Chapter 11

David’s Son. ¹ With the onset of spring, the time of year when kings go off to war, David sent forth Joab along with his officers and the entire Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. However, David himself remained in Jerusalem. ² One evening, when David arose from his couch and walked about on the roof of his palace, he saw from the roof a woman bathing. She was very beautiful. ³ David made inquiries about the woman, and he was told: “That is Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite.”

⁴ David sent messengers to fetch her, and when she came to him, he had relations with her, just after she had purified herself from her uncleanness. Then she returned home. ⁵ The woman conceived, and she sent a message to David: “I am pregnant.”

⁶ Then David sent word to Joab: “Send me Uriah the Hittite,” and Joab did so. ⁷ When Uriah returned, David asked him how Joab and the troops were faring and how the war was going. ⁸ Then David said to Uriah: “Go down to your house and bathe your feet.” Uriah departed from the king’s palace, and a gift from the king was sent to his house.

⁹ However, Uriah did not return to his house, but rather he slept at the palace gate with all the king’s bodyguard. ¹⁰ Upon receiving the report that Uriah had not returned home, David said to him: “You have just arrived from a journey. Why didn’t you go down to your house?”

¹¹ Uriah replied: “The Ark and Israel and Judah are lodged in tents, and my master Joab and your majesty’s soldiers are encamped in the open fields. How then can I feel comfortable to go to my house, to eat and to drink and to sleep with my wife? As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I shall do no such thing.”

¹² Then David said to Uriah: “Remain here for one more day. Tomorrow I will send you back.” Therefore, Uriah remained that day in Jerusalem. ¹³ On the following day David invited Uriah to eat and drink with him and caused him to become drunk. In the evening he went outside to lie down and fall asleep with the king’s servants, but he did not go down to his house.

¹⁴ In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it to him in the care of Uriah. ¹⁵ In the letter he wrote: “Assign Uriah up front where the fighting is fierce, and then draw back from him so that he may be struck down and die.”

¹⁶ As Joab was besieging the city, he stationed Uriah where he knew the enemy had deployed its most valiant warriors. ¹⁷ When the men of the city came forth and fought against Joab, some of the soldiers of David fell. Uriah the Hittite was also slain.

¹⁸ Then Joab sent David a full account of the battle, ¹⁹ and he instructed the messenger: “When you have finished telling the king all the details about the fighting, ²⁰ his anger may be aroused and he may say to you: ‘Why did you go so close to the city to fight? Were you not aware that they would shoot from the wall? ²¹ Do you recall who killed Abimelech, the son of Jerubbaal? Was it not a woman who dropped down a millstone on him from the wall, resulting in his death at Thebez? Why did you go so close to the wall?’ Then say to him: ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite is also dead.’ ”

²² Therefore, the messenger set off, and on his arrival he relayed to David everything that Joab had instructed him to say. ²³ He told David: “Their men initially gained an advantage over us, and they came forth to fight against us in the open, but we drove them back to the entrance of the gate. ²⁴ Then their archers shot down at your servants from the wall, and some of the king’s servants died. Your servant Uriah the Hittite was also slain.”

²⁵ David then said to the messenger: “This is what you are to say to Joab: ‘Do not let this matter cause you any distress, for the sword devours now one and now another. Press your attack against the city and destroy it.’ That message should encourage him.”^[a]

²⁶ When the wife of Uriah was told that her husband was dead, she mourned for him. ²⁷ Then, when the period of mourning was over, David sent for her and brought her to live in his palace. She became his wife and bore him a son. However, the Lord was greatly displeased at what David had done.