2 Samuel
Chapter 11
1 After a year ended, when kings usually went to war, David sent Joab, his officers, and all Israel. They defeated the Ammonites and surrounded Rabbah. But David stayed in Jerusalem.
2 One evening, David got up from his bed, walked on the palace roof, and saw a very beautiful woman bathing.
3 David sent someone to find out about the woman. Someone asked, “Isn’t this Bathsheba, Eliam’s daughter, Uriah the Hittite’s wife?”
4 David sent people to get her. She came to him, and they slept together after she was clean from her impurity. Then she went back home.
5 The woman became pregnant, and she sent word to David, saying, “I am expecting a baby.”
6 David sent a message to Joab: “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” So Joab sent Uriah to David.
7 When Uriah came to him, David asked how Joab was, how the people were, and how the war was going.
8 David told Uriah, “Go to your house and wash your feet.” Uriah left the king’s house, and a serving of food from the king was sent after him.
9 Uriah slept at the entrance of the king’s house with all his master’s servants and did not go down to his own home.
10 When they told David, “Uriah did not go home,” David asked Uriah, “Didn’t you come from a trip? Why didn’t you go home?”
11 Uriah said to David, “The ark, and Israel, and Judah stay in tents; and my leader Joab, and my lord’s servants, camp in the fields. Should I then go to my house to eat, drink, and be with my wife? As you live, and as your spirit lives, I will not do this.”
12 David told Uriah, “Stay here today as well, and tomorrow I will let you go.” So Uriah stayed in Jerusalem that day and the next day.
13 When David invited him, he ate and drank in front of David, and David got him drunk. In the evening, he went to sleep on his bed with his master’s servants instead of going home.
14 In the morning, David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it with Uriah.
15 He wrote in the letter: Place Uriah at the front where the fighting is fiercest and then pull back so he will be struck down and die.
16 When Joab saw the city, he sent Uriah to a place where he knew strong soldiers were.
17 The city men came out, fought with Joab, and some of David’s servants died, including Uriah the Hittite.
18 Then Joab sent a message to tell David everything about the war.
19 He gave the messenger instructions, saying, “After you finish reporting the war news to the king,
20 If the king gets angry and asks you why you came so close to the city during the battle, didn’t you realize they would shoot arrows from the wall?
21 Who killed Abimelech, son of Jerubbesheth? Wasn’t it a woman who dropped a millstone on him from the wall so he died in Thebez? Why did you go close to the wall? Then you must say, ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite is also dead.’
22 The messenger went, came, and told David everything Joab had sent him to say.
23 The messenger told David, “The men were too strong for us. They attacked us in the open field, but we fought them off all the way to the city gate.”
24 The archers shot arrows at your servants from the wall; some of the king’s servants have died, and your servant Uriah the Hittite is also dead.
25 David told the messenger, “Tell Joab, ‘Don’t be upset about this because the sword takes one as well as another. Fight harder against the city, destroy it, and cheer him up.’”
26 When Uriah’s wife learned that her husband Uriah had died, she grieved for him.
27 After the mourning ended, David brought her to his house, she became his wife, and had a son for him. But what David did made God unhappy.