{"id":4411,"date":"2008-02-22T14:33:18","date_gmt":"2008-02-22T18:33:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/?p=4411"},"modified":"2008-02-22T14:35:39","modified_gmt":"2008-02-22T18:35:39","slug":"samson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2008\/02\/samson\/","title":{"rendered":"Samson"},"content":{"rendered":"

Regina Spektor’s contribution to the underrepresented lyrical genre of speculative historical romance <\/a> suggests, from the perspective of Delilah, that the story could have ended differently: <\/p>\n

Samson came to my bed
\nTold me that my hair was red
\nTold me I was beautiful and came into my bed
\nOh I cut his hair myself one night
\nA pair of dull scissors in the yellow light
\nAnd he told me that I’d done alright
\nAnd kissed me ’til the mornin’ light…<\/p>\n

Samson went back to bed
\nNot much hair left on his head
\nAte a slice of wonderbread and went right back to bed
\nOh, we couldn’t bring the columns down
\nYeah we couldn’t destroy a single one
\nAnd history books forgot about us
\nAnd the bible didn’t mention us, not even once…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I find it entirely plausible that Delilah’s best chance to solve the interpersonal problems in her relationship with Samson lay in eliminating his superhuman strength at a much earlier stage, to make him a character not worth writing about. Would Samson have been personally better off in the long run as an Israelite family man with a Philistine bride and a buzz cut? Possibly so, although it might have been a setback for the strategic objectives of his nation.<\/p>\n

There are other figures in the scriptures who could have avoided their place in the story, for good or for ill. We might, for example, know of Cain only as Abel’s brother, with whom he traded several bushels of grain for a few sheep. On the other hand, we might have read in the Old Testament, “And the children of Israel of the tribe of Ephraim that were led away captive to Babylon were Lehi and all his household….” If he had lived to 85 years of age as a prosperous New England farmer, Joseph Smith could have avoided the jails of Liberty and Carthage, but he would not warrant so much as a footnote in local histories today.<\/p>\n

When is obscurity the best possible outcome, and when is it a sin of omission?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Regina Spektor’s contribution to the underrepresented lyrical genre of speculative historical romance suggests, from the perspective of Delilah, that the story could have ended differently:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4411","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-corn"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4411","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/67"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4411"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4411\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4411"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}