Samson a charismatic?

"That what I motion'd was of God; I knew / From intimate impulse, and therefore urg'd / The Marriage on; that by occasion hence / I might begin Israel's Deliverance, / The work to which I was divenly call'd" (Samson, 222-226).

"I cannot praise thy Marriage choises, Son, / Rather approv'd them not; but thou didst plead / Divine impulsion prompting how thou might'st / Find some occasion to infest our Foes. /...[who] found soon occasion therby to make thee / Their Captive" (Manoa, 420-426).

"I begin to feel / Some rouzing motions in me which dispose / To something extraordinary my thoughts. / I with this Messenger will go along, / Nothing to do, be sure, that may dishonour / Our Law, or stain my vow of Nazarite. / ... This day will be remarkable in my life / By some great act, or of my days the last" (Samson, 1381-1389).

"Which when Samson / Felt in his arms, with head a while enclin'd / And eyes fixt he stood, as one who pray'd, / Or some great matter in his mind revolv'd (Messenger, 1635-1638)."

These quotes may give insight on how Samson knows what God requires of him. Do they give evidence that he is a charismatic, receiving direct inspiration from God? Or else, is he just a very religious man who does the best thing he can think of? Or worse, does he determine God's will by his own inclinations?

The first quote is about his first wife, who proved false (227). He then picked a second wife, Dalila, in the same way: "I thought it lawful from my former act, / And the same end; still watching to oppress / Israel's oppressours" (231-233). This marriage, too, he comes to think is a mistake. But before each marriage he seemed to see the marriage as part of his divine mission to destroy the Philistines. If his method for discerning these parts of his divine mission was the "intimate impulse" (223 - the footnote says "intimate" = "inward"), what becomes of the credibility of his method?

He seems to claim a similar inspiration before agreeing to be taken by the officer to the festival. What should we think of this action, then? Is it direct inspiration from God? A smart move with foresight?

Just before he has his grand finale, he has a moment of silence. Contrary to the messenger's thrust, I think it might make a difference whether he prayed or turned a matter over in his mind. Or perhaps he did both.

As much as I want to grant Samson charismatic ability and direct inspiration from God (that might come during a silent, reflective moment or during a moment of spiritedness) because its very cool, I cannot overlook his track record of being very wrong. Instead, I am inclined to think that Samson was a very good man with regards to virtue (173) --although he had his faults, as he is at pains to express--, for which reason God granted him his very strong powers. In other words, I grant that God gave Samson power because Samson was good at doing the right thing or deciding how to follow his mission (proclaimed by the angel), even though he might not have gotten it perfect (I say might because I wonder just how big a sin is trusting your wife - but then again perhaps he thought he was betraying loyalty to God). But I don't grant that God gave Samson direct inspiration, despite the fact that he might have thought so. Indeed, the kind of inspiration or desire that he may have took to be from God (at first, not later) may have been his "downfall," seeing as he "couldst repress" all other desires (541-559).

Therefore, I think that Samson is a very religious moralist (what if his strength is read as moral courage?) of sorts who God gives strength and does not abandon at the end (or how else would he have gotten the strength), but not a charismatic receiving diving inspiration, despite his own claims that evidence such a link. Some theologians (e.g. St. Paul) would say that because Jesus had not died and rose yet, a person such as Samson was still "under the law" and not able to become the "new creation" that goes with taking on the "Spirit of Christ." As such, Samson might be forced to take a much more active and much harder (in one sense, not in another) role than a true Christian might to achieve his salvation, or to do the right thing.

What do you think?