I will show kindness unto Hanun the son of Nahash, as his father showed kindness unto me.
David and Hanun
Powerful though David had proved himself in every direction in the art of war, his heart was inclined to peace. The position which he had gained as a warrior would naturally have made Hanun more afraid of David than David could be of Hanun. The king of Israel could not have failed to know this, and it might naturally occur to him that it would be a kindly act to the young king of Ammon to send him a message that showed that he might thoroughly rely on his friendly intentions. The message to Hanun was another emanation of a kindly heart. It is a happy thing for any country when its rulers and men of influence are ever on the watch for opportunities to strengthen the spirit of friendship. It is a happy thing in the Church when the leaders of different sections are more disposed to measures-that conciliate and heal than to measures that alienate and divide. In family life, and wherever men of different views and different tempers meet, this peace-loving spirit is of great price. Men that like fighting, and that are ever disposed to taunt, to irritate, to divide, are the nuisances of society. Between the Ammonites and the Israelites collisions had occurred on two former occasions, on both of which the Ammonites appear to have been the aggressors The former of these was in the days of Jephthah. The second was the collision at Jabesh-gilead at the beginning of the reign of Saul. When the men of Jabesh, brought to bay, begged terms of peace, the bitter answer was returned that it would be granted only on condition that every man’s right eye should be put out. It was then that Saul showed such courage and promptitude. In the briefest space he was at Jabesh-gilead in defence of his people, and by his successful tactics inflicted on the Ammonites a terrible defeat, killing a great multitude and scattering the remainder, so that not any two of them were left together. After such a defeat, Nahash could not have very friendly feelings to Saul. And when Saul proclaimed David his enemy, Nahash would naturally incline to David’s side. It was long, long ago when it happened, but love has a long memory, and the remembrance was still pleasant to David. And now the king of Israel purposes to repay to the son the debt he had incurred to the father. Up to this point it is a pretty picture; and it is a great disappointment when we find the transaction miscarry, and a negotiation which began in all the warmth and sincerity of friendship terminate in the wild work of war. The fault of this miscarriage, however, was glaringly on the other side. Our difficulty is to understand how sane men could have acted in such a way. It is hardly necessary to say a word to bring out the outrageous character of their conduct.
(1) There was the repulse of David’s kindness. It was not even declined with civility; it was repelled with scorn. It is always a serious thing to reject overtures of kindness. Kindness is too rare a gem to be trampled under foot.
(2) But Hanun not only repelled David’s kindness, but charged him with meanness, and virtually flung in his face a challenge to war. To represent his apparent kindness as a mean cover of a hostile purpose was an act which Hanun might think little of, but which was fitted to wound David to the quick. Unscrupulous natures have a great advantage over others in the charge they may bring. In a street collision a man in dirty clothing is much more powerful for mischief than one in clean raiment. Rough, unscrupulous men are restrained by no delicacy from bringing atrocious charges against those to whom these charges are supremely odious. They have little sense of the din of them, and they toss them about without scruple. Such poisoned arrows inflict great pain, not because the charges are just, but because it is horrible to refined natures even to hear them.
(3) To these offences Hanun added yet another--scornful treatment of David’s ambassadors. In the eyes of all civilised nations the persons of ambassadors were held sacred, and any affront or injury to them was counted an odious crime. Very often men of eminent position, venerable age, and unblemished character were chosen for this function, and it is quite likely that David’s ambassadors to Hanun were of this class. When therefore these men were treated with contumely--half their beards, which were in a manner sacred, shorn away, their garments mutilated, and their persons exposed--no grosser insult could have been inflicted. It is a painful moment when true worth and nobility lie at the mercy of insolence and coarseness, and have to bear their bitter revilings. Such things may happen in public controversy in a country where the utmost liberty of speech is allowed, and when men of ruffian mould find contumely and insult their handiest weapons. In times of religious persecution the most frightful charges have been hurled at the heads of godly men and women, whose real crime is to have striven to the utmost to obey God.
3. The Ammonites did not wait for a formal declaration of war by David. Nor did they flatter themselves, when they came to their senses, that against one who had gained such renown as a warrior they could stand alone. Their insult to King David turned out a costly affair.
4. It requires but a very little consideration to see that the wars which are so briefly recorded in this chapter must have been most serious and perilous undertakings. The record of them is so short, so unimpassioned, so simple, that many readers are disposed to think very little of them. But when we pause to think what it was for the king of Israel to meet, on foreign soil, confederates so numerous, so powerful, and so familiar with warfare, we cannot but see that these were tremendous wars. They were fitted to try the faith as well as the courage of David and his people to the very utmost. (W. G. Blaikie, D. D.)
Ungenerous judgments
In thousands of men, the mind, if unveiled, would be found to be a star-chamber filled with false witnesses and cruel judgments. If you were to go back into the old star-chamber of England, and read the records made of testimony given and sentences passed by men of partial information, what a literature of hell those records would be I But worse than these are the cruel, rash, hateful judgments which men form of each other in the silence of the mind, simply because they follow their interests, their feelings, their prejudices, and not their conscience, in ascertaining facts and coming to conclusions. (H. W. Beecher.)
Two aspects of David
In Chapter s 10. and 11. we see king David at his best and also at his worst. The second verse of the tenth chapter opens almost in the same spirit as the first verse of the ninth. In both instances David is determined to “show kindness.” In the first instance he would show kindness to any survivor of the house of Saul, as we have just seen, and now he will show kindness unto Hanon the son of Nahash, because Hanun’s father had shown kindness to David in the old times of distress. In both these historical instances David acts retrospectively, in the sense that he is not proposing to show kindness to living men for their own sakes but on account of some virtue or goodness on the part of their ancestors. A merely technical or literal nature would have been content with contemporary action--that is to say, would not have troubled about going back into yesterday in order to honour the memory of a dead man. But even in this generous retrospection David is faithful to his poetic nature and his religious enthusiasm. David is to be Credited with good retentions in this case, as he was in the case of proposing to build the temple and to do kindness to any survivor of the house of Saul Even good intentions hays a distinctive value of their own. Sweet waters do not rise from bitter fountains. To have one good wish, one unselfish desire, one generous impulse, is to have some degree of divine influence operating upon the heart, and so far is to show that the heart has not been given over to utter reprobation, This is a comforting thought for ourselves. Hanun responded to the counsels of his advisers in a manner which he supposed would increase his own popularity with his subjects. He “took David’s servants, and shaved off the one half of their beards, and cut off their garments in the middle.” it is little to the honour of human nature that there are not only insults which men can hurl at one another in moments of passion and defiance, but there are studied insults which are elaborated in cold blood and inflicted with a sense of enjoyment by the cruel men who have fashioned new modes of social humiliation. The insult inflicted upon Israel was not only personal, it was deeply religious. Not, only was David dishonoured, but God Himself was defied. In Leviticus 19:27, we see how stringent was the law regarding this matter of shaving the head. It, is not for us to enter into the value of any such ordinances; suffice it to say that they were the distinct ordinances of the people of Israel, and as such had religious value and significance. There is a cruelty in our own day which seeks to injure men- through the medium of their religious convictions. To-day men are kept out of pecuniary positions because of their religious faith. Social advancement is barred to not a few persons on account of their religious convictions. Were such men without conviction, light-headed, and light-hearted, ready to adopt any form or ceremony as they might adopt a change of garments, their course in life would be much smoother; but because they are earnest, even to agony, their convictions are made into so many stumbling-blocks by which their progress is hindered. The counsellors of Hanun the son of Nahash were too blinded by their own passion to foresee the results of their foolish policy. What was a practical jest to them was an occasion of just anger to the king whom they had insulted. It is well to take some account of the resources of the enemy before being too defiant or adopting a course of lofty superciliousness. But folly seldom sees both sides of a question. It is a notable characteristic of the genius of history that it is always faithful to its own time. As the action of David would now be out of place as between Christian nations, so any other course than that which he adopted would have been out of place in relation to his particular injury. Read history in its own light. It is essential to adopt this canon of interpretation in reading many portions of the Old Testament; otherwise the mind will be thrown often into a state of moral bewilderment, and be ready almost to cry out against the Spirit of God. (J. Parker, D. D.)
A father’s kindness repaid to his son
A good man of my acquaintance died very suddenly the other day, and when it came to settling up the account, it was found that, while with his presence and work he was able to get a living for his family out of his share in the business, with him gone there was nothing left. All the children were grown up and able to support themselves, with the exception of one young man who had two years yet to spend in the medical school before he would be able to take up his profession as a doctor. It seemed at first that he must drop out, and work his way for awhile saving up money to go on. But just then a man came forward, who said: “Some years ago I was in a difficult place and needed a friend very much. Just at the critical time your father stepped into the breach, and in the gentlest, cheeriest way helped me out. I said then if ever I had a chance I would pay that kindness back. Now is my chance. You go back to the medical school and finish your course, and I will take care of the expenses. You can charge them up to your father’s kindness account.” He who sows a kind deed may be sure that it is a long-lived, hardy crop, and certain to bring in its harvest by and by. (L. A. Banks, D. D.)