A Prophecy Fulfilled

Sisera, general of the Canaanites, signals retreat from the onslaught of Barak and the Israelites by leaving his chariot and fleeing the battlefield on foot. While some of the chariots apparently are able to draw away (4:16), Barak tracks them down, along with all the Canaanite foot soldiers, and puts an end to them. Sisera, therefore, is the last survivor of his army, but Barak is soon hot on his trail.

We are told that Sisera flees to the tent of Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, for Heber is at peace with Sisera’s lord, King Jabin. This may not be his ultimate destination, however, for when Jael meets him in his flight she must urge him to stop and to have no fear. He finally accepts her invitation and enters the tent, where she gives him a blanket, either for concealment or to warm his body; milk to slake his thirst; and a place to rest. And so he drifts away to sleep, asking her to deny his presence should any man come inquiring for him. Significantly, however, she makes no promises to lie on his behalf. And once he is asleep, she proves herself to be not his ally but his deadly enemy. “Whether she designed this or no when she invited him into her tent does not appear,” Matthew Henry writes. “Probably the thought was darted into her mind when she saw him lie so convenientiy to receive such a fatal blow; and, doubtless, the thought came not from Satan as a murderer and destroyer, but from God as a righteous judge and avenger.” Moved to break the peace between her husband and Jabin so as to strike a blow on behalf of the people of Israel, Jael takes a tent peg and drives it into Sisera’s temple with a hammer, killing him and pinning his body to the ground. And so Barak, coming in pursuit of his quarry, finds him dead in Jael’s tent. Looking on Sisera’s body, he sees the unexpected fulfillment of the prophecy of Deborah (4:9).

The battle at Mount Tabor breaks Jabin’s power, and God continues to strengthen Israel until he is finally destroyed. Another oppressor is thus thrown off, but in the process Israel finally makes some progress against the Canaanites, as well. “The Israelites, having soundly smarted for their foolish pity in not doing it before, resolve now it is in their power to indulge them no longer, but to make a thorough riddance of them, as a people to whom to show mercy was as contrary to their own interest as it was to God’s command,” Henry writes.