American Literature

Though both are stories that exhibit elements of their centuries-old religious origins, and the culture of particular peoples the biblical story of Samson and the Navajo story of the Changing Woman do not seem to have much in common in the onset. One is a story of a judge of a people, while the other is the mother of another. When seen in their original religious and cultural contexts though, they do reveal two common values.

One value that is portrayed in both texts is that a man and a woman in a marriage, or their cultures equivalent of a marriage, should act as equals with each playing a set role. The way this was relayed though, were different in both texts. Samson was bullied by his first wife, and even by Delilah. These women did not respect his role as the man in the relationship and forced him to do things for their own benefits. In Christian texts, the wife is supposed to submit to her husband the women in Samsons life did not do this and so they met terrible consequences. The Changing Woman story shows this value quite differently, as the protagonist of the story is a woman. In some versions of the story she reasons out with Sun, the father of her children, that though he is steadfast and she ever-changing, they are still one and must be equals. For Navajos, men and women are equally vital to the tribe.

Another value is that one is the belief that ones birth and life are for a particular purpose. Changing woman and Samson were born to women who were in all accounts, infertile (though for Changing Woman, she was also born into a barren world). Samsons mother conceived him after an angel visited her, and the condition of his birth was that he was set aside by God for a specific purpose. Changing Woman was born into a barren world, to her parents who could not conceive she was a gift from Sun and her purpose on Earth was to give it new life. They even share a theme of rebirth as Samson was reborn with his lost strength, while Changing Woman is reborn into her youth every year. Both Samson and Changing Woman fulfilled what they were destined to do although their end results were complete opposites, with Samson many while Changing Woman was mother to many.