Then Jael Heber's wife took a tent-pin, and took a hammer in her hand, and went softly to him, and struck the pin into his temples, and it pierced through into the ground; for he was in a deep sleep; so he swooned and died.
Even though Jael was God’s instrument of delivering Sisera into the Israelites’ hands, some scholars have criticized her methods. [Note: E.g., Keil and Delitzsch, p. 306. ] Compare Rahab’s lie and Ehud’s strategy. Oriental hospitality required Jael to protect her guest. Instead she treacherously assassinated him. Yet in the light of Sisera’s violation of hospitality customs it seems that Jael’s act was self-defense. Moreover, this was war, and holy war at that. What she did shows her commitment to do God’s will, namely, destroying the inhabitants of the land (cf. Deuteronomy 31:1-8; Deuteronomy 32; Joshua 1:1-9). [Note: Wood, Distressing Days . . ., pp. 198-99.] I believe that is the reason Deborah honored her in the poem that follows in chapter 5.