Summary
Delila arrives despite Samson's protestations. She asks forgiveness from him, but he refuses to listen to her and tells her to leave. Delila argues that it was her inherent feminine weakness that made her betray Samson, and he is also to blame for trusting a woman in the first place. Then, she says that she had been promised by the Philistines that they would only confine Samson, and because she loved him so much she thought confinement was a way to keep him safe.
Samson agrees that he is to blame, but retorts that weakness is no excuse, since "all wickedness is weakness" (834). He accuses Delila of betraying him for gold, but Delila says she did it instead for the public good of her country. Samson maintains that she would not have betrayed him if she truly loved him, and that her country was no longer her country after they were married. Delila offers to speak to the Philistine lords and have Samson released so that he can live with her once again. Samson rejects her offer, saying that she would take advantage of his blindness and betray him once more.
Before departing, Delila announces that while she will be regarded with hatred by Israel, she will be celebrated among her own people and will enjoy that fame. She departs, and the chorus inquires why women are so deceptive, suggesting that they are too beautiful on the outside to be virtuous on the inside. The chorus says that God gave men power over women so that they can protect themselves from being influenced by their wives.
Analysis
Samson's interaction with Delila serves two key functions in the play: first, Milton dramatizes Delila's deceptive behavior for a second time (the first being the precursor to the drama, in which Delila coaxed Samson's secret from him and had his hair cut by a Philistine servant). That Delila appears at the prison and expresses her sorrow over what happened to Samson helps draw a parallel between the way Delila and Samson each confront their misdeeds. Delila defends her actions, saying that it was simply her inherent weakness as a woman that led to her betrayal. Samson, by contrast, continues to assert—without exonerating Delila completely—that his own willingness to trust her was the ultimate cause of his destruction. In this way, Samson comes to represent constancy of penance and loyalty to God, while Delilia represents fickleness and unpredictability. Once Samson makes it clear that she will not receive his forgiveness, Delila reveals her true feelings about her deed, noting that she will be celebrated by her people for years to come. Delila, then, represents the corrupted and self-interested perspective of those who hold themselves in higher esteem than they do God's word—a common critique Milton himself expressed of the English clergy prior to the dissolution of the monarchy.
The second crucial role of Delila in the play is the parallel she draws between Samson and Adam in Paradise Lost. Adam is convinced by Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, after Eve has been persuaded by specious arguments from Satan. Delila explains how she was pressured by numerous Philistine officials and led to believe that Samson would not be harmed, admissions that may cultivate sympathy in the reader for Delila in much the same way as Milton's Eve. This parallel between Eve and Delila offers a more nuanced interpretation of the misogyny that dominates this moment in the play, when both Samson and the chorus condemn all women for deception and wickedness. In Paradise Lost, Adam's misogynistic accusations toward Eve only appear after the fall, after Satan has convinced them to eat from the tree. Feminist scholars have read this crucial detail as the implication that it is Satan who actually introduces misogyny into the world. In the case of Samson and Delila, the Philistines who used Delila to get to Samson represent the evil, idol-worshipping behavior that betrays God. As such, Samson Agonistes suggests how misogyny is not man's natural impulse, nor is it necessarily "correct." Instead, as in Paradise Lost, misogyny becomes the result of wickedness levied against God and the chosen people.
