a struggle, he fell into the hands of the Philistines.
The same danger reaches past Samson:
Playing with what is not of God is no help to my communion with Him. Trifling with it, or linking the things of God with the things of the world, will end in shipwreck and ruin, just as Samson found.
The cords broke because the real bond had not yet been cut. The mark of his dependence on God was still in place.
Three attempts had failed to quench the power of the Spirit: the seven green withs that were never dried, the new ropes that no one had ever used, and the seven locks of his head woven into the web. God still sustained His poor, unfaithful servant. But then he gave away his secret. That removed the mark of his dependence and destroyed the bond of communion between his soul and God. What was left for him? All his strength had vanished.
The verse ends with the secret still safe. One writer weighs what such a secret is worth:
Holding a friend's secret, and keeping it, proves you are close to him. But the secret of God, having His confidence, is the highest of all privileges. To betray it to a stranger, whoever he may be, is to despise the precious position His grace has given us. It is to lose that position. What have the enemies of God to do with the secret of God? It was in this way that Samson gave himself up to his enemies. No attempt against him had any power as long as he kept his Nazirite separation to God.
Verse 9 ends in triumph, and that is the trap. The escape taught him nothing, and the next time he would answer more easily.
He takes one step after another, coming nearer and nearer to the cliff. At last he plunges over it recklessly. Each step taken makes the next easier. With each one his eyes are more completely sealed. Then, when his ruin is complete, he is unaware of it until the consequences overtake him.
- Secret kept. The secret of his strength was not known. While it held, no cord could hold him.
- Secret shared. God's confidence is the highest of privileges; handing it to an enemy is the way to lose it.
- Secret toyed with. He would not tell the truth, and he would not walk away. He played with the trap.
- Secret narrowed. Each dodge brought him a step closer to the edge, and each step made the next one easier.
- Secret gone. Boasting of an old victory put a fresh cord around his soul. When the bond with God went, the strength went too.