Bible Studies
I have heard the account of David and Bathsheba from 2 Samuel 11 referenced many times these past four decades of my Christian walk. I cannot recall one single occasion it was ever described as other than an act of adultery. Nor have any commentaries or books I have referenced on the life of David stated otherwise. Yet the categorical classification of this incident as adultery in the lives of these two individuals has always been troubling to me. Nowhere in the Bible is this encounter declared adultery. A dictionary definition of the word “assume” is to take for granted; to accept without proof. A casual reading of 2 Samuel 11 could conjure up adultery to presuming minds. But is that in fact what actually happened? I think not!
What is salient about the account from 2 Samuel 11 verses 2 through 4 is its brevity. “Then it happened one evening that David arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king’s house. And from the roof he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold. So David sent and inquired about the woman. And someone said, “Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” Then David sent messengers, and took her; and she came to him, and he lay with her, for she was cleansed from her impurity; and she returned to her house.” So much is missing from this account. Such a lack of information is a festering ground for presumption and falsehood.
Jump two chapters later to 2 Samuel 13 and the account of Amnon and Tamar. There is a plethora of information about this incident that leaves no doubt that a rape took place. But if this happening between Amnon and Tamar was written with the brevity of 2 Samuel 11, verses 2-4, would rape even be considered? Limiting the detailed account in chapter 13 to three brief verses could result in something like this: “After this Absalom the son of David had a lovely sister, whose name was Tamar; and Amnon the son of David loved her. Amnon said to the king, ‘Please let Tamar my sister come and make a couple of cakes for me.’ And Tamar took the cakes which she had made, and brought them to Amnon her brother in the bedroom. Amnon said to her, ‘Come, lie with me, my sister’ and he lay with her. Afterwards Tamar remained in her brother Absalom’s house.”
From this account Amnon and Tamar would be perceived as willing participants to incest but there would be no justification for Amnon being accused of rape. But from the abundance of detail provided in chapter 13 we know in truth Amnon was overwhelmed with the beauty of Tamar and the desire to have her. The inability to satisfy his lust towards Tamar brought him to the point despondency (verse 2). We know his confidant wickedly suggested that as a son of the king his desire for Tamar should not go unabated (verses 3-5). We know Amnon deceitfully involved his father, King David, to precipitate the opportunity to fulfill his lustful desire towards Tamar (verse 6). We know that Tamar was obedient to her father’s wishes and from an innocent heart wanted to help restore the health of her brother Amnon (verses 7-8). We know she was repulsed by the thought of incest and resisted Amnon’s sexual advances (verses 12-13). We know Amnon overpowered her and forced himself upon her (verse 14). We know Amnon then loathed Tamar and sent her away from his sight (verses 15-17). We know Tamar was humiliated and greatly ashamed becoming depressed in the days following as she sought comfort in her brother Absalom’s home (verses 19-20).
Here is a great quandary because of the very brief account in chapter 11. We have no detail as to what actually transpired between David and Bathsheba. Was David’s interest in Bathsheba innocent at first or malicious from the start? Were the messengers sent by David to bring Bathsheba to the king apprehensive about what David may be plotting or eager for their king to conquer this beautiful maid? Was Bathsheba suspicious by this summons of the king or simply awed by the fact she was being permitted an audience with the godly and anointed king of Israel? Did David order everyone out so that he could be alone with Bathsheba and have his way with her? Did she feel violated by the king’s sexual advances but compelled to yield to the king because of fear for her husband who was a soldier under David’s command? Did David use his position and prestige to intimidate Bathsheba and have his way with her? For who could or would deny the king what he wanted for fear of coming under his wrath? Did he force himself on her as Amnon did with Tamar? And did David send her away, back to her own house, with a loathing akin to Amnon’s disgust with Tamar? What took place between Amnon and Tamar is graphically detailed in chapter 13. Perhaps the author of 2 Samuel gave the encounter between David and Bathsheba such a laconic account in chapter 11 in an attempt to diminish the embarrassment and humiliation of this great king of Israel. Can we really know if it was consensual sex between the two of them, and thus adultery, or a rape of Bathsheba by David? I think the Lord has given us an indication as to what actually transpired between David and Bathsheba. But are we willing to be honest about what really happened?
The sexual account of David and Bathsheba is practically void of any detail or the concurrent state of mind of these two. The Hebrew word for adultery or adulterous is “na’aph.” One thing we can be certain about is the writer of 2 Samuel never refers to this incident as adultery. If the Holy Spirit was not going to label this incident as adultery then who are we to do so? But as to whether it was consensual, and therefore adultery, is repudiated by one word written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Verse 4 of 2 Samuel 11 states: “Then David sent messengers, and took her; and she came to him, and he lay with her.” The word took is “laqach” in Hebrew and it can mean to take, to fetch, to lay hold of, to seize, to capture, to carry off. Of course a person taken can be a willing participant, in agreement with such an act. But one taken can also be seized against their will resulting in the violation of that individual’s body and soul. Is there any way to know what the true intent of this word “took” signifies in verse 4? Yes there is!
Most of 2 Samuel 11 provides the details to David’s attempted cover up of his sin and the deadly consequences for Bathsheba’s husband Uriah. In chapter 12 the Lord sends Nathan to confront David about what he had done. He does so by telling David of an incident that happened in a city of Israel. It concerned a rich man with many flocks and a poor man with a single ewe lamb that was cherished even as one might their own daughter. The rich man wanted to entertain a traveler but wanted to spare his own flocks. So he came to the poor man and “took the poor man's lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.” The word “took” in verse 4 is “na’aph.” It is the very same Hebrew word rendered “took” in verse 4 of chapter 11 concerning David’s seizing of Bathsheba. A primary definition of “rape” is the unlawful compelling of a person through physical force or duress to have sexual intercourse. Why would God portray Bathsheba as an innocent lamb forcibly taken from her husband if she were complicit in an adulterous affair with David? Why did God deal only David and not Bathsheba if she were a conspirator with David? Who else do we know of that God puts forth as an innocent lamb forcibly taken? Nathan’s account makes no sense, and is misleading, unless Bathsheba was forced to have sex with David against her will, the very definition of raped stated above.
The Lord through Nathan told David that the sword should never depart from his house for this evil he had done. Numbers 14 says of the Lord, “but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation.” Consider the observation of Job, “As I myself have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble and mischief reap the same. (Job 4:8) Job’s words are in agreement with Paul’s testimony about sowing sin from Galatians 6:7: “Do not be deceived and deluded and misled; God will not allow Himself to be sneered at (scorned, disdained, or mocked by mere pretensions or professions, or by His precepts being set aside.) [He inevitably deludes himself who attempts to delude God.] For whatever a man sows, that and that only is what he will reap.”
The two major sins that quickly came upon the household of David after the Uriah incident were the rape of Tamar by Amnon and the murder of Amnon by Absolom. It seems reasonable to me that the sins of rape and murder that overtook the household of David were predicated by the very same sins of David against the household of Uriah. Clearly David reaped what he had sown. The Lords forgiveness is complete but it does not necessarily placate his justice.
It may be asked; “What difference does it make if this incident is regarded as adultery?” How someone is perceived seems to be of importance to Christ. Consider the woman in Matthew 26 who poured a very expensive ointment on the head of Jesus in preparation for his burial. Christ’s disciples presumed her to be a wasteful person, uncaring about the poor. But Jesus corrected them and declared her loving and unselfish action towards him would be a memorial to her throughout the whole world as the gospel was preached. Surely, how we perceive someone is of importance to our Lord.
Are those who embrace and teach that Bathsheba was guilty of adultery with David any different than the disciples of Christ who branded the woman in Matthew 26 as wasteful and uncaring. And when Bathsheba is branded with the scarlet A on her forehead is not the displeasure of the Christ, as it was with his own disciples, a reprimand to those wielding the branding iron of condemnation? Isaiah spoke of those who believed they had judged and concluded correctly about the Lord’s servant. “People made fun of him, and even his friends left him. He was a man who suffered a lot of pain and sickness. We treated him like someone of no importance, like someone people will not even look at but turn away from in disgust. The fact is, it was our suffering he took on himself; he bore our pain. But we thought that God was punishing him, that God was beating him for something he did.” (Isaiah 53:3-4) Let the Spirit of the Lord check our hasty judgments and quick denunciations and bring us to repentance of such behavior.
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For instance: my take about the Tamar incident in Ch. 13 was this: The same author was writing both accounts, possibly written mere hours apart. He went to great pains to clearly identify Amnon's conquest of Tamar as rape; why on earth would he have failed to do so with Bathsheeba if he believed it to be unconsentual? I'm a layperson, and I do not know any of the formal rules of scriptural exigesis, but it seems to me that this omission, coming so close to another parallel incident, points strongly to Bathsheeba's actions and motivations having differed in some essential way from Tamar's, and that difference prompted the paucity of details we are given in the Bathsheeba story. I think it is clear that the author of II Samuel was clear on the importance of making that distinction if it existed.
On the other side of the coin, however, is God's choice of Solomon as the most exalted and honored of all of David's children, the one chosen by God through Nathan immediately upon his birth for regency. In OUR economy, it seems inconceivable to choose the lineage of Christ from the product of the David/Bathsheeba union, no matter the purity of Bathsheeba's intentions at the time of David's sin. It is a tainted union, plain and simple. But God chose Solomon. Perhaps that is because the ways of God are inscrutable. Or perhaps it was a gift of restitution to Bathsheeba, who had her husband murdered and her life uprooted by this man.
I dunno...