Open English Translation 2SA Chapter 11

11 The next spring (when kings usually go to war), David sent Yoav and his officials and all the Israeli warriors, and they defeated the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah.[ref]

But David stayed in Yerushalem, 2 and early one evening he got up from a nap and walked around the palace roof area. From there he saw a woman bathing, and she was very good-looking. 3 David sent a messenger to find out who she was, and was told, “That’s Eliam’s daughter Batsheva—Uriyyah the Hittite’s wife.” 4 Then he sent messengers to get her, and she came and he slept with her. (She had been purifying herself after the completion of her menstrual period.) Then she returned to her house.

5 After some time, the woman realised that she was pregnant, and so she informed David. 6 David sent to Yoav, “Send Uriyyah the Hittite here to me.” So Yoav sent Uriyyah to David. 7 When he arrived, David asked him about how Yoav and his men were doing, and how the battle was going, 8 then he told him, “Go to your house and relax.” So Uriyyah left the palace and the king sent a gift to be delivered to his house. 9 But Uriyyah didn’t go home—instead he slept at the palace entrance with all the king’s servants, 10 The next day, David was informed that Uriyyah didn’t go home to his house, so he asked him, “Didn’t you just get back from a long journey? Why didn’t you go home?”

11 “The sacred chest and the warriors from Israel and Yehudah are living in tents,” Uriyyah replied. “And my master, Yoav, and my master’s servants are camping out in the open. So I couldn’t just go to my house to eat and to drink and to sleep with my wife. By your life and by the life of your spirit, I couldn’t do that.”

12 “Well, stay here today also,” David told him, “and tomorrow I’ll send you back.” So Uriyyah stayed in Yerushalem that day and the following day, 13 and David summoned him over, and they ate and drank together, and David got him drunk. But even then, Uriyyah didn’t go back to his house, but when he left in the evening he went back to sleep in the dorm with his master’s servants.

14 The next morning, David wrote a note to Yoav and told Uriyyah to deliver it. 15 He’d written, “Place Uriyyah in the front where the fighting is strongest, then fall back from behind him so that he’ll be struck and die.” 16 So as Yoav was surrounding the city, he placed Uriyyah where he knew the strongest enemy warriors would be fighting. 17 The warriors from the city came out and fought against Yoav’s men, and some of David’s servants were killed and so was Uriyyah.

18 Then Yoav sent a messenger to David to give him a full account of the battle. 19 He told the messenger, “Once you’ve finished telling all the details of the battle to the king, 20 if he gets angry and asks, ‘Why did you all go so close in to the city to fight? Didn’t you know that they’d shoot down from the wall? 21 Wasn’t Yerub-Beshet’s son Abimilek killed by a woman in Tevets when she threw a millstone down from the wall? Why did you approach the wall?’ Then you should say, ‘Your servant Uriyyah the Hittite is also dead.’ ”[ref]

22 So the messenger left and went and told David everything that Yoav had told him, 23 saying, “Their men gained ground and came out against us in the countryside, but we forced them back to their city gate. 24 Then their archers were shooting at your men from the top of the wall and some of your men were killed, including your servant Uriyyah the Hittite.”

25 David sent the messenger back to encourage Yoav, “Don’t let yourself be upset by what happened because no one knows who might die in a battle. Reinforce your battle against the city and tear it down.”

26 When Uriyyah’s wife Batsheva heard that her husband had been killed, she mourned for him. 27 When her time of mourning was over, David sent for her and brought her to the palace. She became a wife to him and bore a son for him, but Yahweh was unhappy about what David had done.