And then there’s Samson and Delilah…
The rulers of the Philistines went to her and said, “See if you can lure him into showing you the secret of his great strength and how we can overpower him so we may tie him up and subdue him. Each one of us will give you eleven hundred shekels of silver.”
Judges 16:5 NIV
After sharing three very wrong answers with her…
“Then she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when you won’t confide in me? This is the third time you have made a fool of me and haven’t told me the secret of your great strength.””
Judges 16:15 NIV
In spite of his love for her, she had evil motives in discovering his secret and he’d provided himself with three opportunities to realize this.
Is love blind?
Her shaming and manipulation eventually brought down Samson, stealing the true secret of his strength and eventually his own life.
Love is blind. Or at the very least, it can too easily weaken our resolve.
I realize this may be the simplest takeaway of many we can derive from their story, but because of his arrogance and ignorance, it consequently turned deadly.
Samson was captured and had his eyes gouged out by the Philistines, which both ironically and symbolically illustrates my point so poignantly.
Love is blind.