Judges 4:24

24. Prospered… prevailed… destroyed Compare marginal reading. “The meaning is, that Barak’s great victory was the beginning of a successful resistance to Jabin, by which the Israelites recovered their independence, and finally broke the Canaanite power. Accordingly we hear no more of Canaanite dominion in the Book of Judges.” Hervey.

The morality of Jael’s deed has been, of course, the subject of many a dissertation. The enemies of the Bible would fain use it to throw reproach on the sacred history; and as both Jael and her deed are evidently praised by an inspired poetess, in Judges 5:24-27, the friends of truth have sought in various ways to show how such praise might be compatible with the apparent wickedness of Jael’s act. It is claimed that her deed violated all the proper usages of war. A fugitive chieftain, an ally of her husband, defeated and almost exhausted, sought protection in her tent, and received from her more than the common tokens of security. But, in violation of the sacred rites of hospitality, she murdered in his sleep her confiding and unprotected guest. This surely makes up a dark picture; but it is one sided, and overdrawn by magnifying certain points at the expense of others which are equally prominent in the sacred history. The whole subject may be relieved of difficulty by attention to the following considerations.

1 . Though Heber was at peace with Jabin, and neutral in this war, there were circumstances in view of which Jael might not have felt herself bound to observe at this time the treaty of her husband. She was, perhaps, an Israelitess; but if not, her husband’s family were historically identified with the interests of Israel. She had before her eyes abundant evidence that Jabin’s power was utterly broken and annihilated in all that region where Heber had his home. She could not but feel, therefore, that her husband’s alliance with Jabin was no longer binding. “Israel’s freedom is her freedom; Israel’s glory her glory. Shall she be idle when the tyrant gives himself up into her hands? What if she saves him? Will it not be treason on her part against the ancient covenant with Israel? The conflict in which she finds herself is great, and none but a great and powerful soul could end it as she does. She scorns the reward which Sisera’s safety might, perhaps, have brought her. She takes the nobler object into consideration the freedom of a kindred nation and the older right preponderates. A ruthless warrior is before her, the violator of a thousand laws of right, and all hesitation vanishes.” Cassel.

2 . The prophecy of Deborah, that Sisera was to fall by a woman’s hand, (Judges 4:9,) was probably known to Jael. She had not been personally designated as that woman, but when she saw Sisera flying on foot and alone, and coming towards her tent, the thought might naturally have flashed upon her mind that she herself was the divinely appointed instrument.

3 . In Judges 4:19 we are expressly told that Jael went out to meet Sisera, and urged him to come in. Now suppose that upon his approach she had not gone forth to meet him, but, like the woman of Thebez who killed Abimelech, (Judges 9:53,) had broken his skull with a stone, or even had suddenly rushed forth and thrust a dagger to his heart, who would have charged her with gross wickedness? But if it was her purpose, from the moment she first saw him running towards her, to destroy him, then where appears so much guilt and wickedness as is pretended, merely in the means she used? She probably knew no other way to ensure his destruction by her own hand. Her tent afforded no height from which to crush him with a stone, and to rush forth and attack him in single combat would have been to expose herself to needless danger, if not to certain death. She therefore strategically drew him as into a snare and killed him. Once grant that his destruction was her settled purpose from the beginning, based on her knowledge of Deborah’s prophecy, and the measures she used were but the stratagems of battle. Her deed receives all its glory and significance from the war, with which it is ever to be associated; and what are artifice and stratagem but legitimate parts of war? Who blames the artifice by which Ai was taken when once he sees that its destruction was the will of God? The ability of the greatest generals is often seen more in their skill to deceive and entrap the foe than in their prowess in battle; and, in Judges 4:20, Sisera orders her to lie, and thus deceive his pursuers.

4 . As for Deborah’s praise of Jael’s deed, a clew is furnished in the closing verse of her song, (Judges 5:31,) “So perish all thy enemies, Jehovah.” It is to be explained, like the vindictive Psalms, from the standpoint of the Divine administration. “It is not the poetess, who utters a private wish of her own,” says Bachmann, “but the prophetess, who utters a truth deeply grounded in the very essence of God a weighty law of divine righteousness for all after ages to observe. Sisera’s fall is regarded by her as a righteous judgment of Heaven upon one who was a foe to the name and kingdom of God.” The same Spirit that could justly curse Meroz for neglect to intercept the flying the (Judges 5:23) might well bless Jael’s deed, but might as justly have cursed her had she been guilty of similar neglect. And so the whole song of Deborah breathes the noblest theocratic spirit of her age and people.

There is no need, therefore, of supposing that Deborah speaks only as the poetess, or the patriotic woman in sympathy with the fortunes of Israel; and we reject the notion of Farrar, (in Smith’s Bible Dictionary,) and all similar views, that an inspired prophetess uttered this blessing “in the passionate moment of patriotic triumph,” without pausing “to scrutinize the moral bearings of an act which had been so splendid a benefit to herself and her people.”