Deborah was no feminist; but her private ministry made a huge impact.
[dropcap] I [/dropcap]srael’s third fall into gross idolatry recorded in the book of Judges occurred during the eighty years of rest and quiet following the judgeship of Ehud (3:30). This was followed by a third servitude, longer than either of the two preceding, and more disgraceful, because the instrument was not an independent sovereign outside their own land, but one of the remnant of the Canaanites whom they ought to have destroyed.
Jabin reigned in Hazor, and was therefore a king of the same name, and reigning in the same place as one of Joshua’s foes (see Josh. 11:1). Probably the rebuilder of this city and the restorer of this Canaanite kingdom either traced his descent from his namesake, or wished to associate his reign with that older one. Perhaps it was revenge that led him to make his rule over Israel remarkably severe. Harosheth has been generally looked for somewhere near Hazor: but much probability attaches to the opinion of Dr. Thomson (The Land of the Book), who identifies it with a tell by that name at the south-eastern corner of the plain of Akka, on the north side of the Kishon, close to the north flank of Mount Carmel.
DEBORAH (Judges 4:4-5)
Deborah stands out before us very prominently (vv. 4-5), a witness to the degradation of the people and to the goodness of the covenant God of Israel, who raised up for them at this time a person endowed with the gift of prophecy, the first case recorded since the death of Moses, probably 200 years before; and this person a woman and also a judge.
There is no reason to suppose that she was a judge in any other sense than the rest of the judges in this book; though verse 5 makes it plain that the commencement of her work was that side of the judges office which consisted in holding up the law to Israel, and bringing them back to righteousness. A woman might be able to do this where a man would have failed under a tyranny such as Jabin’s; she would not appear to intimidate the despot.
Her place of judgment was between Bethel and Ramah, now Beitin and Er Ram (see Josh. 7:2; 18:25), the latter five miles south of the former, on that high plateau named Mount Ephraim, though in that part of it which lay within the territory of Benjamin.
The palm tree was known as an emblem of the land of Palestine; and there may have been an allusion to this (compare Baal-tamar, “owner of the palm tree,” a place in this neighborhood, 20:33) in her dwelling or sitting under the palm tree distinguished by her name. Her husband may have been dead, though she is called his wife: for it is not in accordance with the language of the Bible to speak of the widow of a man.
BARAK SENT (Judges 4:6-10)
The prophetess and judge called Barak to her southern home from his in the far north, the city of refuge in Naphtali, Kedesh (see Josh 12:22, 20:7). As on a former occasion Jehovah had fixed who should go up first against the Canaanites (1:1-2), so now His prophetess laid this duty on Barak’s own tribe. As in Ehud’s case, deliverance was to come from the very quarter in which the oppressor had his seat. Tabor, now Jebel Tür, eleven miles west of the Sea of Galilee, is a mountain singularly prominent not so much for its height (1843 ft.) as for its cone-like shape. It sits isolated at the north-east extremity of the great plain of Jezreel, which was watered by the Kishon River (5:21).
Barak was to “draw toward Mount Tabor” or to “draw out in it,” an obscure expression, which some content themselves with calling a military term. Others connect it with the same word as used of the lambs for the Passover (Ex. 12:21), where, as here, we read, “draw out and take,” as if he were to elude the tyrant’s vigilance by taking small bodies of troops one after another to the place of meeting. Then Deborah in the name of Jehovah added, “and I will draw,” or “draw out to thee” the opposing army in all its force, but only to give it into Barak’s hand.
The magnificent valley of Jezreel, an ideal place for large numbers of troops to act freely, and therefore the scene of numerous important battles, promised to be eminently suitable for Jabin’s chariots of iron (see Josh. 17:16-18). Here a victory should have been achieved as decisive as Joshua’s over the earlier Jabin. Barak’s refusal to go without Deborah may reasonably be attributed rather to piety than to fear, especially as we read of no hesitation in coming at the first call of Deborah. Nevertheless there was something in it of making conditions before he would yield obedience to the command of Jehovah. Therefore he was not to have the renown he might have had: he began by relying too much on the bodily presence of a woman, saint and prophetess though she was; and in the end Sisera would be delivered by Jehovah into another woman’s hand.
HEBER AND JAEL THE KENITES (Judges 4:11)
The woman into whose hand Sisera was to be sold was the wife of Heber, a Kenite, and a descendent of Hobab (Num. 10:29-32), called in the AV here “the father-in-law of Moses,” rather “brother-in-law” for this meaning appears also to be included in the word.
It is vain to speculate on the circumstances which had led him to separate from his countrymen living in the territory of Judah, towards the south (1:16) and to move gradually in a northerly direction till he came as far as this oak which was by Kedesh. But since he thus moved about, he might be or become a conspicuous personage in the land of Israel, and his wife no less so, judging from the evidence of her strength of character. A similar inference may be drawn from the mention of peace between Jabin the king of Hazor and the house of Heber (v. 17). We know nothing of the circumstances which enabled the house of Heber to retain their friendly relations with Israel, and yet to be at peace with Jabin. This also removes a feeling of surprise at the mention of “the days of Jael” (Jud. 5:6).
THE BATTLE PLAN AND VICTORY (vv. 12-17)
The matter chiefly deserving attention here is that Barak would have ventured down with his relative handful of militia from Mount Tabor into the great val- ley where the formidable Canaanite forces were gathered. But this was his reply to Deborah’s “Up! For this is the day!” and “Is not the Lord gone out before thee?”
This was because Jehovah “discomfited” Sisera and his camp, that is, struck panic into them (see Josh. 10:10). But the writer is careful to make an unprecedented addition (for in Ex. 17:13 “discomfited” stands for an entirely different Hebrew word). This panic was “with the edge of the sword.” It was “before Barak;” for while the excellency of the power was of God, doing what Barak could not naturally have achieved, still he had to use his sword as if all depended on him. He naturally pursued Sisera’s host towards Harosheth, westward near to the mouth of the Kishon; whereas Sisera escaped on foot in a north-easterly direction for 35 or 40 miles, as it is commonly thought, till he came to the oasis in Zaanaim, beside Barak’s home at Kedesh.
SISERA DELIVERED INTO JAEL’S HAND (Judges 4:18-24)
The terrible scene which is vividly presented in these verses is surrounded with difficulties which our ignorance cannot solve. How did Sisera find his way straight to a woman’s tent (v. 17)? Was he so great a coward that he broke through all ordinary rules to seek refuge with Jael? Or had he base intentions, such as would justify all that Jael did, and such as his mother’s language (Jud. 5:30) suggests to be in accordance with his habits?
Again, could hers have been an act of deliberate treachery? Had she suddenly discovered the impossibility of preserving a neutral attitude? Or had she all along disapproved of her husband’s neutrality, and felt that the Kenites were duty bound to act along with Israel? Was it an attempt to avoid Barak’s wrath on account of harboring his great enemy? Did she see an oportunity to set things right again, with the idea that this was the critical moment in which God was calling her to fulfill that prophecy of Deborah’s (v. 9)—a prophecy which may have circulated among the women of the land?
According to the laws of hospitality in those countries, Sisera was entitled to consider himself safe when she gave him food and drink: and there was apparent heartiness in answering his request for water by giving him milk from the skin that hung beside her. But that all changed when he pressed her to lie for him (v. 20). “Then,” we read, she “took an hammer in her hand.”
The language of verses 23-24 suggests a struggle kept up for some time, though always more and more in favor of Israel. But that signal day determined the fate of Jabin, whose commander lay dead in the tent. “So God subdued on that day Jabin the king of Canaan.”