2 Samuel 12:15-23

Common English Bible

¹⁵ Then Nathan went home.

Bathsheba’s child dies

The Lord struck the child that Uriah’s wife had borne for David, and he became very sick. ¹⁶ David begged God for the boy. He fasted and spent the night sleeping on the ground. ¹⁷ The senior servants of his house approached^[a] him to lift him up off the ground, but he refused, and he wouldn’t eat with them either.

¹⁸ On the seventh day, the child died. David’s servants were afraid to tell him that the child had died. “David wouldn’t listen to us when we talked to him while the child was still alive,” they said. “How can we tell him the child has died? He’ll do something terrible!”

¹⁹ But when David saw his servants whispering, he realized the child had died.

“Is the child dead?” David asked his servants.

“Yes,” they said, “he is dead.”

²⁰ Then David rose from the ground, bathed, anointed himself, and changed his clothes. He entered the Lord’s house and bowed down. Then he entered his own house. He requested food, which was brought to him, and he ate.

²¹ “Why are you acting this way?” his servants asked. “When the child was alive, you fasted and cried and kept watch,^[b] but now that the child is dead, you get up and eat food!”

²² David replied, “While the child was alive I fasted and wept because I thought, Who knows? The Lord may have mercy on me and let the child live. ²³ But he is dead now. Why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? No. I am going where he is, but he won’t come back to me.”