Delilah

Judges 16

  • Judges 16:4-6 After this he fell in love with a woman in the valley of Sorek whose name was Delilah. The lords of the Philistines came to her and said to her, “Coax him, and find out what makes his strength so great and how we may overpower him, so that we may bind him in order to subdue him, and we will each give you eleven hundred pieces of silver.” So Delilah said to Samson, “Please tell me what makes your strength so great and how you could be bound, so that one could subdue you.”

  • Judges 16:18-19 When Delilah realized that [Samson] had told her his whole secret, she sent and called the lords of the Philistines, saying, “This time come up, for he has told his whole secret to me.” Then the lords of the Philistines came up to her and brought the money in their hands. She let him fall asleep on her lap, and she called a man and had him shave off the seven locks of his head. He began to weaken,[d] and his strength left him.

Roundel with Delilah Cutting the Hair of Samson. Photo from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

In the Book of Judges, Delilah is the traitorous lover who discloses the source of Samson’s preternatural strength to his enemies: his hair. Cut it, and he’s weak. Often, Delilah is remembered as the proto-femme fatale: she is the seductive woman who brings about the great hero's downfall. Or at least, that’s usually how the story gets told.

Only, Samson’s hair is not his only weakness. Read his story in its entirety, and it's clear he has a weakness for foreign women and a temper that runs hot. Before Delilah, Samson takes a Philistine woman for his wife. During the wedding festivities, a contest over a riddle leads to Samson killing 30 Philistine men; then, after a failed conjugal visit, Samson sets fire to 300 foxes. In the animals' distress, they burn the Philistines' harvest. What happens to the Philistine wife? To get back at Samson, the Philistines burn her and her father in their home. 

In another story, Samson visits a sex worker in Gaza. While he’s with her, the Gazites plot to kill him the next morning at the city gate. Their plan is foiled when Samson leaves at midnight, and as he goes, he takes the very gates of the city with him. 

A cleverer person might, after these events, be more careful about one’s romantic partners. Not Samson. He moves on to Delilah, and the Philistines pay her to discover the Israelite judge’s secret. Three times she asks Samson about the source of his strength; three times he lies. 

At this point, Samson should really be more suspicious. Delilah is not exactly discreet. Still, the fourth time, he tells her. Turns out, Fleabag (the iconic television character) was right. Hair really is everything, or at least it was for Samson. While he sleeps, Delilah calls the Philistines; Samson’s hair is cut, and he is captured. 

Once caught, Samson is blinded and made to perform at the Philistines' pleasure until, in his final dramatic act, he gets his revenge by pulling down an entire building on himself and the Philistines. But what about Delilah? She may have lost a lover, but apparently she lived on—a wealthier woman. The Book of Judges is full of dubious heroes and dark tales; women, especially, are met with violent disaster. So while Delilah is no moral exemplar, it’s hard to begrudge her her ending. Delilah may be remembered as the first femme fatale, but Samson should be remembered for what he was, too: strong, but not smart. 

  • Delilah’s name is “a wordplay on Hebrew layla, ‘night,’ for as the night overcomes the mighty sun (the name Samson, Shimshon, is related to ‘sun,’ shemesh), so Delilah overcomes the apparently invincible strong man, Samson” (“Delilah: Bible” by J. Cheryl Exum). 

  • It’s often assumed that Delilah is Philistine. Samson is certainly attracted to Philistine women, but the fact that she has to be bribed by the Philistine leaders may indicate otherwise. Plus, Samson’s birthplace of Zorah is located in the valley of Sorek, where Delilah lives.  

  • Just how much money did Delilah make off Samson? Scholar Wilda C. Gafney calculates that the Philistine’s payment comes to approximately 138 pounds of silver: “At $25.17 per ounce (in March 2024), a contemporary value for their offer would be $55,575.36. In the Middle Bronze era setting of this text, that might be a million or perhaps even a billion rhetorical dollars.”