Judges 16:28 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Samson called unto the Lord This prayer proceeded not from malice and revenge, but from faith in, and zeal for, God, who was there publicly dishonoured, and from a concern to vindicate the whole commonwealth of Israel, which it was his duty to do to the uttermost of his power, as he was judge. And God, who heareth not sinners, and would never exert his omnipotence to gratify any man's malice, manifested by the effect that he accepted and owned Samson's prayer as the dictate of his own Spirit. And although, in this prayer, he mentions only the personal injuries done by the Philistines to himself, and not the indignities which they had offered to God and his people, yet that may be ascribed to the prudent care which he had manifested upon former occasions, to draw the rage of the Philistines upon himself alone, and divert it from the people. For which end, it is supposed that this prayer was made by him with an audible voice, though he knew the Philistines would entertain it only with scorn and laughter. “We must always consider Samson,” says Dr. Dodd, “in the light of an extraordinary person, immediately raised up by God for the chastisement of the Philistines. In this view, his death was heroic, as he voluntarily sacrificed himself, by the only means in his power, to the service of his country, in the destruction of those who had, in a base manner, insulted him and his God, and who, holding Israel in bondage, vainly imagined their Dagon superior to the eternal Jehovah.” Indeed, as the same author observes further, “Samson was unquestionably a very singular type of the Messiah; called and sanctified in and from the womb; set apart to deliver his people out of the hands of all their enemies; performing all by his own personal strength alone, without assistant, and almost without weapons, (Isaiah 63:1; Isaiah 63:3; Hosea 1:7,) and in his death evidently doing more than in his life, thereby destroying the power of the devil, and triumphing over all his enemies,” Hebrews 2:14.