Learning to see God’s involvement (Judg 13:15-25)

Going to a job interview in the UK shortly after receiving my doctorate, I was trying to anticipate the kind of questions I might be asked. As a rookie Old Testament scholar who spent the previous three years researching a narrow topic at depth, I felt like the fish that has been diving deep into a small lake only to be thrown into the vast ocean and told to swim. I nervously dipped into this book or that on the Old Testament beforehand, but as I was heading to the interview and felt the flutter of nerves, it suddenly came to me. Surely, God is not absent as I take these tentative steps forward, whether I get the job or not. We can become so absorbed in doing our part that, even if momentarily, it slips our mind that God is involved in our lives.

Manoah and Gideon

For the couple in Samson’s story, the explicit recognition of God’s involvement is a drawn-out process. When Manoah encounters the angel, his focus is on what needs to be done for the prospective child (Judg 13:8, 12) and there is no awareness in his offer of hospitality that his visitor is anything other than a human being (Judg 13:15-16). While angelic messengers are not always recognised as such, there is implied criticism in the way Manoah’s meeting with an angel is presented. It invites comparison with Gideon’s, who recognises the supernatural identity of the messenger from the start, voluntarily offers a sacrifice and builds an altar to God in response (Judg 6:11-24).

Spiritual perception slow in coming

By contrast, Manoah is slow to see the divine element. The angel has to direct him to offer a sacrifice to God, but he does not pick up the clue (Judg 13:16). Since Old Testament names express a person’s character or destiny, Manoah’s desire to know the visitor’s name suggests that he is still trying to work out his identity (Judg 13:17). The angel’s response points once again to God, since the word ‘wonderful’ has the sense of being beyond human comprehension (Ps 139:6). Yet the penny still does not drop for Manoah until the angel performs ‘wonders’ (elsewhere the same Hebrew root describes God’s deliverance in the exodus thereby connecting the angel with God’s mighty acts; Ps 78:12-13; Judg 13:19-20). When Manoah finally recognises God’s involvement in a more direct way, it should reassure him, but instead he concludes that he must die, and it is his wife who has a better grasp on why this is unlikely (Judg 13:22-23).

Manoah’s spiritual perception, then, is rather dull. He is slow to see God’s reality and involvement in his circumstances and what he experiences, he misinterprets. He knows some of the basics, but his relationship with God is nevertheless distant, rather than rooted in the practical reality of day-to-day living. This is further underlined by his use of Elohim throughout the chapter, which is God’s generic name. While some variation may not be significant, it is noticeable here against the narrator’s consistent use of Yahweh, God’s personal name (translated into English as LORD).[1]

Growing understanding

Manoah’s wife is spiritually more astute and by the end of the encounter with the angel, she speaks of the LORD (Yahweh; Judg 13:23), which indicates her growing understanding. Yet, there are question marks around her summary of the angel’s message (see my post Truly hearing what God is saying and her naming of Samson (Hebrew Shimshon) is ambiguous (Judg 13:24). The word is a diminutive of the Hebrew ‘sun’ (shemesh, i.e. ‘little sun’) and it may be a positive expression of trust in God (Judg 5:31), or a pagan influence from sun-worship creeping in.[2]

Confronting questions

This devout couple’s shortcomings confront us with the question of our own spiritual perceptions. How much of our faith consists of truths learnt but not tested in reality, like Manoah’s head knowledge that seeing God means death? Do we recognise God’s involvement in our life and draw the right conclusions from it? The encouragement of our reading is that God patiently works with us despite our blind spots and seeks to teach us His ways. Like Manoah’s wife who came to a deeper understanding of God, there is hope for us too. The Lord offers the possibility of a closer relationship with Him to all who hunger for more.

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[1] The only exception is Judg 13:9, where the narrator uses Elohim (God). Israelites considered God’s name, Yahweh, so sacred that they did not pronounce it but read ‘Adonay’ (Lord) when they saw it in writing. That is why English translations render the Hebrew Yahweh as LORD in small capitals.

[2] Barry G. Webb takes the positive view in The Book of Judges, NICOT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012), 358, while Daniel I. Block argues for the negative and supports this from the fact that Beth-Shemesh (house of Shemesh), an important town close to Zorah and Eshtaol where Samson grew up, was once the centre of sun-worship. Judges, Ruth, NAC 6 (Nashville: B&H, 1999), 417. ‘[H]ow can this barren Israelite couple, who conceive and bear a child with the miraculous aid of the Lord, name their son Shimshon, “Little Sun” (“Sunny boy”!), which if not outrightly pagan is dangerously compromising?’, Ibid., 419.

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