Discovery Box2 Samuel 11:1-12
Context11:1 In the spring of the year, at the time when kings 1 normally conduct wars, 2 David sent out Joab with his officers 3 and the entire Israelite army. 4 They defeated the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David stayed behind in Jerusalem. 5 11:2 One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of his palace. 6 From the roof he saw a woman bathing. Now this woman was very attractive. 7 11:3 So David sent someone to inquire about the woman. The messenger 8 said, “Isn’t this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?”
11:4 David sent some messengers to get her. 9 She came to him and he had sexual relations with her. 10 (Now at that time she was in the process of purifying herself from her menstrual uncleanness.) 11 Then she returned to her home. 11:5 The woman conceived and then sent word to David saying, “I’m pregnant.”
11:6 So David sent a message to Joab that said, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” So Joab sent Uriah to David. 11:7 When Uriah came to him, David asked about how Joab and the army were doing and how the campaign was going. 12 11:8 Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your home and relax.” 13 When Uriah left the palace, the king sent a gift to him. 14 11:9 But Uriah stayed at the door of the palace with all 15 the servants of his lord. He did not go down to his house.
11:10 So they informed David, “Uriah has not gone down to his house.” So David said to Uriah, “Haven’t you just arrived from a journey? Why haven’t you gone down to your house?” 11:11 Uriah replied to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah reside in temporary shelters, and my lord Joab and my lord’s soldiers are camping in the open field. Should I go to my house to eat and drink and have marital relations 16 with my wife? As surely as you are alive, 17 I will not do this thing!” 11:12 So David said to Uriah, “Stay here another day. Tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah stayed in Jerusalem both that day and the following one. 18
[11:1] 1 tc Codex Leningrad (B19A), on which BHS is based, has here “messengers” (הַמַּלְאכִים, hammal’khim), probably as the result of contamination from the occurrence of that word in v. 4. The present translation follows most Hebrew
[11:1] 3 tn Heb “and his servants with him.”
[11:1] 5 tn The disjunctive clause contrasts David’s inactivity with the army’s activity.
[11:2] 6 tn Heb “on the roof of the house of the king.” So also in vv. 8, 9.
[11:2] 7 tn The disjunctive clause highlights this observation and builds the tension of the story.
[11:3] 8 tn Heb “he”; the referent (the messenger) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
[11:4] 9 tn Heb “and David sent messengers and he took her.”
[11:4] 10 tn Heb “he lay with her” (so NASB, NRSV); TEV “he made love to her”; NIV, CEV, NLT “he slept with her.”
[11:4] 11 tn The parenthetical disjunctive clause further heightens the tension by letting the reader know that Bathsheba, having just completed her menstrual cycle, is ripe for conception. See P. K. McCarter, II Samuel (AB), 286. Since she just had her period, it will also be obvious to those close to the scene that Uriah, who has been away fighting, cannot be the father of the child.
[11:7] 12 tn Heb “concerning the peace of Joab and concerning the peace of the people and concerning the peace of the battle.”
[11:8] 13 tn Heb “and wash your feet.”
[11:8] 14 tn Heb “and there went out after him the gift of the king.”
[11:9] 15 tc The Lucianic recension of the Old Greek translation lacks the word “all.”
[11:11] 17 tn Heb “as you live and as your soul lives.”
[11:12] 18 tn On the chronology involved here see P. K. McCarter, II Samuel (AB), 287.
