Judges 5 Study Notes

5:14-18 The response to God’s call to arms shows that Israel was not united. Ephraim . . . Benjamin . . . Machir (Manasseh), Zebulun . . . Issachar, and Naphtali came eagerly, but Reuben . . . Gilead (Gad), Dan, and Asher remained behind.

5:19-21 The climax of the song brings into view the battle itself. Defeating Jabin was in effect a defeat for all the kings of Canaan. Earthly kings were no match for the Lord’s heavenly host, the stars of the heavens, who fought on Israel’s side. Divine intervention was evidenced by a sudden storm that swelled the river Kishon, normally little more than a brook, into a raging torrent, and made Sisera’s horses and chariots useless.

5:22 Rather than galloping, galloping, Daniel Block believes the context better supports “the wild rearing of the stallions in the frenzy of battle.”

5:23 Meroz cannot be precisely identified. Most likely, they were an Israelite group who had adopted the ways of the Canaanites and remained outside the conflict, thereby earning a curse from the angel of the Lord.

5:24-27 The curse on Meroz forms a contrast with the blessing on Jael, a non-Israelite who came “to help the Lord with the warriors” (v. 23). She is lauded for her resourcefulness and cunning. A comparison to Eglon’s fatal encounter with Ehud is invited by a key comparison: Instead of a left-handed assassin, Jael did her work with her right hand. The end result for the oppressor is the same—the details of the death repeated with gory redundancy.

5:28-30 From the bloody murder scene, the song moves poignantly to the image of Sisera’s mother, waiting vainly for his return. Her ladies reassured her that what was delaying her son was just the time involved in dividing the spoil. Each soldier would need to select some choice garments for themselves and their ladies, and a girl or two, or more literally, a “womb or two,” highlighting the sexual and reproductive functions the captive women were expected to provide.

5:31 Reinforcing the theme that obedience to the Lord leads to rest and disobedience to death, the final note of the chapter is that the land had peace (lit “had rest”) for forty years.