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Speaking (and singing) of the dead

Speaking (and singing) of the dead

Last updated on: August 31, 2026 at 3:53 pm by Fred Clark

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Speaking (and singing) of the dead 2026-08-31T15:53:26-04:00 Fred Clark

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The Song of Deborah is possibly the oldest text incorporated into the Bible. This poem, included in the fifth chapter of the book of Judges, is thought by scholars to be centuries older than the written text of the rest of that book — or any other book in the Hebrew Scriptures.

This is a victory song — a song celebrating (most of) the people coming together to fight off an invasion by the Midianites, who were led by their general Sisera. The Israelites (and their allies) were rallied to defend their land by the leadership of a woman, Deborah, and Sisera himself was slain by another woman, Jael. In a story that rarely gets told in Sunday school or VBS (where it would be a huge hit with the kids because it’s awesome) Jael lured him into her tent, slipped him a mickey, then drove a tent peg through his skull.*

The Song of Deborah celebrates the death of Sisera, spits on his grave, and dances a little jig.

What about the ancient idea of nil nisi bonum? Of “never speak ill of the dead”? Yeah, well, the Greeks who came up with that wouldn’t be born for another 600 years.

But Sisera was still a person — he had a family who loved him! Shouldn’t we think about that? Shouldn’t we think about how Sisera’s mother must feel to hear that her beloved son has died?

And, well, yes — Deborah does think about that. The Song of Deborah ends with a verse about Sisera’s mother. It imagines her sitting back at home, waiting for her son’s return. And it’s fierce:

Through the window peered Sisera’s mother;
behind the lattice she cried out,
“Why is his chariot so long in coming?
Why is the clatter of his chariots delayed?”
The wisest of her ladies answer her;
indeed, she keeps saying to herself,
“Are they not finding and dividing the spoils:
a woman or two for each man,
colorful garments as plunder for Sisera,
colorful garments embroidered,
highly embroidered garments for my neck—
all this as plunder?”

Yes, poor Sisera’s Mama — waiting for her son to return in his fancy chariot and dreaming of all the loot and new slaves he’ll be bringing back for her. Except oops — sorry Mom! — your son isn’t coming home because he’s dead! One of those women he planned to enslave put a tent peg through his skull! [shrug emoji, cry-laughing emoji]

This, again, is quite probably the oldest passage in the Bible, the earliest sacred, inspired text in the canon.

The word of the Lord. (Thanks be to God.)

The other passage maybe in the running for possibly the oldest is another victory song that scholars think likely predates any of our written texts by many centuries. This passage, tucked into our Bibles in Exodus 15, is sometimes called the Song of Moses and Miriam. It celebrates the death of Pharaoh and his army in the Red Sea.

This passage is more familiar because, even after 3,000+ years, this song is still kind of a banger: “I will sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously: the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea.”

The two oldest passages in the Bible share a common theme. Well, two common themes, I suppose, with the second being “Iron war chariots are not so impressive in the mud.”

But the main theme of both songs — both ancient, canonical, inspired songs of holy writ — is that the villains who sought to enslave us are dead and that is a Good Thing. Their death is cause for celebration and it is right and good and proper and meet for God’s people to fulfill their duty to celebrate the death of these would-be enslavers.

These songs are, again, very, very old. They are unimaginably old. You saw all those think-pieces about The Odyssey and how difficult it is for us to grasp the vast difference between our ways of thinking and the ancient world of Homer? These songs are centuries older than Homer.

So I read these now, in translation from translations, in the 21st century, sitting here in a continent that none of the writers or readers of that text imagined existed, and I wonder how different and how similar the first writers and hearers of these songs were from people like us today.

Were there also self-righteous scolds back in 1200-ish BCE who feigned indignation after hearing Deborah sing “And Sisera’s Mama, too!” and who demanded more propriety and sympathy for the family of poor, deceased Sisera? Did any of them suggest to Deborah that she shouldn’t say such vicious things after Sisera’s death because, after all, she wouldn’t want people to be so glib and gleeful and to say such mean things after her death, would she?

Maybe there were such people saying that, even way back then. If so, then Deborah is not only the first person to compose words of holy scripture, but she may also have been the first person who got to respond to such nonsense by saying, “Yes … or I could just make sure no one celebrates like this when I die by, you know, not invading their countries and not trying to kill and enslave all of their people.”

I’ve been thinking about the song of Deborah because I’ve spent parts of the last week reading grateful tributes and praise and mourning following the death of Dolly Parton. Dolly was beloved and still is beloved and the outpouring of love and gratitude and communal mourning has been genuine and massive and moving.

None of the scolds needed to chime in, fretting about how unseemly it seems for people to be speaking ill of the dead, because no one has been speaking ill. They have no reason to.

No one has been speaking ill of the late great Tim Curry either. We were too busy fondly recalling all of the scene-stealing, delightfully strange performances he gave us.

Dolly was 80 years old. Curry was also 80 years old and his film credits included a small part in Home Alone 2. That reminded us all of someone else.

And so, like many people, I witnessed and participated in the massive outpouring of mourning and gratitude in response to the life and death of Dolly Parton and could not help but think of the stark contrast between that experience and the pent-up tidal wave of celebration that will arrive on The Day That It Happens.

“The day that what happens?” you do not need to ask, because everyone knows. (Including him.) When a certain gold-plated chariot is finally parked next to those of Sisera and Pharaoh, the global outpouring of joy and relief and jubilation will be as genuine, heartfelt, and communal as the mourning the world began last week over the loss of Dolly Parton.

When that day comes, billions around the world will sing like Deborah and Miriam, praising God and saying “So may all your enemies perish, O Lord!”

That word “enemies” calls to mind another biblical passage, one written 1,300 years or so after the Song of Deborah: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. …”

That’s from the Sermon on the Mount, and it gets trotted out by the scolds and the enforcers of propriety every time some unrepentant Scrooge dies and their death is celebrated by the people they once harmed. That’s a bit suspicious, given that these same scolds never invoke Matthew 5 when their country bombs its “enemies.” They seem fine with that, but rush to quote “Love your enemies” whenever they see anyone cheering over the demise of a Rush Limbaugh or a Roger Ailes or a champion of ethnic cleansing and censorship (you know the one).

One way you know Dolly Parton lived life the right way: I don’t think anyone’s going to get fired for accurately quoting Dolly Parton today.

— Garrett M. Graff (@vermontgmg.bsky.social) 2026-08-25T20:38:44.712Z

But this transparent hypocrisy doesn’t mean they’re wrong about this commandment to “Love your enemies.” I am commanded to love my enemies. I am obliged to love my enemies.

This is why Deborah’s choice of pronouns matters. She does not sing “So may all my enemies perish,” or even “So may all our enemies perish.” She says “So may all your enemies perish, O Lord!” Sisera, Deborah says, was an enemy of God. He was someone who exploited the weak, plundered the poor, slaughtered the innocent, and enslaved widows and orphans. That, according to the oldest passage in the Bible, is what it means to be an enemy of God.

Whatever obligation I have to love my enemies and to pray for those who persecute me, my obligation is different when it comes to those who make themselves the enemies of the poor, the weak, the widow and the orphan and the oppressed. I may be obliged to respond with love to my oppressor, but that is not my obligation when it comes to someone else’s oppressor.

So, yeah, I think Niebuhr was right about the supererogatory challenge of the Sermon on the Mount. If someone strikes me on the right cheek I am obliged to turn the other cheek. If someone strikes you — or if someone spends decades striking widows and orphans, aliens and the poor — I am obliged to do something else and to do something more.

And so on The Day That It Happens I will join with millions of people around the world in singing songs of joyous praise.

We will echo the words of Deborah and of Miriam and of the Magnificat. And our song will be, like those songs, good and true and holy.

* “Most blessed of women be Jael,” Deborah sings.

That phrase “Most blessed of women” appears in stained glass windows and at the base of statues all over the world because of the only other time it is used in our Bibles, in Luke’s Gospel, where Elizabeth quotes those words to describe Mary, the mother of Jesus.

The iconography of those statues and pictures of Mary often show her crushing a serpent under her foot. That’s due to somewhat strained and stretched reading of a verse from Genesis. Elizabeth’s direct citation of this blessing of Jael and Luke situating this reference to the Song of Deborah just before the Song of Mary seems more deliberate than that reference. Maybe our statues of Mary should include a tent peg.

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