16. Why did you sit between the saddlebags?Was it to listen to the shepherds playing their flutes?Reuben’s divisions of important men had second thoughts.
17. Gilead remained east of the Jordan River.And Dan. . . Why did he stay by the ships?Asher sat on the seashore and remained along the inlets.
18. But Zebulun mocked death,and Naphtali risked his life on the battlefield.
19. Kings came and fought.Then the kings of Canaan fought.They fought at Taanach by the waters of Megiddo.But they didn’t carry off any rich loot.
20. The stars fought from heaven.They fought against Sisera from their heavenly paths.
21. The Kishon River swept them away—that old river, the Kishon.I must march on with strength!
22. Then the horses’ hoofs pounded.The mighty war horses galloped on and on.
23. “Curse Meroz!” said the Messenger of the Lord.“Bitterly curse those who live there!They did not come to help the Lord,to help the Lord and his heroes.”
24. Jael, wife of Heber the Kenite,should be the most blessed woman,the most blessed woman living in a tent.
25. Sisera asked for water.She gave him milk.She offered him buttermilk in a royal bowl.
26. She reached for a tent peg with one hand,for a workman’s hammer with the other.She struck Sisera.She crushed his head.She shattered and pierced his temples.
27. He sank.He fell.He lay between her feet!He sank.He fell between her feet.Where he sank, he fell dead.
28. Sisera’s mother looked through her windowand cried as she peered through the lattice.“Why is his chariot taking so long?Why don’t I hear the clatter of his chariots?”
29. Her wisest servants gave her an answer.But she kept repeating to herself,