One of the most complex figures in the Bible is Yoav ben Tzruyah, King David’s senior general and chief of staff. In this role, he carried out David’s orders and, at times, made decisions that he felt were in the king’s best interest, even if David himself did not, including dispatching enemies that threatened David’s rule. In retaliation for killing two military commanders — Abner, son of Ner, and Amasa, son of Yeter — David issues a deathbed instruction to his son Solomon to “act in accordance with your wisdom, and see that [Yoav’s] white hair does not go down to She’ol in peace” (I Kings 2:6).
How did David’s right hand man fall from grace? And why, on today’s daf, do the rabbis attempt to rehabilitate Yoav’s character?
As we’ve learned in our study of Tractate Sanhedrin, enacting the death penalty requires due process, and so today’s daf opens by imagining Solomon questioning Yoav as one might interrogate a defendant in a court of law:
They brought Yoav (before Solomon), who judged him. Solomon said to Yoav: What is the reason that you killed Abner? Yoav said to him: I was the blood redeemer of Asahel.
In II Samuel 2, we learn that Abner kills Asahel, a commander in King David’s army. Asahel isn’t just a general — he’s Yoav’s brother, and so according to the law of the blood redeemer (Numbers 35), Yoav has the right to kill Abner in retaliation. But Solomon objects:
Asahel was a pursuer. Yoav said to Solomon: Abner could have saved himself by (wounding Asahel) in one of his limbs.
The biblical text makes clear that Abner was in fact being pursued by Asahel, and so Abner kills him in self-defense. Since the killing was defensive, it was justified and Yoav has no right to take revenge. But Yoav notes that if Abner had wanted to stop Asahel’s pursuit, all he had to do was wound him in the leg; he didn’t have to kill him. Since he did, Yoav is still within his rights as a blood avenger to kill Abner in return.
Having dealt with the matter of Abner, the text now turns to Yoav’s killing of Amasa, a rebel army commander who was seeking to dethrone David. Yoav defends his actions on the grounds that he was preventing Amasa from overthrowing David’s monarchy, but Solomon still calls him out for rebelling against David himself by joining the revolutionary efforts of Adonijah, another of David’s sons. Yoav, seeing that his effort to convince Solomon is failing, attempts to forestall the inevitable by rushing to the Temple and grabbing hold of the horns on the altar, but to no avail. “So Benaiah son of Jehoiada went up and struck him down. And he was buried at his home in the wilderness” (I Kings 2:34).
It’s here that the Gemara takes an unexpected turn.
Is that to say that (Yoav’s house) was a wilderness? Rav Yehuda says that Rav says: Like the wilderness; just as the wilderness is open to all, so too, Yoav’s house was open to all.
Alternatively, like the wilderness; just as the wilderness is clean of theft and sexual immorality, so too Yoav’s house was clean of theft and sexual immorality. As for the verse: “And Yoav kept alive the rest of the city” (I Chronicles 11:8), Rav Yehuda says: He would give them small fish.
Why, having determined Yoav’s guilt, would the Gemara seek to rehabilitate him by claiming that he was righteous and charitable? Rabbi Evan Sheinhait suggests that the rabbis are seeking a compromise position between the law of the Torah, which supports the acts of the blood avenger, and the law of Babylonia (where the rabbis live), which has outlawed the practice. Rabbi Sheinhait notes that this compromise “supports the rabbi’s understanding that hanging and burial [the punishment for capital crimes] are processes of teshuvah. Anyone’s character can be redeemed even if their actions cannot.”
In other words, capital punishment is a form of atonement, wiping away the stain of sin. The rabbis cannot defend Yoav’s actions outright because it violated the law, which they are obliged to respect under the principle of dina d’malchuta dina — the law of the land is the law. But having atoned with his life for his crime, Yoav’s character can still be defended. Or as civil rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson has said: “Each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.”
Read all of Sanhedrin 49 on Sefaria.
This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on February 4, 2025. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.
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