Judges 14:4

4. It was of the Lord Our historian is writing SACRED history, and he marks everywhere the working of Divine Providence. Samson was raised up of God to begin to deliver Israel, and therefore every event of his life that was associated with that work was providentially ordered.

That he sought an occasion Not that Samson had a foreknowledge of what would be the outcome of this marriage, and purposely sought this woman to wife that he might find some opportunity of working mischief and ruin among the Philistines; but that the Lord overruled all these events for the purpose of weakening the Philistines’ power. Samson evidently had some suspicion or impression that the marriage would lead to great results. He at least recognised, as his parents did not, the hand of God in the matter, and he felt assured that his love for the woman, and her righteousness in his eyes, were providential indications that in marrying her he was boldly entering on the great mission of his life. But how the matter would terminate neither he nor his parents then knew.

Against the Philistines Rather, From the Philistines. The provoking and responsible occasion for Samson to injure the Philistines was to be on their side, not on his.

For at that time This sentence is added as the general reason why the Lord was providentially preparing the way to weaken and overthrow the Philistine dominion over Israel.

The theory of the Old Testament language in regard to God’s providence seems to be this: Whatever act of man, however free or wicked, contributes to the higher scheme of Jehovah’s purpose, and so, though divinely disapproved, is divinely recognised, and wrought into the series of events, is roughly said to be of the Lord, and his act and doing. The old Hebraic age had not yet attempted to draw the metaphysical line between God’s will and God’s non-prevention of those sins which are necessarily to be admitted into that system of free-agency from which the highest good shall accrue. Those sins, therefore, which are seen by the inspired writer to adjust into the high scheme of God, and to bring out his intended results, are, in lump, attributed to him. They are not his by approval, by decree, by direct production, nor by fore-ordination; but are only indiscriminately said to be his, because, foreseen by him, they are simply non-prevented, and woven into his complex plan for bringing out the highest good. This is not rightly called a Hebraism in the sense of a Hebrew idiom; but it is a Hebraism in the sense of being a Hebrew style of thought and expression. The Hebrew knew, indeed, that Jehovah was absolutely holy, and men’s sins were wicked, but had never fully adjusted the relation between the two. A later age, when moral thought becomes more defined, raises the question of God’s exact collision with sin, and draws the discriminating line. See notes on Matthew 11:25; Acts 2:23; Acts 4:28; and introductory note to Romans 9:0.