The Bible knows nothing of her patriotism, nor does the sacred historian give her the title of Samson's wife, though it has long been the custom of Biblical commentators to speak of her in this relation.
St.Chrysostom set the fashion and Milton followed it:-- But who is this?
What thing of sea or land-- Female of sex it seems-- That, so bedeck'd, ornate and gay Comes this way sailing Like a stately ship Of Tarsus, bound for the isles Of Javan or Gadire, With all her bravery on, and tackle trim, Sails fill'd and streamers waving, Courted by all the winds that hold them play; An amber scent of odorous perfume-- Her harbinger, a damsel train behind?
Some rich Philistian matron she may seem; And now, at nearer view, no other certain Than Dalila, thy wife.
It cannot be without significance that the author of the story in the Book of Judges speaks in a different way of each of the three women who play a part in the tragedy of Samson's life.

The woman who lived among the vineyards of Timnath, whose murder Samson avenged, was his wife.
She was a Philistine, but Samson married her according to the conventional manner of the time and, also according to the manner of the time, she kept her home with her parents after her marriage.
Wherefore she has gotten her name in the good books of the sociological philosophers who uphold the matronymic theory touching early society.
The woman of Gaza whom Samson visited what time he confounded his would-be captors by carrying off the doors of the gates of the city was curtly "an harlot." Of the third woman it is said only that it came to pass that Samson "loved a woman in the Valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah." Thereupon follows the story of her bribery by the lords of the Philistines and her betrayal of her lover.

Evidently a licentious woman who could not aspire even to the merit of the heroine of Dekker's play.
Milton not only accepted the theory of her wifehood, but also attributed patriotic motives to her.

She knew that her name would be defamed "in Dan, in Judah and the bordering tribes." But in my country, where I most desire, In Eeron, Gaza, Asdod and in Gath, I shall be nam'd among the famousest Of women, sung at solemn festivals, Living and dead recorded, who to save Her country from a fierce destroyer, chose Above the faith of wedlock bands; my tomb With odours visited and annual flowers; Not less renown'd than in Mount Ephraim Jael, who, with inhospitable guile, Smote Sisera sleeping.
In the scene before us Dalila is wholly and simply a siren, a seductress who plays upon the known love of Samson from motives which are not disclosed.

As yet one may imagine her moved by a genuine passion.