//In Judges chapter four, a female warrior named Deborah predicts that an enemy general named Sisera will die by the hand of a woman. Perhaps she imagines that she, herself, will slay Sisera; we don’t know.

Her prediction comes true. A few verses later a woman named Jael lures Sisera into a tent with her, covers him with a rug and gives him some milk. When he falls asleep, she quietly drives a tent peg through his temple.

“Most blessed of women be Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, most blessed of tent-dwelling women. He asked for water, and she gave him milk; in a bowl fit for nobles she brought him curdled milk. Her hand reached for the tent peg, her right hand for the workman’s hammer. She struck Sisera, she crushed his head, she shattered and pierced his temple. At her feet he sank, he fell; there he lay. At her feet he sank, he fell; where he sank, there he fell–dead.” –Judges 5:26-27

While the peg is still colored with blood, the legend is already growing. In Deborah’s rendition, Jael taunts Sisera with curdled milk before striking his head with a hammer, and he falls down at her feet, dead. Perhaps that is the version Deborah was told?

Deborah then wraps up the victory hymn by mocking the mother of Sisera, who she imagines peering through a window waiting for her son to arrive back from battle. Yikes! Guys, there’s a lesson, here … don’t anger the women.

I enjoy Bible-based historical fiction, so long as it doesn’t get too romancy. This one pushes the limit for me (hey, I’m just a guy), but the gooeyness didn’t detract from the scholarship and culture. Do be aware that by “culture,” we’re talking about the very tip…royalty in the king’s palace, not us common folk.

//Yesterday, we discussed a few verses that might help pin down this slippery topic of whether or not abortion is a sin. In the minds of most people, it comes down to a question of when the fetus is alive.

Today’s verse may contain the Biblical answer. If a pregnant woman is caused to have a miscarriage, but she herself is not harmed, the person who hurt her is fined. But no consideration is given to the lost baby; the fetus is not considered alive, and only the life of the woman is considered.

However, this is not the end of the story. When the original Hebrew was translated into Greek in the Septuagint, the wording changed. “If two men fight and they strike a woman who is pregnant, and her child comes out while not yet fully formed, he will be forced to pay a fine … but if it is fully formed, he will give life for life …”

So, while the original Hebrew seems to indicate that life begins at birth (the Mishnah agrees; see Niddah 5:3), the Greek translators, one or two centuries before Christ, were troubled by this, and decided that life begins “when fully formed.”

The debate continues even today.

What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?

Words for the heart, at least in times of comfort. But note how Job, in his misery, twists this verse around:

Job sees not a God who attends to the needs of individuals, but a God who meddles in human lives, testing us unmercifully. “Can’t you just leave me alone?” Job whines.

Which picture of God do you see?

//Maybe you’ve heard of the Jubilee, which comes every 50 years. After seven times seven years, the next year is a Jubilee year, where the land is to rest. No sowing and no reaping, just eat directly from the vines.

Moreover, on the Jubilee year, any land you once owned which was purchased by another returns to your possession. This seems like a strange law, preventing any type of permanent change in land ownership. It also seems unfair to the buyer, for who would invest in land which would eventually revert back to the original owner?

If you’ve ever wondered about a potential buyer’s motivation, the answer is plainly spelled out in scripture; it’s just hidden in a book that’s hardly read. The Law actually encourages setting the purchase price on a pro rata basis, given what you are actually purchasing:

If you sell land to one of your countrymen or buy any from him, do not take advantage of each other. You are to buy from your countryman on the basis of the number of years since the Jubilee. And he is to sell to you on the basis of the number of years left for harvesting crops. When the years are many, you are to increase the price, and when the years are few, you are to decrease the price, because what he is really selling you is the number of crops. –Leviticus 25:14-16