Deborah carries the distinction of being one who broke out of tradition and became the only female judge in a time when the hearts of the children of Israel see-sawed between serving the One True God and the Baal and the Asherahs of the land. She carries further distinction in that she is one of only two judges identified also as a prophet. And she carried such authority that people came up to see her, up into the mountains of Ephraim where she sat to judge, to settle their disputes. Coming up the mountain to see Deborah likely wasn’t an easy task, but the people were willing.
And Deborah sat under a palm tree. The prophetic symbolism here is that she sat and ruled from a place of joyful victory. And the palm tree was known as “the palm tree of Deborah” further signifying the level of authority she carried in the land.
By the time Deborah’s story begins, the LORD, in His displeasure with their behavior, had sold the children of Israel into the hand of King Jabin, a king who harshly oppressed them for twenty years, with nine hundred chariots of iron under the command of Sisera. It' is in this harsh climate that Deborah rises up as a prophet to judge a nation - until the Day everything changed, as all things must eventually change.
