And Hanun took David's servants, and had the one half of their beards shaved off, and their raiment cut off in the midst, as far as their buttocks, and sent them away.
David sends a friendly embassy to a neighbouring king. The men come home half-shaved and half-stripped. Why did that count as such an outrage? And what does it say about people who cannot believe kindness is kindness?
The beard was not a matter of fashion in Israel. It was protected by law and tied to a man's honour, so tampering with it was an act of contempt.
The Israelites always grew the beard and prized it. The law forbade them to spoil the edges of their beards, Lev. 19:27, and a priest was not to shave off the corner of his beard as a sign of mourning. Lev. 21:5. King Hanun did a deep dishonour to David's ambassadors when he ruined their beards.
Hanun cut away half the beard and half the clothing on purpose. He did not kill the men. He made them a public spectacle and sent them home in that state.
No one could shame a king's ambassadors more than this. They had to cross Hanun's country in disgrace, half naked, mocked, and made a joke. Is it surprising that they were "greatly ashamed"?
The princes had no category for unearned goodwill, so they explained it by their own standards.
The princes of Ammon were suspicious, just as people in false religions are suspicious of the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. False teaching never gives honest credit to the grace of God. It pushes instead the legal principle of man's self-righteousness. Its motives are selfish, so it suspects the same selfish motives in others.
Hanun did not think this up alone. His advisers pushed him into it. The slide from mistrust to open mockery was short.
The world has more confidence in the opinion of its counselors than in the message of Christ. These counselors will do anything to turn aside from the gospel those of their followers who show any inclination at all to receive it. The distance between distrust and insult is shorter than we might suspect.
Ambassadors in that world were not resident diplomats but personal representatives, so what was done to them was done to the one who sent them.
Such men stood in the place of the kings who sent them, and people normally treated them with proper respect, whatever the message. David deeply resented the insult done to the messengers he had sent in kindness to Hanun, king of the Ammonites. 2 Sam. 10:1-14. In 2 Samuel 9 the kindness of God found acceptance; here kindness met rejection. In the New Testament the apostles were ambassadors for Christ to a guilty world, urging their hearers to be reconciled to God.
David's first move is not war but shelter. He has the men wait at Jericho until they are fit to be seen again.
Hanun echoes his father's scorn in a milder form. He takes half the beards and half the clothes of David's ambassadors. At Jericho, the place of the world's judgment, they must wait until they have their dignity as men back. Then they return.
Commentators differ here. Some read David's move as pure grace, a last offer of kindness to a hostile neighbour. Others judge the mission itself unwise.
Here David did not take the right course. Ammon was an enemy. Nahash did show David some kindness while he was in exile, but he had also insulted Israel, and he was ready to gouge out the right eyes of the men of Jabesh-gilead. Hanun treated David's peaceful messengers in this shameful way. That showed he was a wicked man like his father, and not worthy of David's kindness.
Nothing in the chapter suggests Hanun knew what he was throwing away.
Hanun refused the last message of grace — and how little he suspected that it was the last. The result is a terrible judgment. It begins in this chapter and runs on through the chapters that follow. It is a judgment without pity, brought on by anger at the insult done to grace.
In the chapter before, Mephibosheth welcomed David's kindness. Hanun does the opposite.
Everyone who has Christ set before him must play either the part of Mephibosheth or the part of Hanun. The first valued "the kindness of God" that David showed; the second refused it, and it ruined him... The man who will not value the love of God's heart must still feel the severity of God's hand.
- Kindness sent. David remembers an old favour and sends kindness, not demands. The offer costs Hanun nothing.
- Kindness suspected. Advisers who see selfish motives in everyone suspected the same in David. Distrust turned to insult fast.
- Kindness insulted. Half the beard, half the garment. It was public shame of the deepest kind, aimed through the messengers at their king.
- Shame covered. David keeps his shamed servants at Jericho until they have their dignity back. War comes later.
- Kindness avenged. The insult to grace brings the judgment. Whoever will not know the love of God's heart will feel the weight of His hand.
And they told [it] to David; and he sent to meet them, for the men were greatly ashamed. And the king said, Abide at Jericho until your beards be grown, and then return.
David sent messengers in kindness to a neighbouring king, and they came home shamed — half-shaved and half-stripped. This verse records what David did next, and it raises two questions: why did the insult cut so deep, and why did rejected kindness end in war?
The men were not travellers. They were official representatives, and in the ancient world that carried weight.
They were officials sent from one king to another with any important message, or to settle matters of shared interest... Such men represented the kings who sent them. Whatever the message, people normally treated them with proper respect. David deeply resented the insult done to the messengers he had sent in kindness to Hanun, king of the Ammonites.
The men stood for David. The insult to their bodies struck his name.
A beard was not a fashion choice in Israel. Law and custom guarded it, and cutting it spoke of mourning and disgrace.
The Israelites always grew the beard and prized it. The law forbade them to "mar the edges of their beards" (Leviticus 19:27), and a priest must not shave off the edge of his beard as a sign of mourning (Leviticus 21:5). King Hanun inflicted a deep insult when he cut the beards of David's ambassadors.
Hanun cut their clothes too, so the men travelled home exposed as well as disfigured.
No treatment could shame a king's ambassadors more than this. They had to travel through Hanun's land dishonoured, half naked, mocked, and made a laughing-stock. Is it surprising that they were "greatly ashamed"?
David's first move is not military. He deals with his men's shame before he deals with Ammon.
When David heard this he first gave the men a break at Jericho until their beards grew. We are not told how David himself answered this offensive insult aimed at him and at Israel. We are not told either of any move David made to attack Ammon before Ammon began preparing for battle.
One writer reads the stop at Jericho as a recovery of what Hanun tried to strip away:
Hanun shows a milder form of his father's scorn. He takes away half the beards and half the garments of David's ambassadors. At Jericho, the place of the world's judgement, they must wait until they have recovered their dignity as men: so they return.
The trouble started with Hanun's advisers. They told him that David's men had come to spy.
Hanun is not receptive. If he had been alone, his heart might have been touched. He does not drive the messengers away at once, but he is badly advised. The princes of the Ammonites stir up his distrust: "Is it not to search the city and to spy it out, and to overthrow it, that David has sent his servants to you?" How easily such suggestions succeed when Jesus is not known! These men, they say, are hypocrites; their purpose is to make war against us.
Another writer traces that suspicion to the character of the men who held it:
The Ammonites could not appreciate the grace of David's heart, but only suspected mischief, as the wicked naturally do.
One writer sets this chapter beside the one before it. Two offers of kindness, two opposite answers:
In 2 Samuel 9 the kindness of God was accepted; here kindness was rejected. In the New Testament the apostles were ambassadors for Christ to a guilty world, to urge their hearers to be reconciled to God. 2 Corinthians 5:20; Ephesians 6:20; and judgement will fall on those who do not obey the gospel. 2 Thessalonians 1:8; 1 Peter 4:17.
The waiting at Jericho has been taken as a picture of the pause before that judgement falls:
David told the men to wait at Jericho until their beards were grown. The Lord is now waiting until the appointed time, and His patience is salvation. But the judgement, severe and certain, is approaching.
- Kindness sent. David sent his messengers in kindness to Hanun, king of the Ammonites; commentators see in it the grace of David's heart.
- Kindness suspected. Bad advice turned that kindness into a suspected plot; Hanun's princes told him the messengers had come to spy.
- Kindness insulted. Shaving the beard and cutting the garments shamed an envoy as nothing else could. Law and custom made the beard a man's honour.
- Servants sheltered. Before any army moves, the king goes out to meet his shamed men and keeps them at Jericho until they recover their dignity as men.
- Sender avenged. An insult to the messenger is an insult to the one who sent him. Commentators see in the delay a picture of patience that has a limit.