Background
She was the wife of Lappidoth, of whom nothing is known, and judged the people under a palmtree between Ramah and Bethel, north of Jerusalem.
She was the wife of Lappidoth, of whom nothing is known, and judged the people under a palmtree between Ramah and Bethel, north of Jerusalem.
In her time, the Israelites were sorely oppressed by Jabin, the Canaanite king who ruled in Hazor. To lead their war of liberation, she selected Barak and ordered him to fight Jabin’s general, Sisera. Barak refused to go to battle without her and the two gathered together a strong coalition of northern and central tribes at Mount Tabor. Sisera prepared to fight them with nine hundred iron chariots (Israel having none) and all his army.
The time of battle was determined by Deborah, who promised her troops victory in the name of God. She ordered Barak to exploit the fortuitous flooding of the valley of the Kishon Brook, where Sisera’s chariots sank in the mud and were disabled and his army was wiped out. Sisera himself fled the field of battle and took refuge in the tent of Jael, wife of Heber the Kenite, who killed him in his sleep. The victory marked the decline of the Canaanite kingdom and ushered in a forty-year period of tranquillity for Israel.
Two accounts are contained in the Bible of these events - one in prose (Jud. 4) and the other in verse (“1 he Song of Deborah,” Jud. 5). The latter is one of the earliest examples of poetry in the Bible and is a triumphant song of victory written with intense personal emotion. It praises God, who brought “the stars in their courses” to combat Sisera, for the great victory. It applauds those tribes that participated in the battle and derides those who absented themselves. It also lavishes blessings on Jael and ends with a call for the destruction of all God’s enemies.
Deborah played an unusually prominent role for a woman of the period. She was the only female biblical judge and was a charismatic figure.