1. Judges 4:5 (ESV)
  2. Exposition

Why might Deborah have sat close to Bethel?

Judges 4:5 (ESV)

5 She used to sit under the palm of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in the hill country of Ephraim, and the people of Israel came up to her for judgment.

In this way, Deborah may have functioned as an alternative to the priesthood which had become ineffective in mediating revelation from God, and Deborah's pronouncements may have functioned as a substitute for the Urim and Thummim.1