“Yo’av said to ‘Amasa, ‘Is it going well with you, my brother?’ Then, with his right hand, Yo’av took ‘Amasa by the beard to kiss him. Amasa took no notice of the sword in Yo’av’s hand, so Yo’av stabbed him in the groin. His insides poured out on the ground, and he died without being stabbed a second time.”-2 Samuel 20:9-10
When we last left off, Amasa, who had just gathered a militia to put down Sheva’s rebellion, had run into Joab.
The two men were standing face-to-face out on the fields of Gibeon.
Now, Amasa had every right to be concerned.
Joab had a reputation for being a ruthless general.
Yet, he was now standing in front of him with a smile on his face.
As they approached each other, Joab further put him at ease by asking, “Is all well with you, my brother?”
He then playfully grabbed Amasa’s beard and kissed him.
This warm display of typical Middle Eastern affection would have disarmed Amasa.
We also need to keep in mind that these men were 1st cousins.
So they were a close family.
But it was all a murderous deception.
And fits well with how Joab did away with his opponents in the past.
We’re also told that Joab was decked out in full military regalia.
This appearance would have intimidated Amasa at first.
But Joab’s warm demeanor quickly put Amasa at ease.
As they drew near, Joab reached out to touch Amasa’s beard with his right hand.
At that moment, Joab’s sword silently fell out of its scabbard onto the ground.
That’s when Joab struck.
With his left hand, he grabbed the sword and thrust it into Amasa’s abdomen with full force.
Amasa’s guts spilled out like a mini Niagara Falls.
Joab’s blow was so on target, he didn’t need to strike a second time.
Amasa was finished.
But there’s another gruesome reason why Joab didn’t stab him a second time.
When a defeated opponent lay writhing on the ground in pain, it was common for a soldier to quickly finish him off.
This was regarded as a kind of gentleman’s code in battle.
But Joab didn’t do that.
Why?
Because he wanted Amasa to suffer until the very end.
It was Joab’s way of telling Amasa, “How dare you think you could usurp my position as the supreme military leader over all Israel?”
This man was as cold as ice.
Let’s switch over to the takeaway.
I can’t help but see the parallel between Joab’s deception and Judas’s betrayal of Yeshua with a kiss.
This seems to be a Biblical pattern that we can take as a general principle.
Both men had devious intentions to hurt their opponents.
But they disguised those intentions with warm gestures of physical affection.
So the lesson here is when your enemy is acting kind towards you, that’s when you should be most on guard.
Ironically, this means you can trust people who are open with their hostile feelings much more than those who always walk around with ridiculous grins on their faces.
You see these characters in the corporate world all the time.
Ya feel me?
Done.
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