And David sent to Joab [saying], Send me Urijah the Hittite. And Joab sent Urijah to David.
David has already sinned with Bathsheba, and word has come that she is pregnant. His first move is not confession but an order to the army — and the man he calls home is the husband he has wronged.
The message to Joab is not a fresh start but the next step in a chain. The sin had a consequence. David spent his energy escaping it, not owning it.
But the consequences follow, and to escape them sin follows sin. He sends for Uriah and plays the deceiver. Uriah's devotion and honesty stand out plainly against David's own conduct here, and they thwart him. At last the thought of his own shame, and of what may come of it, drives him to madness. He sends the unsuspecting man back with his own death warrant in his hand. The unscrupulous man he knows so well will carry it out, and will serve him in it.
Something had already gone wrong before David sent that order. A person who is living in the awareness of God does not scheme like this.
How long did the satisfying of his flesh last? He has barely committed the fault before it bears fruit — a pregnancy. The situation is serious and the king is full of fear. His good name is compromised; his sin will come out; he must hide it. We always behave in this way when we have lost the sense of God's presence. David is caught in these circumstances. He struggles and wants to manage them. In his blindness he fails to see that God is directing them.
David can send this order because he is king. He turns the authority God gave him into a shield for his own name.
It is not only that David sins in the matter of Bathsheba, but he uses his royal, God-given power to cover up the sin. He stood before no earthly court, but he has a reputation in the eyes of men, and this must be kept at all cost. How true it is, "The way of the treacherous is their ruin"! Lust conceives and gives birth to sin. That sin hurries him on, and so does the thought of his own reputation, until he adds murder to it — all in the vain hope of blotting it out. He succeeds; the power is in his hand — sadly, the power God had entrusted to him, and this is the use he puts it to.
(The writer's older translation reads here, "The way of transgressors is hard.")
Uriah is named with his nationality — a Hittite, a foreigner in Israel's army. The plan collapses on the character of the very man David chose to use.
Later, in the days of David, the stranger is again held up with honour. This appears first in Uriah. He was a Hittite. Yet his faithfulness to the God of Israel, and his self-giving zeal for the cause of Israel, shine out beside even Israel's chief and noblest and best son in that day. This poor remnant of the defiled Gentiles rebukes no less a son of Israel than king David himself.
Uriah's plain loyalty was enough to wreck the scheme, and it forced David further:
A Hittite in David's army, with whose wife, Bathsheba, David committed adultery. The simple faithfulness of Uriah defeated David in his attempt to cover his sin. David added to his wrongdoing by securing Uriah's death, with Joab's cooperation, at the hands of the Ammonites.
The order goes through Joab. From this point the commander knows what the king wants kept quiet.
Above all, Joab sought to make himself indispensable. The best way to achieve this was to cater to the king's weaknesses. When David rid himself of Uriah by placing him in Joab's hands, Joab did not speak a single word of reproach; he acted without hesitation. Guilty David had gained a discreet accomplice. But this accomplice, by that very discretion, becomes David's master. From now on the king's reputation depends on Joab.
Hiding the sin was hopeless from the start, and David's nearness to God is the reason.
The closer David was to God, the more useless were his efforts to hide his sin. Left to himself for a time as chastisement, he adds a second offence to the first... But who can escape the eye of God? So God, who knows and loves him, does not fail to visit his sin.
The lesson is pressed on every reader:
...should we fall into a sin, never, never seek to cover it up by another, still worse than the first. A course of deceit positively blights the soul, destroying all simplicity, all joy, all communion.
- Cover. The order "send me Uriah" is a cover-up, not a confession — and covering sin only breeds more sin.
- Cause. David schemes because he has lost the sense of God's presence. That loss is what makes anyone hide.
- Cost. He spends God-given royal power on guarding his own name. It works — and that is the tragedy.
- Contrast. Uriah the foreigner is simply faithful. His loyalty wrecks the plan and rebukes the king who sent for him.
- Chain. Joab's silence buys David an accomplice who becomes his master. But no one escapes the eye of God.
And when Urijah had come to him, David asked how Joab prospered, and how the people prospered, and how the war prospered.
David has sinned with Bathsheba, and news of her pregnancy has turned a private sin into a problem he must manage. So he calls her husband home from the front and asks him about the war — but why is he asking, and why is he not there himself?
David asks about his commander Joab, the troops, and the fighting. None of that is the real reason Uriah is standing in front of him.
He has Uriah brought from the camp and hypocritically asks him about Joab, the people, and the war (v. 7). Did he really care? Were not all his thoughts directed toward the single object of hiding his sin?
The next verse shows what the small talk was leading up to: an instruction to go home, followed by a gift.
Uriah may have wondered why David had brought him back. David only asked how the battle was going. Then he told Uriah to go home and wash his feet — a soldier's feet need special care. When Uriah left, David sent a present after him (v. 8).
The man asking how the war is going is the man who stayed home from it. Failing at his own work left him open to another master.
It is safe and healthy to be hard at work in service — service that flows out of communion with God. That way we stand in open hostility to the enemy. But if we are not acting against him, he will use us as tools for his own purposes. When David failed in energy as the captain of the hosts of Israel, he became the slave of lust.
Once David hears of the pregnancy, he stops acting as king. He acts as a man protecting his name.
The sin has barely been committed before it bears fruit — a pregnancy. The situation is serious and the king is full of apprehension. His good name is at risk. His sin will come out. He must hide it. We always behave in this way when we have lost the sense of God's presence. David is caught in these circumstances. He struggles and tries to manage them. In his blindness he does not see that God is directing them.
David's method — hiding one sin behind another — carries a warning for the rest of us.
David was guilty of lying (1 Sam. 21:2) and of the most terrible deceit (2 Sam. 11). By this he tried to cover up an awful sin, and so made it twice as bad. How often some earlier sin is the cause of a long course of deceit and lying. Dear friends, above all else let us seek to be straight with God, with other people, and with ourselves. And if we do fall into a sin, never, never try to cover it up with another sin, worse than the first.
Uriah will not go home while the army sleeps in the field. His refusal wrecks the plan and shames the man who made it.
His conscience seems to have been hardened here, and not open to conviction as we would expect. If it had been open, he would surely have hesitated before adding the sin of murder to that of adultery. He would have grieved under Uriah's sharp reproof — all the sharper because Uriah never meant it as a reproof — when he said, "The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house?" What a rebuke to David! The Lord and His people were in the open fields, fighting Israel's enemies. But David was at home, enjoying comfort and indulging the desires of nature.
The private interview was meant to keep the matter quiet. It did not.
This was a very great sin: David committed it in secret; God punishes it in the sight of all Israel. David did not know how to glorify God. He reigned in God's name, yet he did not keep a true testimony about the nature of God's kingdom; he falsified its character instead. So God Himself will know how, in front of everyone, to trace that kingdom's true features again — through the chastisement He sends on the man who has dishonoured Him.
Yet the failure is not the last word.
Who can define the fearful lengths to which even a David can go, when he is out of communion with God? Blessed for ever be the God of all grace, who has always proved Himself equal to all the demands of His wayward children!
- Absent. David stayed back from the war; when he failed as captain of Israel's armies, he became the slave of lust.
- Alarmed. The pregnancy exposed him, and a man who has lost the sense of God's presence moves straight to hiding.
- Acting. His questions about Joab, the troops and the fighting were a screen. One thought filled his mind: hiding the sin.
- Answered. Uriah would not go home while the ark and the army were in the field. He never meant his words as a rebuke, but they shamed the king and wrecked the plan.
- All Israel. David sinned in secret. God dealt with it before all Israel. And He still proved Himself equal to all the demands of His wayward children.
And David said to Urijah, Go down to thy house and wash thy feet. And Urijah departed out of the king's house, and there followed him presents from the king.
David has already sinned with Bathsheba, and now word has reached him that she is pregnant. Verse 8 is the first move of the cover-up. David calls the husband home from the camp with a kind word and a gift, and the whole plan turns on whether Uriah goes.
Nothing in David's orders sounds sinister. One writer traces the alarm behind them.
Alarmed at this, David planned a subtle way to keep his sin from being discovered. He sent orders to Joab to send Uriah back to Jerusalem. Uriah may have wondered why David had brought him back. David only asked how the battle was going. Then he told Uriah to go to his house and wash his feet, for a soldier's feet need special care. When Uriah left, David sent a present after him.
Before the order to go home came the small talk about the war. Another writer questions whether David cared about the answers.
He has Uriah brought from the camp and hypocritically asks him about Joab, the people, and the war. Did he really care? Were not all his thoughts directed toward the single object of hiding his sin?
David is not honouring this soldier. He is using him as a screen, and when kindness fails he goes further.
See how far David was carried into evil. He sacrificed his character to give in to his desires. Now he tries to use Uriah as a screen to hide himself from the public eye. He must keep his reputation at all cost. He tries kindness, but in vain. He makes the wronged and dishonoured Uriah drunk, but to no purpose. At last he murders him by the sword of the Ammonites. How dreadful!
David's throne was a trust from God. Here he uses it against a loyal soldier.
He forgets his position as king, and a king from God. Was it reigning in righteousness to take advantage of his royal power to oppress Uriah? He makes himself a slave to the wretched Joab by making him an accomplice in his crime. How degrading! He was far happier in the days when he was hunted like a partridge in the mountains. Then he had a living faith and a good conscience!
This verse is where the cover-up begins. Commentators read it as a warning for everyone, not just kings.
We come to David. He was guilty of both lying and deceit of the most fearful kind. By this he sought to cover up an awful sin, and so made it twice as bad. Oh, how often some earlier sin is the cause of a long course of deceit and lying. Dear friends, above all things, let us seek to be straight with God, with other people, and with ourselves. And if we do fall into a sin, never, never seek to cover it up by another one, worse than the first. A life of deceit blights the soul. It destroys all simplicity, all joy, all fellowship.
David's scheme depended on Uriah going home. One thing stopped it.
The simple faithfulness of Uriah foiled David in his effort to cover his sin.
The failure was not bad luck. One writer explains why the cover-up was doomed from the start.
The nearer David was to God, the more useless his efforts to hide his sin became. … But who can escape the eye of God? God, who knows and loves him, does not fail to deal with his sin.
- Cover-up begins. Alarmed by news of the pregnancy, David sends for Uriah and tells him to go home. It is a subtle plan to keep his sin from being discovered.
- Cover-up disguised. Questions about Joab, an invitation home, a gift sent after him — the kindness has one aim. David wants to hide his sin.
- Cover-up armed. David bends a God-given throne to protect his reputation, and makes himself a slave to Joab, his accomplice.
- Cover-up blocked. One soldier's simple faithfulness ruins the scheme. The nearer David was to God, the more useless his cover-up became.
- Cover-up warned against. Never patch one sin with another. Deceit blights the soul. It destroys simplicity, joy, and fellowship.
And Urijah slept at the entrance of the king's house with all the servants of his lord, and went not down to his house.
David's plan was simple. Bring Uriah home from the front, give him a night with his wife, and the coming child would raise no questions. Verse 9 is where that plan breaks — not by resistance, but by one soldier's ordinary sense of duty.
The king had given Uriah every encouragement to go home, including a gift sent after him. One writer traces the steps and where they stopped:
Alarmed at this, David came up with a subtle plan to hide his sin. He sent orders to Joab to send Uriah back to Jerusalem. Uriah may have wondered why David had brought him back. David only asked how the battle was going. Then he told Uriah to go home and wash his feet, since a soldier's feet need special care. When Uriah left, David sent a present after him (v.8). But he did not go there, and stayed overnight with others of David's servants in the servants' quarters.
Uriah's refusal was not stubbornness. David himself had once spoken the same way. He was uneasy in his own fine house while the ark of God — the chest that marked God's presence with Israel — stayed in a tent:
Uriah, whom the king sent to his wife, instead slept with all the king's other servants at the palace door. … He had learned this devotion in the school of David himself. In 2 Samuel 7:2 did not David say to Nathan: "See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, while the ark of God dwells in a tent"? His attendants had taken in this godly desire and testimony of David's, and it had borne fruit in them. Uriah speaks like the David of earlier days. … The man is simple and noble in heart. He says: God is calling me to a service, a work for Himself, and as long as He does not rest I cannot rest.
Uriah was not born an Israelite. That makes what he put first that night striking:
Uriah's first thought is concerning the ark of God. How could he think of resting in his house when God's ark was under a tent in the field of battle? He thought of Israel, of Judah, of Joab, and of the troops, but his first thought was of the ark. This brave man was not an Israelite by birth, but a Hittite, one by nature an enemy of Israel. Yet he had come to Israel, and he was loyal to Israel's king. He clearly valued the ark of the Lord above all else in the land he had adopted as his own.
Uriah had no idea what he was interrupting. That is what made his answer cut so deep:
It would seem that his conscience had grown hard on this occasion, and was not open to conviction as we should expect. Had it been otherwise, he would surely have faltered and hesitated before he added the sin of murder to that of adultery. He would have mourned under the sharp reproof of Uriah — only the sharper because it was entirely unintentional. … What a rebuke to David! The Lord and His people were in the open fields, fighting the enemies of Israel, but David was at home enjoying his ease and indulging the desires of nature.
Uriah's night at the door did not stop David. Being near to God does not make hiding sin easier. It makes it harder:
The nearer David was to God, the less his efforts to hide his sin worked. Left to himself for a time as discipline, he adds a second transgression to the first. … He makes himself a slave to the wretched Joab by making him a partner in his crime. How degrading! How much happier he was when he had a living faith and a good conscience, even though he was hunted like a partridge in the mountains! But who can escape the eye of God?
The king thought he was managing events. He was not:
He had hardly committed the sin before it bore its fruit — a pregnancy. The situation is serious and the king is full of fear. His character is compromised. His sin will come out. He must hide it. We always behave in this way when we have lost the awareness of God's presence. David is caught in these circumstances. He struggles and wants to handle them. In his blindness he fails to see that God is directing them.
- Ease — The Lord's people were fighting in the open fields while David stayed at home, enjoying his comfort.
- Cover — Once he lost the awareness of God's presence, hiding the sin became his whole aim. The hiding is what dragged him from adultery to murder.
- Door — Uriah slept at the king's door because the ark was in a tent. The devotion David once taught him now blocked David's way out.
- Rebuke — The sharpest reproof of that night was unintended. It came from a foreign-born soldier who knew nothing of the plot.
- Exposure — David thought he was managing events. God was directing them. Being near to God never makes a cover-up work.
And they had told David saying, Urijah did not go down to his house; and David said to Urijah, Art thou not come from a journey? why didst thou not go down to thy house?
David has already sinned with Bathsheba, and he needs the sin hidden. So he calls her husband Uriah home from the siege at Rabbah — but Uriah will not go down to his own house, and in this verse the king asks him why.
David's questions sound like a commander's care for his men. One writer reads them differently:
On hearing this, David questioned Uriah as to why he did not go to his house when he had opportunity after some time of being away from home (v.10). Uriah's reply must have been a pointed lesson to David as to self restraint. He had decided that, since the ark and Israel were in temporary shelters, and that Joab and the army were camping in the open, engaged in serious combat for the sake of Israel, he was not going to relax and enjoy himself at home as though he was not a part of Israel's defence: he would virtually remain "on guard."
The ark was the golden chest that marked God's presence with His people. It was the first thing on the mind of this foreign soldier:
Uriah's first thought is concerning the ark of God. How could he think of resting in his house when God's ark was under a tent in the field of battle? He thought of Israel, of Judah, of Joab, and of the troops, but his first thought was of the ark. This brave man was not an Israelite by birth. He was a Hittite, by nature an enemy of Israel. Yet he had come to Israel, he was loyal to the king of Israel, and he clearly valued the ark of the LORD above everything else in the land he had made his own.
Uriah knew nothing of what had happened in the palace. That is what made his words cut so deep:
It seems his conscience was hard at this time. It was not open to conviction, as we would expect it to be. If it had been, he would surely have faltered before he added the sin of murder to the sin of adultery. He would have mourned under Uriah's sharp reproof — all the sharper because Uriah never meant it as a reproof — when he said, "The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house?" What a rebuke to David! The Lord and His people were in the open fields, fighting the uncircumcised enemies of Israel. But David was at home, taking his ease and indulging the desires of nature.
The most painful part of Uriah's answer is where he learned it. David had once spoken the same way himself:
He had learned this devotion in the school of David himself. In 2 Samuel 7:2 did not David say to Nathan: "See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, and the ark of God dwells in a tent"? David's servants had taken in this godly desire and this testimony, and it had borne fruit in them. Uriah speaks like the David of earlier days. Without meaning to, what a reproach he brings to his honoured master! The man is simple and noble in heart. He says, God is calling me to perform a service, an activity for Himself, and as long as He does not rest I cannot rest.
All of this traces back to one choice: David stayed home while his army fought. That choice, one writer says, is where the door opened:
While we are at work for the Lord, whatever that work may be, nature is held down. But when we are at ease, nature begins to work, and it feels the pull and influence of things around us. We should seriously ponder this. Satan will ever find mischief for idle hearts, as well as idle hands. David came to feel this. If he had been at Rabbah with his army, his eye would never have fallen on something able to stir the corrupt principle inside him. Staying at home was itself the opening that let the enemy in.
David's question was the first step in a cover-up. The warning drawn from it is direct:
We pass over several others and come to David. He was guilty of both lying and deceit of the most terrible kind. He used them to cover up an awful sin, and so made it twice as bad. How often some previous sin is the cause of a long course of deceit and lying. Dear friends, above all things let us be straight with God, with other people, and with ourselves. And if we do fall into a sin, never, never try to cover it up with another sin, worse than the first.
- Ease — David stayed home while his army fought. Satan finds mischief for idle hearts.
- Cover — His question was not concern but concealment. He brought Uriah home to hide his sin.
- Conscience — Uriah's answer cut deep because he never meant it as a rebuke. David's conscience was hard, and he did not flinch.
- Contrast — A foreign soldier put the ark first and refused comfort while God's people camped in the open. Israel's king did the opposite.
- Consequence — Covering sin with more sin doubles it. The only way out is to be straight with God at once.
And Urijah said to David, The ark, and Israel, and Judah abide in booths; and my lord Joab, and the servants of my lord, are encamped in the open fields shall I then go into my house, to eat and to drink, and to lie with my wife? [As] thou livest, and [as] thy soul liveth, I will not do this thing.
David's army was at war in the field while the king stayed home in Jerusalem. He called Bathsheba's husband back from the front, and the soldier's reply became the sharpest rebuke in the chapter — from a man who never meant to give one.
Uriah's words cut because of where David was when he heard them. Commentators note that the ark had gone out with the army, and the king had not.
Uriah's words suggest that the ark was in the battle area with the armies of Israel, but the king was not with the ark. Had David been there, sharing the dangers and hardships of his soldiers, he would have escaped the terrible temptation that met him. He would also have escaped the very solemn and sad stain on his history, when he dishonoured the Lord.
Notice the order in Uriah's sentence. The ark — the chest that stood for God's presence with Israel — was out in the field, sheltered under a tent. Uriah names it first, before the army, his commander, and his fellow soldiers.
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Uriah's first thought is about the ark of God. How could he think of resting in his house when God's ark was under a tent in the field of battle? He thought of Israel, of Judah, of Joab, and of the troops, but his first thought was of the ark. This brave man was not an Israelite by birth. He was a Hittite, one by nature an enemy of Israel. Yet he had come to Israel, and he was loyal to the king of Israel. It was plain that he valued the ark of the Lord above everything else in the land he had adopted.
Uriah did not invent this refusal. He learned it from the king himself, who had once said much the same thing to the prophet Nathan.
He had learned this devotion in the school of David himself. In 2 Samuel 7:2 did not David say to Nathan: "See now, I dwell in a house of cedars, and the ark of God dwells under curtains"? David's attendants had taken in this godly desire and this testimony of his, and it had borne fruit in them. Uriah speaks like the David of earlier days. What an unwitting reproach he addresses to his respected master! The man is simple and noble in heart. He says, God is calling me to perform a service, an activity for Himself, and as long as He does not rest I cannot rest.
Uriah meant no criticism at all. That is what makes his words so severe — and David's reaction so alarming.
It seems his conscience had grown hard on this occasion. It was not open to conviction as we would expect. Had it been otherwise, he would have faltered and hesitated before he added the sin of murder to that of adultery. He would have mourned under Uriah's sharp reproof — all the sharper because Uriah never meant it as a reproof. What a rebuke to David! The Lord and His people were in the open fields, fighting the enemies of Israel. David was at home, enjoying comfort and indulging the desires of nature.
Uriah seals his refusal with an oath, and he keeps it. David's next move was to get him drunk — and even that did not shift him.
When David failed to get Uriah to go to his home the first night, he tried another tactic: he told Uriah to stay in Jerusalem two more days, but had him eat and drink with him until Uriah became drunk, thinking this would tempt Uriah to go home. But this plan failed too. Uriah again slept with the servants.
That immovable loyalty is what forced David's hand, and what cost Uriah his life.
Uriah's simple faithfulness ruined David's plan to cover his sin. David added to his wrongdoing by arranging Uriah's death, with the help of Joab, at the hands of the Ammonites.
Uriah would not rest while the fighting went on. Commentators press the same point on God's people today.
But the bright day when we shall rest has not yet arrived. He therefore urges the saints to be diligent in the meantime. Now is the time for work. Everyone who has the love of Christ in such a world as this must feel it, because sin and misery cover the world. Divine love, whether in God or in His people, refuses to rest in evil or in misery.
- Position. David's fall began before Bathsheba — with a king at home while the ark was in a tent on the battlefield.
- Priority. Uriah names the ark first — before army, commander, or comrades. A Hittite outsider valued God's presence above everything.
- Pupil. He learned it from David himself. Without knowing it, he echoes the king's own earlier words about cedar and curtains.
- Piercing. Uriah never meant to rebuke, which made it sharper. David's hard conscience felt nothing, and he went on to murder.
- Pattern. As long as God has not taken His rest, His servants do not settle down — now is the time for work, not ease.
And David said to Urijah, Abide here to-day also, and to-morrow I will let thee depart. And Urijah abode in Jerusalem that day and the morrow.
David's first plan has failed. Uriah would not go home to his wife, so David's sin is still uncovered. Now the king asks him to stay one more day. The delay looks like hospitality. It is a second try at the same cover-up.
The next verse shows what the extra evening was for.
When David failed to get Uriah to go to his home the first night, he tried another tactic. He told Uriah to stay in Jerusalem for two more days, but had him eat and drink with him until Uriah became drunk. David thought that in this way he could tempt Uriah to go to his home. But this plan failed too: Uriah again slept with the servants.
David is no longer only guilty of the first sin. Look at what hiding it does to his conscience.
And sin follows sin. The offspring of sin is sin. What cunning and deception followed! But honest Uriah frustrates his wicked plan. Did not David's conscience smart under it? No doubt it was deadened.
Uriah's answer the day before is why David now needs a second day. Where did a soldier learn to talk like that?
What a beautiful answer Uriah gives: "The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house?" He had learned this devotion in the school of David himself. In 2 Samuel 7:2 did not David say to Nathan: "See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwells in a tent"? David's attendants had taken in this godly desire and this testimony of his, and it had borne fruit in them. Uriah speaks like the David of earlier days. What an unintended reproach he addresses to his respected master!
The extra day buys David nothing. He is fighting more than one stubborn soldier.
David pays no attention to these earnest words. He cares about one thing only: pushing Uriah into the act that will let the king cover up his sin. He gets his servant drunk, but even so Uriah stays firm in his decision. Like a caged bird David struggles helplessly against the hand that has shut him in. Satan suggests the one way to escape public exposure of his fault. So David becomes Uriah's murderer.
The warning here is for anyone, not just for kings.
We come to David. He was guilty both of lying (1 Samuel 21:2) and of deceit of the most dreadful kind (2 Samuel 11). By this deceit he tried to cover up an awful sin, and so made it twice as bad. How often some earlier sin is the cause of a long course of deceit and lying. Dear friends, above all things let us seek to be straight with God, with other people, and with ourselves. And if we do fall into a sin, never, never try to cover it up with another one, still worse than the first. A course of deceit truly blights the soul. It destroys all simplicity, all joy, all communion.
Nothing David did hid the sin from God. He carried it for the better part of a year.
David did not confess his sin to God at once. Psalm 32:3-4 shows that the Lord waited for some time before sending the prophet Nathan to him — likely over nine months, since a son had been born to Bathsheba. He was giving David the chance to confess his sin freely. In that time, as David says, God's hand was heavy on him "day and night." How could his conscience have any rest?
David was not always this man. That is what makes his fall so frightening.
Surely we may say there was a time when David would not have been lying on his couch while the armies of the Lord fought the enemy. There was a time when he would not have exposed a faithful servant to the enemy's attack to save his own reputation. Such, however, is man — the best of men. When pride swells the heart, or lust dims the eye, who shall try to set a limit to human depravity? Who shall define the frightening lengths to which even a David can go when out of communion? Blessed for ever be the God of all grace, who has always proved Himself equal to all the demands of His wayward children!
- Delay. "Remain here today also" is not courtesy. It is a second try at the same cover-up, and it sets up the drinking in the next verse.
- Cover. Sin produces sin. Each try at hiding the first one deadens the conscience and, as one writer puts it, makes the sin twice as bad.
- Contrast. Uriah learned his devotion from David. Without meaning to, the loyal soldier rebukes the king with the king's own words.
- Cage. The cover-up never succeeds. David struggles like a trapped bird, and the only exit Satan offers him is murder.
- Confession. God waited months, and His hand lay heavy on David. The way out was never a better plan. It was honesty before the God of all grace.
And David invited him, and he ate and drank before him; and he made him drunk. And in the evening he went out to lie on his couch with the servants of his lord, but did not go down to his house.
David has already sinned with Bathsheba. He called Uriah home from the war to make the coming child look like Uriah's. The first night's plan failed. So on the second day the king tried wine, and this verse records both the plan and its collapse.
The point of the meal was not hospitality. One writer follows the line from that meal to its end, and names what David was guarding.
And notice how far David went in doing evil. He sacrificed his character to indulge nature. Now he tries to use Uriah as a cloak to screen him from the public eye. He must keep his reputation at all cost. He tries kindness, but in vain. He makes the wronged and dishonoured Uriah drunk, but to no purpose. At last he murders him by the sword of the children of Ammon. How dreadful!
The Hebrew word behind "drunk" is no softer than it sounds. A study of the Bible's drink terms lists this verse among the places where the verb carries its plain force:
Scripture often uses the verb form (as in Genesis 9:21; 1 Samuel 1:14; 2 Samuel 11:13; Isaiah 29:9, and others) to mean intoxication.
The plan behind the wine was simple:
When David failed to get Uriah to go home the first night, he tried another tactic. He told Uriah to stay in Jerusalem two more days, and had him eat and drink with him until Uriah became drunk. David thought that in this way he would tempt Uriah to go to his home. But this plan failed too: Uriah again slept with the servants.
The wine did not bend Uriah. He lay down again with the king's servants and did not go home. That loyalty drove David to his next move.
But the consequences follow, and to escape them sin follows sin. He sends for Uriah and plays the deceiver. Uriah's devotion and honesty stop him, and they stand out plainly against David's own conduct here. At last the thought of his own shame, and of what may come of it, drives David to madness. He sends the unsuspecting man back with his own death warrant in his hand.
Commentators are agreed that nothing in this scene shocked David into stopping. One writer asks the obvious question about the king's conscience and answers it bluntly.
The offspring of sin is sin. What cunning and deception followed! But honest Uriah frustrates his wicked plan. Did not David's conscience smart under it? No doubt it was deadened. Then he becomes the murderer of Uriah the Hittite.
David held every advantage in that room — the crown, the table, the wine. Another writer weighs what using them cost him.
The nearer David was to God, the less his attempts to conceal his sin could succeed. Left to himself for a time as chastening, he adds a second transgression to the first... He forgets his position as king, and a king from God. Was it reigning in righteousness to take advantage of his royal power to oppress Uriah? He makes himself a slave to the wretched Joab by making him an accomplice in his crime. How degrading! How much happier he was back when they hunted him like a partridge in the mountains, but he had a living faith and a good conscience! But who can escape the eye of God? God knows him and loves him, and He does not fail to deal with his sin.
One writer turns David's case on the reader.
David was guilty both of lying and of terrible deceit. He used them to cover up an awful sin, and so made it twice as bad. How often some earlier sin is the cause of a long course of deceit and lying! Dear friends, let us above all things seek to be straight with God, with our fellow men, and with ourselves. And if we fall into a sin, never, never seek to cover it up with another one, still worse than the first. A course of deceit ruins the soul. It destroys all simplicity, all joy, all fellowship. In David's case these sins led to sufferings of almost unmatched severity, at the hands of his own children.
- Cover. David's aim at that table was not friendship. He wanted Uriah as a cloak to screen him from the public eye.
- Wine. The word means real drunkenness. The drink was a tactic, meant to tempt Uriah home so the child would look like his.
- Failure. Drunk, Uriah still slept with the servants. The devotion that defeated the plan is what sent him back carrying his own death warrant.
- Escalation. Each cover-up cost more than the sin it hid: deceit, then murder, then a king made the slave of Joab, his own accomplice.
- Exposure. No one escapes the eye of God. So never cover one sin with another, still worse than the first.
And it came to pass in the morning, that David wrote a letter to Joab, and sent it by Urijah.
David has already taken Bathsheba, and Uriah will not go home to his wife, so the cover-up has failed. Now the king reaches for the pen — and the man who carries the note is the man it condemns.
The horror of this verse is in who carries the letter. One sin now drives the next:
But the consequences follow, and to escape them sin follows sin. He sends for Uriah and plays the deceiver. Uriah's devotion and honesty stop him short, standing out so clearly against his own conduct here. At last the thought of his own shame, and of what may come of it, drives him to madness. So he sends the unsuspecting man back with his own death warrant in his hand. The unscrupulous man he knows so well is to carry it out, and to serve him by it.
Uriah's answer echoed words the king himself had once spoken about the ark:
He had learned this devotion in the school of David himself. In 2 Samuel 7:2 did not David say to Nathan, "See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwells in a tent"? His attendants had taken in this godly desire and testimony of David's, and it had borne fruit in them. Uriah speaks like the David of earlier days. What an unwitting reproach he addresses to his respected master!
The letter does not only kill Uriah; it pulls a second man into the murder:
Not only would David make himself guilty of the murder of Uriah, but he would implicate Joab and others in this too. Joab of course would say he had to obey his master. But in this case he ought to have had a conscience toward God that would not let him obey David.
And an accomplice who knows the secret does not stay a servant:
The same David who had said, "Let the blood of Abner fall on the head of Joab" (2 Sam. 3:28-29), now takes this Joab, a murderer himself, as his accomplice. So David becomes the slave of the man who had every interest in bringing him into bondage.
David uses the power of his throne to guard his own name:
It is not only that David sins in the matter of Bathsheba, but he uses his royal, God-given power to cover up the sin. He stood before no earthly court, but he has a reputation in the eyes of men, and he must keep it at all cost. How true it is, "The way of the treacherous is their ruin"! Lust conceives and gives birth to sin. Sin hurries him on, and so does the thought of his own reputation. He adds murder to it, in the vain hope of blotting it out. He succeeds; the power is in his hand — sadly, the power God had entrusted him with, and this is the use to which he puts it.
(Older translations of Proverbs 13:15 read "the way of transgressors is hard.")
David never strikes a blow himself. God's verdict ignores the distance:
There was no room for evasion or excuse. "You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword." But David had struck no blow. Uriah died as a soldier by the hand of the enemy. Had David covered over his sins with such an excuse? If he had, he could do it no longer. "You have killed him with the sword of the Ammonites" were words whose truth he could not deny. In this case every distinction between legal guilt and moral guilt collapsed. David had signed no death warrant. The Ammonites who struck Uriah knew nothing of David's plot against the life of his faithful servant. Yet in God's eyes it was as much David's act as if he had put out his own hand and struck him dead.
David meant this to stay between himself and Joab. It did not:
This was a very great sin: David committed it in secret; God punishes it in the sight of all Israel. David did not know how to glorify God. While reigning in His name, he did not keep a true testimony to the nature of God's kingdom; instead he falsified its character. But God Himself will know how to retrace its features in the sight of all men. He will do it through the chastisement He sends on the man who has dishonoured Him — the man who had taken away the only witness to His government which God had set up before men.
- Cover-up. The letter exists only because a first sin needed hiding; sin follows sin, and David adds murder to hide the first.
- Courier. Uriah carries his own death warrant. The loyalty he learned from David is what marked him out as the target.
- Accomplice. Joab obeys when conscience toward God should have stopped him. The king who buys his silence becomes his slave.
- Clean hands. No blow struck, no warrant signed — yet God says, "You have killed him with the sword of the Ammonites."
- Exposure. David acted in secret; God answered in the sight of all Israel.
And he wrote in the letter saying, Set Urijah in the front of the thickest fight, and withdraw from him, that he may be smitten and die.
David had already sinned with Bathsheba, and his efforts to send her husband Uriah home had failed. So the king wrote an order and handed it to the man it was written against.
The order went to Joab, the army commander. One commentator traces what it would achieve, and who else it would stain:
David did not even try to hide his intentions about Uriah. He told Joab to place him in the front line of the fiercest battle, then pull everyone else back. Uriah would then stand as the only target for the enemy, and so be killed. Not only would David make himself guilty of the murder of Uriah, but he would implicate Joab and others in this too. Joab, of course, would say he had to obey his master. But in this case he ought to have had a conscience toward God that would not let him obey David.
The letter travelled in the hand of the man it condemned. One sin now called for another to hide it:
But the consequences follow, and to escape them sin follows sin. He sends for Uriah and plays the deceiver. He is thwarted by the devotion and honesty that contrast so plainly with his own conduct here. At last, driven to madness by the thought of his own shame and what may come of it, he sends back the unsuspecting man with his own death warrant in his hand. The unscrupulous man he knows so well is to carry it out, and to serve him by it.
Uriah would not sleep at home while the army camped in the field. His reason echoed words David himself had once spoken:
What a beautiful answer Uriah gives: "The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house?" He had learned this devotion in the school of David himself. In 2 Samuel 7:2 David said to Nathan: "See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwells in a tent." … Uriah speaks like the David of earlier days. Without meaning to, he rebukes the master he respects!
David held his crown from God. Here he turned royal power against one of his own soldiers, and ended up owned by his accomplice:
The nearer David was to God, the less his attempts to conceal his sin succeeded. Left to himself for a time as chastening, he adds a second transgression to the first… He forgets his position as king, and a king from God. Was it reigning in righteousness to take advantage of his royal power to oppress Uriah? He makes himself a slave to the wretched Joab by making him a partner in his crime. How degrading! How much happier he was when he was hunted like a partridge in the mountains, but had a living faith and a good conscience! Yet who can escape the eye of God? So God, who knows and loves him, does not fail to deal with his sin.
David wrote this letter to bury an earlier sin. That is where the deepest damage lies:
David was guilty of lying and of deceit of the most fearful kind. By it he tried to cover up an awful sin, and so made it twice as bad. How often some earlier sin is the cause of a long course of deceit and lying. Dear friends, let us above all things seek to be straight with God, with our fellow men, and with ourselves. And should we fall into a sin, never, never seek to cover it up by another, still worse than the first.
Joab obeyed, Uriah died, and the chapter closes with the one opinion David had left out of his planning:
At the end of this chapter, so full of corruption and shame, we find a little expression, the only thing David had not thought of and the only one he ought to have remembered: "But the thing that David had done displeased the LORD."
H. L. Rossier (an older translation reads "was evil in the sight of Jehovah")
That verdict is not the end of the story, and the commentators refuse to let readers stand above David:
The rest of this sad and shameful story of lying and murder might have been written about the writer or the reader, if we had stood in the same place. Only the grace of God kept us from it. But even such a sin can be forgiven. On the broken-hearted cry, "I have sinned against the LORD," comes the instant reply, "The LORD also has put away your sin."
- Concealment. David wrote the letter to hide an earlier sin. The cover-up, not the first fall, produced the murder.
- Corruption. The cover-up needed helpers, so David pulled Joab and other soldiers into his guilt. Orders from a king were no defence for Joab.
- Captivity. Concealment cost David his freedom: the king who made Joab a partner in crime became Joab's slave.
- Contrast. Uriah carried the order against his own life. He was living out the devotion he learned from David — the victim was the sharpest rebuke.
- Conviction, then grace. David forgot the eye of God. Yet the same record shows a broken-hearted confession meeting instant forgiveness.
And it came to pass as Joab watched the city, that he assigned Urijah to a place where he knew that the valiant men were.
David's letter has arrived, and Joab now carries it out. The siege becomes the cover for a killing. The test falls on two men: Uriah, who never learns what he carried, and Joab, who knows what David asked and does it anyway.
David's order was not disguised, and Joab had every chance to refuse it.
David did not even try to hide his intentions about Uriah. He told Joab to place him in the front line of the fiercest battle, and then pull everyone else back. Uriah would stand as the only target for the enemy, and so be killed (v.15). Not only would David make himself guilty of the murder of Uriah, but he would implicate Joab and others in this too. Joab of course would say he had to obey his master. But in this case his conscience toward God should have stopped him from obeying David.
Joab's silence was not loyalty. By saying nothing, he gained a permanent hold over the king he served.
Above all, Joab sought to make himself indispensable. The best way to achieve this was to cater to the king's weaknesses. When David rid himself of Uriah by placing him in Joab's hands, Joab did not speak a single word of reproach; he acted without hesitation. Guilty David had gained a discreet accomplice, but he is an accomplice who through this very discretion becomes David's master. From now on the king's reputation depends on Joab.
Another writer sees the same reversal as a loss of freedom. David was better off as a hunted man than as a king who owes Joab his secret.
He makes himself a slave to the wretched Joab by making him a partner in his crime. How degrading! He was far happier when men hunted him like a partridge in the mountains, but he had a living faith and a good conscience!
Joab did not pick that spot for military advantage. He picked it because it was deadly, and it cost more lives than the one he meant to take.
However, in besieging the city, Joab put Uriah in the greatest place of danger, evidently close to the wall. Men from the city saw an advantage in coming out to fight, since they had the protection of the city behind them. Joab's plan worked well — not for the good of Israel, but to have Uriah killed. Others also fell before the enemy. Joab knew this was a risk he must take to make sure Uriah died (v.17).
David commanded Israel's army because God had placed it in his hand. Now he uses that same power to remove an inconvenient man.
It is not only that David sins in the matter of Bathsheba, but he uses his royal, God-given power to cover up the sin. He stood before no earthly court, but he has a reputation in the eyes of men, and he must protect it at all cost. How true it is, "The way of transgressors is hard"! Lust conceives and gives birth to sin. That sin, and the thought of his own reputation too, drive him on to add murder to it, in the useless hope of wiping it out. He succeeds; the power is in his hand — alas! the power God had entrusted him with, and this is the use to which he puts it.
The arrangement gave David a perfect alibi. Uriah would die in war, killed by foreigners who knew nothing of any plot. God did not accept the distinction.
David had signed no death warrant. The Ammonites who struck down Uriah knew nothing of David's plot against the life of his faithful servant. Yet in God's eyes the act was as much David's as if he had signed a death warrant for Uriah's public execution, or had reached out his own hand and struck him dead. "You have struck down"! "you have killed"! Those words laid the whole affair bare. David had imagined, no doubt, that he had managed it quietly and successfully.
- Sin breeds sin. Lust gives birth to sin. Then the thought of his own reputation drives David to add murder on top of it, in the useless hope of wiping the first sin out.
- Silence is complicity. Joab's conscience toward God should have stopped him obeying David. Carrying out a wrong order does not move the guilt onto the man who gave it.
- The accomplice owns you. Joab never spoke one word of reproach, and by that discretion he becomes David's master. A shared secret is a leash.
- The cost spreads. Others fell at the wall beside Uriah. A private sin managed by public power kills people who were never part of it.
- The alibi fails. The Ammonites struck the blow, but in God's eyes the act was David's own. David arranged it quietly; God laid it bare.
And the men of the city went out and fought with Joab; and there fell some of the people, of the servants of David; and Urijah the Hittite died also.
Here David's letter does its work. Joab presses the siege of Rabbah. Some of the king's own soldiers fall at the wall, and Uriah the Hittite dies with them. Commentators ask how a king came to this, who else paid for it, and how God answered.
One writer traces the fall back further, to a king who dropped his own work.
It is well to be always on the watch, for we have a watchful enemy. "Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour," says the apostle. Satan watches for his opportunity. When he finds a soul not busy with its proper service, he is sure to draw that soul into evil… When David lost his energy as the captain of Israel's armies, he became the slave of lust.
Uriah himself carried the orders that killed him. Trying to escape one sin drove David into a worse one.
But the consequences follow, and to escape them sin follows sin. He sends for Uriah and plays the deceiver. Uriah's devotion and honesty stop him short, for they contrast so plainly with his own conduct here. At last the thought of his own shame, and of what may come of it, drives him to madness. He sends the unsuspecting man back with his own death warrant in his hand. The unscrupulous man he knows so well will carry it out, and will serve him by doing it.
The verse says some of David's servants died, not only Uriah. Joab counted those deaths as part of the price.
However, in besieging the city, Joab put Uriah in the greatest place of danger, apparently close to the wall. Men from the city saw an advantage in coming out to fight, since they had the protection of the city behind them. Joab's plan worked well — not for the good of Israel, but to have Uriah killed. Others also fell before the enemy, but Joab knew this was a risk he must take to make sure Uriah died.
Uriah was a Hittite — a foreigner by birth, serving Israel's king. Commentators note how his character shows up David's.
And afterwards, in the times of David, the foreigner is kept in view with great honour. This appears first in Uriah. He was a Hittite. Yet his faithfulness to the God of Israel, and his self-giving zeal for the cause of Israel, shine out wonderfully. They stand in contrast with even Israel's chief and noblest and best son in that day. This poor leftover of the defiled nations rebukes no less a son of Israel than King David himself.
David could not do this without Joab. Sharing the crime changed who held power over whom.
God left him to himself for a time, as discipline. So he adds a second offence to the first… He forgets his position as king, and a king from God. Was it reigning in righteousness to use his royal power to oppress Uriah? He makes himself a slave to the wretched Joab by making him a party to his crime. How degrading! He was far happier when he was hunted like a partridge in the mountains! Then he had a living faith and a good conscience.
The killing at Rabbah looked like an ordinary loss in war. God called it what it was, and answered it in public.
See God's dealings with David, because of the matter of Uriah. "The sword shall never depart from your house… you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun." Here was judgment for David's sin. And we know that in his later life, the sword did not depart from his house.
Years later, Uriah's name still appears among David's mighty men. One writer pictures the king reading it.
When David looked over the list of His servants, how his eyes must have paused in sorrow at the name of Uriah the Hittite, which ends the list! He was among the mighty men and not the least of those hearts devoted to the king and his people. And David had had him put to death to satisfy his own lust! His name remained there as a testimony against the one whom he had served. This one name reminded David of all his past shame and discipline. But he condemned himself and honoured the grace that had restored him. He would never have dreamed of erasing Uriah's name from the record.
- Idleness starts it. David left his post as captain of Israel's armies, and an unoccupied soul gave the enemy his opening.
- Cover-up deepens it. Escaping the consequences of the first sin drove him to a second; Uriah carried his own death warrant.
- Others pay for it. Joab accepted the loss of more of David's men as the price of the plan — the sin of a leader never stays contained.
- Accomplices own him. Making Joab a partner in the crime turned the king into the slave of his own commander.
- God answers it. God dealt openly with what David did in secret. The sword never left his house — yet grace restored him, and Uriah's name stayed on the list of honour.
Then Joab sent and told David all the matters of the war;
The siege of the Ammonite city has done what David's letter asked, and a runner is on his way back to David with the news. What looks like a routine battlefield report is the closing move of a cover-up. Commentators ask whose interests the message serves.
Joab shapes his report around the one thing David is waiting for. The order of the news, and what he saves for last, shows why he sent it — though the messenger does not keep to Joab's plan.
Joab may not have been so quick to report to David the conduct of the war if it had not been for Uriah's death. He sends a messenger and tells him to report the events first. The messenger must wait for David's answer before saying any more (v.19). David might be angry that Joab had endangered his army by going too close to the wall. Both Joab and David knew that tactic was dangerous. If David was angry, the messenger was to add that Uriah the Hittite was dead too (v.21). Joab wanted David to see the point: he had planned this unwise ploy because David wanted Uriah killed. However, the messenger did not follow Joab's orders exactly. He reported what had happened in the battle... but he did not wait for a response from David before telling him that Uriah was among the dead (v.24). Perhaps he saw no reason for Joab's instructions and did not want to see David's anger rise.
From this point messages pass between two men who share the same secret. Commentators note that the silence Joab keeps is not loyalty — it is leverage.
Above all, Joab sought to make himself indispensable. The best way to achieve this was to cater to the king's weaknesses. David rid himself of Uriah by placing him in Joab's hands. Joab did not speak a single word of reproach. He acted without hesitation. Guilty David had gained a discreet accomplice. But by that very discretion the accomplice becomes David's master. From now on the king's reputation depends on Joab.
Another writer weighs what that bargain cost David.
He makes himself a slave to the wretched Joab by making him a party to his crime. How degrading! He was far happier when he was hunted like a partridge in the mountains and had a living faith and a good conscience!
The report and the reply it draws out belong to a pattern: one wrong act protected by another.
We come to David, who was guilty both of lying (1 Sam. 21:2) and deceit (2 Sam. 11) of the most fearful character, by which he sought to cover up an awful sin, thereby making it twice as bad. Oh, how often some earlier sin is the cause of a long course of deceit and lying. Dear friends, above all things, let us seek to be straight with God, with other people, and with ourselves. And if we do fall into a sin, never, never try to cover it up with another sin, still worse than the first.
David's reply to Joab tries to close the matter down.
When David heard that his evil scheme against Uriah had worked, he said, "Say this to Joab, 'Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours now one and now another.'" This is how he thought to hush up the whole matter. He imagined, in vain, that once Uriah was out of the way, all would be well.
David never lifted a weapon against Uriah; he only wrote and received messages. God's later verdict refuses that defence.
There was no room for evasion or excuse. "You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword." But David had struck no blow. Uriah died as a soldier, killed by the enemy... David had signed no death warrant. The Ammonites who struck down Uriah knew nothing of David's plot against the life of his faithful servant. Yet in God's eyes it was as much David's act as if he had signed the death warrant for Uriah's public execution, or had put out his own hand and struck him dead.
David could manage every man in the story — the army, the messenger, the general, the public. One Reader he could not.
But there was an Eye that could see right through the covering David's insensitivity had cast over his heart and conscience. "The sword devours now one and now another" — true enough, and war has its ups and downs. But this would not satisfy the holiness of God. No; the whole matter must be exposed.
The same writer sets man at his worst against God's grace.
Such, however, is man — the best of men. When pride swells the heart, or lust dims the eye, who shall try to set a limit to human depravity?... Blessed for ever be the God of all grace, who has always proved Himself equal to all the demands of His wayward children!
- Message. Joab reports only because Uriah is dead. He orders the news so that Uriah's death answers David's anger over the losses.
- Master. The silent accomplice gains the upper hand. David's reputation now sits in Joab's hands.
- Cover. Hiding one sin with another makes it twice as bad. Never patch a fault with a worse one.
- Measured. David struck no blow, yet God says, "You have struck down Uriah" — God counts a death you arrange as a death you dealt.
- Seen. David could handle every man in the chain. He could not handle the Eye that reads through the covering. God brought the whole matter into the open — and grace proved equal even to that.
and charged the messenger, saying, When thou hast ended telling the matters of the war to the king,
Uriah is dead, and the news has to travel back to Jerusalem. Before the runner sets off, Joab coaches him on what to say and when to say it. The report is built to manage the king's reaction, not to tell him the truth.
Joab splits the news in two. The messenger delivers the war report first, then waits for the king's answer before saying the rest.
Joab may not have been so quick to report to David the conduct of the war if it had not been for Uriah's death. When he sends a messenger, he tells him to report the events first, and then to wait for a response from David before saying any more (v. 19). Joab knew that coming too close to the wall was dangerous, and so did David. So if David was angry that Joab had put his army at risk this way, the messenger was to add that Uriah the Hittite was dead also (v. 21). Joab wanted David to see that he had planned this unwise move because David wanted Uriah killed.
The order matters. The verse marks the pause point: the messenger stops when the war news is done. Joab holds back Uriah's name, because that one name answers any complaint David could make.
The messenger saw no point in Joab's careful order, so he changed it.
However, the messenger did not follow Joab's orders precisely. He reported what had happened in the battle. Men had come out from the city, and Israel pressed them close to the gate. That let archers shoot from the wall, and they killed some of David's men. But he did not wait for a response from David before telling him that Uriah was among the dead (v. 24). Perhaps he saw no reason for Joab's instructions and did not want to see David's anger rise.
David sends back no rebuke and no grief for the men who died. His words close a chain that began with one private sin.
And sin follows sin. The offspring of sin is sin. What cunning and deception followed. But honest Uriah frustrated his wicked plan. Did not David's conscience hurt him because of it? No doubt it was deadened. Then he becomes the actual murderer of Uriah the Hittite. News of Uriah's death reaches David, and hypocrisy is crowned in the words of the king: "Let not this thing displease you, for the sword devours one as well as another."
Joab carried out the order without a word of protest, and that silence cost David more than he knew.
Above all, Joab sought to make himself indispensable. The best way to achieve this was to cater to the king's weaknesses. David rid himself of Uriah by placing him in Joab's hands. Joab did not say a single word of reproach; he acted without hesitation. Guilty David had gained a discreet accomplice. But by that very discretion the accomplice becomes David's master. From now on the king's reputation depends on Joab.
The message back to Joab was meant to close the matter. God reopened it.
God sends Nathan to him to lead his conscience into the immediate presence of the holiness of God. This is the proper place for a conscience to be. When it is not there, it will find ways out, excuses and cloaks of every kind. David thought to hush up the whole matter. He imagined, in vain, that once Uriah was out of the way, all would be well.
A well-worded report could satisfy men. It could not touch the God who had already seen it all.
David committed his blatant sin in the matter of Uriah the Hittite in secret. But God knew the whole sordid story, and exposed his guilt to all Israel (2 Sam. 12:12). The king said within himself, surely the darkness will cover me. But he had to learn that the darkness could not hide him from the LORD. To his shame, he found that the light of the sun revealed his secret sin (Ps. 139:11-12).
- Staged. Joab splits the news in two and holds Uriah's name in reserve. That one name answers the king's anger before David can speak it.
- Spoiled. The messenger ignores the script and blurts out Uriah's death early — the plan of two men, undone by a third who knew nothing.
- Sealed. David's reply, that the sword devours one as well as another, is hypocrisy crowned: he covers a murder with a shrug.
- Snared. Joab's silence buys him a king. The shared secret makes the accomplice the master, and David's reputation sits in Joab's hands.
- Seen. The cover held with men and failed with God. What David did in the dark, God later brought out before all Israel, in the light of the sun.
and if so be that the king's wrath arise, and he say to thee, Why did ye go so near to the city to fight? did ye not know that they would shoot from the wall?
David handed Uriah over to Joab, and Joab placed him where the fighting was deadliest, right under the city wall. Now Joab coaches his messenger on how to break the news, rehearsing the angry question he expects from the king about a needless loss of men.
Joab does not simply send facts. He scripts the order of the telling. The one name that matters comes last, after the king's temper burns itself out.
Joab may not have been so quick to report to David the conduct of the war if it had not been for Uriah's death. When he sends a messenger, he tells him to report the events first. The messenger must wait for a response from David before saying any more (v.19). Coming too close to the wall was dangerous, and Joab knew it as well as David did. So if David was angry that Joab had put his army at risk this way, the messenger was to add that Uriah the Hittite was dead also (v.21). Joab intended to impress on David that he had planned this unwise ploy because David wanted Uriah killed.
The question Joab anticipates is a fair one. Pressing troops up against a city wall is bad soldiering, and it was chosen for exactly that reason.
However, in besieging the city, Joab put Uriah in the greatest place of danger, evidently close to the wall. Men from the city saw an advantage in coming out to fight, since they had the protection of the city behind them. Joab's plan worked well — not for the good of Israel, but to have Uriah killed. Others also fell before the enemy, but Joab knew this was a risk he must take to be sure that Uriah was killed (v.17).
Joab did what David wanted, and he never protested. That silence was not loyalty. It was leverage.
David rid himself of Uriah by placing him in Joab's hands. Joab did not speak a single word of reproach. He acted without hesitation. Guilty David had gained a discreet accomplice. But that very discretion makes the accomplice David's master. From now on the king's reputation depends on Joab.
Joab counts on the king erupting over a tactical blunder. He is right about the man. David could still burn with anger over another man's wrong.
"Then David's anger was greatly kindled against the man." Do not always trust people when they show anger with great force. David even then could feel hotly enough about evil. Alas! there was no self-judgment... The only thing that enables us to judge anything rightly in others is self-judgment. If we are to see clearly the speck in a brother's eye, let us not forget to take the log out of our own. David stands here as a solemn example. A man who is so quick to see sin in another may be completely blind to his own grave and unjudged wrongdoing.
No flash of anger came. When the report reached him, David sent back a calm word telling Joab not to let the losses trouble him — and thought the matter closed.
David said, when told of the success of his awful scheme against Uriah, "Say this to Joab: Do not let this thing displease you, for the sword devours one as well as another." In this way he thought to hush up the whole matter. He vainly imagined that, with Uriah out of the way, all would be well.
Instead, the private exchange between a king and his general became the most public thing about him.
There it is, clear and sharp-edged, down to the last word of smooth hypocrisy: "Do not let this thing be grievous in your eyes, for the sword devours one as well as another — encourage him!" There it is in the light, and it will be in the light forever. It is published in the book of inspiration and handed down from generation to generation. All eyes that will may read it, and the people of God certainly will, as long as the word of God shall last!
- Scripted — Joab rehearses the king's anger before it comes, so that Uriah's name arrives last. The messenger tells it his own way instead.
- Costly — Joab chose the reckless approach to the wall. Other soldiers fell so that one man would be sure to fall.
- Owned — the silent accomplice becomes the master. From this day the king's reputation sits in Joab's hands.
- Blind — Joab expects hot anger over a military mistake. David could still blaze at another man's sin while blind to his own.
- Published — the smooth reply meant to bury the matter is the sentence Scripture keeps in the light. It stands as long as the word of God lasts.
Who smote Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth? did not a woman cast the upper stone of a handmill from the wall, that he died in Thebez? why did ye go near the wall? -- then say thou, Thy servant Urijah the Hittite is dead also.
Joab expects David to be angry: men have died for nothing under the wall of Rabbah. So he arms his messenger with a famous disaster — Abimelech killed at Thebez — and then with the line that ends the argument before it starts: Uriah the Hittite is dead too.
Joab calls Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth. That is Gideon, under a changed form of the name his father gave him:
His father protected him, saying, Let Baal plead for himself, and symbolically named Gideon JERUBBAAL, "Let Baal plead." In 2 Samuel 11:21 it is JERUBBESHETH, "Let the shameful thing plead," meaning the same, without mentioning the name of Baal.
Joab is quoting a death soldiers knew by heart. Abimelech was trying to burn out a tower:
Again Abimelech had the intention of burning this tower, but made the mistake of venturing too close. A woman in the tower (her name unknown) dropped a large millstone from the top of the tower on the head of Abimelech, crushing his skull. He could only call to his armour bearer to kill him with his sword. This was not to save him from suffering, but so that people would not say that a woman killed him!
Joab cites it as a tactical blunder. But nobody at Thebez walked away clean:
City in Ephraim. Abimelech took it, except for the tower. From that tower a piece of a millstone killed him. So the besieged and the besieger were all punished in their sin.
Joab stages the report: losses first, a pause, then Uriah's name. The order carries its own message:
When he sends a messenger, he tells him to report the events first. The man must wait for a response from David before saying any more (v.19). David might be angry because Joab had endangered his army by coming too close to the wall. Joab, like David, knew that this tactic was dangerous. If the king was angry, the messenger was to add that Uriah the Hittite was dead also (v.21). Joab wanted David to see that he had planned this unwise move because David wanted Uriah killed.
Getting rid of Uriah cost David more than Uriah's life:
David had once said, "Let the blood of Abner fall on the head of Joab." Now he takes this same Joab, a murderer himself, as his accomplice. So he becomes the slave of the man who had every interest in bringing him into bondage.
Joab asked no questions, and that silence became a leash:
When David rid himself of Uriah by placing him in Joab's hands, Joab did not say one word of reproach. He acted without hesitation. Guilty David had gained a discreet accomplice. But by that very discretion the accomplice becomes David's master. From now on the king's reputation depends on Joab.
David's whole scheme has one aim, and it is not pleasure:
He sacrificed his character to indulge nature. Now he tries to make Uriah a cloak to screen him from the public eye. He must keep his reputation at all cost. He tries kindness, but in vain. He makes the wronged and dishonoured Uriah drunk, but to no purpose. At last he murders him by the sword of the children of Ammon. How dreadful!
It worked — and the tool was power God had entrusted to him:
Lust conceives and brings forth sin. That sin, and the thought of his own reputation, hurry him on to add murder to it, in the vain hope of blotting it out. He succeeds; the power is in his hand — alas, the power God had entrusted him with, and this is the use to which he puts it.
- Cover. David's aim in this whole scheme is not desire but concealment. He makes Uriah "a cloak to screen him from the public eye," and pays any price to keep his name clean.
- Cost. The cover charges other lives. Soldiers died under the wall so that one name could appear on the casualty list. At Thebez too, "the besieged and the besieger were all punished in their sin."
- Code. Joab's ordering of the report is deliberate. Naming Uriah last was meant to press on David that the king's wish caused the blunder.
- Chain. Joab's silence was not loyalty. By "this very discretion" he "becomes David's master," and the king's reputation now sits in Joab's hand.
- Cloak. The name Joab quotes, Jerubbesheth, means "Let the shameful thing plead" — a name built to avoid saying Baal out loud. It rides inside a message built to keep David's crime unspoken.
And the messenger went; and he came and told David all that Joab had sent him for.
A messenger walks from the siege at Rabbah into the king's presence. He repeats everything Joab told him to say. Behind that flat line sits a murder arranged by letter, a general who now knows too much, and a king waiting to hear that his secret is safe.
Joab did not send raw news. He built the report so that the one fact David wanted would land at the right moment. Commentators read his instructions as a signal back to the king.
Joab may not have been so quick to report to David the conduct of the war if it had not been for Uriah's death. When he sends a messenger, he instructs him to tell first the events that happened, and wait for a response from David before saying any more (v.19). Joab had put his army in danger by coming too close to the wall, and both he and David knew that tactic was dangerous. If David was angry about that, the messenger was to add that Uriah the Hittite was dead also (v.21). Joab wanted David to understand one thing: he had planned this unwise move because David wanted Uriah killed.
Our verse says he told David all that Joab had sent him to tell. Yet the next verses show he changed the order.
However, the messenger did not follow Joab's orders precisely. He reported what had happened in the battle. Men had come out from the city, and Israel pressed them close to the gate. That let archers shoot from the wall, and they killed some of David's men. But he did not wait for a response from David before telling him that Uriah was among the dead (v.24). Perhaps he saw no reason for Joab's instructions and did not want to see David's anger rise.
Joab carried out the order without one word of protest. That silence was not loyalty; it handed him a permanent hold over the king.
Above all, Joab sought to make himself indispensable. The best way to achieve this was to cater to the king's weaknesses. David rid himself of Uriah by placing him in Joab's hands. Joab did not speak a single word of blame; he acted without hesitation. Guilty David had gained a discreet accomplice. But that very discretion makes the accomplice David's master. From now on the king's reputation depends on Joab. But God's intervention thwarts Joab's plans. God speaks, David admits his guilt, and what was hidden is brought into the open and confessed in tears.
David answers the report without alarm, telling Joab not to let the matter trouble him. Writers do not read that calm as strength. They call it smooth hypocrisy, and they note that God preserved it word for word.
This is the account of a crime that, as Nathan says, has made the enemies of the Lord blaspheme from that day to this. There it is, clear and sharp-edged, to the last word of smooth hypocrisy: "Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours now one and now another… And encourage him." There it is in the light, and to be ever in the light, published in the book of inspiration, handed down from generation to generation.
The messenger's arrival looked like the end of the affair. It was not. One writer shows why.
David was told that his evil scheme about Uriah had worked. He said, "Thus shall you say to Joab, 'Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours now one and now another.'" So he thought to hush up the whole matter. He imagined, wrongly, that all would be well once Uriah was out of the way… God sends Nathan to him to lead his conscience into the immediate presence of the holiness of God. This is the proper place for conscience to find itself. When it is not there, it will find ways out, excuses, and cover-ups.
The chapter ends in cover-up. The same writer follows David past Nathan's words to the outcome.
When Nathan's words fell with divine power upon David's heart, he cast the crushing weight of his burden upon infinite grace — grace that works through the precious blood of atonement. His sin had raised a question between his conscience and God, and that question was now perfectly settled. So David was brought to rejoice in it with a humble heart. Grace gained a glorious triumph. David left the field scarred and badly wounded. Yet he carried away a deeper experience of what God was, and of what grace had done for his soul.
- Scripted. Joab staged the report so that Uriah's death would answer David's anger. It was a coded message: the king's order was done.
- Altered. The messenger told everything, but not in Joab's order; he named Uriah without waiting, likely to keep the king calm.
- Owned. Joab's silence bought him mastery over David. From that day the king's reputation rested in Joab's hands.
- Recorded. David's smooth reply — the sword devours now one and now another — was not buried. It stands in Scripture, in the light, for every generation to read.
- Reached. The cover-up worked with men. It failed with God. Nathan brought David's conscience into God's presence, and grace settled what hiding never could.
And the messenger said to David, The men prevailed against us, and came out against us into the field, and we were upon them as far as the entrance of the gate.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And the shooters shot from upon the wall against thy servants; and some of the king's servants are dead, and thy servant Urijah the Hittite is dead also.
The messenger from the siege of Rabbah delivers his report in a careful order — the losses at the wall first, then one name at the end. That last name is the one David was waiting for. He had put Uriah into Joab's hands, and Joab carried it through without a word.
Joab, David's army commander, scripted this report. He told the messenger when to let Uriah's name drop.
When Joab sends a messenger, he instructs him to tell first the events that happened, and wait for a response from David before saying any more (v.19). Joab had endangered his army by coming too close to the wall. Both Joab and David knew that tactic was dangerous. So if David was angry about it, the messenger was to add that Uriah the Hittite was dead also (v.21). Joab wanted David to realise he had planned this unwise move because David wanted Uriah killed.
The messenger did not follow the script.
He reported what had happened in the battle. But he did not wait for a response from David before telling him that Uriah was among the dead (v.24). Perhaps he saw no reason for Joab's instructions and did not want to see David's anger rise.
The verse counts more than one casualty. The plan required it.
In besieging the city, Joab put Uriah in the greatest place of danger, evidently close to the wall. Men from the city saw an advantage in coming out to fight, with the protection of the city behind them. Joab's plan worked well — not for the good of Israel, but to have Uriah killed. Others also fell before the enemy, but Joab knew this was a risk he must take to be sure Uriah died (v.17).
Each step of the cover-up cost more than the last.
See the terrible lengths to which David was carried in committing evil. Having sacrificed his character to indulge nature, he tries to make Uriah a cloak to screen him from the public eye. His reputation must be maintained at all cost. He tries kindness, but in vain; he makes the wronged and dishonoured Uriah drunk, but to no purpose; at last, he murders him by the sword of the children of Ammon. How dreadful!
The man named at the end of the report had once answered David with David's own words.
The king asks, "Why did you not go down to your house?" Uriah's answer is beautiful: "The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house?" (v. 11). He had learned this devotion in the school of David himself. In 2 Samuel 7:2 did not David say to Nathan: "See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwells in a tent"? Uriah speaks like the David of earlier days. What an unwitting reproach he addresses to his respected master!
Once Joab had done it, the power between the two men reversed.
When David rid himself of Uriah by placing him in Joab's hands, Joab did not speak a single word of reproach; he acted without hesitation. Guilty David had gained a discreet accomplice, but he is an accomplice who through this very discretion becomes David's master. From now on the king's reputation depends on Joab.
David could think the matter was now closed.
The story, instead of ending, is only beginning at this point. At the end of this chapter, so full of corruption and shame, we find a short line. It is the only thing David had not thought of, and the only one he ought to have remembered: "But the thing that David had done was evil in the sight of Jehovah."
(ESV: "But the thing that David had done displeased the LORD.")
Sin done in private does not stay private.
This was a very great sin: David committed it in secret; God punishes it in the sight of all Israel. David was reigning in God's name. If he did not know how to glorify God, if he failed to maintain a true testimony to the nature of God's kingdom, if he had instead falsified its character — then God Himself will know how, in the sight of all men, to retrace its features. He will do it through the chastening He sends on the man who has so dishonoured Him. That man had taken away the only witness to His government which God had set up before men.
- Secret. David's aim was to keep one sin out of sight. Every step behind this verse serves that aim.
- Shared. Joab obeyed without a word of reproach — and the silence that protected the king made the king his subject.
- Spread. The plan could not take one life alone; other soldiers fell at the wall as the price of Uriah's death.
- Spotless. Uriah learned his loyalty from David. In this report, that loyalty rebukes the king who sent him to die.
- Seen. David left God out of his plan. What he did was evil in God's sight, and God would answer it in front of all Israel.
Then David said to the messenger, Thus shalt thou say to Joab Let not this thing displease thee, for the sword devours one as well as another make thy battle strong against the city, and overthrow it; -- and encourage him.
David has just heard that Uriah is dead. His reply travels back to Joab, the commander who arranged that death. The words sound like a general shrugging off normal battle losses. But what is going on in the heart of the man who sent them?
The messenger brought news of a setback in the battle. Only one name in the report mattered to the king.
Of course the only news that interested David at that moment was Uriah's death. The messenger probably wondered why David did not criticize Joab's conduct of the battle. But David only mildly told him to tell Joab not to be discouraged by this setback, because "the sword devours now one and now another" (v.25). In this way he tried to hide the relief he felt at the news of Uriah's death. Joab, though, would see it plainly.
Scripture does not hurry past this sentence. It records the message word for word and leaves it standing in full view.
It is strange to find the history dwelling on all this at such length — a terrible accusation against a man who holds the place David holds. This is the record of a crime that has made the enemies of the Lord blaspheme, as Nathan says, from that day to this. There it is, clear and sharp-edged, down to the last word of smooth hypocrisy: "Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours now one and now another — encourage him!" There it is in the light, and there it stays in the light, published in the book of inspiration.
A man still sensitive to God could not have dictated such a message. Something had gone quiet in David long before this point.
Did David really think it was all over once Uriah was out of the way? Did he forget that the eyes of the Lord were resting on him in his evil course? It seems his conscience had grown hard at this point, and was not open to conviction as we would expect. Had it been open, he would surely have wavered before adding the sin of murder to the sin of adultery. He would have grieved under Uriah's sharp rebuke — a rebuke all the sharper because Uriah never meant it as one.
That numbness explains the calm tone of the message.
David sends this note to Joab, and it costs him more than he knows. A king who needs another man's silence is no longer free.
He forgets his position as king, and a king appointed by God. Was it reigning in righteousness to use his royal power to oppress Uriah? He makes himself a slave to the wretched Joab by making him a partner in his crime. How degrading! He was far happier when he was hunted like a partridge in the mountains, yet had living faith and a clear conscience!
The man David now depends on is one he had once condemned as a murderer.
The same David who had once said, "Let the blood of Abner fall on the head of Joab" (2 Sam. 3:28-29), now takes this Joab, a murderer himself, as his accomplice. So he becomes the slave of the man who had every interest in bringing him into bondage.
The message to Joab was meant to draw a line under the whole affair. It did not.
When David was told that his evil scheme against Uriah had succeeded, he said, "Thus shall you say to Joab, 'Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours now one and now another.'" In this way he thought he could hush up the whole matter. He imagined, wrongly, that once Uriah was out of the way all would be well… God sends Nathan to him to lead his conscience into the immediate presence of the holiness of God. That is where conscience belongs. When it is not there, it invents excuses, evasions, and cover-ups.
David weighed how the thing would look to Joab, to the messenger, to Israel. The chapter ends by naming the one audience he left out.
The story, instead of ending, is only beginning at this point. At the end of this chapter, so full of corruption and shame, we find one short sentence. It is the one thing David had not thought of, and the one thing he should have remembered: "But the thing that David had done was evil in the sight of the LORD."
- Cover. David's calm line about the sword covers his relief — and Joab could see straight through it.
- Cost. The cover-up cost him his freedom: he made himself the slave of Joab by making Joab his accomplice.
- Cause. Behind the cover was a hardened conscience, no longer open to conviction. That is why David moved from adultery to murder without wavering.
- Cure. A conscience kept out of God's presence invents excuses and cover-ups. So God sent Nathan to bring David's conscience into the light of His holiness.
- Court. David considered every opinion but one — and the verdict that stood was the Lord's.
And the wife of Urijah heard that Urijah her husband was dead, and she mourned for her husband.
Uriah is dead, his widow mourns him, and then David marries her. On the surface the king's secret is safe — until the chapter's last line names the one witness he had left out of his plans.
Bathsheba's grief was real, and she was not in on the plot. One writer walks through the sequence plainly.
Of course Bathsheba did not know that David had planned her husband's death. She did mourn for her husband for a certain time (v.26). When the days of mourning were over, David sent for her and took her as his eighth wife, and she bore a son. But we are assured that what David had done was evil in the sight of the Lord. This could not go unpunished.
A second commentator notes that Scripture records it all, out in the open.
There it is in the light, and always to be in the light, published in the book of inspiration and handed down from generation to generation. All who will may read it, and the people of God certainly will, as long as the word of God shall last. Yes, down to the seven days of mourning of the wife for the husband her sin had put to death.
The marriage looks like a tidy ending, and David treated it as one.
The Lord must maintain His holiness, however He may deal with the sinner... News came that his evil scheme about Uriah had worked. David said, "Say this to Joab: Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours one as well as another." So he thought to hush up the whole business. He imagined, wrongly, that once Uriah was out of the way, all would be well.
The chapter does not end with the wedding. It ends with a short clause that overturns everything David had arranged.
The story, instead of ending, is only beginning at this point. At the end of this chapter, so full of corruption and shame, we find a little expression. It is the only thing David had not thought of, and the only one he ought to have remembered: "But the thing that David had done was evil in the sight of Jehovah."
(The ESV renders the same clause, "But the thing that David had done displeased the LORD.")
Another writer traces the root back to what David had stopped remembering about God.
Notice, "You have despised Me." David had tried to hide his sin from public view by putting Uriah out of the way. He forgot the all-seeing eye of the Lord, and he forgot too the honour of His holy name. Had he remembered the Lord at the moment when his own desire was speaking inside him, he would not have fallen into the trap. The sense of God's presence is the great protection from evil. Yet how often the presence of another person moves us more than the presence of God.
One of David's psalms lets us hear what his silence cost him.
David had kept silent, not confessing his sin to God; but God laid an almost unbearable burden on his heart. How could his conscience rest when he had been guilty of adultery and murder? Being king, he could slip out of this stigma before the people, but he could not avoid having to do with God.
The last word on this marriage is not judgement.
Yet what grace shines out in this, as in every scene of David's remarkable career. Bathsheba becomes the mother of Solomon. He sat on the throne of Israel in its most glorious period. He also stands in that privileged line through which Christ came as a man!... The darkest scene in David's life becomes, under the hand of God, the means of the richest blessing — divine grace reflected on a dark background.
Pardon, though, did not cancel the consequences.
Grace may pardon the individual, but the results of sin will certainly appear. This is true even when the sinner enjoys the deepest and sweetest experiences of divine love and restoring grace while under the rod... David still had to listen to the solemn sentence: "Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife."
- Covered — Bathsheba mourned, the wedding followed, and the scandal looked buried. She never knew David had arranged her husband's death.
- Calm — David thought that with Uriah gone the matter was closed, and he tried to hush the whole thing up.
- Uncovered — the chapter's last line names the witness he left out: what he had done was evil in the sight of the Lord.
- Cost — he kept silent, and God laid a heavy burden on his heart. A king can escape public shame, but he cannot escape God.
- Grace — under God's hand, the darkest scene in David's life became the channel of the richest blessing. Yet the sword never left his house.
And when the mourning was past, David sent and fetched her to his house, and she became his wife, and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done was evil in the sight of Jehovah.
Second Samuel 11 ends with every loose end tied up. Bathsheba has mourned, David has married her, and she has borne him a son. No one in Jerusalem is asking questions. But the last line of the chapter says how it all looked to God, and that one line undoes the whole arrangement.
The chapter's last sentence is short, and it lands after a long stretch of scheming. It names the one thing David left out of his calculations.
The story does not end here. It is only beginning. This chapter is full of corruption and shame, and at the end of it we find one short sentence. It is the only thing David had not thought of, and the one thing he should have remembered: "But the thing that David had done was evil in the sight of Jehovah."
(The ESV reads "displeased the LORD" here; the writer quoted an older translation, "was evil in the sight of Jehovah.")
David arranged the whole affair so that no human eye could trace it back to him. That precaution shaped how God would answer it.
This was a very great sin: David committed it in secret; God punishes it in the sight of all Israel. If David did not know how to glorify God, and — while reigning in His name — did not keep a true testimony to the nature of God's kingdom; if instead he falsified its character, then God Himself will know what to do. In the sight of all men He will trace the kingdom's true features again. He will do it through the chastisement He sends on the man who has dishonoured Him — the man who had taken away the only witness to His government that God had set up before men.
Verse 27 records a legal, respectable outcome. Bathsheba's mourning ends, and she enters the palace as David's wife. But respectability gave no cover.
Of course Bathsheba did not know that David had planned her husband's death. She did mourn for her husband for a certain time (v.26). When the days of mourning were over, David sent for her and took her as his eighth wife, and she bore a son. But we are assured that what David had done was evil in the sight of the Lord. This could not go unpunished.
There is no outburst here, no thunder, no immediate sentence — only a statement of how the matter stood with God. That restraint is itself the point, and it is not the end of the story.
Scripture has a striking way of putting things. After David had carried out his sin, we read: "the thing that David had done displeased the LORD." There is no long account of God's anger. Yet this one line tells us His mind about the sin of His servant. But if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive them; and so we find it here. "I have sinned against the LORD," says David. "The LORD has put away your sin," answers the prophet (2 Sam. 12).
God gives His verdict at the end of chapter 11, but Nathan the prophet does not arrive until chapter 12. That gap was not God losing interest.
David did not confess his sin to God at once. Psalm 32:3-4 shows that the Lord waited some time before He sent the prophet Nathan to him. It was likely over nine months, for Bathsheba had borne a son by then. God was giving David the chance to confess his sin freely. In that time, as David says, "day and night" God's hand was heavy on him. How could his conscience have any rest?
Forgiveness came, but it did not cancel the consequences.
David's sin has been very great; but we can still see in him the precious work of the Spirit. Uriah's simple faithfulness put him to shame, and he cannot escape the hand of God! David is pardoned, for he confesses his sin. But in His government God shows Himself to be inflexible. He spares the king — who deserved death — yet He tells him that the sword shall never depart from his house.
- Seen. David managed every human witness and forgot the one Witness who mattered. The sin he did in secret, God punished in the sight of all Israel.
- Verdict. One short line gives God's mind, and it is enough to overturn a marriage that looked proper in every way.
- Silence. For months God waited, His hand heavy on David's conscience, giving him room to speak first before He sent Nathan.
- Pardon. David said, "I have sinned against the LORD," and the answer came at once: the LORD has put away your sin.
- Government. Forgiveness restored the man, but it did not remove the consequences. The sword would not depart from his house.