Now she had liers-in-wait abiding in the inner chamber. She said to him, The Philistines are on you, Samson. He broke the cords, as a string of tow is broken when it touches the fire. So his strength was not known.
Samson allowed a woman to seduce him again. She lived in the Sorek Valley between Samson’s home area of Zorah and Eshtaol and the Philistine town of Timnah. The place itself was a compromise between Israelite and Philistine territory. Her name "Delilah" is evidently Jewish and probably means "devotee" or "worshipper." [Note: Ibid, pp. 453-54, offered three other possible interpretations of her name.] However she seems to have been a Philistine, possibly a temple prostitute. [Note: Lindsey, p. 407.] Her devotion to the Philistines is obvious in the text, and her devotion to their gods may well have motivated her actions in this instance. Evidently she and her family had chosen to live among the attractive and advanced enemies of God’s people.