Why did you tarry among the sheepfolds?
to hear the piping for the flocks?
Gilead stayed beyond the Jordan;
and Dan, why did he abide with the ships?
Asher sat still at the coast of the sea,
settling down by his landings.
Zebulun is a people that scorned death;
Naphtali too, on the heights of the field.
“The kings came, they fought;
then fought the kings of Canaan,
at Taanach, by the waters of Megiddo;
they got no spoils of silver.”
The stars fought from heaven,
from their courses they fought against Sisera.
The torrent Kishon swept them away,
the onrushing torrent, the torrent Kishon.
March on, my soul, with might!
Then loud beat the horses’ hoofs
with the galloping, galloping of his steeds.
Curse Meroz, says the angel of יהוה,
curse bitterly its inhabitants,
because they did not come to the help of יהוה,
to the help of יהוה against the mighty.
Most blessed of women is Jael,
the wife of Heber the Kenite,
of tent-dwelling women most blessed.
He asked for water and she gave him milk,
she brought him curds in a lordly bowl.
She put her hand to the tent peg
and her right hand to the workmen’s mallet;
she struck Sisera a blow,
she crushed his head,
she shattered and pierced his temple.
He sank, he fell;
where he sank, there he fell dead.
Out of the window she peered,
the mother of Sisera gazed through the lattice:
“Why is his chariot so long in coming?
Why tarry the hoof beats of his chariots?
Her wisest ladies make answer,
indeed, she answers the question herself:
Are they not finding and dividing the spoil?”
A girl or two for every man;
spoil of dyed stuffs for Sisera,
spoil of dyed stuffs embroidered
for my neck as spoil?
So perish all your enemies, O יהוה!
But may your friends be like the sun
as it rises in its might.”
The importance of this poem or hymn of praise is striking in its similarity to the Ugaritic language wherein the poet in Judges 5 describes a theophany. In this earliest instance, the mountains quaked before YHWH, the One of Sinai, before YHWH, the God of Israel (Judg 5:5). The translation of the verb quake assumes the form נָזֹלּוּ (nazollu) from the root זָלַל (zalal, to shiver and shake). Some scholars interpret the Hebrew in the sense of flowing, liquid matter (as in volcanic magma). The LXX, the Syriac Peshitta, and the Targum all understand the word נָזֹלּוּ (nazollu) in this way. Indicative of the theophanic formula is the appearance of the angel of יהוה (Judg 5:23) with יהוה personified as the divine warrior defending the ancient clans from their enemies in Canaan.
It is an instructive bit of song for it introduces us into the world of Hebraic poetry–a world which in another thousand years will usher forth in Sepher Tehillim, the book of Praises. The theophany described as it is portrayed in Judges 5 is disclosed in this ancient poem dating from the late thirteent-century BCE—not far removed from the events being celebrated. Ancient Israel’s first psalm in Judges 5, Deborah’s Song, is “the oldest surviving extended fragment of Hebrew literature.” (REB p. 251).
It is explicitly described as having been sung and it is one of the earliest markers that can be traced to having been laid down at the dawn of the Hebraic traditions. The traditions of ancient Israel refer not only to the sacred texts that have come down to us but also include the life of worship and the liturgies that shaped that worship. Israel’s psalms are the best examples we have from the Hebrew scriptures of the shape and the shaping of ancient Israel’s worshiping life. In them we have the words Israel spoke in response to the word of יהוה being addressed to them. The origins of several other key markers, one of which is the Zion tradition, is directly connected to the ark narratives. The tradition of the election of Zion by יהוה is, of course, based upon the bringing of the ark to Jerusalem. 58 The connection of the ark tradition with the temple is later called into question by the prophets, particularly Jeremiah.59
There are many patterns of thought connected with the ark in the Hebrew scriptures. It was originally designated as the ark of Elohim which is the general usage in the books of Samuel. It was considered the place where יהוה was enthroned (Num 10:35–36; I Sam 4:4; II Sam 6:2). With the ark was connected the idea of יהוה as leader of the host. In deuteronomistic thought the ark and the covenant are joined and the “Ark of the Covenant” is said to contain the tables of the law. In chronistic thought, the cherubim are for the protection of the law and not for the place where יהוה sits enthroned. In the story of II Sam 6, the ark is brought to Jerusalem and merely placed in a tent. Later the building of the temple and the housing of the ark are combined.
The presence of the ark in Jerusalem meant that יהוה dwelt in the midst of [his] people. Centered around the choice of Jerusalem by יהוה as [his] dwelling place was, very much like the Davidic election tradition, joined to and expanded by pre-Israelite traditions. This is so from the very earliest compositions to the latter ones and brings the book of Psalms to its final resolution and close. The ark represented the presence of God at the heart of historic ancient Israel’s corporate life and worship. It is in these traditions rather than in the prophetic work of Isaiah, for example, that the origin of the tradition of Zion’s inviolability must be found. Memories of the ark of God continued to resonate deeply in the collective consciousness of the psalmists.
“The narratives on the youth of Samuel (eleventh century B.C.E.) were written in later times and edited by the Deuteronomistic school, but they include an incidental note on the ark, which bears the mark of authenticity . . . the ark was apparently kept in the temple of Shiloh, in the central mountain range of Ephraim, but there is no indication that it played any significant part in the life of the nation. The narrative merely states: ‘The lamp of Elohim had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the temple of Yahweh, where the ark of Elohim was . . .’ (I Sam. 3:3). The text does not suggest that the cultic object was considered as the visible sign of the permanent presence of Yahweh in the shrine. On the contrary, the recital of the vision in which Samuel was called to a prophetic mission clearly implies that the divine manifestation was distinct from the ark. The renaissance of interest in the ark under David was the prelude to a most important development in the Hebraic theology of presence. It contributed to the astounding development of the myth of Zion.”60
The concept of God’s dwelling in Zion has its origins in, and is based on, the presence of the ark of God in the temple in Jerusalem. 61A variant prophetic tradition made certain distinctions relative to the ark and temple. 62From several narratives in the Hebrew Scriptures, we know that the ark was closely associated with the presence of God. In some 75 psalms dispersed throughout all five books of the Psalter, the presence of God in Zion is an essential feature, whether in the prayers of the communal longing to return “home”