Sisera
|
|
Sisera, mentioned in the Book of Judges 4:2 in the Hebrew Bible, was the captain of Jabin's army which was routed and destroyed by the army of Barak on the plain of Esdraelon.
His name is usually regarded as Hittite or Hurrian. Some speculated that its origins were Egyptian (Ses-Ra, "servant of Ra").
After all was lost he fled to the settlement of Heber the Kenite in the plain of Zaanaim. Jael, Heber's wife, received him into her tent with apparent hospitality, and "gave him butter" (i.e., lebben, or curdled milk) "in a lordly dish." Having drunk the refreshing beverage, he lay down, and soon sank into the sleep of the weary. While he lay asleep Jael crept stealthily up to him, and taking in her hand one of the tent pegs, with a mallet she drove it with such force through his temples that it entered into the ground where he lay, and "at her feet he bowed, he fell; where he bowed, there he fell down dead."
Sisera in the Midrash
According to the Midrash (Yalḳuṭ Shim'oni on Judges iv. 3), Sisera hitherto had conquered every country against which he had fought. His voice was so strong that when he called loudly the most solid wall would shake and the wildest animal would fall dead. Deborah was the only one who could withstand his voice and whom it did not cause to stir from her place. Sisera caught fishenough in his beard when bathing in the Kishon to provision his whole army. According to the same source (lii., end), thirty-one kings followed Sisera merely for the opportunity of drinking, or otherwise using, the waters of Israel. The descendants of Sisera, according to B.Gittin 57b, were teachers of the young in Jerusalem.
- Sisera, the ancestor of some of the Nethinim who returned with Zerubbabel (Ezra 2:53; Neh. 7:55).