Commentaria in Judices
And St. Ambrose, epistle 70: “His father,” he says, “was of the tribe of Dan, fearing God, born in no ignoble place, excelling the rest. But the mother was barren, yet not unfruitful in virtues of soul, and she properly deserved to receive in the hospitality of her mind the vision of an Angel.” R. Abraham, in the book Inchasin, says that the name of the mother was Hatselelponith, and that she was sprung from the tribe of Juda.
4. BEWARE THEREFORE THAT THOU DRINK NO WINE NOR STRONG DRINK,—that is, anything that can intoxicate. He adds the reason:
5. FOR THOU SHALT CONCEIVE AND BEAR A SON, WHOSE HEAD NO RAZOR SHALL TOUCH; FOR HE SHALL BE A NAZARITE (that is, separated and consecrated) OF GOD FROM HIS INFANCY AND FROM HIS MOTHER’S WOMB, AND HE SHALL BEGIN TO DELIVER ISRAEL,—as if to say: God destines Samson, the son to be born of thee, as liberator of Israel, and therefore wills and commands that he be a Nazarite, that is, dedicated to him from the womb for all his life: wherefore he likewise commands thee, who art to be his mother, to abstain from wine and strong drink as long as thou shalt bear him in the womb, and nurse him when born; lest namely thou nourish and suckle him, and infect him with wine and strong drink drunk by thee, since he wills him to be a Nazarite, who must abstain from these altogether. See what I said on Numbers vi. Samson therefore was a Nazarite for all his life, but his mother was not a Nazarite; but only had to abstain from wine and strong drink during the whole time of his conception and nursing, lest she violate his Nazariteship. “Samuel and Samson,” says St. Jerome, book II Against Jovinian, “drink not wine and strong drink. For they were sons of promise, and conceived by abstinence and fasting.” St. Basil, homily On Fasting: “What made the most strong Samson invincible? Was it not fasting, by which he was conceived in his mother’s womb? Fasting conceived him, fasting nourished him, fasting made him strong: which indeed the Angel commanded the mother, warning her not to touch whatever proceeded from the vine, not to drink wine, nor strong drink.”
WHOSE HEAD NO RAZOR SHALL TOUCH.—You will say: this does not seem true; for Dalila shaved the hair of her husband Samson. I answer, she did this to Samson sleeping and unwilling, fraudulently and hostilely, that she might betray and deliver him, despoiled of his hair as of his strength, to the Philistines: but here the Angel commands that neither Samson nor his parents cut or shave Samson’s head, because God wills him to be a Nazarite, whose consecration and holiness consisted in unshorn and entire hair. This is therefore a command of a thing to be done, not an oracle of a future thing. The reason was that long hair is a sign of beauty, majesty, veneration, terror, austerity, consecration, as is plain here in Samson.
FOR HE SHALL BE A NAZARITE OF GOD FROM HIS INFANCY, AND FROM HIS MOTHER’S WOMB.—Hence some think that Samson was sanctified in the womb. For a Nazarite is what is separated and consecrated to God. But likewise, for Samson is commanded to be a Nazarite from the womb, so that in the womb he sucks no juice of wine and strong drink drunk by the mother, and therefore that his mother abstain from them, so that in this way he is said to be dedicated to God as a Nazarite of the old law, but not sanctified in the womb. Samson was therefore a Nazarite, that is, first, separated from the other Jews; secondly, crowned with his hair; thirdly, consecrated to God; hence he was a type of Christ and of the Religious of the New Testament, as Jerome Platus shows at length, book II On the Good of the Religious State, chap. xix. Tropologically, let parents here learn to give back to God the children they have received from him: “I speak confidently,” says St. Jerome to Leta, “that thou shalt receive sons, who hast given back to the Lord thy firstborn. These are the firstborn that are offered in the law. So was Samuel born; so Samson arose; so John the Baptist at the entrance of Mary leaped and played.”
6. A MAN OF GOD CAME TO ME.—She did not know he was an Angel, but thought he was a Prophet. Moreover, as the Angel here appeared first to the mother of Samson, then to the father; so the Archangel Gabriel appeared first to the Blessed Virgin, announcing to her the incarnation of the Word, as she was the virgin who was to bear, and then to Joseph her spouse.
AND WHEN I ASKED HIM.—The Chaldee and the more recent writers render the contrary, I did not ask him, reading lo with Aleph, that is, not. But our translator reads better with the Septuagint lo with vau, and this is noted in the margin, which the Hebrews call keri ukethib, that is, reading and writing, namely different and diverse. For that the mother asked the Angel his name is plain from what she adds: “He would not tell me.”
15. LET US DRESS THEE A KID OF THE GOATS,—a young goat, that is, a tender and youthful kid. The word “dress” (faciamus) is ambiguous: for it signifies both to prepare food and feasts, and to perform sacred rites, or to slay and burn a victim to God. Wherefore Manue by “let us dress” wished to find out who it was that was speaking with him, whether a man, or God, or an Angel of God. For if he permitted a sacrifice to be offered to himself, it was certain that he was God; but if he refused it and wished only food to be set before him, it was certain that he was a man. Hence the Angel urges both: “I will not eat thy bread,” because I am an Angel, who feed not on visible but on invisible food, as Raphael said, Tobias chap. xii, verse 19: “But if thou wilt offer a holocaust, offer it to God,” not to me, who am God’s Angel.
AND (that is, because) HE SHALL BEGIN TO DELIVER ISRAEL FROM THE HAND OF THE PHILISTINES.—Therefore I will have him be a Nazarite, that is, dedicated to me, because through him as mine I will deliver Israel from the servitude of the Philistines.
Hence learn that abstinence from wine and strong drink makes men not only holy but sound and robust, as it made Samson; for he drew his strength from the Nazariteship, whose chief law was to abstain from wine and to nourish the hair. Wherefore Samson was a type of Christ, of whom it is written: “He shall be called a Nazarene.” Hence also the birth of Christ was announced by the Angel Gabriel, as was the birth of Samson. Note “he shall begin,” because Samson did not fully and perfectly deliver the Israelites in his life, but only in a beginning way. For he did not wholly overthrow the Philistines in one battle, as other Judges did, but struck and weakened them by many small defeats, until in death he crushed their princes with himself in the ruin of the house; for then he seems plainly to have enervated them, but so that a little after, their strength resumed, they again afflicted the Hebrews under Samuel.
18. WHY ASKEST THOU MY NAME, WHICH IS WONDERFUL?—The Hebrew peli, which signifies both wonderful and secret, as the Chaldee renders it.
Some think that the name of this Angel was Pele, that is, Admirable. But they are mistaken: for the Angel refuses to tell his name, because it is admirable and unutterable in speech. So our translator, the Septuagint and others.