2 Samuel 10:4

_WHEREFORE HANUN TOOK DAVID'S SERVANTS, AND SHAVED OFF THE ONE HALF OF THEIR BEARDS, AND CUT OFF THEIR GARMENTS IN THE MIDDLE, EVEN TO THEIR BUTTOCKS, AND SENT THEM AWAY._ Hanun ... shaved off the one half of their beards. From the long flowing dress of the Hebrews and other Orientals, the curtailment of their garments must have given them an aspect of gross indelicacy and ludicrousness. Besides, a knowledge of the extraordinary respect and value which has always been attached, and the gross insult that is implied in any indignity offered, to the beard in the East, will account for the shame which the deputies felt, and the determined spirit of revenge which burst out in all Israel on learning the outrage. Two instances are related in the modern history of Persia of similar insults by kings of haughty and imperious temper, involving the nation in war (see other instances in Joseph Wolff...

1-5 Nahash had been an enemy to Israel, yet had showed kindness to David. David therefore resolves gratefully to return it. If a Pharisee gives alms in pride, though God will not reward it, yet he that receives the alms ought to return thanks for it. Those who bear ill-will to their neighbours, are resolved not to believe that their neighbours bear any good-will to them. There is nothing so well meant, but it may be ill interpreted, and is wont to be so, by men who love nobody but themselves. The best men must not think it strange if they are thus misrepresented. Charity thinketh no evil. According to the usages of those days and countries, Hanun treated David's ambassadors in the most contemptuous manner. David showed much concern for his servants. Let us learn not to lay unjust reproaches to heart; they will wear off, and turn only to the shame of those who utter or do them; while the...

Verse 2 Samuel 10:4. _SHAVED OFF THE ONE HALF OF THEIR BEARDS_] The _beard_ is held in high respect in the East: the possessor considers it his greatest ornament; often swears by it; and, in matters of great importance, _pledges_ it. Nothing can be more secure than a pledge of this kind; its owner will redeem it at the hazard of his life. The beard was never cut off but in _mourning_, or as a sign of _slavery_. Cutting off half of the beard and the clothes rendered the men ridiculous, and made them look like slaves: what was done to these men was an accumulation of insult....

In 1 Chronicles 19:4, more concisely “shaved.” Cutting off a person’s beard is regarded by the Arabs as an indignity equal to flogging and branding among ourselves. The loss of their long garments, so essential to Oriental dignity, was no less insulting than that of their beards....

EXPOSITION 2 SAMUEL 10:1 THE KING OF THE CHILDREN OF AMMON DIED. This war is very briefly referred to in 2 Samuel 8:12; but we have now entered upon a narrative, the interest of which is altogether unlike all that has gone before. There we saw David crowned with earthly glory, and made the monarch of a vast empire; he is also a prophet, and, as such, not only restores, but enriches and enlarges, the worship of the sanctuary; and, as prophet and king, he becomes not only the type, but the ancestor of the Messiah. In this narrative he is a sinner, punished with terrible, though merited, severity, and must henceforth walk humbly and sorrowfully as a penitent before God. From...

WHEREFORE HANUN TOOK DAVID'S SERVANTS,.... His ambassadors: AND SHAVED OFF ONE HALF OF THEIR BEARDS; that is, he ordered them to be shaved off; than which a greater indignity could not have been well done to them and to David, whom they represented, since the Israelites shaved not their beards, and were very careful of preserving them; for had it been the custom to shave, they might have shaved off the other half, and then they would not have appeared so ridiculous; and with other people it has been reckoned a very great punishment as well could be inflicted, and as great an affront as could well be offered, to mar a man's beard, or shave it off in whole or in part p. The Lacedemonians, as Plutarch q relates, when any fled from battle, used, by way of reproach, to shave off part of their beards, and let the other part grow long; and with the Indians, as Bishop Patrick observes from an a...

7. THE WAR WITH AMMON AND THE SYRIANS CHAPTER 10 _ 1. David and Hanun (2 Samuel 10:1)_ 2. Ammon and the Syrians smitten (2 Samuel 10:6) The chapter with the war against Ammon and the Syrians is the prelude to the great sin of David. While Joab is carrying on the siege of Rabbah, the last city of the Ammonites, David, no doubt flushed with the great victory and prosperity, remained in his house and committed his awful sin. The war with Ammon originated through the insults which Hanun the King of Ammon had heaped upon David's ambassadors. David wanted to show kindness also to Hanun as his father Nahash had shown kindness to David. We have no record of this kindness. In this endeavour David did certainly not follow the right course, for Ammon was an enemy, and while Nahash

2 SAMUEL 10. WAR WITH THE AMMONITES AND THE SYRIANS (J). 2 Samuel 10:1. The king of Ammon insults David's ambassadors. [J. G. Frazer (_Taboo and the Perils of the Soul,_ p. 273) connects Hanun's action with the well-known belief that to get possession of the hair of a person is to have him in one's power. He supposes that Hanun, distrusting David's designs and desirous to have some guarantee of peace, thought he secured this by retaining half the beards and garments He quotes as a parallel the treatment of a traitor by two Moabite Arabs who shaved completely one side of his head and his moustache on the other, and set him at liberty. A. S. P.] 2 SAMUEL 10:6. The Ammonites hire mercenaries from the Syrian states; Joab takes command of the general levy of Israel and the standi

David's ambassadors insulted by the Ammonites 1. _And it came to pass after this_ On this formula of transition see note on ch. 2 Samuel 8:1. _the king of the children of Ammon_ Forty years at least had passed since the events of 1 Samuel 11, so that this Nahash was probably the son or grandson of the king defeated by Saul at Jabesh. On the Ammonites see note on 1 Samuel 11:1. _Hanun_ This name is identical with the Phoenician _Hanno_, which appears so frequently in Carthaginian history. In Greek both take the form Ἄννων (_Annon_)....

WHEREFORE HANUM TOOK DAVID'S SERVANTS, &C.— The wearing of long beards and garments was then, as it still is, the fashion of the East, where they were deemed badges of honour; and, consequently, the cutting off or curtailing of either was regarded as the greatest indignity. Nay, in some places, the cutting off of the beard was not only looked upon as matter of the highest reproach, but also of the severest punishment. So it was anciently among the Indians, and is at this day among the Persians. It was one of the most infamous punishments of cowardice in Sparta, that they who turned their backs in the day of battle were obliged to appear abroad with one half of their beard shaved, and the other half unshaved. There were two reasons which caused the Easterns of old, as well as at present, to look upon the beard as venerable: in the first place, they considered it as a natural ornament desi...