Edited to add: In all seriousness, the church needs the song of Deborah and Barak (Judges 5) set to music. And will have it, Lord let it be in my lifetime.
We aren’t to glory in the death of the wicked—and yet:
"Between her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay; Between her feet he bowed, he fell; Where he bowed, there he fell dead. (v. 27)
Reminds me of Miriam’s “The horse and rider He has thrown into the sea,” only more intense and personal.
And then it goes on about Sisera’s mother, she’s worried about him, wondering why he’s late returning, thinking it must be because he’s gathering so much spoil from the victory…
And if anyone was faint of heart singing this or wondering if they really should be joyful, there is this giant hammer stroke at the end:
“Thus let all Your enemies perish, O LORD; But let those who love Him be like the rising of the sun in its might.” And the land was undisturbed for forty years. (v. 31)
Interesting. But, then, in our parish we do sing those words to Anglican chant, just as they appear in English translation. The relevant verses (not all of them that we sing, of course) are:
The Lord is a | migh- | ty | warrior; * And | Yah- | -weh | is | his | Name.
The chariots of Pharoah and his army has he | hurled into | the | sea; * the finest of those who bear | armor have | been | drowned in | the | Red Sea.
The fathomless deep has | ov- | -er- | -whelmed them; * they | sank into | the | depths | like a | stone.
Your right hand, O Lord, is | glorious | in | might; * your right hand, O Lord, has | ov- | -er- | -thrown | the enemy.
We also sing the English text of the Psalms, not a metrical rewriting of them, including imprecatory Psalms.
Pastor Chu, do you infer this solely from verse 27? But 4:21 says she went secretly to him and that he was sound asleep and exhausted.
The Bible is so often explicit about sexual sin that I don’t want to see us reading additional sexual things into it every time it says “feet”. I don’t think you’re doing that, though.
No. I don’t mean at all that anything happened between Jael and Sisera. I just think that the sarcasm used by Deborah dripped with more irony and mockery than our modern ears can handle today.