SPIRITUAL FEATURES SEEN IN SAMSON
SPIRITUAL FEATURES SEEN IN SAMSON
JT It is to be noted that the Spirit of God is prominent in Samson. It says at the end of the previous chapter, “The Spirit of Jehovah began to move him”. Judges 13:25. Certain features mark each judge; the first one is Othniel, a man of resources; the Holy Spirit seems to be prominent in connection with Samson. The circumstances of his birth help to indicate the mind of God in him. It says in chapter 13 that “the Angel of Jehovah ascended in the flame of the altar”. Judges 13:20 We are thus in the presence of circumstances that indicate spiritual things. Notwithstanding the extraordinary incongruities in the life of Samson, what underlies are spiritual features that show themselves at times. I think his history indicates the history of the assembly, marked by extraordinary incongruities, and yet God is there, and the power of God evidenced. We could not think for a moment of any individual believer being guilty of his conduct, and yet proving the power of God with him; so that his history is, I believe, a type of the assembly and God’s wonderful forbearance; and we see how, at the end, the most humiliating captivity is offset by the overthrow of the Philistine world. The world comes down at the end by the same power that is seen throughout in connection with these extraordinary circumstances. The growth of his hair, I think, marks an epoch spiritually in the history of the assembly. Judges 16:22 says, “But the hair of his head began to grow after he was shaved” — there is the evidence of latent power in him at the end, which would coincide, I think, with our own time Has John’s ministry been given particularly of the Lord to bring to light that latent power?
JT So it would appear. The element of life is brought in, so that the hair, after the shaving, began to grow. Shaving would be humiliation. The secret of his strength had been divulged, but “the hair of his head began to grow”, it says, “after he was shaved” Judges 16:22; it is the evidence of life after the humiliation.
PL The fetters of bronze could not bind life, could they?
JT No. He was bound with fetters of bronze and made to grind in the prison house — a most humiliating captivity. But there was life, and it agrees with what he began with: “Out of the eater came forth meat”. But the secret of it is in the Spirit. At the end of chapter 13 it says the Spirit of God moved him at Mahaneh-Dan, that is, in his own locality.
Each judge has some peculiar characteristic which indicates the times in which he had to exercise his power and influence. As I was remarking about Othniel, what dominated Israel in his time was the king of Mesopotamia — the land of the two rivers; that is, it was a question of human resources used to dominate the people of God. The two rivers, I suppose, would point to great resourcefulness, and Othniel judged Israel and went to war, it says; he was a man of spiritual resourcefulness. He belonged to the family of Caleb and his wife was of the same family and possessed springs of water. The idea of a spring is refreshment and resources; there are no limits to a divine spring. So that he had greater resources than the king of Mesopotamia. I only mention that to indicate what is to be gathered up from the book of Judges, that each judge is marked by the features that mark the dominating power that exists in his day, but in a spiritual way. So in Ehud’s day, they were dominated by the Moabites, who were men of pride. The king of Eglon was a very fat man, so what met that was the word of God, the two-edged sword — the dagger with two edges. Then there was Shamgar, a man of experience and his weapon was an ox goad. Experience was needed to deal with the dominating power in his day, and his experience with God involved discipline, and he was effective in that connection. He smote six hundred men of the Philistines. Then Deborah comes after him; a woman who evidently acquired great power over herself; she dwelt, we read, under the palm tree of Deborah. Then Gideon, who represents the greatest spiritual energy among the judges, was occupied with conserving the wheat from the Midianites. These were the features that marked these men, and God took them up and used them. Whatever were the features that were needed, God takes them up in the person and uses them.
Then there is a history of great weakness after Gideon, till we arrive at Jephthah and Samson — a history of rivalry. You have the parable of the trees by Gideon’s son. Then in Samson we have reference to the Spirit of Jehovah, which is the secret of all that we get in Samson. His was a most sorrowful life, in one sense, because it was the very opposite of nazariteship, and yet the nazariteship was there all along. You can only understand it by taking account of the history of the assembly.
Ques How do you regard Samson’s responsible history in the light of his being a nazarite from birth?
JT It relates to the assembly. It is only in the light of the history of the assembly that it can be understood, as far as I can see. The features of nazariteship are indicated in the instructions to his father and mother. The wine would denote natural joys, which are denied to a nazarite; the long hair [p. 105] would denote that he was to be disregarding of human and worldly propriety. A nazarite is not to indulge in natural joys, nor is he to consider ordinary human propriety. He is to be oblivious to all these things: he is not to be conformed to this world in his habits and dress. He is called really to another world, and he is to be governed by that, so that his dress and deportment here are a testimony against what exists in this world. “Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind”, Romans 12:2.
Ques Would the nazarite’s position in that way answer to the position of the assembly or the position of the individual believer?
JT What the assembly is necessarily works out from its members. The idea of the nazarite has to be taken up by each one individually. What comes out in Romans is that, in answering to our baptism, we walk in newness of life. It does not say what that newness is, but the life is to be new; in other words, it is to be different from what we had been going on with. Then the next thing in Romans in that connection is that we should serve in newness of spirit. Our ordinary life is new, and our relationship with God is to be in newness of spirit. In christendom things are carried on in the old way. There is really no difference in principle between current religion today and what existed in the Old Testament; so we are to “serve”, it says, “in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter”. Romans 7:6 And then, in chapter 12 we are not to be “conformed to this world”, but to “be transformed by the renewing of your mind”; Romans 12:2 that is, our minds are to be occupied, not with current things, the books and other things that occupy worldly people, but with things that are new — new mental desires and tastes; and thus the nazarite is available from the outset of the believer’s history; there is that principle. So that he is not concerned [p. 106] as to how people take account of him because of his allegiance to Christ; he is different.
The element of nazariteship marked the assembly from the beginning; so these four chapters devoted to Samson cover the whole history. There can be no doubt that the mind of God is seen in the manner of the Angel in connection with his birth. It says, “My name, seeing it is wonderful”. Judges 13:18.
Ques What would help us to the return of nazariteship in these days?
JT Well, we have to begin with Romans; there can be no doubt that Romans is greatly needed. If believers in the human organisations around are enlightened by 2 Timothy, they have to begin over again — that is the principle. There are thousands of people who have been going on with christianity nominally, but when the light of 2 Timothy comes to them and they see the necessity for separation, there has to be a new beginning; they have to begin over again, and Romans is the fundamental part of Scripture. There is not any difference between the religion of today in principle and the religion of Cain; it is the old thing. It has taken on new features, but the underlying principle is the same, and we have to begin with something new. In the case of Samson’s parents, the woman is more honoured than the man. Both visits are to the woman, meaning that there was one there with whom God could link Himself. Her husband was behind her spiritually.
Ques What would the rule of the Philistines represent?
JT They were a race of big people and on the same territory as Israel; outwardly they were in the same position. Their domination would be that, that they were men of distinction by their size. They knew the ways of Israel. They came in first with Shamgar Judges 3:31. “After him was Shamgar, the son of Anath, which slew of the Philistines six hundred men with an ox goad; and he also delivered Israel”.
[p. 107] It was a matter, in his case, of experience; he got them down that way, but here in Samson it is nazariteship. Shamgar delivered Israel, it says; that is, there was a final issue, a definite issue to his ministry. But with Samson it was not so, he brought down the Philistine world in his death. So, in our day, the world is coming down. The overthrow of the world would synchronise, I think, with the translation of the assembly. But what strikes one is the humiliation of it. There is no glory in Samson, nevertheless the fact is there.
Ques Do you connect the growth of the hair with what we get in the Lord’s address to Philadelphia — a little strength?
JT That is just what I thought, and that is to remind the world, if they only knew it, of the end. “But the hair of his head began to grow” Judges 16:22 — that is the end of things.
Rem So that the growing of Samson’s hair would be a sign in a way; we take our bearings from what is from within, rather than from what is abroad in the world.
JT That is the thing; if you see the hair growing — and it is the hair of his head, mark you, which I suppose would be an allusion to divine intelligence — it is life in that connection. Seeing these things, you discern more than you would know by taking account of governmental things. International occurrences are not such a guide as we might think, because things happen and re-happen.
Rem Samson was publicly in humiliating circumstances as the assembly is also publicly, but we are reminded of the fact that the hair is growing.
JT That is it. It is by getting hold of things in a spiritual way that we get the mind of God on them. If we bear in mind the circumstances of his birth and of his death, we see just how matters stand.
[p. 108] The circumstances of his birth were most auspicious; the angel did wondrously. His name was Wonderful, reminding us of God’s wonderful ways. The more we follow the history, the more we see how wonderful God’s ways have been; His patience too. We read that “as the flame went up from off the altar towards the heavens, that the Angel of Jehovah ascended in the flame of the altar”. Judges 13:20 Although we do not get anything like that at the end of Samson’s history, we get it at the beginning — an allusion which can be spiritually understood. I think the ascension, as we may call it, the rapture, shows that the end is in view at the beginning. You see what God will reach; and the Angel acting wondrously, the divine way, coming into this world and going out of it, and all going up in the burnt offering in the sense of what Christ is, show what underlies the whole history. How can we understand the assembly going up to heaven save in the apprehension of that?
Ques Samson went astray in his affections; has not that a voice to us?
JT That is what marks the history of the assembly, “Thou hast left thy first love”. Revelation 2:4. Then there is the teaching of Balaam in Pergamos, and of Jezebel in Thyatira.
Ques Where do the incidents recorded in this chapter — the slaying of the lion and the swarm of bees — come in in connection with what you are saying?
JT It is an allusion, I suppose, to the death of the Lord Jesus, for that is where the history begins, and there are results from it; there was a result in life from the very outset.
Ques Do the bees suggest the energy of life working mutually?
JT That is right; We come back to the beginning, I think, where there is evidence of life. I think Philadelphia would embrace what is at the beginning.
[p. 109] There is nothing said about her love for Christ, but there is something said about His love for her: “I have loved thee”, Revelation 3:9 He says, showing that she had kept His word and not denied His name. There were assembly features there which stretched back to the beginning. What marks the beginning is that the outcome of the death of the lion is honey. A swarm of bees, I think, is a type of the people of God in life who are the outcome of the death of Christ — their history is there.
Ques What is the significance of the honey?
JT I think, to follow the type here, it would be the yield of mutual feeling and affection amongst the Lord’s people. An element of this kind has to be interpreted according to its setting; elsewhere it would mean something different — natural sweetness. But in Luke 24 the Lord ate the honeycomb; and He says, too, in the Song of Songs, “I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey”, Song of Songs 5:1 so it would be something He could partake of.
Ques Is the same thought conveyed in that as in Samson’s riddle?
JT Yes, I thought so. “Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness” — it was food. There was a mutual state of things amongst them in Luke 24; they were gathered together. Those who came back from Emmaus found the eleven and those that were with them gathered together. Then we find that the bees are at work — Luke alone presents that side; he says that the eleven were gathered together, and those that were with them, saying, “The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared to Simon”. Luke 24:34. Then the two related how He had been made known to them in the breaking of bread. There is allusion to the mutual working — they were all contributing. Then the Lord comes in as they thus spake and says, “Have ye anything here to eat?” Luke 24:41.
[p. 110] Rem So you would look for the bees working at the present moment.
JT Yes, we come back to the beginning. So that the last days of the assembly’s history are marked by the features of the first days; that is to say, mutual affections and mutual relations and feelings. There are many who do not accept obligation to contribute in the assembly. Things are left, as far as they are concerned, in the hands of certain ones, which is not mutual feeling at all.
JJ Would not God secure in the state of nazariteship what He would have in the whole assembly?
JT What God can do by one man is indicated in a nazarite. But then this passage does not teach nazariteship; we have to go to Numbers for that. It calls attention to a nazarite who did not live the life of one, but here it is the history of the assembly that is in view. There is nazariteship in the individual. I think that is how it came out; certain persons in the history of the assembly answered to it; so, I suppose, an overcomer in each assembly would in some sense answer to the nazarite. Take for instance in Pergamos, “Antipas my faithful witness, who was slain among you”. Revelation 2:13. He must have answered to the true idea of a nazarite. So, I believe, in every church the overcomer would answer in some sense to the nazarite and that would be the link for God — the link for God would lie there.
PL It justifies God going on, and in that way defers the final judgment.
JT That is right. So that every phase of the recovery would be connected with the beginning. The Holy Spirit remains in the assembly; in whomsoever He may be is another matter, but He is there, and the principle of nazariteship has existed right through, it was there underlying it all.
Ques Even in the dark ages?
JT Quite.
[p. 111] Rem So that the truth of nazariteship was maintained all through by the Spirit.
JT That is what I should understand; whereas the public history is marked by the truth having been divulged. The sorrowful side is that Samson divulged the secret, and that is what has brought in the leaven of the systems around us. Who the actual persons were who did that is not of importance, but the thing was done.
Ques Would you say a word as to having divulged the secret?
JT When the assembly waned and left its first love the secrets were given away. In Pergamos you see new teaching. Ephesus apparently kept the doctrines right, but in Pergamos you get the Nicolaitanes admitted; they would be teachers who would give out the secrets. They would bring christian doctrine down to the level of ordinary human teaching, and hence vitiate the doctrines so that christianity was brought down to the level of current teaching.
Ques Does that reach its head in Jezebel, in popery?
JT It culminates in that. She has got hold of all the secrets; she uses the most precious terms in a most vicious way; “that woman Jezebel”, Revelation 2:20 the Lord says.
Rem It has been said it is Satan’s masterpiece.
JT Well, it is. Then, she took hold of the vineyard of Naboth, the inheritance. What belongs to the true people of God has been boldly taken hold of by her. She has taken over all the precious terms applicable to the assembly; the whole thing, the Scriptures, the Holy Spirit, the revelation of God, are boldly taken over as her property. That is how the matter stands. It requires nazariteship to deal with that. So, I think, you have in Samson’s history these two things running together: the unfaithfulness, on the one hand, that divulges the secrets, that gives away the truth, and on [p. 112] the other hand, the nazarite was there; there were some who were true.
Rem They regain power.
JT Quite so. When the hair begins to grow, that is the end of things for the world. It is for us to see to it that there is the cultivation of what was at the beginning, that is to say, mutual feeling and affection in intelligence, which will in itself bring down all these pretentious things.
Ques Do you think we get the support of the Holy Spirit on this line, as nazariteship is known?
JT That is where it is realised. One is struck with the allusions. First, in the end of chapter 13, the Spirit began to move Samson in Mahaneh-Daniel Then in verse 6 of this chapter the Spirit of Jehovah came upon him, and in the next chapter, verse 14, we read, “The Spirit of Jehovah came upon him, and the cords that were on his arms became as threads of flax that are burned with fire, and his bands loosed from off his hands”. Judges 15:14 And so at the end he pulls down the building; there is power — the power of God. “He bowed himself with might”, it says, “and the house fell on the lords, and on all the people that were therein”. Judges 16:30 We see in that the power there is where the element of nazariteship exists. The particular form of opposition at that time was the Philistine element.
Ques What would answer to it in our own times? You have connected the Philistines with men of great ability.
JT I suppose the past hundred years has developed men of extraordinary ability, and nothing but nazariteship could have met it. The secret of what we are enjoying, I believe, is due to the fact that there were those who took up nazariteship, and the Spirit of God came mightily upon them and the Philistines came down.
PL At the end of 2 Timothy, it is a question of [p. 113] the man of God or magicians; so here would you say it is a question of the man of God or the Philistine?
JT Yes. So Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, but he overthrew them by the evidence of life, the power of life. It is very beautiful to see the return to nazariteship in the smallest way in the beginning of the growth of hair. It is in separation that life is seen. Christians who remain in the organisations around do not really live; there are not the conditions of life. It is in separation you get these conditions — that the hair begins to grow, and then the power of God is known.
PL It says, “Lo, it is a people that shall dwell alone ... . Who can count the dust of Jacob?”. Numbers 23:10 Is that the vitality of life in separation?
JT Quite. Then the next thing is the shout of a king is among them. Israel’s king is higher than Agag. There is more there than there is in the flesh. If it is a question of big men, you have them now, men great spiritually.