9b: Tear this old building Down

The next mishna on this page continues to elaborate on the mida k'neged mida principle introduced in regard to the Sota on the previous amud. Here it gives examples of mida k'neged mida not only working negatively, but positively as well -- as in the case of Miriam, Moshe and Joseph. It begins, however, with Shimshon - whom the gemara goes on to discuss in depth.

Is there a reason that Shimshon is discussed so deeply? Perhaps we will see that each of the people mentioned in the mishna are also discussed thoroughly as we read on, but it interesting nonetheless that Shimshon is first. The mishna is not in chronological order, which is somewhat unusual. So maybe putting Shimshon first in the Mishna, and then discussing his story from Judges in the gemara tells us that there is a connection between Shimshon and the Sota. There are two that I can think of.

First, it is the juxtaposition of the Sota and the Nazir in the Torah. The section on Sota in parashat Naso comes right before the section Nazir (which leads the midrash to note that after a person sees the Sota ritual they would want to become a Nazir -- I'm thinking about it myself). Because of this, it is naturally in the rabbinic mind to think of a Nazir after a long discussion about the Sota. In general, because of the placement in the Torah, there is a connection between these two pieces.

Second, where the Sota is a licentious woman, Shimshon had a taste for non-Israelite women, who are consistently depicted in our sources as being licentious. It was of course his relationship with Delila, that the gemara spends so much time talking about, that eventually brings him down. If we look at it this way, perhaps the point of the discussion about Shimshon is to show that infidelity has consequences for both woman and men. Until now, we have only been speaking about the consequences for the woman who commits adultery. With Shimshon, though it is techinically not adultery, it is still an inappropriate relationship that he gets burned for having--it can bring men down as well as women.