Who was Sisera in the Bible?

Captain of the army of Jabin king of the northern Canaanites. His army was overthrown with great destruction, through God's intervention, by Deborah and Barak. Sisera, thirsty and weary, sought shelter in the tent of Jael, who killed him with a tent peg driven through his head with a hammer — showing how God can energise a feeble instrument to work out His deliverance. See JAEL. Judges 4:2-22; Judges 5:20-31; 1 Sam. 12:9; Ps. 83:9.

Ehud evidently judged Israel during 80 years of peace, but after his death Israel again turned from the Lord's ways, doing evil in His sight. It is not said what evil, but their lapses apparently always involved worshiping the idols of the nations. On this occasion the Lord delivered Israel into the hand of Jabin king of Canaan (v. 2). Jabin's name means"he will understand," for Canaanites ("traffickers") are keen to discern where they may make material gain, and religion is one of the most convenient ways for them. This enemy has too often afflicted the Church of God too. The commander of his army was Sisera, and Israel was under bondage to them for 20 years (v. 3) until they could no longer endure the cruel bondage they suffered. Material gain may be attractive to us at first, but it will soon involve us in things that cause the believer's conscience to trouble him enough to cry out for deliverance. This enemy was a formidable one, having 900 chariots of iron.

Sold into the hand of Jabin (4:1-2) 2. The cry of the children of Israel (4:3) 3. Deborah and Barak (4:4-11) 4. The conflict and Jael's deed (4:12-24)

Ehud the mighty instrument of Jehovah had died, and again the children of Israel lapsed into evil. Then the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin, King of Canaan, that reigned in Hazor. His captain was Sisera, which dwelt in Harosheth of the Gentiles. A powerful oppressor he was, for this King had nine hundred chariots of iron and oppressed Israel twenty years. About one hundred and thirty years before Joshua had overcome Jabin, King of Hazor. "He took Hazor and smote the King thereof with the sword, for Hazor before him was the head of all these kingdoms." All were slain and Hazor was burnt with fire. And now the Lord sold them into his hand. This Jabin is a successor of the one whom Joshua had killed. Hazor had been built again out of its ruins. We see, so to speak, a resurrection of an old enemy. It is significant too that this declension and captivity under Jabin is the third one. As mentioned in annotations on Genesis the number three stands everywhere in the Word for revival and resurrection. The former enemy enslaves Israel once more. How often has this been the case in the history of the church, and how true it is today. Satan knows how to revive old errors and evils and use them to bring God's people into captivity. And is it not so in our individual experience? Some sin which overpowered us was through the grace and strength of Christ and of His Spirit mastered, and its power broken. But can that same sin not be revived? Is it forever gone? If there is neglect of prayer, no childlike dependence in true humility, no watchfulness, it will, like Jabin, return and domineer over us in even greater power than before. Jabin means "discerning"--"understanding." This city Hazor, where he dwelt, means "enclosure." This Jabin represents human intellect, the understanding of the natural man, which is corrupt and opposed to God and to His revelation. It is the wisdom of the world. Jabin is in his own "enclosure," which rejects and excludes what God has given. The Christian believer is called upon to bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. "Casting down imaginations (reasonings), and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought to the obedience of Christ" (2 Cor. 10:5). Man's own thoughts, his natural understanding, must be completely subjected to God's Word. How much of this spirit of exaltation against the knowledge of God is about us and in the professing church! Higher criticism belongs here. All the errors in doctrine, affecting always the Person of our Lord, are the results of putting the thoughts of man above the Word of God. Then in connection with this we must think of the sects and parties, the works of the flesh, that is the natural man and his reasonings, which have divided the body of Christ. These divisions are "the enclosures" of Jabin.

After the death of Ehud, Israel resumed their sinful ways, and Jehovah gave them into the hand of Jabin king of Canaan, the captain of whose army was Sisera. This powerful king, with his nine hundred chariots of iron, "mightily oppressed the children of Israel twenty years" (Judges 4:1-3). Under the oppression of Jabin, the children of Israel cried to Jehovah, and in spite of all their repeated failures, He heard their cry.

That it is Jabin, of all the Canaanite kings, that we find thus revived, must, of course, have its significance also. The revival of the Canaanite would naturally be shown in one who is, in some sense at least, the typical Canaanite. Nothing can be in Scripture which does not speak to the ear that is open. Jabin, too, is emphatically here, not merely, as in the book of Joshua, "king of Hazor," but, over and over again, "king of Canaan." The meaning of these names we already know. Jabin means "discerning"; Hazor, "enclosure." As the enemy of the people of God, it is the wisdom of the world with which we have here to do — a wisdom which reigns in its own "enclosure," shut up, as is the constant fashion, in cliques and parties and philosophies, by which it elevates itself over what is outside its boundary. The spirit of it is easily manifest as that of self: self-interest, self-assertion, self-satisfaction, the true "trader" or Canaanite spirit, that of gain. The inroad of this into the Church was early indeed. "All seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ," was said, in the apostle's days, of those at Rome. (Phil. 2:21.) Of the Ephesian elders it was prophesied, "Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them." (Acts 20:30.) But already at Corinth the sects and parties produced by such attempts were being formed, as we know, and the true people of God were becoming subject to Jabin's rule; and this has developed much more widely since, even until the Church of God has been broken up into various denominations, to the dishonor of the One Name which is upon us all. This, then, is the true Canaanite revival shadowed here.

The captain of Jabin's host is Sisera, whose name means, according to Gesenius, "battle-array"; and who dwells in Harosheth ("carving, cutting, artificers' work") of the nations. Such names should not be difficult to read in such a connection. The strife of sects, the odium theologicum, is notorious; and how the sects themselves are thus maintained needs no insisting on. Sisera is still captain of the host. The very truths of God's word are often arrayed against one another, and, allied with errors of greater or less gravity, become but the battle-cries of partisans. And when we realize whom the Canaanite leaders represent — "the spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places" — how serious becomes the aspect of evil here! The assault of Satan is most of all against the truth, the power of which he recognizes well enough, and which he can no more easily prevail against than by dividing it, so to speak, against itself, and allying it with some deceit of his own devising. Thus what is of God is prejudiced in the eyes of His people by the associations in which they find it; while, on the other hand, many, seeing it to be truth, are put off their guard as to these, and receive along with it some deadly error. How, for instance, has the truth of the Lord's coming been mixed up with the abominations of materialism, the denial of eternal punishment, and many another thing, until the very one whose heart would welcome it, if otherwise presented, looks upon it as a synonym for heresy of this kind! How important, therefore, here is God's word to Jeremiah, "If thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth." (Jer. 15:19.) But, in general, how little are we able to find the truth in the creed of another! in another sense than the true, what one sees in the Shulamite is indeed "but the company of two armies." On both sides the truth suffers, while it is made the power and preservative principle of error itself, which, if simply that, would soon find at the hands of every Christian its merited judgment.

Jehovah discomfited Sisera and his chariots and his host, by the swords of the Israelites, and apparently the overthrow was completed by a severe storm and the overflowing of the river Kishon. Judges 4:6-17; Judges 5:20-21. The Canaanites being smitten, Sisera left his chariot and fled for refuge to the house of Heber the Kenite, where he was killed by Jael, Heber's wife. Judges 4:18-24. Judges 5: gives the song of Deborah and Barak over the victory. Barak's faith is like that of many who can follow if another will lead, though they cannot take a first place; it is very gracious of God to mention Barak in Heb. 11:32 as one in the cloud of witnesses who had become victorious by their faith.

With the Lord going before, the victory was assured and decisive. Sisera, his chariots and all his army were totally routed (v. 15). Sisera himself left his chariot and fled on foot. He evidently escaped the observation of the Israelites, but otherwise "not a man was left of all the Canaanite army" (v.16).

Sisera, the commander of the Canaanites, when soundly defeated by Israel, was able to escape alone, and to find the tent of Heber the Kenite (v. 17), whom he thought to be friendly to him because there was no conflict at that time between Heber and Jabin. When Sisera approached, Jael, the wife of Heber, met him with welcoming words (v. 18), inviting him into the tent, where she covered the weary man with a blanket. He asked for water to drink, and she gave him milk.

(1) Sisera was the great leader, and his name means, "he that binds with chains", and we are well aware that the great captive-maker is Satan himself. He was finally destroyed by that which was very weak in itself — his head was bruised, even to death, by a woman and a nail of the tent, and Jesus, the woman's Seed, has bruised the serpent's head. Men despised Him, because He was meek and lowly; His death was weakness and folly in their eyes, but —

Then the captain of the host is a great warrior. Poor man has high thoughts of his attainments and his knowledge. When you touch a man's knowledge you touch his pride. From this comes contention, each one asserting the truth of his own position. The apostle James answers his question, "From whence come wars and fightings among you?" by replying, "Come they not hence even of your lusts that war in your members?" There are lusts of the mind as well as grosser desires, and these beget a desire for war. The captain of Jabin's host, who is a warrior, is Sisera, which fittingly means a "battle array."

Wife of Heber the Kenite, a descendant of Jethro, father-in-law of Moses, who was head of an Arab clan which was established in the north of Palestine. When Sisera's army was defeated by Barak and Deborah, he left his chariot and fled on foot to the tent of Jael, whose husband was at peace with Jabin. Jael invited him into her tent, and bade him not to fear, gave him milk to drink, and covered him up. Being weary he fell asleep, and Jael with a hammer drove a tent-peg through his temples till it entered the ground. Judges 4:17-22; Judges 5:6, 24.

Great indignation has been expressed at this act of Jael, and even Christians have blamed her severely; but it was foretold that Jehovah would "sell Sisera into the hand of a woman;" and immediately after the deed, it is added, "So God subdued on that day Jabin the king of Canaan before the children of Israel." And Deborah, in her song of praise, pronounced Jael to be "blessed above women." It is clear from this song that Sisera was an enemy not only of God's people, but of the Lord Himself, for she prophetically utters the words, "So let all thine enemies perish, O Lord." Compare Num. 10:35. Hence God empowered Jael to take his life — as He had led Joshua in some instances to destroy the women and children of the places conquered by him. Where an act is clearly the execution of God's righteous judgement, it rises altogether above what would be justifiable under ordinary circumstances of hospitality or of warfare. Of course in some instances the thing accomplished may be according to the will of God, but not the way in which it is effected.