In the first scene of the Bathsheba narrative, David, who remains in the palace while his troops are deployed in war, spies a woman bathing from his rooftop after a late afternoon siesta. Set against the background of the siege of the Ammonite town, Rabbah (1 Sam 11:1; 12:26–31), the battle occasions Bathsheba’s husband Uriah’s absence from home and the adultery, his summons from the front to cover for the resultant pregnancy, and his eventual death. The contrast between David and Uriah implies a searing critique of the king’s power, when the corrupt king takes his loyal soldier’s wife to bed. Bathsheba is first introduced by name when the king sends messengers to enquire after the woman, who report: “Is this not Bathsheba, daughter of Eliam, wife of Uriah the Hittite?” (11:3). Her father and husband are both members of David’s elite vanguard (2 Sam 23:34, 39); her grandfather, Ahitophel, father of Eliam, is one of the king’s wisest counselors (who later betrays David in allying with Absalom, chs. 15–16). Despite her status as a married woman and the illustrious men with whom she is affiliated, David summons her for his pleasure (2 Sam 11:4–5):

So David sent messengers, and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her.

(she was purifying herself of her uncleanness). And she returned to her house.

The woman conceived; and she sent [word] to David, and said: “I am pregnant.”

Bathsheba’s role in these few terse lines reveals very little of her feeling or character. She plays an almost entirely passive role in this chapter and utters only three words (two in Hebrew). The parenthetical aside about her purifying herself may refer back to the roof bath as a ritual cleansing at the end of her period, which would affirm David’s paternity. Alternatively, the purification takes place after they lie together and alludes the ritual of cleansing following sexual relations (Lev 15:15-17). Yet Bathsheba cannot wash herself of the consequences, and a month or two later she is compelled to send word that she is pregnant. She alone carries the results of the tryst in her body. 

Did Bathsheba lie with the king willingly? Some readers suggest that she deliberately positions herself on the roof, bathing naked within David’s purview so that he would take her and make her one of his wives, and thus she would perhaps bear the future king. It seems, however, that he wants her only for that one time; she alone risks the death penalty for adultery, given her husband’s absence, the resulting pregnancy, and the king’s absolute power. Others suggest that she is raped, since she has no wherewithal to resists the king’s summons, though the language does not imply force. As the story unravels, the narrative seems to exonerate Bathsheba of any guilt and is exclusively concerned with the king’s degeneracy. While David has no intention of continuing the liaison, the pregnancy embroils him.

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