When kings went out to war, David remained in Jerusalem while Joab led the army against the Ammonites. One evening David saw a woman bathing from his roof. He learned that she was Bathsheba, daughter of Eliam and wife of Uriah the Hittite. David sent for her, and she became pregnant.
David called Uriah back from the war. He asked about Joab and the army and told Uriah to go home. Uriah refused, saying that the ark, Israel, Judah, Joab, and the soldiers were in camps and he could not go home to eat, drink, and be with his wife. David made him drunk the next day, but Uriah still did not go home.
David sent a letter to Joab ordering him to place Uriah where the fighting was fiercest and withdraw from him. Uriah carried the letter himself. Joab stationed men near the city wall, and Uriah died with other servants of David. Bathsheba mourned her husband. When her mourning ended, David brought her to his house; she became his wife and bore a son.
God sent Nathan to David. Nathan told of a rich man with many flocks and a poor man with one little ewe lamb, which lived with him like a daughter. When a traveler came to the rich man, he took the poor man’s lamb instead of one from his own flock. David burned with anger and said that man deserved to die and repay fourfold.
Nathan said, “You are the man.” God had made David king and delivered him, yet David had struck down Uriah and taken his wife. David admitted that he had sinned against God. Nathan told him that God had put away his sin so he would not die, but the child born from the act would die.
When the child became ill, David fasted and lay on the ground before God. On the seventh day the child died. David saw his servants whispering and understood. He rose, washed, anointed himself, changed his clothes, and went to worship. Then he returned home and ate. Bathsheba later bore another son, and David named him Solomon.
Nathan said that the sword would not depart from David’s house. What David had done in secret would not remain hidden, and trouble would arise from within his own household. Nathan’s words kept the death of Uriah from being treated as an event David could simply leave behind.
After the child died, David’s servants asked why he had fasted while the child lived but ate after the death. David said he had sought God’s mercy while there was still time, but the child would not return. He would go to the child, but the child would not come back to him. Bathsheba later bore Solomon, and Nathan gave him the name Jedidiah because God loved him.