What does it mean to “rub salt into the womb?” The answer to that question is not a simple as it at first seems. It had an original meaning, and it has a meaning that is applied today. Originally it referenced the practice of literally putting salt into a wound. People put salt into a wound as an antiseptic. Therefore it was any action that was painful, but at the same time was for the benefit of the one suffering the pain. Today, with modern antibiotics and antiseptics there is no need to put salt into a wound. The only reason to do so would be to cause pain. Therefore in today’s language the idiom means to make something it is already difficult or unpleasant even worse by aggravating or intensifying the situation.

Deborah and her song was fulfilling both definitions of the idiom. First by today’s definition, she was indeed making the Canaanite situation more painful. She was reminding them that they believed Baal was the god of the Mountains and of the North and they knew him as “the rider of the clouds.” The God of Israel came down from the southern mountains, came into the northern mountains and released from the clouds, thunderstorms and torrential rains. The floodwaters rushed out of the mountains and washed away the Canaanite Army.

She was not only rubbing salt in the wound, but she was also praising her God. The Canaanites had to go to where their God was; her God came to where she was. The Canaanites trusted and worshiped their god Baal, and he let them down. The Israelites had proved unfaithful to their God, but in their hour of need he once again delivered them.

It was out of her praise, that Deborah fulfilled the second meaning of putting salt into a wound. Her praise of God gave the Canaanites an opportunity to turn to Him in faith. She was providing to them a painful but healing truth. The God of Israel is the only God that delivers.