In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war,
“In that part of the world, wars were not normally fought during the winter months because rains and cold weather made travel and campaigning difficult. Fighting resumed in the spring.”
More info where that came from.
That seems gentlemanly.
David sent Joab out with the king’s men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem.
I wonder what the other army’s king thought when he couldn’t find David out there? David could have avoided a whole bunch of trouble if he had been out at war as was expected of him.
2 One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace.
Again with the flat roofs.
From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful, 3 and David sent someone to find out about her.
The houses must have been close together. “Someone is bathing…I must know more about her!’
The man said, “She is Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite.”
Uriah was in the army that was out fighting for Israel and David. He was not a man to be trifled with…and yet this happens.
4 Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her. (Now she was purifying herself from her monthly uncleanness.)
- David had several other wives. He was already not paying attention to God’s original plan for marriage between one man and one woman.
- This is the first time David outright stole someone else’s wife. At least with Abigail, David waited til after her husband was dead. Now he’s gone completely bonkers.
- Bathsheba is only doing what the king commands her to do. You can’t go against that as a subject. This is all on David here. There was no consent, David didn’t ask God if this might be a bad idea. David as a man and a king is supposed to lead and lead well. This is not on Bathsheba at all.
- In that time nobody would have had sex with someone who was on her period.
- I think that’s all the things David is not paying attention to.
- Wait, also Uriah would definintely be mad and also do the right thing if he ever found out. Remember, he’s an army guy, not someone to be trifled with. David is playing with fire all over the place.
Then she went back home. 5 The woman conceived and sent word to David, saying, “I am pregnant.”
The natural outcome.
6 So David sent this word to Joab: “Send me Uriah the Hittite.”
David has been found out. He doesn’t repent. This is the beginning of the cover up. David wants to get away with this. He needs to get away with this, otherwise Uriah will be very angry with him and probably kill him. David needs this to get resolved as soon as possible.
And Joab sent him to David. 7 When Uriah came to him, David asked him how Joab was, how the soldiers were and how the war was going.
Distraction by way of small talk.
8 Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” So Uriah left the palace, and a gift from the king was sent after him. 9 But Uriah slept at the entrance to the palace with all his master’s servants and did not go down to his house.
10 David was told, “Uriah did not go home.” So he asked Uriah, “Haven’t you just come from a military campaign? Why didn’t you go home?”
11 Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah are staying in tents, and my commander Joab and my lord’s men are camped in the open country. How could I go to my house to eat and drink and make love to my wife? As surely as you live, I will not do such a thing!”
Uriah is a man focused on his job, his calling. Unlike David at this point.
12 Then David said to him, “Stay here one more day, and tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. 13 At David’s invitation, he ate and drank with him, and David made him drunk. But in the evening Uriah went out to sleep on his mat among his master’s servants; he did not go home.
David is trying to get Uriah to sleep with his wife right away, so that when the kid is born he’ll be all, “yeah that totally makes sense that we would have a kid after nine months.” I can tell that he would ask a question “Why does that kid not look like me?’ Uriah is smart enough for that. Uriah also doesn’t want sex to affect his military reflexes. He’s a guy anyone would want in their army. He gets the job done, and he does it right. David realizes that none of his plans are working properly. He must take things to the next level.
14 In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it with Uriah. 15 In it he wrote, “Put Uriah out in front where the fighting is fiercest. Then withdraw from him so he will be struck down and die.”
He knows Uriah, an competent military man would never open a letter that was not for him. Even if he is carrying his own death warrant. Joab might possibly think this is a strange request with how obviously good a soldier Uriah was, but he too can’t go agains the orders of the king.
16 So while Joab had the city under siege,
Seig means all the entrances and exits are blocked. Nobody goes in or out. The people who live there get starved. The hope with this tactic is that the other army will surrender for fear of losing civilian population. A population that could produce future soldiers for their very army.
he put Uriah at a place where he knew the strongest defenders were. 17 When the men of the city came out and fought against Joab, some of the men in David’s army fell; moreover, Uriah the Hittite died.
Fine, kill off your soldier of the month. It’s your loss. Uriah might not have found out, but God still knows what you’re up to.
18 Joab sent David a full account of the battle. 19 He instructed the messenger: “When you have finished giving the king this account of the battle, 20 the king’s anger may flare up, and he may ask you, ‘Why did you get so close to the city to fight? Didn’t you know they would shoot arrows from the wall? 21 Who killed Abimelek son of Jerub-Besheth? Didn’t a woman drop an upper millstone
A big and heavy stone used for grinding flour or wheat at the time.
on him from the wall, so that he died in Thebez? Why did you get so close to the wall?’ If he asks you this, then say to him, ‘Moreover, your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead.’”
22 The messenger set out, and when he arrived he told David everything Joab had sent him to say. 23 The messenger said to David, “The men overpowered us and came out against us in the open, but we drove them back to the entrance of the city gate. 24 Then the archers shot arrows at your servants from the wall, and some of the king’s men died. Moreover, your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead.”
This guy was good at repeating things word for word.
25 David told the messenger, “Say this to Joab: ‘Don’t let this upset you; the sword devours one as well as another. Press the attack against the city and destroy it.’ Say this to encourage Joab.”
David clearly doesn’t care about anything anymore.
26 When Uriah’s wife heard that her husband was dead, she mourned for him. 27 After the time of mourning was over, David had her brought to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing David had done displeased the Lord.
The man after God’s own heart has stopped paying attention.
Scripture Discussed: 2 Samuel 11
IIWAC: Pretty Woman Becomes Runaway Bride
“In that part of the world, wars were not normally fought during the winter months because rains and cold weather made travel and campaigning difficult. Fighting resumed in the spring.”
More info where that came from.
That seems gentlemanly.
David sent Joab out with the king’s men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem.
I wonder what the other army’s king thought when he couldn’t find David out there? David could have avoided a whole bunch of trouble if he had been out at war as was expected of him.
2 One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace.
Again with the flat roofs.
From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful, 3 and David sent someone to find out about her.
The houses must have been close together. “Someone is bathing…I must know more about her!’
The man said, “She is Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite.”
Uriah was in the army that was out fighting for Israel and David. He was not a man to be trifled with…and yet this happens.
4 Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her. (Now she was purifying herself from her monthly uncleanness.)
Then she went back home. 5 The woman conceived and sent word to David, saying, “I am pregnant.”
The natural outcome.
6 So David sent this word to Joab: “Send me Uriah the Hittite.”
David has been found out. He doesn’t repent. This is the beginning of the cover up. David wants to get away with this. He needs to get away with this, otherwise Uriah will be very angry with him and probably kill him. David needs this to get resolved as soon as possible.
And Joab sent him to David. 7 When Uriah came to him, David asked him how Joab was, how the soldiers were and how the war was going.
Distraction by way of small talk.
8 Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” So Uriah left the palace, and a gift from the king was sent after him. 9 But Uriah slept at the entrance to the palace with all his master’s servants and did not go down to his house.
10 David was told, “Uriah did not go home.” So he asked Uriah, “Haven’t you just come from a military campaign? Why didn’t you go home?”
11 Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah are staying in tents,[a] and my commander Joab and my lord’s men are camped in the open country. How could I go to my house to eat and drink and make love to my wife? As surely as you live, I will not do such a thing!”
Uriah is a man focused on his job, his calling. Unlike David at this point.
12 Then David said to him, “Stay here one more day, and tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. 13 At David’s invitation, he ate and drank with him, and David made him drunk. But in the evening Uriah went out to sleep on his mat among his master’s servants; he did not go home.
David is trying to get Uriah to sleep with his wife right away, so that when the kid is born he’ll be all, “yeah that totally makes sense that we would have a kid after nine months.” I can tell that he would ask a question “Why does that kid not look like me?’ Uriah is smart enough for that. Uriah also doesn’t want sex to affect his military reflexes. He’s a guy anyone would want in their army. He gets the job done, and he does it right. David realizes that none of his plans are working properly. He must take things to the next level.
14 In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it with Uriah. 15 In it he wrote, “Put Uriah out in front where the fighting is fiercest. Then withdraw from him so he will be struck down and die.”
He knows Uriah, an competent military man would never open a letter that was not for him. Even if he is carrying his own death warrant. Joab might possibly think this is a strange request with how obviously good a soldier Uriah was, but he too can’t go agains the orders of the king.
16 So while Joab had the city under siege,
Seig means all the entrances and exits are blocked. Nobody goes in or out. The people who live there get starved. The hope with this tactic is that the other army will surrender for fear of losing civilian population. A population that could produce future soldiers for their very army.
he put Uriah at a place where he knew the strongest defenders were. 17 When the men of the city came out and fought against Joab, some of the men in David’s army fell; moreover, Uriah the Hittite died.
Fine, kill off your soldier of the month. It’s your loss. Uriah might not have found out, but God still knows what you’re up to.
18 Joab sent David a full account of the battle. 19 He instructed the messenger: “When you have finished giving the king this account of the battle, 20 the king’s anger may flare up, and he may ask you, ‘Why did you get so close to the city to fight? Didn’t you know they would shoot arrows from the wall? 21 Who killed Abimelek son of Jerub-Besheth[b]? Didn’t a woman drop an upper millstone
A big and heavy stone used for grinding flour or wheat at the time.
on him from the wall, so that he died in Thebez? Why did you get so close to the wall?’ If he asks you this, then say to him, ‘Moreover, your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead.’”
22 The messenger set out, and when he arrived he told David everything Joab had sent him to say. 23 The messenger said to David, “The men overpowered us and came out against us in the open, but we drove them back to the entrance of the city gate. 24 Then the archers shot arrows at your servants from the wall, and some of the king’s men died. Moreover, your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead.”
This guy was good at repeating things word for word.
25 David told the messenger, “Say this to Joab: ‘Don’t let this upset you; the sword devours one as well as another. Press the attack against the city and destroy it.’ Say this to encourage Joab.”
David clearly doesn’t care about anything anymore.
26 When Uriah’s wife heard that her husband was dead, she mourned for him. 27 After the time of mourning was over, David had her brought to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing David had done displeased the Lord.
The man after God’s own heart has stopped paying attention.
Scripture Discussed: 2 Samuel 11