1 Chronicleschapter 19
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Speaks with:2 Samuel 10×71 Chronicles 18×31 Chronicles 11×31 Kings 20×31 Chronicles 19×3Joshua 13×2
Summary
Chapter summary
David sends messengers to comfort Hanun of Ammon at his father's death; Hanun's counselors persuade him they are spies, and he shaves the men and cuts off their garments to the hip, a calculated humiliation that starts a war. The Ammonites hire Syrian chariots by the thousand, and Joab finds himself caught between two fronts. He splits the army, takes the Syrians himself, gives the Ammonites to Abishai, and speaks the chapter's memorable line: 'Be of good courage, and let us play the man for our people, and for the cities of our God: and let Jehovah do that which seemeth him good.' The Syrians flee, and after a second defeat refuse to help Ammon again.
Context
History · Ezra — 1 Chronicles overview
- A. 1–5 Kindness repaid with shaved beards and cut garments
- B. 6–15 Joab caught between two armies: let us play the men
- C. 16–19 The Syrians beyond the River broken for good
The outline
A.Kindness repaid with shaved beards and cut garmentsvv. 1 to 5
Read vv. 1 to 5 →B.Joab caught between two armies: let us play the menvv. 6 to 15
Read vv. 6 to 15 →C.The Syrians beyond the River broken for goodvv. 16 to 19
Read vv. 16 to 19 →
The world behind this chapter
1 Chronicles 19The history
Sending an embassy to console a new king on his father's death was ordinary courtesy between neighboring courts, and suspecting such an embassy of spying out the defenses was an equally ordinary suspicion. Envoys did report on walls and gates. Hanun's advisers were not paranoid; they were wrong.
What he does to the men is calculated. He shaves them and cuts their garments off at the hips. In that world a full beard was the mark of a free adult man and the visible sign of his honor, and exposure was the shame reserved for prisoners of war. He did not merely refuse the condolence; he turned David's ambassadors into a public statement, and it could not be undone.
That is why they wait at Jericho until their beards grow. It is also why the Ammonites immediately hire an army — a thousand talents of silver for chariots and horsemen from the Aramean kingdoms to the north. Mercenary contracts of exactly this kind ran the politics of the region; a small kingdom bought a great kingdom's chariots because it could not field them.
The battle itself is a textbook problem: Ammonite infantry in front of the city gate, hired Aramean chariots out in the open field behind the Israelites. Joab splits the army and sets the two halves back to back, each ready to reinforce the other — a solution to being surrounded that requires discipline more than numbers.
What it meant to them
Joab's words before the charge became the chapter's keepsake: be strong, play the man for our people and for the cities of our God, and let the LORD do what is good in his sight. Courage and submission in the same breath.
For readers whose own security depended on the goodwill of officials in Samaria and Persia, the chapter was also a plain lesson in how fast an insult can become a decade of war.
Sources cited
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews, and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
- Roland de Vaux, Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on 1 Chronicles 19. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.