after it had been shaved." "Now the rulers of the Philistines assembled to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to celebrate, saying, “Our god has delivered Samson, our enemy, into our hands.” And they brought Samson out to entertain each other. But Samson prayed, "O Lord, remember me" and he pushed the columns holding up the Temple and killed everyone there. The story does not call Delilah a Philistine. The valley of Sorek was Danite territory that had been overrun by Philistines, so the population there would have been mixed. Delilah was likely an Israelite or the story would have said otherwise. The Philistines offered Delilah an enormous sum of money to betray Samson. Art has generally portrayed Delilah as a type of femme fatale, but the biblical term used (pattî) means to persuade with words. Delilah uses emotional blackmail and Samson's genuine love for her to betray him. No other Hebrew biblical hero is ever defeated by an Israelite woman. Samson does not suspect, perhaps because he cannot think of a woman as dangerous, but Delilah is determined, bold and very dangerous indeed. The entire Philistine army could not bring him down. Delilah did, but it was Samson himself who made that possible. The Levite's concubine The Levite's concubine in the book of Judges is "vulnerable as she is only a minor wife, a concubine". She is one of the biblical nameless. Frymer-Kensky says this story is also an example of class intersecting with gender and power: when she is unhappy she runs home, only to have her father give her to another, the Levite. The Levite and his concubine travel to a strange town where they are vulnerable because they travel alone without extended family to rescue them; strangers attack. To protect the Levite, his host offers his daughter to the mob and the Levite sends out his concubine. Trible says "The story makes us realize that in those days men had ultimate powers of disposal over their women." Frymer-Kensky says the scene is similar to one in the Sodom and Gomorrah story when Lot sent his daughters to the mob, but in Genesis the angels save them, and in the book of Judges God is no longer intervening. The concubine is raped to death. The Levite butchers her body and uses it to rouse Israel against the tribe of Benjamin. Civil war follows nearly