Judges 14 and 15: Marrying the Philistine
Monday, June 24, 2024
The Philistines were a war-like tribe of people who came out of the Aegean area as part of the movement of Sea Peoples to end the Hittite rule and to settle along the Mediterranean in the area of Gaza today. In the Book of Joshua and early in the Book of Judges, we read that Yahweh allows this people to survive so that they might test the Israelites. Through time, the nation of Israel will have to learn how to co-exist; rather than convert or kill off, this strong-willed pagan people. Some say that the modern Middle Eastern conflict dates back to these early skirmishes, and we can never know this for certain; but here is what we can and do know. This conflict and this story about a man dedicated to God from birth has many surprising twists and turns that all lead to one lesson: We must rely on God alone, no matter the circumstance, no matter the condition.
From the notes in La Biblia de América we learn the following. Believing that they will obtain the power to decipher Samson’s riddle and somehow control his strength, the Philistines plot to bring him down. But when we examine this story closely, we see that sometimes we too, must marry the Philistine because we never know if this has been brought about by the Lord, who is providing an opportunity against the unholy in our lives who have dominion over our sacred places.
We might learn something about our fear of failure and rejection when we listen to Jia Jiang’s Ted Talk: What I learned from 100 Days of Rejection at: https://www.ted.com/talks/jia_jiang_what_i_learned_from_100_days_of_rejection
We might also explore Jia Jiang’s book: REJECTION PROOF: HOW I BEAT FEAR AND BECAME INVINCIBLE THROUGH 100 DAYS OF REJECTION: Harmony Books, N.Y.
LA BIBLIA DE LA AMÉRICA. 8th. Madrid: La Casa de la Biblia, 1994. Print.
For more about the Philistine people, visit: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-philistines
Adapted from a reflection written on May 8, 2009.
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