Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1915-01-29
SAMSON, BIBLICAL
PRACTICAL JOKER
Strong Man Was One of World S
Greatest Grandstand
Players
FAILED TO USE HIS GIFTS
Whimsical Humor Impelled Him
to Wild Escapades of Adven-
ture; Betrayed by Woman
THE STRONGEST MEMS WEAK
NESS
The International Sunday School les
son for January 81 Is "The
Birth of Samson
.Judu ia. STA Of Ok

| los O-IO, Sfs %
| (By William T. Ellis.)
A frank look at the weakness OF the
strongest man, Samson, is to-day $
Sunday school lesson.
Back in the unsettled times of Is
rael, more than thousand years be-
for the birth of Jesus, before ever the
people had king, and the leadership
was with judges, or champions, or
heroes. Samson was born.
Like so many other notable charac-
ters, he was the child of yearning and
prayer and covenant. His parents had
been long childless when they received
with joy the promise of son. In a
spirit of grateful exaltation, they
! dedicated the babe to a life apart, and
later were taken for John the Baptist.
His head should bo unshaven, he
should drink no wine and touch
naught unclean. And the child grew,
and Jehovah began to move him."
There was a great beginning. In
heritance, natural gifts, spiritual en-
duement-all were the lot of this
young Nazirite. The most favored
youth of his day was Samson. All the
elements of greatness were his. He
had been made ready for great service
| to his time. Thus far his case runs
parallel to that of a host of our fav-
ored young men of to-day. richly dow
cred in body, mind. fortune and home.
! To them, as to Samson, the nation
looks for leadership and deliverance.
Some of them, alas, fail in quite the
same fashion as he.
The Man Who Missed His Chance
Every mature person has marveled
at the young men and women of
promise who have not amounted to
anything. Every college has its stor-
les to tell of graduates sent forth
with high hopes, who have never met
expectations. They are the Samsons,
lowered with giant capacities, which
they fail to use Alright.
All who follow baseball recall the
death last year, of a meteoric pitcher
who could not settle down to his real
work. He preferred to be a barroom
hero, a wonder" on a small team, to
doing his days work on the famous
nine of which he was for time a
member. Swiftly he slipped down and
down, until death ended the tale of
what might have been. 1t was the
Samson story over again.
Samson's strength was not only
physical. He had qualities of leader
Ship-enterprise, daring, resourceful-
ness and self-reliance. His pranks
reveal this. But these gifts were not
used in sober, mature and reasonable
fashion for the benefit of his people.
Samson preferred a mad personal eX-
plot to a substantial achievement OF
citizenship. He had not that sense
of responsibility which marks the
real leader.
Samson and Richard The Lion
Later history developed a brilliant
figure singularly akin to Samson.
This was King Richard the Lion
Hearted, of England. Both gloried in
deeds of danger and derring-do.
.AIx 90
up. A whimsical humor impelled
them to wild escapades of adventure,
when they should instead have been
soberly serving the welfare of their
people. Neither was bad, and there
were noble traits in both; but they
failed to use their gifts Alright. No
Substantial achievement remained as
a memorial to either. Picturesque
and heroic figures they were, but no
historian can write them down as sue
cessful.
The presence of enemies never af-
frighted blithesome Samson. He dwelt
amid the Philistines, the powerful in
vaders from the West who so long OPP
pressed Israel. In his day the enemy's
yoke was heavy on the peoples neck.
1t was an hour for hero, a deliverer;
and Samson was sent to be the man.
He, however used for his own sport
gifts that were meant for service. In
stead of organizing and leading the
Jews against the tyrants, he provoked
the latter by his wild pranks. Not
until his closing hour did Samson So
berly serve his nation.
That is the condemnation that must
be written over against his name as
against the name of every other gifted
man who lives for himself alone in n
time when his country needs him-he
failed to give his best to his time.
Probably if Samson were in England
to-day he would be either a profess
sional football player or an aviator,
no place in the trenches for him.
The Bibles Practical Joker
Samson is best known for his prac-
tical jokes. He is the buffoon of tho
Bible. In his way to court with a
l hilistine wife he slew lion with his
bare hands. Later, as he passed by,
he saw the carcass filed with honey.
At the wedding feast he wagered thir-
ty garments with the guests that they
could not guess his riddle:
| l"Out of the eater came forth food.
And out of the strong came forth
sweetness"
His bride teased Samson into telling
her the answer, which she told to her
countrymen, that they might not have
to pay the wager. Samson thereby
lost the wager and the wife. but he