II Samuel 11:26-12:13a continues the story of David and Bathsheba with its focus on the confrontation between David and Nathan. I feel a profound sense of disappointment in David. This story allows us to explore the secretive nature of sin, how to have redemptive conversations about sin, and that the point of conversations about sin is redemption and forgiveness.
The story of David involves the struggle he had in the most of intimate relationship he had, that of his family.
Family is such an intimate communion of minds and hearts. Within the family, we see each other at the best and worst. What we do with this knowledge will determine the quality of our family life.
I think we see David at his worst in his family. Short phrases summarize his plight. “I am pregnant,” says Bathsheba. “You are the man,” says Nathan. “I have sinned against God,” says David. The darker side of the life of David seemed to come out in his family life. He committed the sin of coveting when he saw Bathsheba bathing. He committed the sin of adultery as he carried out his plan to have intercourse with her, even while her husband was fighting in his army. The prophet Nathan accuses David of committing the sin of stealing from one much less powerful and wealthy than he is. He committed the sin of murder as he instructed his commanders to place her husband in a situation of the heaviest fighting to kill him. His son, Amnon, rapes his daughter, Tamar, and he does nothing, a fact that arouses the anger of Absalom, who then kills his half-brother Amnon. Absalom then breaks the commandment to honor father and mother by inciting others to rebel against David. His son, Solomon, marries many foreign wives and builds idols to their gods, thereby breaking the first two commandments. My point, of course, is that the life of David, as central as it is to the story of Israel, becomes an example of how even the greatest King, David, and his family, broke several of the Ten Commandments. As much faith and loyalty as Judah had in David and his family, the family remained flawed.
In many ways, the life of David is a reminder not to place too much trust in people, regardless of how “good” they may appear to be. They are not perfect. We must still rely upon God and look to Christ. People can point the way to Christ. Yet, at times, their light burns dimly. The life of David is also a reminder to protect and nurture one’s family. As one person wisely said, the grass is not greener on the other side of the fence. The grass is greener where you water it.
26 When the wife of Uriah heard that her husband was dead, she made lamentation for him. 27 When the mourning was over, traditionally seven days, David sent and brought her to his house, moving into the palace of David, and she became his wife, and bore him a son. David then marries Bathsheba, not so much out of love, but out of a desire to protect himself from public shame. Quick marriages were the norm for David. He married Abigail upon hearing of her husband's death (1 Samuel 25), but the case with Uriah's wife is different. She needs to become his wife before the pregnancy becomes obvious. The cover-up is successful, and David's son is born. No one knows the sordid details - except God. It appears that David has gotten away with murder, coveting and adultery. I Chronicles 20:1-3 also tell the story of the second campaign against Ammon. However, the author tells it quickly, without the domestic troubles of the royal family.
However, explicit judgment of the actions of a character in the books of Samuel. Here, such explicit judgment comes from the Lord: the thing that David had done displeased the Lord. This statement heightens the importance of the sins because they are the result of the actions of the king. The king is under the authority of the Lord, and nothing escapes the attention of the Lord. 1 And the Lord sent, contrasting with David sending Joab and his officers, sending someone to enquire about Bathsheba, sending for Uriah, sending a message through Uriah to Joab, sending for Bathsheba to become his wife, Nathan to David. Nathan is a prophet with the court of David. His livelihood depended upon the good favor of David. He is an insider to the government. The remarkably firm statement he will make of moral condemnation of David is uttered by one who stands who lose everything. The parable Nathan will tell presents a legal case. The point is to get David to pass judgment upon himself without knowing he was doing so. It closely corresponds to the actual events as the narrator has described them. It stresses the social aspect of the robbery, the rich man taking the scant property of the poor man. He came to him, and said to him, “There were two men in a certain city. Nathan begins by using the traditional words that begin a tale (cf. the story of Hannah and Elkanah in 1 Samuel 1:1 and Job in Job 1:1). The one man was rich and the other poor (ra'sh[1]). 2 The rich man had very many flocks and herds, a parallel with the many wives and concubines of David; 3 but the poor man had nothing but one little ewe (kivsah[2]) lamb, which he had bought. He brought it up, it grew up with him, with his children; it used to eat of his meager fare, and drink from his cup, and lie in his bosom, and it was like a daughter to him. The emphasis is upon the emotional attachment of the man with the lamb. As Nathan describes the relationship of the poor man and the little ewe, he describes the same activities that David used in his attempt to entice Uriah to be his wife, and so that one could attribute Bathsheba's pregnancy to Uriah: Eat, drink, and lie (cf. 11:11). Nathan details the intimacy between the poor man and the little ewe by saying that the little ewe would "lie in his bosom" (see NIV: "slept in his lap"). This is not merely descriptive of providing loving shelter, but also of sexual intimacy. The author uses the same term in verse 8 as the Lord reminds David that David's master's (Saul’s) wives had been given to him. 4 Now, there came a traveler ('oreah[3]) to the rich man. Of course, the rich man with large flocks could have easily provided a feast for the wayfarer. Yet, he was loath (it seemed a pity to him) to take one of his own flock or herd to prepare for the wayfarer (helekh[4]) who had come to him. The author underscores the callous disregard of the rich man for the feelings and rights of the poor man by the comparative unimportance of the visitor for whom he has the pet lamb slaughtered. He is not a visiting relative, or a person of any real importance to the rich man. He is simply a holech and an ‘oreach, a “walker” and a “person on the road.” In other words, the rich man kills his neighbor’s pet for the sake of preserving his social position through hospitality to someone for whom he does not even know or care. Likewise, David destroys Uriah’s life both figuratively and literally for the sake of a transient desire to possess Uriah’s wife. Therefore, he took the poor man’s lamb, and prepared that for the guest who had come to him.” The analogy with the actual case breaks down here, for the rich man does not simply add the beloved lamb to his flock. The word "took" stirs the reader in many ways: David took Bathsheba (11:4), which is also reminiscent of the earlier warning of the prophet Samuel to the people concerning their desire for a human king, like the other nations. He warned of the dangers of self-centered kings and all that they would "take" for themselves (I Samuel 8:10-18). David has become the king of whom Samuel prophesied: He took something that was not his and treated it as his own. The king was supposed to be a defender of the poor. Instead, he had become the taker. An Indian chief once said, "The white man made thousands of promises, but kept only on. He promised to take our land, and he took it." It is easy for us to become takers.
5 The story of the man greatly angered David against the man. We are again reminded eto the capacity of David for intense anger. The story Nathan tells has the characteristics of a tale, so it is a surprise when David accepts it as a report that needs his official action. The king is utterly appalled. He said to Nathan, “As the Lord lives, the man who has done this deserves to die, an outburst of indignation, for Israelite law would not impose the death penalty for robbery; 6 he shall restore the lamb fourfold, in accord with Exodus 21:37, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity (same Hebrew word is translated as “loath) in verse 4, having pity for himself at losing a lamb from his herd but having no pity for his poor neighbor.” Accustomed to overseeing judicial proceedings, David convicts and sentences the man: Guilty! Death is appropriate; someone needs make reparations. In anger, David condemns this blatant injustice, and in so doing, he condemns himself. According to biblical law, if a person had illegally taken another's property, one must pay back fourfold (Exodus 22:1b). Nathan uses a useful type of juridical ploy for occasions when the perpetrator of a crime is also the reigning monarch, for one can find other fictive legal cases in ancient Near Eastern literature. Two very similar examples appear. In II Samuel 14, Joab hires the “wise woman of Tekoa” to present a fictive legal case before David in order to convince him to bring Absalom back to court. His response was fitting for a king. It shows a sense of justice. The other example is in Egyptian tale of the Contendings of Horus and Seth (1189 BC to 1077 BC). Horus and Seth have competing rights to the throne. The pertinent part of the story involves a goddess who transforms herself into a beautiful woman in order to have come out of the mouth of Seth words that will reveal that Horus has the rightful claim to the throne. She tells a story that reveals the issue involved. She bore a son to him. Her husband died. A stranger set up residence in the barn and told the son the cattle belonged to the stranger. She wants Seth to offer protection for the son. Seth cannot believe that while her son is still living the stranger wants the cattle. At that point, the goddess reveals herself and tells him that he should be ashamed and his own mouth has judged him.
Verses 7-12 contain the rebuke to the king offered by Natha. The king was supposed to be a defender of the poor. Instead, he had become the taker. This story reminds us of the secretive nature of sin. The point of verses 7-9 is that David has been ungrateful to the Lord, who has given him everything. 7 Nathan said to David, “You are the man! Thus, Nathan pointed to David as the culprit, but only after David drew the unavoidable conclusion. Thus says the Lord, the messenger formula that makes it clear the following words are not simply Nathan speaking but offer a message from the Lord, the God of Israel: I anointed you king over Israel (), and I rescued you from the hand of Saul (I Samuel 16-30). 8 I gave you (in contrast to David’s behavior of taking, the Lord has graciously given to David) your master’s house, and your master’s wives into your bosom, the Bible does not record this incident, and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah (II Samuel 2:1-7, II Samuel 5:1-11, I Chronicles 11:6b, 12:23-40). Further, if that had been too little, I would have added as much more. Verses 7 and 8 are ironic echoes of David's prayer of thanksgiving in 7:18b-29, a prayer in which David thanks the Lord for the many blessings bestowed upon him. Here, the Lord reminds David that he would have "given" David more, but instead, David has elected to "take" from someone else. 9 Why have you despised the word of the Lord, to do what is evil in his sight? He despised the Lord by not living the life reflected in the ten commandments. You have struck down (killed) Uriah the Hittite with the sword, even though Joab did not withdraw troops as David commanded he is still responsible for the death of the man, breaking the sixth commandment, and have taken his wife to be your wife (breaking the 10th commandment on coveting and and the seventh commandment on adultery), and have killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. The Lord makes it clear that David has broken three commandments. The Lord has made him king, yet, he has despised the commandment of the Lord and done evil in the sight of the Lord. Having arrived at the summit of his life, he has forgotten the Lord who made him king and brought him to this height.[5]Verses 10-12 offer the punishments from the Lord, corresponding to the sins of David. David used the sword to strike down Uriah. 10 Now, therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, for you have despised me, and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife. Clearly, consequences will result from these evil acts. We now see the irony of David's earlier words to Joab, "Do not let this matter [Uriah's death] trouble you, for the sword devours now one and now another" as the Lord now issues the sentence: The sword shall never leave David or his heirs. David's dynasty will never be free from conflict, crises and destructiveness. It becomes a fitting punishment. David did his killing by the sword (of the Ammonites), and the sword is his sentence. 11 Thus says the Lord: I will raise up trouble against you from within your own house. We should not lose sight of the paradox of this punishment: The founding of the great Davidic dynasty is simultaneously the tale of the fall of the house of David. Readers will quickly see the predictive curse of the Lord in the rape of Tamar (13:3-22); the murder of Ammon (13:23-29); the conspiracy of Absalom (15:1-12) and his subsequent violent death (18:1-17); and Adonijah's failed attempt to usurp his father's throne (I Kings 1). This fatal pronouncement might be the reason he is so criminally passive in the face of his children’s later violence toward each other. The Lord had promised that David's kingdom would endure forever (7:16), but in the broad daylight, David's house will now suffer. And I will take your wives before your eyes, and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this very sun. Since David took the wife of Uriah, someone else, his son Absalom, will take his wives. 12 For you did it secretly; but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun.” This happens in II Samuel 16:21-22 in another stroke of irony when David’s own son Absalom usurps his throne and sleeps with the royal harem on the rooftop of the palace — the very rooftop, in fact, from which David first sees Bathsheba and desires her (II Samuel 11:2). 13a David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” The response is like that of Saul (I Samuel 15:24), but David does not offer excuses, such as that Bathsheba seduced him. David accepts responsibility for what he has done, which is always the first step toward righting relationships with the Lord and with others. This statement is two words in Hebrew. This is a perfect parallel to the judgment, "You are the man," and to Bathsheba's direct message, "I am pregnant." David's words are terse, direct, and very costly. His response stands in contrast to the response of Saul in I Samuel 15 where Saul shifts blame to others. In what may be David's finest moment, David recognizes who is the true King of Israel and humbles himself before him, acknowledging his sin and repenting. To his credit, David confesses his sin. David's response to Nathan's prophecy is to confess, repent and acknowledge God's justice. As punishment for adultery, both David and Bathsheba should have been executed (Leviticus 20:10). Because he is repentant, however, he does not receive the death penalty. Rather, the violence he has perpetrated on the family of the innocent Uriah will rebound upon his own family.
One could argue that in the background of this story is the luxury to which David is now accustomed. While his soldiers are fighting, David is living a slothful life that leads to these terrible actions that break a covenant with God and the people of God. In the context of the biblical tradition regarding David, he is now closer to Saul, and in fact, one could argue that he has done worse than Saul was. This shows that the choice or election of God comes from grace and not from the moral strength of David. In one sense, this story is strange, for the context is the exploits of David after he became king. It has an intrusive element. It becomes an occasion for sin entering through sloth.[6]
The story of David at this point invites a conversation about sin. Sin has many dimensions to it. It may show itself as rebellion. It may also show itself as missing the mark. In essence, we are having that conversation within the church and in culture, even when we do not use the word.
In some ways, church and culture today easily acknowledge sin. We may disagree as to what actions and thoughts are sinful, but we agree that we sin. We are sure that adultery and racism are sins, but do not generally think smoking or dancing are sins.[7] I wonder, however, if the problem is not failure to believe in sin, but failure to envision the possibility of redemption. It gratifies me that so many Americans think of racism as a sin. For the percentage to be that high, regardless of political affiliation, racism is sinful. The president of a school expels students who posted a racist video. The president of the Black Student Association suggested the tougher path of forgiveness, fighting hate with love. Redemption is the harder path to travel, but it can lead to change of human lives.[8] The path of revenge and resentment may feel like justice in the moment, but it puts us down the path of living out of the worst part of ourselves. It turns us into the people we supposedly abhor.[9]
Now, let us step back and consider a larger issue.
Yes, America has its faults and sins. They flow from its history of connection to Europe. Most of us can list them. Slavery and treatment of the Native American would rate high on the list. Critics will implicate Christianity and white people in these sins. Such imperfections are there. No one can erase it from the history.
What would redemption look like?
Maybe you would have preachers throughout the country, known as abolitionists, encourage America to abolish slavery. Maybe you would fight a war at great cost in human lives to remove it, and maybe you would work tirelessly for another 100 years to remove racism from any form of respectability. An avowed racist could not receive a majority anywhere in this country.
Yet, the path of revenge will lead to your worst self. You might become like the people you hate. It might lead to riots and violence in the streets, destroying the businesses your community needs to make progress. It might lead to harming relationships with the police, the people you need to protect you from those in the community who wish harm.
Many Americans are quick to label almost anything a “sin,” even if they do not use the word. For some people, the only path to redemption is to agree with them. If only we could separate evil people from the rest of us and destroy them. If only we could erase the flaws that American history reveals. The problem, of course, is that the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. The same person will be close to being a devil and at times close to sainthood. Each of us is capable of greater good and greater evil than we may presently know.[10]
We need to have redemptive conversations about sin. Such conversations have the power to change our lives. Real conversation catches fire and changes people. We can have conversations that simply exchange information. Many people today simply talk at each other, telling opinions or expressing an ideology. An ideology is a closed system. You have the arrogance of believing that your ideology is morally superior to that of the one with whom you disagree. Real conversation involves humility and openness to learning from the other person. Real conversation means we talk to each other in ways that we are open to the conversation changing us. Real conversation is at the root of creativity. Such conversation will change mind-sets better than laws will.[11] Imagine if Nathan pointed the finger at David and told him he transgressed the Ten Commandments. We can imagine David becoming defensive and commanding him to leave. Instead, Nathan invited David, who has secretly broken so many of the Ten Commandments, to consider a story. With the story, Nathan brought David to a change of mind-set and a change of life. He brought repentance. With confession and repentance, the door opened to redemption. Real conversation is a meeting of differing mind-sets. Our mind-set transforms facts in a way that allows us to draw different implications from them and engage in new trains of thought. A conversation does not just reshuffle the cards. It creates new cards. Considered from a Christian perspective, what might the new conversation look like? We may include the card of love rather than indifference, forgiveness rather than resentment, righteousness rather than self-righteousness, justice rather than despair, and humility rather than arrogance.
Thus, the story of David holds an ambiguous and puzzling place in the massive history of Israel that we read in Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings, a story that connects the time of the Patriarchs and Moses on the one hand with the exile on the other hand. That history shows the disobedience of Israel, and especially its kings, as they broke their covenant with God. The height of that covenant was the Ten Commandments. The kings broke the commandments. The power of the story of David is that the most successful king militarily and politically, the king who sought direction from God, also dramatically broke covenant with God and with Israel.
[1] Unusual for biblical prose
[2] Unusual for biblical prose
[3] Unusual for biblical prose
[4] Unusual for biblical prose
[5] (Barth 2004, 1932-67) II.2 [35.2] 381.
[6] (Barth 2004, 1932-67), II.2 [35.2] 381-4 and IV.2 [65.2] 464-7.
[7] A survey (http://www.greymatterresearch.com/index_files/Sin.htm) of Americans listed several possibilities and asked whether they considered them sins.
The behaviors a majority of all Americans describe as sinful are:
· Adultery 81
· Racism 74%
· Using “hard” drugs such as cocaine, heroine, meth, LSD, etc. 65%
· Not saying anything if a cashier gives you too much change back 63%
· Having an abortion 56%
· Homosexual activity or sex 52%
· Not reporting some income on your tax returns 52%
A number of other behaviors are considered sinful by a significant portion of all Americans, although not a majority. These are:
· Reading or watching pornography 50%
· Gossip 47%
· Swearing 46%
· Sex before marriage 45%
· Homosexual thoughts 44%
· Sexual thoughts about someone you are not married to 43%
· Doing things as a consumer that harm the environment 41%
· Smoking marijuana 41%
· Getting drunk 41%
· Not taking proper care of your body 35%
Then there are behaviors that fewer than one-third of all Americans see as sinful:
· Gambling 30%
· Telling a “little white lie” to avoid hurting someone’s feelings 29%
· Using tobacco 23%
· Not attending church or religious worship services on a regular basis 18%
· Playing the lottery 18%
· Watching an R-rated movie 18%
· Being significantly overweight 17%
· Not giving 10% of your income to a church or charity 16%
· Drinking any alcohol 14%
· Working on Sunday/the Sabbath 14%
· Spanking your child when he/she misbehaves 7%
· Making a lot of money 4%
· Dancing 4%
[8] Parker Rice and Levi Pettit were members of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity at the University of Oklahoma. The video of their racist sing-a-long gained much press in the early part of 2015. Eventually, the President of the school expelled them, he shut down the fraternity, and the fraternity itself would go through a nationwide examination. Given the circumstances, all of this may well be the best path of action. I do not know the individuals involved, so I am not passing on evaluation of their actions.
However, I find it striking that Isaac Hill, the president of the Black Student Association at the University told Megyn Kelly that people should forgive the students. His counsel was to fight hate with the power love. Cal Thomas, columnist, was quite right to suggest that the goal of actions by fellow students and especially by the university should have been redemption. Redemption is a harder path to travel, but the destination is to change the thinking of the students.
[9] In her article, "The Power of Forgiveness: Why Revenge Doesn't Work," Dr. Judith Orloff writes: "...revenge reduces you to your worst self, puts you on the same level with those spiteful people we claim to abhor."
[10] If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart? ... One and the same human being is, at various ages, under various circumstances, a totally different human being. At times he is close to being a devil, at times to sainthood. But his name doesn't change, and to that name we ascribe the whole lot, good and evil. --Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago (Westview Press, 1997), vol. 1, 168.
[11] Theodore Zeldin, Conversation (New York: Hidden Spring Books, 2000),
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