Issachar

The name Issachar means “He Is Wages,” or, “He Brings Wages.” It refers to how his mother Leah got the privilege of bearing him to Jacob. (Gen. 30:14-18) He was Jacob’s ninth son, and in the naming of the twelve tribes of spiritual Israel Issachar is ranked as ninth. His father Jacob likened him to a powerful, hardworking beast of burden, one that sticks to his burden, one that can take rest without getting rid of his double load. The two saddlebags may picture the burdens of peace and war that Issachar carried during the history of Israel.


He was willing to work, for he saw that his location in Israel was good. He had no complaints to make about his territory assignment in the Promised Land. He appreciated that his resting-place was good and his land pleasant.

Issachar’s name might suggest that he would hire himself out for work. At any rate, he was willing to bend down his shoulder to undertake the burden of responsibility. During the period when Israel had judges as her God-given visible rulers, the tribe of Issachar furnished a judge named Tola. For twenty-three years he served as judge of Israel. (Judg. 10:1, 2)

Years before this, Judge Barak and the prophetess Deborah had words of praise for the men of Issachar, saying in their victory song: “Jehovah’s people came down to me against the mighty ones. And the princes in Issachar were with Deborah, and as Issachar, so was Barak.” (Judg. 5:13, 15) The princes took the lead for the tribe of Issachar when the call to duty came for the liberation of Jehovah’s people. All the men of Issachar presented a fine example of courage and zeal, so that Judge Barak became like them in the war.

Their valor manifested itself again in the days of David. Hence concerning the above-mentioned Judge Tola it is written: “Of Tola there were valiant, mighty men, by their descendants. Their number in the days of David was twentytwo thousand six hundred. . . . there were troops of the army for war, . . . And their brothers of all the families of Issachar were valiant, mighty men, eighty-seven thousand by the genealogical enrollment of them all.” (1 Chron. 7:1-5) The men of Issachar watched God’s indications of what he wanted to be done at a certain time. So they gave David a military escort when the time came to put the kingship over all Israel in the hands of David. We read: “Of the sons of Issachar having a knowledge of how to discern the times to know what Israel ought to do, there were two hundred head ones of theirs, and all their brothers were at their orders.”—1 Chron. 12:23, 32.

Thus when Issachar bent down his shoulder to bear burdens, it was an expression of his loyalty to God’s chosen nation and to the leaders whom God raised up, such as David.

Running parallel with this was Issachar’s willingness to subject himself to the tasks that all the members of the national organization had to perform in common. It was just as the dying patriarch Jacob foretold it: “And he will become subject to slavish forced labor."

w62 7/1 p. 398 pars. 26-29 Fellow Rulers with the “Lion of the Tribe of Judah”