David Commits Adultery with Bathsheba
16 When Joab was besieging[j] the city, he put Uriah toward the place which he knew there were valiant warriors.[k] 17 The men of the city came out and fought with Joab. Some from the army from the servants of David fell; Uriah the Hittite also died. 18 Joab sent and told David all of the news of the battle. 19 He instructed the messenger, saying, “As you are finishing to speak all the news of the battle to the king, 20 if the anger of the king rises and he says to you, ‘Why did you go near the city to fight? Did you not know that they would shoot from atop the wall? 21 Who killed Abimelech the son of Jerub-bosheth,[l] if not a woman who threw an upper millstone on him from atop the wall and he died at Thebez? Why did you go near the wall?’ Then you shall say, ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite also died.’” 22 Then the messenger left, and he came and told David all that Joab had sent him to say. 23 The messenger said to David, “Because the men overpowered us,[m] the men came out to us in the field, but we forced them back[n] to the entrance of the gate. 24 The archers shot at your servant from atop the wall, and some of the servants of the king died; your servant Uriah the Hittite also died.” 25 Then David said to the messenger, “Thus you shall say to Joab, ‘Do not feel badly about this matter;[o] now one and then another[p] the sword will devour. Intensify your attack on the city and overthrow it.’” And he encouraged him. 26 When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned over her husband. 27 When the mourning was over, David sent and brought her to his household, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing which David had done was evil in the eyes of Yahweh.
Footnotes
- 2 Samuel 11:1 Literally “And it happened at the turn of the year”
- 2 Samuel 11:1 According to the reading tradition (Qere); Kethib has “angels” or “messengers”
- 2 Samuel 11:1 Literally “sons/children of Ammon”
- 2 Samuel 11:2 Literally “at the time of the evening”
- 2 Samuel 11:2 Hebrew “the”
- 2 Samuel 11:2 Literally “very good of appearance”
- 2 Samuel 11:7 Literally “as far as the peace of Joab, as far as the peace of the army, and as far as the peace of the battle”
- 2 Samuel 11:12 Literally “also the day”
- 2 Samuel 11:13 Literally “and he made him drunk”
- 2 Samuel 11:16 Literally “And it happened at the besieging of Joab”
- 2 Samuel 11:16 Literally “there were men of ability”
- 2 Samuel 11:21 In putting words in David’s mouth, Joab alludes to the story of Abimelech the son of Gideon from Judg 9:52–55. Though Gideon was also known as Jerub-ba’al, Joab conventionally substitutes bosheth (shame) for Ba’al to avoid naming the Canaanite deity
- 2 Samuel 11:23 Literally “the men were superior over us”
- 2 Samuel 11:23 Literally “we were upon them”
- 2 Samuel 11:25 Literally “Do not let his matter be evil in your eyes”
- 2 Samuel 11:25 Literally “for as this and as this”