Jael and the use of Deception

A Shincheonji person may point to the following story to justify the “wisdom of hiding”:

Judges 4:17-21 – 17 Now Sisera fled on foot to the tent of Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite, because there was peace between Jabin the king of Hazor and the house of Heber the Kenite. 18 And Jael went out to meet Sisera, and said to him, “Turn aside, my master, turn aside to me! Do not be afraid.” So he turned aside to her into the tent, and she covered him with a [a]rug. 19 And he said to her, “Please give me a little water to drink, for I am thirsty.” So she opened a leather bottle of milk and gave him a drink; then she covered him. 20 And he said to her, “Stand in the doorway of the tent, and it shall be if anyone comes and inquires of you, and says, ‘Is there anyone here?’ that you shall say, ‘No.’” 21 But Jael, Heber’s wife, took a tent peg and [b]a hammer in her hand, and went secretly to him and drove the peg into his temple, and it went through into the ground; for he was sound asleep and exhausted. So he died.

This passage from Judges 4:17-21 describes a dramatic sequence of events involving Sisera, the commander of the Canaanite army, and Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite:

1. Sisera flees on foot to Jael’s tent after his army’s defeat, seeking refuge because there was peace between his king, Jabin, and Heber’s house.
2. Jael invites Sisera into her tent, offering him sanctuary and covering him with a rug.
3. Sisera asks for water, but Jael gives him milk instead and covers him again.
4. Sisera instructs Jael to stand at the tent entrance and deny his presence if anyone comes looking for him.
5. While Sisera is sleeping deeply, exhausted from the battle, Jael takes a tent peg and a hammer.
6. Jael secretly approaches Sisera and drives the tent peg through his temple into the ground, killing him.

Jael deceived the enemy Sisera, and drove the tent peg through the enemy’s temple, accomplishing God’s will of protecting Israel. She was even praised for her actions, in Judges 5:24. This is another example of how the use of deception is justified to further God’s will.

Jael and the Importance of Context

In evaluating Jael’s act, there are several factors to be brought into focus. 

For one thing, after the defeat of Sisera’s army and the reestablishment of the Israelite government, Jael would be liable to a charge of harboring a fugitive criminal if she did receive him as a guest into her tent.

Furthermore, Jael, being apparently alone at the time, was in no position to refuse him entrance, armed and powerful warrior as he was, or to order him to go on and seek refuge somewhere else. Undoubtedly, had she attempted this, he would have forced his way into the tent anyway; and probably he would have killed her first, in order to keep her from betraying his whereabouts.

Finally, Sisera represented a brutal and tyrannous oppression of God’s people that might well be renewed at a later time, if he were permitted to escape. This meant that Jael herself would have been involved in the guilt of the slaughter of many innocent lives in Sisera’s future career of aggression against the northern tribes of Israel. 

She was not ready to involve herself in complicity with this guilt. Nor was she willing to face the almost certain prospect that she and her husband would both be disgraced and put to death as traitors to Israel after the victorious troops of Deborah and Barak had traced Sisera’s flight to her home. 

Nor would Jael’s own sense of commitment to Yahweh and His people have permitted her to side with His enemy in this fashion. She therefore had little choice but to adopt the strategy that she did. Facing an anguishing alternative between two moral principles, she had to choose the lesser of two evils.

Gleason L. Archer, New International Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties, Zondervan’s Understand the Bible Reference Series (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1982), 163–164.