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Context No. 1829 of 4322 · 2 Maccabees

Context · Reflection

2 Maccabees 12:1-9: in context

1So when this agreement had been made, Lysias departed to the king, and the Jews went about their farming. 2But some of the governors of districts, Timotheus and Apollonius the son of Gennaeus, and also Hieronymus and Demophon, and beside them Nicanor the governor of Cyprus, would not allow them to enjoy tranquillity and live in peace. 3Men of Joppa perpetrated this great impiety: they invited the Jews who lived among them to go with their wives and children into the boats which they had provided, as though they had no ill will toward them. 4When the Jews, relying on the public vote of the city, accepted the invitation, as men desiring to live in peace and suspecting nothing, they took them out to sea and drowned not less than two hundred of them. 5When Judas heard of the cruelty done to his fellow countrymen, giving command to the men that were with him 6and calling upon God the righteous Judge, he came against the murderers of his kindred, and set the harbor on fire at night, burned the boats, and put to the sword those who had fled there. 7But when the town gates were closed, he withdrew, intending to come again to root out the whole community of the men of Joppa. 8But learning that the men of Jamnia intended to do the same thing to the Jews who lived among them, 9he attacked the Jamnites at night, and set fire to the harbor together with the fleet, so that the glare of the light was seen at Jerusalem, two hundred forty furlongs distant.

The men of Joppa commit a treacherous crime. With no apparent ill will, they invite the Jews living among them, along with their wives and children, to a friendly outing on boats they have provided. The Jews, trusting the public goodwill of the city and suspecting nothing, accept the invitation as neighbors wishing to live in peace. Then, once out at sea, their hosts drown them, two hundred and more. When Judas hears of the cruelty, he calls on God the righteous Judge and moves against the murderers.

The evil here wears a particular and sickening mask: it is treachery disguised as friendship. The men of Joppa did not attack their Jewish neighbors openly; they invited them, with every show of goodwill, to a friendly gathering, and the Jews, trusting the outward friendliness, went unsuspecting to their deaths. The betrayal was made possible precisely by the mask of friendship; the smile hid the knife. This is among the uglier forms of human evil, and one the Scriptures know well: the mouth that speaks peace to the neighbor while the heart lies in wait, the words smooth as butter while war is in the heart. There is a grief particular to this kind of wrong. To be harmed by an open enemy is one thing; to be betrayed by those who wore the mask of friendship, who smiled and invited and reassured before they struck, is a deeper wound, for it poisons trust itself. Many have known some version of it, the betrayal that came wrapped in warmth. The passage offers no easy comfort about such treachery, but it does offer one thing: Judas, hearing of the cruelty, called upon God the righteous Judge. When we are betrayed by feigned friendship, when the mask of goodwill hid an intent to harm, our recourse is to the God who sees behind every mask, who is not deceived by the smile that hides the knife, and who judges rightly. He sees the true intent behind the friendly words; the treachery hidden from us is not hidden from him. We cannot always tell the false friend from the true, and we will sometimes be deceived and wounded; but God the righteous Judge sees the heart behind the mask, and to him we can entrust both our wounds and the reckoning. The men of Joppa masked murder as friendship; but there is a Judge whom no mask deceives.

Have I been wounded by treachery that wore the mask of friendship, a betrayal wrapped in warmth and reassurance, and can I bring both the wound and the reckoning to God the righteous Judge, who is not deceived by the smile that hides the knife but sees the true intent behind every mask?

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