Others suggest that she is raped, since she has no wherewithal to resists the king’s summons, though the language does not imply force. It seems, however, that he wants her only for that one time she alone risks the death penalty for adultery, given her husband’s absence, the resulting pregnancy, and the king’s absolute power. She alone carries the results of the tryst in her body.ĭid Bathsheba lie with the king willingly? Some readers suggest that she deliberately positions herself on the roof, bathing naked within David’s purview so that he would take her and make her one of his wives, and thus she would perhaps bear the future king. Yet Bathsheba cannot wash herself of the consequences, and a month or two later she is compelled to send word that she is pregnant. Alternatively, the purification takes place after they lie together and alludes the ritual of cleansing following sexual relations. The parenthetical aside about her purifying herself may refer back to the roof bath as a ritual cleansing at the end of her period, which would affirm David’s paternity. She plays an almost entirely passive role in this chapter and utters only three words (two in Hebrew). The woman conceived and she sent to David, and said: “I am pregnant.” 2 Samuel 11:4-5īathsheba’s role in these few terse lines reveals very little of her feeling or character. So David sent messengers, and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her. Despite her status as a married woman and the illustrious men with whom she is affiliated, David summons her for his pleasure: The contrast between David and Uriah implies a searing critique of the king’s power, when the corrupt king takes his loyal soldier’s wife to bed.īathsheba is first introduced by name when the king sends messengers to enquire after the woman, who report: “Is this not Bathsheba, daughter of Eliam, wife of Uriah the Hittite?” Her father and husband are both members of David’s elite vanguard her grandfather, Ahitophel, father of Eliam, is one of the king’s wisest counselors (who later betrays David in allying with Absalom). Set against the background of the siege of the Ammonite town, Rabbah (1 Samuel 11), the battle occasions Bathsheba’s husband Uriah’s absence from home and the adultery, his summons from the front to cover for the resultant pregnancy, and his eventual death. In the first scene of the Bathsheba narrative, David, who remains in the palace while his troops are deployed in war, spies a woman bathing from his rooftop after a late afternoon siesta. My Jewish Learning is a not-for-profit and relies on your help Donate
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