1When that time of year came around again, the anniversary of the Ammonite aggression, David dispatched Joab and his fighting men of Israel in full force to destroy the Ammonites for good. They laid siege to Rabbah, but David stayed in Jerusalem.
2One late afternoon, David got up from taking his nap and was strolling on the roof of the palace. From his vantage point on the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was stunningly beautiful.
3David sent to ask about her, and was told, "Isn't this Bathsheba, daughter of Eliam and wife of Uriah the Hittite?"
4David sent his agents to get her. After she arrived, he went to bed with her. (This occurred during the time of "purification" following her period.) Then she returned home.
5Before long she realized she was pregnant. Later she sent word to David: "I'm pregnant."
6David then got in touch with Joab: "Send Uriah the Hittite to me." Joab sent him.
7When he arrived, David asked him for news from the front--how things were going with Joab and the troops and with the fighting.
8Then he said to Uriah, "Go home. Have a refreshing bath and a good night's rest." After Uriah left the palace, an informant of the king was sent after him.
9But Uriah didn't go home. He slept that night at the palace entrance, along with the king's servants.
10David was told that Uriah had not gone home. He asked Uriah, "Didn't you just come off a hard trip? So why didn't you go home?"
11Uriah replied to David, "The Chest is out there with the fighting men of Israel and Judah--in tents. My master Joab and his servants are roughing it out in the fields. So, how can I go home and eat and drink and enjoy my wife? On your life, I'll not do it!"
12"All right," said David, "have it your way. Stay for the day and I'll send you back tomorrow." So Uriah stayed in Jerusalem the rest of the day. The next day
13David invited him to eat and drink with him, and David got him drunk. But in the evening Uriah again went out and slept with his master's servants. He didn't go home.
14In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it with Uriah.
15In the letter he wrote, "Put Uriah in the front lines where the fighting is the fiercest. Then pull back and leave him exposed so that he's sure to be killed."
16So Joab, holding the city under siege, put Uriah in a place where he knew there were fierce enemy fighters.
17When the city's defenders came out to fight Joab, some of David's soldiers were killed, including Uriah the Hittite.
18Joab sent David a full report on the battle.
19He instructed the messenger, "After you have given to the king a detailed report on the battle,
20if he flares in anger,
21say, 'And by the way, your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead.'"
22Joab's messenger arrived in Jerusalem and gave the king a full report.
23He said, "The enemy was too much for us. They advanced on us in the open field, and we pushed them back to the city gate.
24But then arrows came hot and heavy on us from the city wall, and eighteen of the king's soldiers died."
25When the messenger completed his report of the battle, David got angry at Joab. He vented it on the messenger: "Why did you get so close to the city? Didn't you know you'd be attacked from the wall? Didn't you remember how Abimelech son of Jerub-Besheth got killed? Wasn't it a woman who dropped a millstone on him from the wall and crushed him at Thebez? Why did you go close to the wall!" "By the way," said Joab's messenger, "your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead." Then David told the messenger, "Oh. I see. Tell Joab, 'Don't trouble yourself over this. War kills--sometimes one, sometimes another--you never know who's next. Redouble your assault on the city and destroy it.' Encourage Joab."
26When Uriah's wife heard that her husband was dead, she grieved for her husband.
27When the time of mourning was over, David sent someone to bring her to his house. She became his wife and bore him a son.