2 Samuel Chapter 11
David and Bathsheba
1 In the spring when kings normally go to war, David sent Joab and Israel’s army to fight the Ammonites and lay siege to Rabbah. David stayed in Jerusalem.
2 When evening came, David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of his palace. From the roof he saw a woman taking a bath; she was beautiful. 3 David sent and asked about her. Someone said, “Isn’t this Bathsheba Bat-Eliam, wife of Uriah the Hittite?” 4 David sent messengers and took her. When she came to him, he slept with her. When she’d purified herself, she went home. 5 She got pregnant and sent and told David.
2 Sam 11:1-5
6 He sent to Joab, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” 7 When he came, David asked how Joab and the people were doing and how the war was going. 8 Then he told him, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” He left the king’s palace, and a present was sent after him. 9 But Uriah slept at the door of the king’s palace with David’s palace guard and didn’t go home. 10 When they told David, “Uriah didn’t go home,” he asked Uriah, “Haven’t you come from a journey? Why didn’t you go home?”
11 He said,
“The Ark, Israel, and Judah are staying in temporary shelters, and my commander Joab and his troops are camping in the open field. Would I go eat and drink and be with my wife? By your life and the life of your soul, I wouldn’t do that.”
12 David told him, “Stay here today; I’ll let you go tomorrow.”
Uriah stayed in Jerusalem that day and the next. 13 David called him; he ate and drank with him and got him drunk. In the evening he went out to sleep on his bed with David’s palace guard and didn’t go home.
2 Sam 11:6-13
14 In the morning, David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it with Uriah, 15 “Put Uriah in the front of the fiercest battle and withdraw from him so he can be struck down.” 16 As Joab kept watch on the city, he put Uriah where he knew there were trained soldiers. 17 Men came out of the city to fight, and some of David’s soldiers fell, including Uriah. 18 Joab sent a report to David about the war 19 and charged the messenger,
“When you’ve told the king everything, 20 if he’s angry and says, ‘Why get so close to the city to fight? Didn’t you know they’d shoot from the wall? 21 Who struck down Abimelech Ben-Jerubbesheth? Wasn’t it a woman that threw an upper millstone on him from the wall and he died at Thebez? Why get so close to the wall?’—then say, ‘Uriah the Hittite is dead too.’”
22 The messenger reported,
23 “The men prevailed against us and came out against us in the field, but we pressed them up to the entrance of the gate. 24 The archers shot from the wall and killed some of your soldiers, including Uriah.”
25 David said,
“Tell Joab, ‘Don’t let this get you down. The sword takes one as well as another. Intensify your battle against the city and overthrow it.’ Encourage him that way.”
26 When Uriah’s wife heard he was dead, she mourned for him. 27 When the time for mourning ended, David had her brought to his house; she became his wife and had a son. But what David had done Yahveh considered evil.
2 Sam 11:14-27