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(1518–1594)]] Delilah or ('''דְּלִילָה''', '''Dəlîlāh'''; Arabic '''Dalilah'''), was the "woman in the Valley Of Sorek " whom Samson loved, and who was his downfall, in the Hebrew Bible '' Book Of Judges '' (Chapter 16). "Samson loved Delilah, she betrayed him, and, what is worse, she did it for money", Madlyn Kahr began her study of the Delilah motif in European painting.The survey of the uses made of Delilah in painting, undertaken by Madlyn Kahr, "Delilah" ''The Art Bulletin'' '''54'''.3 (September 1972), pp. 282-299, has provided examples for this article. BIBLICAL NARRATIVE Delilah was approached by the Philistines , the enemies of Israel, to discover the secret of Samson's strength. Three times she asked Samson for the secret of his strength, and three times he gave her a false answer. On the fourth occasion he gave her the true reason: that he did not cut his hair in fulfillment of a vow to God; and Delilah betrayed him to his enemies. However, contrary to popular belief Delilah did not actually cut Samson's hair, the deed was done by one of her servants. Some consider that one of the false secrets given by Samson, that his strength would leave him if his hair was woven into a cloth, is reminiscent of arcane woman's magic of the art of weaving that is also inherent in the myths of Penelope , Circe , Arachne .See Weaving (mythology) . "Sorek" or "soreq" is only specifically identified as being a place in the Samson story. , "from the womb to the day of his death"; thus he was forbidden to touch wine or cut his hair.As a Nazirite, he was also not permitted to come into contact with the dead, but this does not feature in the Samson narrative. Delilah may be a "vine-woman" (compare the mythic Greek name Oenone ), personifying the womanly temptations of the vine that would betray his Nazarite dedication. (1599-1641)]] For Christians the story of Samson and Delilah is an example of Paul's dictum, "It is good for a man not to touch a woman." (I Corinthians 7:1) and the Christian portrayal of woman as a snare for man: this warning is usually the uppermost theme in Western representations, where Delilah is the natural embodiment of the might be a scene of Courtly Love , Madlyn Kahr has remarked, save for the ominous scissors in Delilah's hand. A small '' places the duo beneath a dead tree wound about with a luxurious vine (the debilitating power of the fruitful woman) and a fountain that overflows and seeps away into the ground, with undertones of unbridled sexual appetite. In Northern Europe the Delilah theme was more prominent among painters like Lucas Van Leiden and Maerten Van Heemskerck , who made a large woodcut of the subject after Titian . Tintoretto followed Titian in introducing a female accomplice of Delilah's; Rubens added further females, with a suggestion of a brothel, and came back to the subject several times. No major seventeenth-century artist approached the subject more often than Rembrandt .Madlyn Kahr, "Rembrandt and Delilah' ''The Art Bulletin'' 55.2 (June 1973), pp. 240-259. John Milton personified her as the misguided and foolish but sympathetic temptress, much like his view of Eve , in his 1671 work '' Samson Agonistes ''. By the time of Camille Saint-Saens ' '' Samson Et Dalila '' (1877) Delilah has become the Eponym of a "Delilah", a treacherous and cunning Femme Fatale . FILM, TELEVISION, AND MUSIC
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