Bathsheba [Proper 13B]

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson

2 Samuel 11:26-12:13a

Bathsheba

Samuel warned them.  He warned the people.  A king, he said, will take and take and take.  But the people wouldn’t listen.  They wanted a king; they demanded a king; they voted for king. And so they got one. Elections do matter.

The warning, in the context of 1 Samuel, seemed to be rather specific, seemed to pertain only to the reign of King Saul.  Saul was the chosen one, their first king; initially everyone was excited; he was oozing with potential; he looked the part; he had great endorsements.  But things devolved quickly.  Saul took and took and took from the people; he exploited their loyalties; he neglected the Law of God.  And early in his reign he had already become the very thing Samuel feared, the very thing about which he had warned the nation.  But David, his replacement, he was different. He was a man after God’s own heart and so surely the old warnings of the prophet Samuel did not apply to him.  Or so they thought.

It would be easy to make this sermon about David, the king, the powerful man in the narrative, the person of interest to the authors.  He is well-known; he is popular still, centuries after his reign.  And sure, he is flawed but also forgiven.  Anyway, we kind of like flawed heroes.  And time and effort sand off the roughest edges, mute the moral complexities.  Because we want our heroes to be heroes.  And David is one of the true heroes of our Judeo-Christian heritage.   

I mean, that said, last week was pretty bad.  In last week’s Old Testament reading, we heard of the terrible events David set in motion.  He saw a beautiful woman and he did what kings do: he took her.  Just like Samuel warned he would.  And he made her pregnant – which complicated things; David’s plan was to have his fun and send her back to her home – no consequences and no second thoughts.  But the pregnancy really spoiled his fun. And so, to cover his tracks, he tried manipulating her husband into leaving his military duties, called him back from the frontlines, so that he would sleep with his wife.  It was a solid plan: if Uriah slept with his wife folks would think the baby was Uriah’s and David would be in the clear.  But Uriah would not cooperate; he probably thought his king was testing his loyalty.  And being the good soldier that he was, he refused to abandon his duty – even temporarily.  Which really ruined David’s plan and so the king made sure that Uriah was killed in battle.  And then took the woman, the one whom he impregnated and widowed, as one of his many wives. 

That was last week.  Last week we heard this horrible story – one that started with the king taking and ended with the king taking a life.  And then we heard “The Word of the Lord.”  And while we were still trying to process all the terrible, we responded, “Thanks be to God” because that is what we do.  But for me, at least, that “Thanks be to God” felt incredibly uncomfortable.

This week we get the rest of the story.  David, resting easier, thinking himself clever, seems to have gotten away with everything; he is ready to move on.  But God is not.  Our text says, “the thing David had done displeased the Lord.”  There were actually a lot of things with which God could have been rightfully displeased; I assume “the thing” covers it all.  The displeased God sends the prophet Nathan, Samuel’s successor, to confront David.  To confront him with a story.   And David, after hearing both the poetic and prosaic versions of “You are the man; you are the one who did evil in the sight of the Lord!”, admits his wrongdoing.  And I guess we are supposed to think that that makes him a hero – which is often how this story is told.  Now I think we can admit that simply admitting his wrong doing is a pretty small price to pay for all the terrible things he did and all the lives that were destroyed - although sadly it still more than we might typically expect when a powerful man is caught red-handed.

And while there are consequences, David’s violence ignites a cycle of violence that devastates his family for generations to come, God is faithful and merciful and God puts away David’s sins.  And that gives us hope when we do bad things.  And that could be the sermon, but while we focus on David, his victim is slowly disappearing, fading away.

Where the story picks up today, she doesn’t even have a name.  Preachers have long called her a seductress, accused her of tempting the king with her naked beauty.  Hollywood scripts imagine a love story – forbidden love eventually blossoming into a fairy tale wedding, a happy ending.  But neither of those versions are accurate; they are twisted truths designed to protect David’s reputation, distortions used preserve some semblance of our royal hero. 

She is never given a chance to tell her truth, but this woman remembered as “the wife of Uriah” has a story and a name.  She is called Bathsheba, a name not once mentioned in today’s lesson, and she is a victim, the patron saint of the countless multitudes of women whose names are forgotten and voices silenced – a brutal history of which we are becoming increasingly aware.

Her name is Bathsheba and this is her story: What she did to catch David’s eye was obey the Law of God.  That is why she was bathing; she was following the divine law requiring women to purify themselves after menstruation.  And David could see her bathing, not because she was dangling temptations before him, but because he lived in a palace that over-looked his kingdom; he was on his roof and he was surveying the world below him. 

This was in the days long before indoor plumbing.  And so, of course, Bathsheba was bathing outside.  She was perhaps even fenced in – but if one is high enough fences don’t block the view.

And he was higher than her – in every way.  He was the most powerful man in a man’s world and she was a woman in a society in which gender equality was not even yet a fantasy.  And besides that, he was the king.  And if you haven’t heard: what kings do is take.  And that is what David did.  He saw her.  He liked what he saw.  And so he took her from her home and he took what he wanted.  And I know folks get squeamish because David is a hero in our faith tradition; he wrote the 23^rd Psalm – a favorite.  But the truth is, David raped Bathsheba – perhaps not violently, but she clearly had no choice: because he was the king and she was just a woman. 

David takes Bathsheba and when he is done, he sends her back to her home because she is married, after all, and while that doesn’t stop him, David knows that it is not a good PR move to take a soldier’s wife and force her to have sex with him – especially when the soldier is out fighting the king’s battles.  It is a bad look.

And so Bathsheba, an observant Jew according to the Biblical text, returns to her home – having been forced to have sexual relations with a man who is not her husband.  She is abandoned to live with her shame – because the man who took her is the king, an incredibly popular king, and so who can she tell? 

And then she finds out she is pregnant.  And so if everything wasn’t bad enough she is now carrying the child of her assailant.  And because her husband is gone, everyone will know it is not his.  They will call her an adulterer; they will say she deserves death.  And so, because now it is a life and death situation, she has to go back to the man who took her and impregnated her and tell him.

The result is: David kills her husband.  And leaves her pregnant and alone in a world without social safety nets.  Her only option is to join his harem – the harem of the man who ruined her life.

And so while the prophet prophesies.  And the king confesses.  The woman, her name forgotten and her pain ignored, fades into the background of this story.  No one knows her trauma.  No one hears her complaint.  No one sees her.  She is the collateral damage in a world in which powerful men are the featured players, the only ones who really matter.  David is the chosen one.  She is the taken one.

Most of the time that is the end of the story.  Most of the time the terrible tale lives on only in the shattered soul of the victim.  And then finally dies with her. 

And if it wasn’t for the prophet, who risked his life to speak the truth, this story would have been no different.  David went to great lengths to cover up the truth.  But still the truth got out. 

And the reason the truth got out was because God saw Bathsheba.  God saw her and God told her story through the prophet.  And so while it is fair to say that this story is about the mercy that God shows to sinners.  That is only half of the story.  This story is also about how God never forgets the victim. 

Her name was Bathsheba.  She was not a temptress.  She was not a storybook princess.  She was a woman in a man’s world – one thing among many that a king could take – on a whim, just because.  She was victimized, abused, and left alone in her suffering.  Her life was shattered because a powerful man liked the look of her body.  It is an old story that might as well be ripped out of today’s headlines.

And I know that for some here today this story hits too close to home: for those who have been abused and victimized; for those who are suffering in silence; for those who feel alone and forgotten. 

But I want you to know: you are not alone; you are not forgotten.  The God who remembered Bathsheba remembers you.  That God loves you.  That God is with you – in your pain, holding on tightly to pieces of your broken heart.  God: the prophetic voice of justice shattering the silence.  You are not forgotten.  The God of Bathsheba knows your story.  The God of Bathsheba knows your name.