Judges 4:1-9

Deborah Summons Barak

4:1 The Israelites again did evil in the Lord’s sight ¹  after Ehud’s death. 4:2 The Lord turned them over to ²  King Jabin of Canaan, who ruled in Hazor. ³  The general of his army was Sisera, who lived in Harosheth Haggoyim. ⁴  4:3 The Israelites cried out for help to the Lord, because Sisera ⁵  had nine hundred chariots with iron-rimmed wheels, ⁶  and he cruelly ⁷  oppressed the Israelites for twenty years.

4:4 Now Deborah, a prophetess, ⁸  wife of Lappidoth, was ⁹  leading ¹⁰  Israel at that time. 4:5 She would sit ¹¹  under the Date Palm Tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel ¹²  in the Ephraimite hill country. The Israelites would come up to her to have their disputes settled. ¹³ 

4:6 She summoned ¹⁴  Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali. She said to him, “Is it not true that the Lord God of Israel is commanding you? Go, march to Mount Tabor! Take with you ten thousand men from Naphtali and Zebulun! 4:7 I will bring Sisera, the general of Jabin’s army, to you at the Kishon River, along with his chariots and huge army. ¹⁵  I will hand him over to you.” 4:8 Barak said to her, “If you go with me, I will go. But if you do not go with me, I will not go.” 4:9 She said, “I will indeed go with you. But you will not gain fame ¹⁶  on the expedition you are undertaking, ¹⁷  for the Lord will turn Sisera over to a woman.” ¹⁸  Deborah got up and went with Barak to Kedesh.

[4:1]  ¹ tn Heb “did evil in the eyes of the Lord.”

[4:2]  ² tn Heb “the Lord sold them into the hands of.”

[4:2]  ³ tn Or “King Jabin of Hazor, a Canaanite ruler.”

[4:2]  ⁴ tn Or “Harosheth of the Pagan Nations”; cf. KJV “Harosheth of the Gentiles.”

[4:3]  ⁵ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Sisera) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[4:3]  ⁶ tn Regarding the translation “chariots with iron-rimmed wheels,” see Y. Yadin, The Art of Warfare in Biblical Lands, 255, and the article by R. Drews, “The ‘Chariots of Iron’ of Joshua and Judges,” JSOT 45 (1989): 15-23.

[4:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “with strength.”

[4:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “ a woman, a prophetess.” In Hebrew idiom the generic “woman” sometimes precedes the more specific designation. See GKC 437-38 §135.b.

[4:4]  ⁹ tn Heb “she was.” The pronoun refers back to the nominative absolute “Deborah.” Hebrew style sometimes employs such resumptive pronouns when lengthy qualifiers separate the subject from the verb.

[4:4]  ¹⁰ tn Or “judging.”

[4:5]  ¹¹ tn That is, “consider legal disputes.”

[4:5]  ¹² map For location see Map4 G4; Map5 C1; Map6 E3; Map7 D1; Map8 G3.

[4:5]  ¹³ tn Heb “for judgment.”

[4:6]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “sent and summoned.”

[4:7]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “horde”; “multitude.”

[4:9]  ¹⁶ tn Or “honor.”

[4:9]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “on [account of (?)] the way which you are walking.” Another option is to translate, “due to the way you are going about this.” In this case direct reference is made to Barak’s hesitancy as the reason for his loss of glory.

[4:9]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “for into the hands of a woman the Lord will sell Sisera.”