Hebrew Life and Times

Driving an ox team.—So we can imagine the young Canaanites of those days watching a Hebrew farmer taking his first lesson with a team of oxen. There was a wooden yoke to lay on their necks; there was the two-wheeled farm cart with its long tongue to be fastened to the yoke. There was the goad, a long pole with a sharp point, to stick into the animals' flanks if they should balk. And probably there were many useful tricks to be learned; for example, words like our "Gee" and "Haw" and "Whoa," to shout at the animals when it was necessary to turn to the left or the right or to stop altogether.

Plowing was one of the most difficult of the tasks to be done with oxen. The furrows had to be run straight and true. And the plows were clumsy affairs—not like our shining steel plows to-day—just a long pole with a short diagonal crosspiece, sharpened at the lower end, or tipped with a small bronze share.

Crops of Ancient Canaan

The Hebrews raised the same crops as the earlier Canaanites. The leading ones were wheat, barley, olives, grapes, and figs. The two grain crops were, of course, the most necessary to life. They were planted in the early spring, and harvested in the summer. The grain was sown broadcast, by hand, just as Jesus describes in his great parable of the sower.

Ancient agriculture.—Harvesting and threshing were done almost entirely by hand. The grain was cut with sickles. Some of the old sickles have recently been found by investigators, buried deep in the mounds where ruined Canaanite cities lie hidden. Some of these sickles are of metal, and others are made of the jawbones of oxen or asses, with sharp flints driven into the tooth sockets. After the grain was cut it was tied in bundles and carried to the threshing floor, which was usually a wide, level space of hard ground or rock. Oxen were driven back and forth across the grain on the floor, drawing a heavy weight, until all or nearly all the kernels were shaken or crushed out of the heads. It usually took several days to thresh all the grain from an average-sized field. Then the straw was raked away, and the grain was left mixed with chaff and dust. The next windy day the winnowers, with large "fans," or wooden shovels, came and tossed the mingled chaff and dust and grain in the wind. The kernels of wheat fell back and the chaff and dust were blown away. Last of all, the good clean grain was gathered in baskets and bags, and hauled to the farmer's house, or to the granary, which was a round brick building standing beside or behind his house.

Vineyards and Olives

Another new experience of the Hebrews in Canaan was the culture of grapevines. The vineyards were often on hillsides, especially those facing the south, and hence warmed by the early spring sunshine. The soil on these hillsides had to be terraced so that the rain would not wash it away. The vines had to be planted, trained on trellises, and pruned. At the time of the grape harvest many of the grapes, especially of the sweeter varieties, were set aside for raisins. They were spread out on sheets in the hot sunshine until they were dry and wrinkled. Then they were packed away in jars, where they settled into delicious cakes. Figs were dried and packed in the same way.

The manufacture of wine.—Many of the grapes were used for wine. The juice of these was trodden out in wine-presses. These were large hollows several feet square, cut in the solid rock on the hillside. There were always two of them, one lower than the other, with connecting passages. The bunches of grapes were piled in great heaps in the higher of the two, and then it was great fun for the boys and girls and youths and maidens to jump barefooted and barelegged among the purple clusters, and trample them until the foaming red juice ran down into the lower of the stone chambers, where it was taken up with gourd dippers and poured into skins. The youngsters would come home with their legs and shirts all stained and spotted red.

Olive orchards.—Almost every Canaanite farm had a few olive trees or a small olive orchard. The olives were prized for the oil which was squeezed from them. This oil was used as we use butter, with bread and in cooking. It was also burned in lamps. In fact, it was their chief fuel for lighting purposes.

The olive press was a large stone with a hollow in the top. From the bottom of the hollow, a hole was drilled through to the outside of the stone. Across the hollow swung a wooden beam, one end riveted to a tree or another stone, and the other end carrying weights. The ripe olives were shaken from the trees, and basket full after basket full poured into the hollow stone. Then the weighted beam would be laid across the top, with flat stones under it, fitting down into the hollow over the olives. The oil, trickling out below, was strained and stored in jars.

Hard Work and Bright Hopes

Most of these different kinds of crops called for an immense amount of hard work and drudgery. Think of the weariness of the reapers, swinging their sickles in the wheat or barley all day long under the hot Syrian sun. Think of the winnowers, tossing the grain into the wind. Think of the aching backs of the plower and the sower. Of course there were happy hours, also. It was great fun to ride home behind the oxen, on a cart packed full and pressed down with golden sheaves. The time of treading out the grapes was a festival of laughter, love-making, and song. And in the rainy season, after a year of plentiful harvests, when the granaries and cellars were well stored, there must have been many happy days of quiet rest and play in Hebrew homes.

But most of all, what cheered them on was the hope of better days to come, when their children at least, or their children's children, would not have to toil quite so hard or so long each day, and when the danger of famine and starvation would not loom up quite so grimly as in the old days in the desert when one summer of drought might mean death for all. Here in Canaan, they thought, we will surely be happy by and by.

Study Topics

1. Explain the following Scripture passages, in the light of the customs described in this chapter: Isaiah 63. 2; Deuteronomy 25. 4; Matthew 3. 12.

2. Psalm 23. 1 draws a great lesson about God from the experiences of shepherd life. What lesson about God is drawn from farm life in Isaiah 5. 1-7?

CHAPTER VIIIToC

VILLAGE LIFE IN CANAAN

The farmers of ancient Canaan all lived in villages. No farmer would have dreamed of building an isolated house for his family on his own field out of sight of his nearest neighbor as our American farmers do. The danger from robbers would have been too great. Instead of that, the Hebrew farmer lived in the nearest village or town. Early in the morning he went out to his field, and in the evening returned to his home inside the protecting village walls.

These ancient villages would have seemed to us most unattractive places. The houses were crowded close together. The streets were only narrow crooked lanes between the houses. In the rear room of each house were the stalls of the family ox and ass. The brays of the ass were the alarm clock in the early morning. There was no drainage. Garbage was thrown into the street. There were smells of all varieties. One is not surprised by the frequent stories of pestilences in the Old-Testament history.

Compensations of village life.—It seems strange that people who were accustomed to life in the open desert should have ever brought themselves to settle down in these dirty, ill-smelling places. Surely, at first they must often have been homesick for the clean, pure air of the plains. On the other hand, probably most of them were willing to put up with the disagreeable odors and the dirty streets for the sake of being near other people. The desert was lonesome. In the village there was always something going on, something to hear and see, gossip of weddings and courtships and quarrels. Even to-day we find it hard to persuade those who are accustomed to the city to live in the country. Even though their city home may be a dark tenement in the slums, yet they enjoy being in a crowd of their fellow men. The country seems lonesome.

Lessons in House Building

This village and town life, like the work on the farm, was a new school for the Hebrew shepherds, and set many an interesting problem for them to solve. They had to learn to build and repair houses. They were most often built of rough stones set in mud. The mud, when dry, became fairly hard, but not like mortar or cement. It was always easy for a thief "to dig through and steal," as Jesus so graphically described. Even though no thief came the dried mud was always crumbling, leaving holes between the stones through which snakes or lizards could crawl. In such a house, if a man should lean against the wall, it might easily happen that a serpent would bite him, as the prophet Amos suggests.[3]

Primitive Homes.—The floor of the average poor man's house was simply the hard ground. The flat roof was made of poles thatched with straw or brushwood and covered over with mud or clay. There was seldom more than one room. Often there were no windows; even in the palaces of kings there were in those days no windows of glass. In one corner of the room there was a fireplace where the family cooking was done. There was no chimney, however, and the smoke had to go out through the open door. The door itself was generally fastened to a post, the lower end of which turned in a hollow socket in a heavy stone. When the family went away from home the door was locked with a huge wooden key, which was carried, not in the pocket, like our keys, but over the shoulder. Such keys had this advantage, at any rate, over ours. You could not very well lose them and you did not need a key ring.

Houses of the well-to-do.—Rich men's houses were, of course, more substantially and comfortably built. Real mortar made of lime was used in the walls. There were several rooms, including perhaps a cool "summer house" on the roof, making a kind of second story. One climbed up to these upper rooms by a ladder on the outside. The roof was solidly built and surrounded by a railing, so that on a hot summer evening the family could sit there and enjoy the cool evening breeze. There were windows also, covered with wooden lattice work, which let in light and air.

No doubt every Hebrew father hoped that some day he or his children might live in such a house. Some of them learned the builder's trade and were able to lay stones in mortar and to use saws and axes and nails and other tools for woodwork. Yet when David built his palace, he had to send to Tyre for skilled masons. Evidently in his day the Hebrews had not progressed very far in the manual training department of their new school.

Other Village Arts and Crafts

Many trades, which with us are carried on in separate shops, were a part of the household work among the ancient Hebrews: for example, spinning and weaving and the making of baskets, of shoes, girdles, and other articles of skin or leather. We will study some of these household activities in another chapter. Other trades, however, even in the early days, were carried on by special artisans who worked at nothing else.

Trained artisans.—Metal workers, for example, formed a special trade. Among the excavations of ancient Canaanite cities have been found the ruins of a blacksmith shop. When the Hebrews entered Canaan no one had as yet learned the art of working in iron and steel by means of a forge with a forced draft. All tools and metal implements, such as plowshares, knives, axes, saws, and so on, were made of bronze, which consists of copper mixed and hardened with tin. The blacksmith melted the metals in a very simple and rough furnace of clay heated by charcoal. The bronze itself, although harder than copper, could be worked into the desired shape by hammering and filing, without the use of heat. We who are used to our sharp, finely tempered tools of steel would certainly have found these clumsy bronze affairs most unsatisfactory.

The pottery shop.—Another very ancient trade is that of the potter. This worker did not need much of a shop; only an oven in which to fire his products, a pile of clay, and a wheel. This consisted of a frame, in which turned an upright rod on which were two flat wooden wheels, one small at about the height of the worker's hands as he sat in front of it, and the other larger, to be turned by the feet. A heap of clay was placed on the upper wheel, which was then turned by the revolving rod, the potter's feet all the time kicking on the larger wheel below. The whirling mass was shaped by the fingers, according to the plan in the worker's mind.

How quickly a modern boy would have contrived a different arrangement, with a belt and foot-tread like the one on our mother's sewing machine! But for those days the ancient wheel was ingenious. Many different kinds of Hebrew pottery are found in the excavations: large jars, small cups, lamps of all sizes and shapes and even babies' rattles.

How Hebrew boys learned a trade.—The youngsters from the desert had never seen any of these interesting crafts, except perhaps now and then when their fathers had brought them with the wool to market. But now, on a rainy day when there was no work to be done in the field or at home, the boys would go down the street to the blacksmith shop, or to the shed where the old Canaanite potter worked his clay. One of the older boys would say, "Let me see if I can make something," and if the old man was good-natured he would let him try and perhaps would teach him some of the tricks of the trade. By and by the boy would hire out as a potter's helper and in a year or two would set up a little pottery of his own.

So there came to be Hebrew as well as Canaanite potters and blacksmiths. They were proud of their skill in these arts, and as a nation they never were foolish enough to look down on them or to despise those who practiced them. All work was looked on as honorable. The apostle Paul was a tent-maker. Jesus was a carpenter. And in this respect for honest and useful work we may see another reason why the people of Israel have played so remarkable a part in the life of humanity.

Study Topics

1. Explain the following Scripture passage in the light of the customs described in this chapter. Isaiah 22. 22; Deuteronomy 22. 8.

2. In earlier chapters we have seen how the Hebrew leaders drew lessons about God from shepherd life (Psalm 23), and from farm life (Isaiah 5. 1-7). What lesson did a great prophet learn in regard to God from the experiences of an artisan? (Jeremiah 18. 1-6.)

3. Why was it necessary to build a tower in a Canaanite vineyard, as suggested in Isaiah 5. 2 and Mark 12. 1?

FOOTNOTES:

CHAPTER IXToC

KEEPING HOUSE INSTEAD OF CAMPING OUT

Let us suppose that we have been invited to spend a day or two as guests in the home of one of these Hebrew families who have just settled in Canaan and begun to learn the new arts and customs of the land. It is one of the poorer homes. We have slept through the night on our mat spread on the dirt floor of the house, with our cloak over us to keep us warm. Before daylight we are awakened by the older people moving about in the dim light of the burning wick in the saucer of oil. Soon everyone is awake. The mats are rolled up and piled in a corner. In the early dawn one of the older girls takes a jar on her shoulder and goes for water to the spring, which is outside the village half way up the hill.

If we are expecting to be called to breakfast, we shall be disappointed. There is no regular morning meal, although everyone helps himself to a bite or two of bread from the bread basket in the corner of the room. By and by father and the older boys take the ox and the ass from the shed just back of the one-roomed house (we are lucky if the animals were not kept all night in the house itself) and start for the field. And the women also have their day's work before them in the house. First of all, there is a bag of wheat to be ground into flour.

Home Tasks

In the desert the wheat or barley, when they had it, was merely pounded between two rough stones such as could be picked up anywhere. The flour, or meal, which was made in this way was not very good. Here in Canaan, each house had a rude stone hand-mill for grinding grain. It consists of a large lower stone with a saddle-shaped hollow on the upper side. The upper stone is somewhat like a large, very heavy rolling pin. The grain is poured into the hollow and the upper stone is rolled back and forth over it while the flour gradually sifts out over the sides on to the cloth which is spread on the ground underneath the mill. It is a monotonous task, and very often two people work it together, one feeding in the grain and the other turning the millstone. This is pleasanter, as each worker is "company" for the other. Perhaps our hostess will let us roll the millstone for her while she feeds in the grain and sweeps up the flour from the cloth on the ground.

Baking bread.—After the wheat is ground into flour there is bread to be baked. On the plains they do not use much yeast-bread, for this requires an oven for baking and one cannot carry heavy ovens from camp to camp. But in Canaan each family has its oven. It is made of baked clay and looks like a section of tiling standing on end, about two feet high, the clay being about an inch and a half thick. There is a cover of the same material. Sometimes the fire is made on the inside and the loaves of dough plastered on the outside. More often the loaves are placed on a baking tray, let down on the inside of the oven, and the fire built all around and over it outside.

All sorts of fuel are used. Wood is the best, of course, but in that land wood has always been scarce. In the times of the Hebrews, as to-day, dried manure, straw, and all sorts of refuse were used. Jesus speaks of the grass of the field, "which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the oven."

Baking day.—To-day, while we are visiting, our Hebrew hostess is kneading some dough. She "set it" last night, pouring in some liquid yeast. By and by it is ready for baking. A tray of small loaves about the size of biscuits is placed in the oven, and a great pile of dried grass placed around the sides and over the cover. By and by the fire is lighted from some coals on the hearth; and in a few moments the house is filled with smoke. We all go out on the street until the oven is heated and the smoke has escaped.

Weaving Wool and Flax

Another household utensil which Hebrew women learned to use in Canaan was the heavy loom. This consisted of a low horizontal frame, with a device for separating the odd and even threads of the "warp" while a shuttle was drawn through them, carrying the yarn for the "web," or the cross threads. With this kind of a loom it was possible to weave much more rapidly than when one had to insert each thread, plaiting it over and under, by hand. There is, no doubt, one of these looms in the house where we are visiting.

Making linen out of flax.—In the desert almost all garments were made of wool, especially in the case of the poorer tribes, who could not afford to buy linen. In those days the use of cotton was probably unknown. Now everyone knows how it feels to wear a flannel shirt on a hot summer day. And one of the things which drew the Hebrew shepherds to Canaan was the hope of raising a little flax on each farm, and spinning it into cool, soft linen garments for the hot summers. So it may be that a part of the work in the house we are visiting to-day is to soak some of the stalks of flax in water, or to beat out from them the long fibers, or to spin and weave some of these fibers into cloth.

Preparing Dinner

Of course the main business of each day in the household then, as now, is to get dinner ready. There is a light lunch about noon for the women and children. To-day perhaps we have some bread and milk. But as the sun begins to sink in the west we know that before long the men folks will come home hungry. We must have dinner ready for them when they come. If it has been a good year, even poor families in Canaan can have a fairly good meal. There is no meat, unless perhaps a lamb or a kid has been killed, especially for us as guests. But there is the curdled milk, and bread with olive oil and other things which shepherd folk never have. Here's a steaming kettle of beans or lentils. How good they smell! And here are some bunches of raisins and figs, just as sweet and luscious as those which we buy in the fruit stores in America. The figs in our stores may have come from that very country of which we are studying.

Serving the meal.—Soon the father and the boys come home. The ox and the ass are fed in the stall behind the house. The mother spreads a cloth on the ground and on it places a small stand about eight inches high, which is their only dining-room table. The pot of beans is placed on this stand, and the bread and other good things on the cloth around it. We all sit down on the ground and begin to eat.

Fingers were made before forks. For the beans, however, we need a spoon, and here are some shells from the beach that serve admirably for that purpose; and we all dip into the same dish on the little stand. By and by, when all is gone but the liquid, we sop that up with pieces of bread. When every crumb is picked up and eaten, we all lift our eyes to heaven, and the father repeats a prayer of thanksgiving to God. Dinner is over. The sun has set. It is growing dark, and soon it will be time to go to bed.

Study Topics

1. Explain the following Scripture passages in the light of this chapter:

Judges 16. 13; Deuteronomy 24. 6; Matthew 24. 41.

2. Read Proverbs 31. 10-31 for another picture of daily life in an ancient Hebrew home. What is said in this chapter about the making of beautiful as well as necessary things, and about the doing of kindly deeds?

CHAPTER XToC

MORAL VICTORIES IN CANAAN

On the whole, Canaan was a good school for the Hebrew shepherds. New arts to learn, new crops to raise, new kinds of cloth to spin and weave, new kinds of food to cook—all this helped to make life more interesting and worth while. But there were other lessons which newcomers might learn which were not so wholesome.

Wine drinking, for example, was a habit which the wisest of the Hebrews always feared. The wine which they made in those foaming wine-presses was, of course, mild and harmless as compared with the distilled liquors of modern times. But even Canaanitish wine could deaden men's consciences and make them more like beasts than men. "Wine is a mocker," said one of the sages who wrote the book of Proverbs, "strong drink is raging, and he that is deceived thereby is not wise."

Idolatry in Canaan

Canaanite religion was to a large extent an unwholesome influence. The Canaanites worshiped many gods. Each village had its Baal, or lord, who had to be bribed with burnt offerings of fat beasts, or (as they thought) the soil would lose its fertility and the crops would fail.

Dangerous examples.—These sacrificial rites were carried on in the shrines or "high places," one of which stood outside almost every village and town. They often were accompanied by dances and other performances which were licentious and degrading. The Hebrews, of course, were pledged to worship only Jehovah. Moreover, during these first centuries in Canaan they were very poor, and had little time for the carousals which went on at the "high places" in the name of religion. Corruption usually comes with wealth and luxury. Poverty and hardship are often useful safeguards. But from the beginning these heathen rites were a temptation and a snare in the lives of the Hebrews.

Canaanite Beliefs about the World

There are certain questions which awaken the curiosity of everyone. How did this wonderful world come into existence? How is it that you and I happen to be here? How did things in general come to be as they are? Some of these difficult questions are to-day being partly answered by careful students of science. In ancient times there was little or no science, yet in every country there were certain answers to these questions handed down from generation to generation and generally accepted as true.

Idolatrous stories of creation.—When the Hebrews entered Canaan they naturally were inclined to accept the ideas of the earlier inhabitants of that country, whose knowledge in regard to many matters was far beyond theirs. The Canaanites in turn had got most of their ideas from the leading civilized nations of that day, the Egyptians, and especially the Babylonians. From these sources had come certain stories about the beginning of things.

Babylonian traders in the inns of Canaan used to tell a story of the creation of the world, and also about a great flood which the gods once sent upon the earth.

How the Hebrews retold these stories.—The best men among the Hebrews knew that these stories were imperfect. Their forty years training in the wilderness had made them wise in the ways of God. This wisdom enabled them to sift the wheat from the chaff. They retold these stories, omitting the error, and retaining the truth. Thus we come to have the wonderful stories of the creation and the flood as we find them in the Bible.

How these stories were handed down.—In the earliest days of the settlement in Canaan very few Hebrews, if any, could read or write. Possibly Moses understood the Egyptian picture-writing, or the wedge-shaped letters of the Babylonian clay tablets. The Hebrew letters, however, in which the books of the Old Testament afterward were written, were invented by the Phœnicians, and the Phœnicians passed on their invention to the old Canaanites.

After the Hebrews came it was not long before ambitious Hebrew boys and girls were staring at the queer marks in the inscriptions which they found here and there, over the gates of Canaanite cities or on the tombs of Canaanite kings. Gradually they learned to spell out syllables, words, and sentences, and then they learned to copy these same letters, so that in time the Hebrews were making inscriptions and books of their own. Among the earliest of these books was one containing the stories of the creation and the flood. They had been handed down by word of mouth from one generation to another, until finally they were gathered into a book. This became a part of the book of Genesis in our Bible.

New Tendencies to Selfishness in Canaan

Another and different kind of temptation which the Hebrews met in Canaan was the tendency to forget their own tribal brothers as they scattered here and there and settled down, each family with its own little farm. There were some, naturally, who were more successful as farmers than others. And those who were unfortunate were not always the lazy or thriftless. Sickness or accident or some pest which attacked the grain or the cattle would sometimes wipe out the entire property of one of those little peasant farmers and leave him and his children face to face with starvation and death. Now, in the old days in the desert, as long as the tribe had a crust of bread or a drop of water, the weakest and poorest could count on a share. But here in Canaan the poor, the widow, the orphan, did not always feel so surely the sheltering arms of kindness and brotherhood.

Humane laws enacted.—Yet the spirit of Moses still lived and made its power felt. Certain laws gradually came to be accepted during this period when the Hebrews were learning to be farmers which were a special protection to the poor and helpless, just as the great leader would have chosen. We can imagine how these laws were first proclaimed by the chiefs of the clans and the elders of the villages wherever there were men who remembered how, years before, the whole nation had been poor and oppressed and enslaved. Here are some examples:

There is one law which illustrates especially well how the best men among the Hebrews tried to meet the new temptations of Canaan in the spirit of kindness and justice which they had learned from Moses.

It was already the custom among the Canaanites to leave the grain in the corners of the fields uncut, and not to pick up the scattered gleanings, which fell from the arms of the harvesters, and to leave on the ground the fruit that fell of itself from the vines and fruit trees. With the Canaanites this was on account of a superstition; the gleanings and the grain in the corners of the fields were for the Baal, or god of the field. If they were taken he would be angry. The Hebrews kept the old custom, but with a different aim—not to keep the Baal in good humor, but to make life a bit easier for the poor and unfortunate among their own neighbors. It was in accordance with this law that Ruth, although a foreigner, was allowed to glean after the reapers in the barley field of Boaz of Bethlehem, and thus obtained food to keep herself and her mother alive. So among these lowly people were being laid the foundations of that greater and better civilization for which Moses had prepared the way, and of which Abraham had dimly dreamed.

Study Topics

1. What parts of this chapter illustrate the special talent of the Hebrews for discovering good in things partly evil?

2. How could this talent be used in our American life? For example, in the matter of moving picture shows?

3. Read Leviticus 19. This chapter contains laws which were made during the period of the settlement in Canaan. Which of them seem to you to be in the spirit of Moses?

CHAPTER XIToC

LESSONS IN COOPERATION

After the Hebrews began to be settled in Canaan, not only were they tempted to neglect the poor and unfortunate; they also failed to stand together against their enemies. Each tribe and clan seemed to care only for its own safety.

The men of Judah in the south, the Ephraimites in central Canaan, and the Naphtalites in the northern hills, and Gilead and Reuben across the Jordan—each group tried to fight its own battles. Often they fought with each other. There was a bloody war between the men of Gilead, and their cousins, the Ephraimites on the opposite side of the Jordan. The Ephraimites crossed the river and attacked the Gileadites, and were badly beaten; when they tried to get back home again, they found the Gileadites holding the fords of the river. Each fugitive was asked, "Are you an Ephraimite?" If he said "No," they would order him to say "Shibboleth" (a Hebrew word). And if he said "Sibboleth" (the Gileadite dialect), and did not pronounce it exactly right, then they would kill him.

This was only one example of the many wars between the tribes. There was no central government to keep the peace. This age in their history is sometimes called the period of the Judges. But these judges did not rule over the whole land. Most of them were only petty champions, each of whom helped his own tribe to defend itself against its enemies.

Sisera and Deborah

In this disorganized state they would have been an easy prey to any strong enemy; and before long, an enemy came. In the fertile plain of Esdraelon, which cuts across Palestine just north of the central highland, there was a group of Canaanite towns which the Hebrews had not as yet conquered. These were organized into a kingdom by a warrior named Sisera, who at once began to reconquer those parts of the country which now belonged to the Hebrews. It was a bitter time for the tribes that were settled around the Plain of Esdraelon. Those villages which were perched on the mountain sides held out for a time, but the inhabitants dared not go down into the valleys. They could not take their grain to the market. The valley roads were all deserted except for bands of Sisera's troopers. Each year Sisera grew stronger, and more of the Hebrews submitted to him. In a little while there would have been none left to call themselves Hebrews and to keep up the noble traditions and hopes of Moses and Abraham.

A wise and patriotic woman.—If only the more distant tribes had come to the help of those that bordered on Sisera's kingdom, if only all the Hebrews had stood together, they could easily have defended themselves. But no one seemed to see this, or had faith enough to try to accomplish anything in this way "until Deborah arose." One day there came up through the sheepfolds of the Reubenites this remarkable woman whose name was Deborah. "Come to the help of your brethren across the river," she said, as she told her story. "Come to the help of Jehovah, by helping his people."

At first the Reubenites seemed greatly moved by Deborah's words. Certainly, they would come, whenever Deborah and her friends were ready. So the brave woman was encouraged and went to other tribes, to all of them one after another. But not everywhere was she successful. Many said: "Why should we go up and help your people? Suppose Sisera wins, he will come and punish us. We will stay here where we are safe." Even the Reubenites, whose first resolves had been so brave, changed their minds, and "stayed in their sheepfolds, listening to the pipings of the flocks."

The battle by the Kishon River.—After many weeks of tramping, however, Deborah was able to get a few of the tribes really organized. Ephraim, Benjamin, Naphtali, Zebulun, Issachar, and some smaller clans all promised to send troops and did send them. An army was gathered under a captain named Barak. The Canaanites under Sisera came out to fight them, and the battle took place on the flat fields of the Plain of Esdraelon. It looked like a victory for Sisera. He had charioteers as well as foot soldiers—troops of men in heavy war carts, from the axles of which extended sharp blades like scythes.

But Deborah had called to her people in the name of Jehovah. And Jehovah seemed, indeed, to be on their side. We may well believe that it was the spirit of God that put it into the hearts of Deborah and Barak to delay the battle until there should be a rainy day. When the clash finally came there was a heavy downpour. The flat plain became a swamp. The war chariots sank into the mud and were helpless. The Canaanites became panic-stricken and fled in terror. Many of them were drowned in the attempt to cross the Kishon, which is usually a shallow creek, but on that day was a deep and swiftly flowing torrent. Sisera, himself in flight, was killed by a woman in whose tent he tried to take refuge. The battle was won for Jehovah's people. The Hebrews could still be free and independent, and they had learned a valuable lesson—the necessity for cooperation.