Lives of Scripture

Sisera commanded the army of Jabin, king of Canaan, whose nine hundred iron chariots had oppressed Israel for twenty years (Judges 4:2-3). When the prophetess Deborah summoned Barak to battle at Mount Tabor, Barak agreed only if Deborah went with him, so Deborah told him the LORD would deliver Sisera into the hand of a woman instead of his (4:6-9). At the Kishon River, the LORD threw Sisera's army into a panic before Israel, and Sisera abandoned his chariot to flee on foot, leaving his entire army to be destroyed (4:14-16). He ran to the tent of Jael, wife of Heber the Kenite, whose clan was at peace with Jabin, and she welcomed him, gave him milk when he asked for water, and covered him while he slept (4:17-19). While Sisera slept exhausted, Jael drove a tent peg through his temple with a hammer, killing him -- fulfilling Deborah's word that the honor of his defeat would belong to a woman (4:21-22). Judges 5's victory song celebrates the moment further, picturing Sisera's mother waiting anxiously at a window for a son who would never return, wondering why his chariot delayed (5:28-30). Sisera's downfall, engineered entirely outside the expected battlefield, became one of Israel's great deliverance stories, later recalled by the prophet Samuel and the psalmist as an example of God defeating Israel's enemies (1 Samuel 12:9; Psalm 83:9).