Lecture XIV: Deborah (part 2)
by Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, D.D.
From Tabor to Taanach is a march of about thir-
teen miles, and therefore the approach must have been
long foreseen by the Canaanitish forces. They moved
westward along the plain, which here forms, as it
were, a large bay to the south, between the projecting
promontory of Taanach and the first beginnings of
Carmel. The plain is luxuriant with weeds and corn.
One solitary tree rises from the midst of it. The great
caravan route from Damascus to Egypt passes, and
probably at that time already passed, across it. At the
head of this curve stood another unsubdued Canaanitish
fortress, Megiddo, afterwards the station of a
Roman "Legion," whence its present name, Led-
jûn. Towards the cover of this, it may be, securer fast-
ness, but still keeping along the level plain, the Canaan-
itish army moved. Its final encampment was beside the
numerous rivulets which, descending from the hills of
Megiddo into Kishon, as it flows in a broader stream
through the cornfields below, may well have been known
as "the waters of Megiddo." It was at this critical
moment that (as we learn directly from Josephus, and
indirectly from the song of Deborah) a tremendous storm
of sleet and hail gathered from the east, and burst
over the plain, driving full in the faces of the advan-
cing Canaanites. "The stars in their course fought
with Sisera." As in like case in the battle of Cressy,
the slingers and the archers were disabled by the rain,
the swordsmen were crippled by the biting cold. The
Israelites, on the other hand, having the storm on their
rear, were less troubled by it, and derived confidence
from the consciousness of this Providential aid. The
confusion became great. The "rain descended," the
four rivulets of Megiddo were swelled into powerful
streams, the torrent of the Kishon rose into a flood
the plain became a morass. The chariots and the
horses, which should have gained the day for the Ca-
naanites, turned against them. They became entangled
in the swamp; the torrent of Kishon - the torrent
famous through former ages - swept them away in
its furious eddies; and in that wild confusion "the
strength" of the Canaanites "was trodden down," and
"the horsehoofs stamped and struggled by the means
of the plungings and plungings of the mighty chiefs"
in the quaking morass and the rising streams. Far
and wide the vast army fled, far through the
eastern branch of the plain of Endor. There, between
Tabor and the Little Hermon, a carnage took place
long remembered , in which the corpses lay fattening
the ground. Onwards from thence they still fled over
the northern hills to the city of their great captain, -
Harosheth of the Gentiles. Fierce and rapid was the
pursuit. One city, by which the pursuers and pur-
sued passed, gave no help. "Curse ye Meroz, curse
ye with a curse its inhabitants, because they
came not to the help of Jehovah." So, as it
would seem, spoke the prophetic voice of Deborah.
We can imagine what was the crime and what the
punishment from the analogous case of Succoth and
Penuel, which, in like manner , gave no help when
Gideon pursued the Midianites. The curse was so fully
and escaped on foot over the northern mountains
towards Hazor. It must have been three days after
the battle that he reached o spot, which seems to
gather into itself, as in the last scene of an eventful
drama, all the characters of the previous acts. Be-
tween Hazor, the capital of Jabin, and Kedesh-Naph-
tali, the birthplace of Barak, - each within a day's
journey of the other, - lies, raised high above the
plain of Merom, amongst the hills of Naphtali, a green
plain, which joins almost imperceptibly with that over-
hung by Kedesh-Naphtali itself. This plain is still,
and was then, studded with massive terebinths.
Naphtali itself seems to have derived from
them the symbol of its tribe, "a towering terebinth."
They were themselves marked in that early age by a
sight unusual in this part of Palestine. Underneath
the spreading branches of one of them there dwelt,
unlike the inhabitants of the surrounding villages, a
settlement of Bedouins, living, as if in the desert, with
their tents pitched, and their camels and asses around
them, whence the spot had acquired the name of "the
Terebinth," or "Oak, of the unloading of Tents." Be-
tween Heber, the chief of this little colony, and the
king of Hazor, there was peace. It would even seem
that from him, or from his tribe, thus planted on the
debatable ground between Kedesh and Hazor, Sisera
had derived the first intelligence of the insurrection.
Thither, therefore, it was that, confident in Arab fidelity,
the wearied general turned his steps. He approached
the tent, not of Heber, but for the sake of greater
security, the harem of the chieftainess, Jael, the
"Gazelle." It was a fit name for a Bedouin's wife -
especially for one whose family had come from the
rocks of Engedi, "the spring of the wild goat" or
"chamois." The long, low tent was spread under the
tree, and from under its cover she advanced
to meet him with the accustomed reverence. "Turn
in, my lord, turn in, and fear not." She covered
him with a rough wrapper or rug, on the slightly
raised divan inside the tent; and he, exhausted with
his flight, lay down, and then, lifting up his head,
begged for a drop of water to cool his parched lips.
She brought him more than water. She unfastened
the mouth of the large skin, such as stand by Arab
tents, which was full of sweet milk from the herds or
the camels. She offered, as for a sacrificial feast, in
the bowl used for illustrious guests, the thick curded
milk, frothed like cream, and the weary man drank,
and then (secure in the Bedouin hospitality which re-
gards as doubly sure the life of one who has eaten
and drunk at the hand of his host) he sank into a
deep sleep, as she again drew round him the rough
covering which for a moment she had with-
drawn. Then she saw that her hour was come.
She pulled up from the ground the large pointed peg
or nail which fastened down the ropes of the tent,
and held it in her left hand; with her right hand she
grasped the ponderous hammer or wooden mallet of
the workmen of the tribe. Her attitude, her weapon,
her deed, are described both in the historic and poetic
account of the event, as if fixed in the national mind.
She stands like the personification of the figure of
speech, so famous in the names of Judas the Macca-
bee, and Charles Martel; the Hammer of her country's
enemies. Step by step we see her advance; first, the
dead silence with which she approaches the sleeper,
"slumbering with the weariness of one who has run
far and fast," then the successive blows with which
she "hammers, crushes, beats, and pierces through and
through" the forehead of the upturned face, till the
point of the nail reaches the very ground on which
the slumberer is stretched; and then comes the one
startling bound, the contortions of agony, with which
the expiring man rolls over from the low divan, and
lies weltering in blood between her feet as she strides
over the lifeless corpse.
At this moment Barak, the conqueror, appeared.
He might be in direct pursuit of the fugitive chief.
He might be approaching his native place, now hard
by. Out from the tent, as before, came the undaunted
chieftainess, and showed the dead corpse as it lay
with the sake or tent-pin fixed firm in the shat-
tered head. With this ghastly scene of the Three
Neighbors of the hills of Naphtali, thus at last brought
face to face, under the Terebinth of Kedesh, the di-
rect narrative suddenly closes, as though its work
were done. But Deborah's song of victory breaks in,
and continues in its highest strains the echo
of that day. In company with the returning
conqueror, or herself leading the chorus, after the
manner of Hebrew women, the Prophetess poured
forth the hymn which marks the greatness of the
crisis. It could be compared to nothing short of the
day when Israel passed through the desert. The
storm which had been sent to discomfit the Canaanite
host, recalled the trembling of the earth, the heavens
and clouds dropping water, the mountains melt-
ing from before the Lord. Barak, with his long train
of spoils and prisoners, had "led captivity captive."
The sentiment even of the woman's delight in the
dresses won in the spoils transpires through the war-
like rejoicing: the pieces of embroidery are counted
over in imagination, as they are torn away from the
mother of the harem of Sisera for the women of
Israel. The feelings and the words of the song rang
on through subsequent times, and in the Prophet
Habakkuk, and still more in the 68th Psalm, we
catch again the very same strains; the march through
the desert; the flight of kings; the dividing of the
spoil by those who tarried at home. It was, as the
close of the hymn expresses it, like the full burst of
the sun out of the darkness of the night or the
blackness of a storm, "a hero in his strength."
The likeness of the outward features of this deci-
sive battle to that of Cressy has been already
pointed out; the storm, the cold, the burst
of sunlight, are all in each. A still more striking re-
semblance is the defeat of the Carhaginians, by Timo-
leon, at the battle of the Crimesus, in Sicily. It
opens with the spirit-stirring or prophet-like speech
of Timoleon, "as though a God were speaking with
him." His encampment, like Barak's, is on the hill
above the river. The chariots of his opponents are
broken by the Greek infantry. The violent storm of
wind, rain, hail, thunder and lightning, beating in the
faces of the Carthaginians, but only on the backs of
the Greeks; the confusion in the river, becoming
every moment fuller and more turbid through the
violent rain, so that numbers perished in the torrent;
the total rout, the capture of the chariots - the
spoils of ornamental shields - are the exact counter-
parts of the victory of Barak over Sisera. But, in its
moral aspect, the triumph of Barak was far greater,
even than the triumph of Greek civilization over
Carthaginian barbarism. It was the enemies of Jeho-
vah who had perished. It was the securing of the
true religion from the attempt of the old Paganism
to recover its ascendancy in the Holy Land. It
ranks, in the Sacred History, next after the Battle
of Beth-horon, amongst the religious battles of the
world.
And, therefore, not unworthily of this object in the
song of Deborah we have the only prophetic utter-
ance that breaks the silence between Moses and
Samuel. Hers is the one voice of inspiration (in the
full sense of the word) that breaks out in the Book
of Judges. In her song are gathered up all the les-
sons which the rest of the book teaches indirectly.
Hers is the life, both in her own history and in the
whole period, that expresses the feelings and thoughts
of thousands, who were silent till "she, Deborah, arose
a mother in Israel." Hers is the prophetic word
that gives an utterance and a sanction to the thoughts
of freedom, of independence, of national unity, such
as they had never had before in the world, and have
rarely had since.
It is the religious aspect of the battle, this pro-
phetic character of its chief leader, that has caused
the difficulty, or the instruction, which is to be de-
rived from her benediction of the assassination of
Sisera.
Few persons read the chapter without a momentary
perplexity. Even in the humblest classes, and
holiest of hearts, a question not of sinful doubt,
but of most religious inquiry, arises, - What is the
purpose of thus recording and of thus blessing an act
which is so repugnant to our notions of Christian and
European morality?
There have been numerous answers given to this
question; that for example of the rabbis, that the
act of Jael was in self-defense against a personal out-
rage of Sisera; or of Augustine, that it was dictated
by a sudden divine impulse or revelation. It is suf-
ficient to say of both these solutions that they are
gratuitous inventions, equally without the slightest
foundation in the narrative itself. And in the case
of the latter hypothesis, the difficulty would not be
removed, but would be greatly increased by this at-
tempt to push it back into a still more sacred region.
It has been argued, again, that the act of Jael is
not commended in the Sacred History. But though
this is a true answer to many so-called difficulties in
the Old Testament, which arises merely from investing
with an imaginary perfection every subject which it
treats; and though this act is not commended ex-
pressly by the words of the narrative, it is commended
by its general spirit; and also both by the spirit and
the words of the song of Deborah. That song, as has
just been observed, is the one prophecy of the period;
and, therefore, if we do not find the inspiration of the
Book of Judges here, we find it nowhere. It gives
the key-note to the whole book, and must be regarded
as the fittest exponent of its meaning.
But in fact, the same answer is to be given which
covers not only this, but hundreds of similar cases.
Deborah, it is true, spoke as a prophetess, but it was
as a prophetess enlightened only with a very small
portion of that Divine Light which went on brighten-
ing ever more and more unto the perfect day. She
saw clearly for a little way - but it was only for a
little way. Beyond that, the darkness of the time still
rested upon her vision.
" 'Curse ye Meroz,' said the angel of the Lord; curse
ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof," sang Deborah.
"Was it," asks our eminent philosophic theologian,
that she called to mind any personal wrongs - rap-
ine or insult - that she, or the house of Lapidoth,
had received from Jabin or Sisera?
" No, she had dwelt under her palm-tree in the
depths of the mountains. But she was a "Mother in
Israel;' and with a mother's heart, and with the
'vehemency of a mother's and a patriot's love, she
had shot the light of love from her eyes, and poured
the blessings of love from her lips, on the people that
had 'jeopardized their lives unto the death,' against
the oppressors; and the bitterness, awakened and
borne aloft by the same love, she precipitated in
curses on the selfish and coward recreants who 'came
not to the help of the Lord, to the help of he Lord
against the mighty.' As long as I have the image
"of Deborah before my eyes, and while I throw my-
self back into the age, country, and circumstances of
this Hebrew Boadicea, in the yet not tamed chaos
of the spiritual creation; as long as I contemplate
the impassioned, high-souled, heroic woman, in all the
prominence and individuality of will and character,
I feel as if I were among the first ferments of the
great affections, - the proplastic waves of the micro-
cosmic chaos, swelling up against and yet towards the
outspread wings of the Dove that lies brooding on
the troubled waters. So long all is well, all replete
with instruction and example. In the fierce and in-
ordinate, I am made to know and be grateful for the
clearer and purer radiance which shines on a Chris-
tian's path, neither blunted by the preparatory veil,
nor crimsoned in its struggle through the all-enwrap-
ping mist of the world's ignorance: whilst in the self-
oblivion of these heroes of the Old Testament - then
elevation above all low and individual interests, above
all, in the entire and vehement devotion of their to-
tal being to the service of their Divine Master - I
find a lesson of humility, a ground of humiliation,
and a shaming, yet rousing, example of faith and
fealty."
And when, from the inspiration of Deborah, we pass
to the deed of Jael, we must be content there also to
admit the same imperfection of moral perceptions,
which the Highest authority has already recognized
in the clearest terms.
"Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt
love thy neighbour and hate thine enemy." Jael did
hate her enemy with a perfect hatred. For the sake
of destroying him, she broke through all the bonds of
hospitality, of gratitude, and of truth. But then, it
must not be forgotten, that if there is any portion of
the Sacred History, where we should expect these
bonds to be loosened, and a higher light obscured, it
would be in this period of disorder, "when there was
no king in Israel, and when every one" - the Isra-
elite warrior here - the Arabian chieftainess there -
"did what was right in his or her eyes." The allow-
ance that, according to our Saviour's rule, we make for
Ehud, for Jael, for Deborah, is precisely the same that,
if it were not Sacred History, we should at once ac-
knowledge. We do not condemn the Greeks, according
to the light which they had, for praising Harmodius
and Aristogiton in their plot against the tyrants of
Athens. We ourselves are almost inclined, in consid-
eration of the greatness of the necessity, and the con-
fusion of the time, to praise the murder of Marat by
Charlotte Corday, "the angel of assassination," as she
has been termed by an historian of unquestioned hu-
manity. Why should we not be as indulgent to the
characters of Sacred History, as we are to those of
common history? Why should not a blessing, even
a Divine blessing, according to the only light which
they were then able to bear, be bestowed on an act,
which the most philosophic observer does not scruple
to bestow as he looks back on the various imperfect
acts of heroism and courage that have been wrought
in troubled and violent times?
And, if we as further, what can we learn from it?
and why should this deed and this commendation of
it still be read in our churches? the answer s this:-
"The spirit of the commendation of Jael is that God
allows largely for ignorance where He finds sincerity;
that they who serve Him honestly up to the measure
of their knowledge are, according to the general course
of His Providence, encouraged and blessed; that they
whose eyes and hearts are still fixed on duty and
not on self, are plainly that smoking flax which He
will not quench, but cherish rather until it be blown
into a flame. . . . When we read some of those
sad but glorious martyrdoms where good men - alas!
the while for human nature - were both the victims
and the executioners, amidst all our unmixed admi-
ration for the sufferers, may we not in some instances
hope and believe that the persecutors were moved
with a most earnest though an ignorant zeal, and
that like Jael they sought to please God, though
like her they essayed to do it by means which Christ's
Spirit condemns? . . . Right and good it is that
we should condemn the acts of many of those com-
mended in the Old Testament; for we have seen what
prophets and righteous men for many an age were
not permitted to see; but no less right and needful
it is that we should imitate their fearless zeal, with-
out which they, by means of their unavoidable ig-
norance, were even in their evil deeds blessed."
THE SONG OF DEBORAH.
PRELUDE.
For the leading of the Leaders in Israel,
For the free self-offering of the People.
Praise Jehovah!
Hear, O Kings; give ear, O Princes;
I to Jehovah, even I will sing,
Will sound the harp to Jehovah, the God of Israel.
THE EXODUS.
O Jehovah, when thou wentest out of Seir,
When thou marchedst out of the field of Edom,
The earth trembled, the skies also dropped,
The clouds also dropped water.
The mountains melted from before the face of Jehovah,
Sinai itself from before the face of Jehovah, the God of Israel.
THE DISMAY.
In the days of Shamgar, the son of Anath,
In the days of Jael, ceased the roads;
And they that walked on highways, walked through crooked roads.
There ceased to be heads in Israel, ceased to be,
Till I, Deborah, arose,
Till I arose, a mother in Israel.
THE CHANGE.
They chose gods that were new,
Then there was war in the gates;
Shield was there none or spear,
In forty thousand of Israel.
My heart is toward the lawgivers of Israel,
Who offered themselves willingly for the people.
Praise Jehovah!
Ye that ride on white-dappled she-asses,
Ye that sit on rich carpets,
Ye that walk in the way,
Meditate the song!
From amidst the shouting of the dividers of spoils,
Between the water-troughs,
There let them rehearse the righteous acts of Jehovah.
The righteous acts of His headship in Israel;
Then went down to the gates the people of Jehovah.
Awake, awake, Deborah!
Awake, awake, utter a song!
Arise, Barak! and lead captive thy captives,
Thou son of Abinoam.
THE GATHERING.
Then came down a remnant of the nobles of the people.
Jehovah came down to me among the heroes.
Out of Ephraim came those whose root is in Amalek,
After thee, O Benjamin, in thy people;
Out of Machir came down lawgivers,
And out of Zebulun they that handle the staff of those that number
the host ;
And the princes in Issachar with Deborah, and Issachar as Barak,
Into the valley he was sent on his feet.
THE RECREANTS.
By the streams of Reuben great are the decisions of heart.
Why sittest thou between the sheepfolds?
Top hear the piping of the flocks?
At the streams of Reuben great are the searchings of heart.
Gilead beyond the Jordan dwells,
And Dan, why sojourns he in ships?
Asher sits at the shore of the sea,
And on his harbors dwells.
THE BATTLE AND THE FLIGHT.
Zebulun is a people throwing away its soul to death,
And Naphtali on the high places of the field.
There came kings, and fought;
They fought kings of Canaan -
At Taanach, on the waters of Megiddo;
Gain of silver took they not.
From Heaven they fought;
The stars from their courses
Fought with Sisera.
The torrent of Kishon swept them away,
The ancient torrent, the torrent of Kishon.
Trample down, O my soul, their strength.
Then stamped the hoofs of the horses,
From the plungings and plungings of the mighty ones.
THE FLIGHT.
Curse ye Meroz, said the messenger of Jehovah;
Curse ye with a curse the inhabitants thereof;
Because they came not to the help of Jehovah,
To the help of Jehovah, with the heroes.
THE DESTROYER.
Blessed above women be Jael,
The wife of Heber the Kenite,
Above women in the tent, blessed!
Water he asked, milk she gave;
In a dish of the nobles she offered him curds.
Her hand she stretched out to the tent-pin,
And her right hand to the hammer of the workmen,
And hammered Sisera, and smote his head,
And beat and struck through his temples.
Between her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay,
Between her feet he bowed, he fell;
Where he bowed, there he fell down slaughtered.
THE MOTHER.
Through the window stretched forth and lamented
The mother of Sisera through the lattice:
"Wherefore delays his car to come?
"Wherefore tarry the wheels of his chariots?"
The wise ones of her princesses answer her,
Yea, she repeats their answer to herself:
"Surely they are finding, are dividing the prey,
"One damsel, two damsels for the head of each hero.
"Prey of divers colors for Sisera,
"Prey of divers colors, of embroidery,
"One of divers colors, two for embroidery, for the neck [of the
"prey]."
THE TRIUMPH.
So perish all Thy enemies, O Jehovah;
But they that love Thee are as the sun, when he goes forth like
a giant.
from The History of the Jewish Church, Vol. I : Abraham to Samuel,
"Lecture XV: Gideon"
by Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, D.D., Dean of Westminster
Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1879, pp. 357-373
Posted Apr 3, 2018, 10:57 PM UTC · edited
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