Judges 5:14

14. Out of Ephraim We are here to supply in thought, they came down, from the preceding verse. That is, the heroes came out of Ephraim. The poetess goes on until Judges 5:19 in specifying the action of the different tribes.

Whose root Or, their root, that is, their fixed abode, their established dwelling or lot.

In Amalek In Judges 12:15, mention is made of “the land of Ephraim, in the mount of the Amalekites;” whence it appears that a colony of this people had migrated from the south of Palestine, and settled among the Canaanites, and given their name to the territory which afterwards became the possession of Ephraim.

After thee After Ephraim.

Among thy people Among Ephraim’s people. In approaching the Plain of Jezreel from the south, Benjamin, from his more southern location, would naturally follow after Ephraim; but as both advanced it would seem that the Benjamites became mixed with the more powerful Ephraimites.

Out of Machir Machir was the only son of Manasseh, and through him were all the Manassites descended. Genesis 1:23; Numbers 27:1. The name is here used poetically for that part of the tribe of Manasseh which was located on the west of the Jordan; just as Gilead, Manasseh’s grandson, is used, Judges 5:17, for the eastern Manassites.

Those that draw the pencil of the writer As the word here rendered pencil ( שׁבשׂ ) generally means rod, or sceptre, most modern scholars translate, the staff of the commander. But there seems no need of departing from the ordinary meaning of the words. The word משׁכים here represents the writer as drawing the letters with his pencil, and the pencil or style is metaphorically called the writer’s sceptre, as being the emblem of his power and worth. Zebulun’s location on the Phenician coast led his people to commercial enterprise, and to the cultivation of the art of writing. Clerks and accountants would therefore become numerous in that tribe. Deborah’s oracle and Ba-rak’s trumpet aroused even the literati to join the army. This was specially worthy of notice, since the quiet life and peaceful calling of the writer make him naturally averse to war.