2 Samuel 11
1 It came about in the springtime, at the time when kings normally go to war, that David sent out Joab, his servants, and all the army of Israel. They destroyed the army of Ammon and besieged Rabbah. But David stayed in Jerusalem.
[In that region], kings usually went [with their armies] to fight [their enemies] in the springtime. But the following year, in the springtime, David [did not do that. Instead, he] stayed in Jerusalem, and he sent [his commander] Joab [to lead the army]. So Joab went with the other officers and the rest of the Israeli army. They [crossed the Jordan River and] defeated the army of the Ammon people-group. Then they surrounded [their capital city, ] Rabbah.
2 So it came about one evening that David got up from his bed and walked on the roof of his palace. From there he happened to see a woman who was bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to look at.
Late one afternoon, after David got up from taking a nap, he walked around on the [flat] roof of his palace. He saw a woman who was bathing [in the courtyard of her house]. The woman was very beautiful.
3 So David sent and he asked people who would know about the woman. Someone said, “Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, and is she not the wife of Uriah the Hittite?”
David sent a messenger to find out who she was. [The messenger returned] and said, “She is [RHQ] Bathsheba. She is the daughter of Eliam, and her husband is Uriah, from the Heth people-group.”
4 David sent messengers and took her; she came in to him, and he slept with her (for she had just purified herself from menstruation). Then she returned to her house.
Then David sent more messengers to get her. They brought her to David, and he (slept/had sex) [EUP] with her. (She had just finished performing the rituals to make herself pure [after her monthly menstrual period].) Then Bathsheba went back home.
5 The woman conceived, and she sent and told David; she said, “I am pregnant.”
[After some time], she realized that she was pregnant. So she sent a messenger to tell David [that she was pregnant].
6 Then David sent to Joab saying, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” So Joab sent Uriah to David.
Then David sent a message to Joab. He said, “Send Uriah, from the Heth people-group, to me.” So Joab did that. He sent Uriah to David.
7 When Uriah arrived, David asked him how Joab was, how the army was doing, and how the war was going.
When he arrived, David asked if Joab was well, and if other soldiers were well, and how the war was progressing.
8 David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” So Uriah left the king's palace, and the king sent a gift for Uriah after he left.
Then David, [hoping that Uriah would go home and sleep with his wife, ] said to Uriah, “Okay, go home and relax for a while. [IDM]” So Uriah left, and David gave someone a gift [of some food] to take to Uriah’s house.
9 But Uriah slept at the door of the king's palace with all the servants of his master, and he did not go down to his house.
But Uriah did not go home. Instead, he slept at the palace entrance with the king’s palace guards.
10 When they told David, “Uriah did not go down to his house,” David said to Uriah, “Have you not come from a journey? Why did you not go down to your house?”
When someone told David that Uriah did not go to his house [that night], David [summoned him again and] said to him, “Why didn’t you go home [to be with your wife last night], after having been away for a long time?” [RHQ]
11 Uriah answered David, “The ark, and Israel and Judah are staying in tents, and my master Joab and my master's servants are camped in an open field. How then can I go into my house to eat and to drink and to sleep with my wife? As sure as you are alive, I will not do this.”
Uriah replied, “The soldiers of Judah and Israel are camping in the open fields, and even our commander Joab is sleeping in a tent, and the sacred chest is with them. (How could I/It would not be right for me to) go home, eat and drink, and sleep with my wife [RHQ]. I solemnly declare [IDM] that I will never do such a thing!”
12 So David said to Uriah, “Stay here today also, and tomorrow I will let you leave.” So Uriah stayed in Jerusalem that day and the next day.
Then David said to Uriah, “Stay here today. I will let you return [to the battle] tomorrow.” So Uriah stayed in Jerusalem that day and that night.
13 When David called him, he ate and drank before him, and David made him drunk. At evening Uriah went out to sleep on his bed with the servants of his master; he did not go down to his house.
The next day, David invited him [to a meal]. So Uriah had a meal with David, and David made him drink a lot of wine so that he would get drunk, [hoping that if he was drunk, he would sleep with his wife]. But that night, Uriah again did not go home. Instead, he slept on his cot with the king’s servants.
14 So in the morning David wrote a letter to Joab, and sent it by the hand of Uriah.
[Someone reported that to] David, [so] the next morning he wrote a letter to Joab, and gave it to Uriah to take to Joab.
15 David wrote in the letter saying, “Set Uriah at the very front of the most intense battle, and then withdraw from him, that he may be hit and killed.”
In the letter, he wrote, “Put Uriah in the front line, where the fighting is the (worst/most severe). Then command the soldiers to pull back from him, in order that he will be killed [by our enemies].”
16 So as Joab watched the siege upon the city, he assigned Uriah to the place where he knew the strongest enemy soldiers would be fighting.
[So after] Joab [got the letter], as his army was surrounding the city, he sent Uriah to a place where he knew that their enemies’ strongest and best soldiers would be fighting.
17 When the men of the city went out and fought against Joab's army, some of the soldiers of David fell, and Uriah the Hittite was also killed there.
The men from the city came out and fought with Joab’s soldiers. They killed some of David’s officers, including Uriah.
18 When Joab sent word to David about everything concerning the war,
Then Joab sent a messenger to David to tell him about the fighting.
19 he commanded the messenger, saying, “When you have finished telling all the things concerning the war to the king,
He said to the messenger, “Tell David the news about the battle. After you finish telling that to him,
20 it may happen that the king will become angry, and he will say to you, 'Why did you go so near to the city to fight? Did you not know that they would shoot from the wall?
if David is angry [because so many officers were killed], he may ask you, ‘Why did your soldiers go so close to the city to fight [RHQ]? Did you not know that they would shoot [arrows at you while they were standing on top] of the city wall [RHQ]?
21 Who killed Abimelech son of Jerub-Besheth? Did not a woman cast an upper millstone on him from the wall, so that he died at Thebez? Why did you go so near the wall?' Then you must answer, 'Your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.'”
Do you not remember how Abimelech, the son of Gideon, was killed? A woman [who lived] in Thebez threw a huge (millstone/stone for grinding grain) on him from [the top of] tower, and he died. So why did your troops go near to the city wall?’ If the king asks this, then tell him, ‘Your officer Uriah also was killed.’”
22 So the messenger left and went to David and told him everything that Joab had sent him to say.
So the messenger went and told David everything that Joab told him to say.
23 Then the messenger said to David, “The enemy were stronger than we were at first; they came out to us into the field, but we drove them back to the entrance of the gate.
The messenger said to David, “Our enemies were very brave, and came out of the city to fight us in the fields. [They were defeating us] but we forced them back to the city gate.
24 Then their shooters shot at your soldiers from off the wall, and some of the king's servants were killed, and your servant Uriah the Hittite was killed too.”
Then their archers shot arrows at us from [the top of] the city wall. They killed some of your officers. They killed your officer Uriah, too.”
25 Then David said to the messenger, “Say this to Joab, 'Do not let this displease you, for the sword devours one as well as another. Make your battle even stronger against the city, and overthrow it,' and encourage him.”
David said to the messenger, “Go back to Joab and say to him, ‘Do not be distressed [about what happened], because no one ever knows who will be killed in a battle.’ Tell him that the next time his troops should attack the city more strongly, and capture it.”
26 So when the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she lamented deeply for her husband.
When Uriah’s wife [Bathsheba] heard that her husband had died, she mourned for him.
27 When her sorrow passed, David sent and took her home to his palace, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But what David had done displeased Yahweh.
When her time of mourning was ended, David sent messengers to bring her to the palace. Thus, she became David’s wife. She later gave birth to a son. But Yahweh was very displeased with what David had done.
