When Lightning Strikes, Judges 4, 11/1923
Judges 4:1-10, 12-16
Rev. Dr. Rhonda Abbott Blevins
November 19, 2023
Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord, now that Ehud was dead. So the Lord sold them into the hands of Jabin king of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor. Sisera, the commander of his army, was based in Harosheth Haggoyim. Because he had nine hundred chariots fitted with iron and had cruelly oppressed the Israelites for twenty years, they cried to the Lord for help. Now Deborah, a prophet, the wife of Lappidoth, was leading Israel at that time. She held court under the Palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim, and the Israelites went up to her to have their disputes decided. She sent for Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali and said to him, “The Lord, the God of Israel, commands you: ‘Go, take with you ten thousand men of Naphtali and Zebulun and lead them up to Mount Tabor. I will lead Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s army, with his chariots and his troops to the Kishon River and give him into your hands.’” Barak said to her, “If you go with me, I will go; but if you don’t go with me, I won’t go.” “Certainly I will go with you,” said Deborah. “But because of the course you are taking, the honor will not be yours, for the Lord will deliver Sisera into the hands of a woman.” So Deborah went with Barak to Kedesh. There Barak summoned Zebulun and Naphtali, and ten thousand men went up under his command. Deborah also went up with him. When they told Sisera that Barak son of Abinoam had gone up to Mount Tabor, Sisera summoned from Harosheth Haggoyim to the Kishon River all his men and his nine hundred chariots fitted with iron. Then Deborah said to Barak, “Go! This is the day the Lord has given Sisera into your hands. Has not the Lord gone ahead of you?” So Barak went down Mount Tabor, with ten thousand men following him. At Barak’s advance, the Lord routed Sisera and all his chariots and army by the sword, and Sisera got down from his chariot and fled on foot. Barak pursued the chariots and army as far as Harosheth Haggoyim, and all Sisera’s troops fell by the sword; not a man was left.
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I was this-week-years-old when I discovered something new about one of my favorite characters in the Bible. And for a Bible nerd like me, I get pretty excited when some totally new insight, something totally unexpected, finds its way into my understanding. And that happened this week! Like a lightning bolt!
So I’m driving to church one morning, and like most people, I was listening to a podcast by a couple of Old Testament scholars. (That’s what you do in the car, right?) And the scholars were discussing the text we read together from Judges 4 about the prophet Deborah.
Now, let me pause here, and tell you that Deborah is one of my all-time-favorite biblical characters. You’ve got Jesus first, and then Deborah is up there in the running for the number two spot for me. Here’s why. As a young woman feeling called into the ministry out of a denomination that prohibits women from serving as pastors, I had all kinds of people telling me I was either mistaken or downright sinful for thinking I might want to be a pastor one day. And it’s possible that I was too young and stupid not to try to prove them otherwise. So sometimes, I would ask them if they’d ever read Judges 4. They would say they had (whether they had or not). And I would remind them that Deborah, a woman, had been placed by God not just as a pastor, but as the leader of the entire nation of Israel. Boom!
Now you know why I love Deborah so much, and why it’s exciting for me to learn something new about her this week—a brand new discovery about one of my top 5 favorite biblical characters. And there may be some insight for each of us today—some truth for our lives— from this new discovery about Deborah as well. Do you want to know about this new revelation I discovered this week? Not so fast! (How do you like that teaser, huh?)
First, I want to set Deborah’s story in context. So let’s remember the arc of this unfolding story in the Old Testament . . .
· Moses led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, but they wandered in the wilderness for 40 years, then Moses died.
· Then Joshua led the Israelites across the Jordan River into the promised land, where they conquered kings and drove out the people—a lot of the people, ok, some of the people—living there and claimed the land for themselves, then Joshua died.
Throughout this period, Israel’s form of governance was a theocracy—a “government by God” or God as king. Moses and Joshua were God’s chosen vessels, but God was king. After Joshua died, and as the people of Israel settled into the Promised Land, God raised up judges from among the people, but not judges like we think of judges today. They were more like tribal chiefs, leaders over the individual tribes of Israel (remember, there were twelve tribes).
There’s a repeating pattern in the book of Judges (which is a very disturbing, bloody book, by the way). God delivered the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt to be a holy people. “Holy” means “set apart.” Unique. Different. But what happens when the Israelites begin settling into the land of Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites and all the other “ites”? The Israelites begin adopting their ways, worshiping their gods, even taking up the practice of child sacrifice, which God put a stop to way back when God provided a ram for Abraham to sacrifice instead of his son, Isaac.
So the pattern throughout the book of Judges goes something like this:
· Sin (the people sin against God)
· Oppression (God allows foreign entities oppress the Israelites)
· Repentance (the people repent of their sin)
· Deliverance (God raises up a judge to deliver them)
· Peace (the Israelites experience a time of relative peace)
And then the cycle happens all over again.
In fact, “again” happens to be the first word in our pericope today: Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord. That’s phase one: “sin.”
Phase two, “oppression,” happens when King Jabin of Canaan and Sisera, the leader of Jabin’s army (with his 900 chariots of iron), “cruelly oppressed” Israel for twenty years.
Phase three: “repentance” happened when the Israelites cried to the Lord for help.
Phase four: “deliverance” in the form of a judge appointed by God—her name was Deborah. Deborah leads the Israelites to victory over their oppressors.
Phase five: The Israelite experience a period of relative peace.
Let’s look a little more closely at this individual we meet, this judge named Deborah. We’re introduced to Deborah in Judges 4:4: Now Deborah, a prophet, the wife of Lappidoth, was leading Israel at that time.
Are you ready for me to tell you the exciting new thing I learned about Deborah when I was “this-week-years-old?” The podcaster I was listening to on my drive to church was Dr. Rachel Wrenn, who has a PhD in Hebrew Bible. Dr. Wrenn points out that the phrase “wife of Lappidoth” can be translated quite differently.[1] This was my big epiphany about Deborah this week.
Now, you probably remember that the New Testament was originally written mostly in ancient Greek (with a bit of Aramaic here and there) while the Old Testament was originally written in Hebrew. It cracks me up when I encounter “King James only” Christians, as if Jesus walked around speaking the king’s tongue. Any English version of the Bible is a translation from the original languages. And, as you likely know, translation isn’t an exact science. Oftentimes, there is no exact translation of a word or a phrase. Translators must often make a choice. And that choice is always influenced by the translator’s culture and presuppositions. (I don’t say “always” a lot—but I do here!) That said, the English translations we read ALWAYS have been translated from original languages, and ALWAYS reflects the translator’s culture and presuppositions.
Back to Dr. Wrenn and her PhD in Hebrew Bible. She asks, “Who is Lappidoth?” naming that if Lappidoth is a person, he’s not mentioned anywhere else in scripture. Then Dr. Wrenn points out that the phrase “wife of Lappidoth” can be translated quite differently.
· The word “wife” is from the Hebrew word אִשָּׁה transliterated “ishshah.” “Ishshah” can be translated as “wife” and can also be translated as “woman” (and often is).
· The word “Lappidoth” is the feminine plural version of the word לַפִּיד
transliterated “lappid.” Would you like to know how the word “lappid” is translated every other place in the Bible? Lightning! Torch! Firebrand!
Deborah might have been the “wife of Lappidoth.” Or Deborah might have been the “woman of lightning!”
Mind. Blown.
So this firebrand named Deborah, the “woman of lightning,” is the leader God chooses to defeat King Jabin of Canaan. Lightning Woman devises a shrewd tactical strategy and summons her military leader, Barak, who tells her he will do as she says, but only if Deborah goes with him (who wouldn’t want Lightning Woman by their side in battle?) She agrees, but tells Barak that he won’t get the credit for victory, but that credit will go “to a woman.” (There’s that word again: אִשָּׁה transliterated “ishshah.”)
Now, the reader is led to believe that it will be Deborah who gets the credit for victory, but not so fast. You’ve got to keep reading the story (one of those bloody stories from Judges). Barak and Lightning Woman utterly destroy King Jabin’s army, so that not a man was left. Sisera, the commander, fled on foot.
Here’s how the story unfolds from there according to Judges 4:17-22:
Now Sisera had fled away on foot to the tent of Jael wife of Heber the Kenite, for there was peace between King Jabin of Hazor and the clan of Heber the Kenite. Jael came out to meet Sisera and said to him, “Turn aside, my lord, turn aside to me; have no fear.” So he turned aside to her into the tent, and she covered him with a rug. Then he said to her, “Please give me a little water to drink, for I am thirsty.” So she opened a skin of milk and gave him a drink and covered him. He said to her, “Stand at the entrance of the tent, and if anybody comes and asks you, ‘Is anyone here?’ say, ‘No.’ ” But Jael wife of Heber took a tent peg and took a hammer in her hand and went softly to him and drove the peg into his temple, until it went down into the ground—he was lying fast asleep from weariness—and he died. Then, as Barak came in pursuit of Sisera, Jael went out to meet him and said to him, “Come, and I will show you the man whom you are seeking.” So he went into her tent, and there was Sisera lying dead, with the tent peg in his temple.
So, that’s fun, right?
Deborah a.k.a. Lightning Woman wasn’t the one to whom victory was given. It was another woman, Jael, who single-handedly defeated the leader of King Jabin’s army.
OK. What do we make of this ancient story and these translation options and Deborah and Barak and Jabin and Sisera and Jael, forever immortalized with a hammer and tent peg in her hand? Are there lessons we can glean for the living of our lives?
I’m glad you asked. Here are the lessons I’ve found for me today, and maybe one or more of these will resonate with you as well.
Lesson #1: Don’t fall asleep in Jael’s tent! Sisera trusted Jael, so he let down his guard. The lesson in this for me is “you can’t trust everyone.” I tend to be naïve, and give people the benefit of the doubt. And that mostly serves me well. But there have been a few occasions when my trusting someone was a big mistake. Jesus told his disciples to “be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” (Matthew 10:16) That’s good advice for us as well.
Lesson #2: Don’t assume that there’s nothing more to learn about the Bible. No matter how much you imagine that you “get it,” that there’s really nothing more to learn and glean from our sacred texts, it’s just not true. One can never peel back all the layers of meaning—all the depths of truth. So keep reading! Keep studying! Keep coming to church and hearing these ancient stories unpacked. The Apostle Paul told Timothy, “Study to show thyself approved.” (2 Timothy 2:15) That’s good advice for us as well.
Lesson #3: Don’t let other people cloud the truth of who you are. Maybe Deborah was the “wife of Lappidoth” or maybe she was the “woman of lightning” (which seems entirely plausible given her high stature as the leader of Israel). Maybe there are all kinds of people telling you who you should be, who they want you to be. Society tries to squeeze us into all kinds of molds. But the truth eventually prevails! Jesus told his listeners one day, “Nothing is hidden that will not be disclosed, nor is anything secret that will not become known and come to light.” (Luke 8:17) So let the truth of who God created you to be shine like the sun and break forth like a bolt of lightning!
I close with a poem entitled, “When Lightning Strikes,” inspired by Deborah, woman of lightning. May we find inspiration in her story, to live the truth of who we were called to be.
when lightning strikes and shadows flee,
may wisdom grow and set us free.
the sacred tales we read with glee
shine light on who we’re yet to be.
deborah’s light, a guiding star,
reveals the hidden truth: we are
more than others wish we would be—
god’s spark, god’s light—in you and me.
this lightning gal, this firebrand queen
throughout the years, her strength unseen
until, at last, the truth laid bare,
her name is lightning, if we dare.
so let us hear when god unveils,
the hidden truths that time assails.
may wisdom grow and set us free
when lightning strikes and shadows flee.