Philistine

And Samson said unto her [Delilah], If they bind me with seven green withs [boughs] that were never dried, then shall I be weak, and be as another man.
Then the lords of the Philistines brought up to her seven green withs which had not been dried, and she bound him with them.
Now there were men lying in wait abiding with her in the chamber. And she said unto him, The Philistines be upon thee, Samson. And he brake the withs, as a thread of tow is broken where it toucheth the fire. So his strength was not known.
And Delilah said unto Samson, Behold, thou hast mocked me, and told me lies....

-- Judges 16: 7-10 (KJV)

Always thorns in the Israelites' sides, the Philistines here make yet another bid to foil Samson, the current Jewish champion and Judge. In this effort they have a handy ally: Samson's wife, Delilah, herself a Philistine. Here she attempts to carry off an ambush but is foiled -- at which point she has the gumption to accuse Samson of tricking her!

Though the Philistines appear throughout the Hebrew Bible, this passage was singled out for comment in a late-17th-century German sermon, in which local anti-intellectuals were likened to the Philistines. This usage caught on in Germany and then eventually in England, where "Philistine" had earlier meant simply "enemy" or on occasion "drunkard."

Thomas Carlyle, for example, referred in 1851 to "Philistines ... what we would call bores, dullards, Children of Darkness." More famously, Matthew Arnold, that self-appointed champion of culture, warned in his Study of Celtic Literature (1867) that "We are imperilled by what I call the 'Philistinism' of our middle class," who are characterized by "vulgarity," "coarseness," and "unintelligence." Is it a surprise that Arnold was the son of an English headmaster?

Originally, Philistine derived from p'lishtim, the Hebrew name for the so-called "sea people" (perhaps from Crete) who had settled in Palestine. (The place name in fact derives directly from the Hebrew term.) John Wyclif, in his 1382 translation of Amos (9: 7), actually calls the people "Palistens," even while he uses "Philistynes" elsewhere.

The legend of Samson and Delilah, by the way, though fairly well known, has lent no memorable phrases to English.

 
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Michael Macrone is Associate Site Producer of GraceCom and the author of nine books on language, literature, and ideas, including the best-selling Brush Up Your Shakespeare!