From Victim to Victor: Dissecting Bathsheba's Story
- Emma
- 2 days ago
- 7 min read
Content Warning: This article discusses:
Sexual assault and coercion
Abuse of power
Infant loss
Murder and state-sanctioned violence
When you hear the name Bathsheba, what comes to mind?
Seductress? Adulteress?
It wasn’t until recently that I began to associate Bathsheba with terms like victim and victor.
In the Bible, 2 Samuel 11 and 12 tell the story of David and Bathsheba. Bathsheba was an Israelite woman, likely of noble birth, who lived during the reign of King David. Wife to Uriah, an elite soldier in David’s army, Bathsheba caught the eye of the king one spring while she was bathing. David brought her to the palace, slept with her, and sent her home with a parting gift—an unintended pregnancy.
In a panic, David called her husband, Uriah, home from war in hopes that he would sleep with her, but Uriah refused to take comfort in his wife while his colleagues were fighting. When Uriah wouldn’t perform his husbandly duties, David sent him to the front lines so that he would be killed. Then, he took Bathsheba as his wife, and she gave birth to their son.
Bathsheba the Seductress
“From the roof he saw a woman bathing—a very beautiful woman.”
—2 Samuel 11:2
The verse is often interpreted incorrectly as Bathsheba bathing on the roof of her home—out in the open so that people could see her.
Especially during the purity culture movement (1990s-2000s), this scenario was often used to illustrate the consequences of immodesty. If only Bathsheba had been bathing inside her home, David wouldn’t have seen her. If she had concealed her body from the wandering eyes of men, she wouldn’t have seduced David.
However, the verse makes clear that David was on the roof of his palace, likely at a higher vantage point than the other buildings in the area, allowing him to see down into the homes below.
Homes in Jerusalem at that time had a central courtyard, the most secure and private space in the home. This space was used for everything from cooking to bathing to sharing meals.
2 Samuel 11:4 confirms that she was not attempting to seduce David—sex was the last thing on her mind—because she was “purifying herself from her uncleanliness” (i.e., she just finished her period and was getting cleaned up). This was a ritual cleaning, which shows that Bathsheba was concerned about Jewish laws and customs and therefore incredibly unlikely to readily break one by committing adultery. It also proves that she was not pregnant at the time with her encounter with David, proving his paternity of the child.
Bathsheba wasn’t attempting to seduce David. She was abiding by Jewish law in the most private part of her home.
Bathsheba the Adultress
The idea of Bathsheba being an adulteress rather than a victim is nothing new. Her story has been dramatized in words and on screens, depicting her as a lustful, power-hungry woman who is plotting against her husband, Uriah. Perhaps one of the most disappointing depictions of this trend is in Francine Rivers’ novella Unspoken, which paints Bathsheba as a lovesick, willing participant. This is just one example of modern retellings pushing a victim-blaming narrative and romanticizing sexual assault.
I can understand why this is the common interpretation of the story. The term adultery is used in the passage several times to describe the encounter, and many authors and pastors have latched onto this term and built an entire narrative about a relatively minor Bible character, even though the story really focuses on David’s sin, not Bathsheba’s.
Adultery is a legal term to describe David’s crime. According to Jewish law, the type of sexual crime and the ensuing punishment was determined by a woman’s marital status and willingness to participate.
If a man, married or unmarried, had consensual intercourse with an unmarried woman, it was considered fornication.
If a man, married or unmarried, had intercourse with a woman against her will, it was considered rape.
If a man, married or unmarried, had consensual intercourse with a married woman, it was considered adultery.
Knowing that Bathsheba was not attempting to seduce David, why does the Bible not label David’s actions as rape?
There is no clear-cut answer to this. Some scholars believe that because Bathsheba did not “cry out,” it was consensual and therefore adultery, not rape. This derives from a litmus test for rape described in Deuteronomy 22 colloquially known as City vs. Field test. If a woman is in the city when she is engaging in intercourse and does not cry out for help, it is assumed it is consensual. The thought was that peers or protectors would hear her crying for help and intervene. However, if a woman is raped in a field and cries out, there is no one there to hear her, so she is taken at her word and considered a victim.
Bathsheba was in the palace when David took her — even if there were people around to hear her, who would be willing to implicate the king of Jerusalem in a crime like rape? Anyone around would have been part of David’s court — loyal to him and unconcerned with Bathsheba’s consent.
The strongest evidence for Bathsheba’s innocence is found in 2 Samuel 12:1-4. Nathan confronts David with a parable:
“There were two men in one city, one rich and the other poor. The rich man had exceedingly many flocks and herds. But the poor man had nothing, except one little ewe lamb which he had bought and nourished; and it grew up together with him and with his children. It ate of his own food and drank from his own cup and lay in his bosom; and it was like a daughter to him. And a traveler came to the rich man, who refused to take from his own flock and from his own herd to prepare one for the wayfaring man who had come to him; but he took the poor man’s lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him.”
Nathan compares Bathsheba to a little ewe lamb — a blameless creature, a victim. The parable strongly suggests that Bathsheba is not complicit in adultery. She was sexually assaulted by David, plain and simple.
Bathsheba as Victim
Bathsheba’s story is not a happy one. If being sexually assaulted by one of the most powerful men in the world was not enough, she was also widowed while pregnant with her assaulter’s son. Then, her child died mere days into his life, leaving her alone in the king’s harem, grieving both her first husband and her child.
In ancient Israel, being widowed was one of the worst things that could happen to a woman. Women could not exist in society without male family members, so David marrying Bathsheba after Uriah’s death was an act of both mercy and malice. Bathsheba was saved from one of the most vulnerable social positions possible—a mercy—but she was forced to marry and live in the harem of the man who assaulted her and caused her pain.
I think about the layers to this story. As the victim of her circumstances, Bathsheba had a rough go, but did she know how Uriah died—and who was responsible? Did she understand her child’s death as part of David’s punishment? We don’t know much about Bathsheba’s feelings or experiences aside from what is explicitly stated in the text. Based on her displays of political acumen in 1 Kings, I think she was aware of what happened and forced to live with the knowledge of betrayal.
Additionally, we never know if David understands the extent of his crimes against Bathsheba. He knows he sinned against God and committed a crime against Uriah, but scripture doesn’t make clear if he realizes that his crimes were also against Bathsheba. I hope, for her sake, that he eventually understood his actions were harmful to her—a woman created in the image of God, imago Dei—rather than just viewing them as a crime against another man’s property.
Even if she never received an apology, even if David never understood the depth of his mistakes, Bathsheba received her own redemption arc, and while it didn’t bring her first husband or her child back, it gave her more than she ever could have hoped for.
Bathsheba as Victor
Bathsheba’s life as the wife of a king is far from a fairy tale. She uses her favor with David and political acumen to protect her second son, Solomon, and position herself as the most influential woman in Solomon’s kingdom.
Toward the end of David’s life, there is no clear successor to the throne. When one of David’s other sons, Adonijah, attempts to seize the throne, Nathan propositions Bathsheba with the following:
“Go, approach King David and say to him, ‘My lord the king, did you not swear to your servant: Your son Solomon is to become king after me, and he is the one who is to sit on my throne? So why has Adonijah become king?’” —1 Kings 1:13
It is unclear if David mentioned naming Solomon as his heir prior to this discussion or if Bathsheba and Nathan were capitalizing on David’s ailing health, hoping he would take their words at face value. Regardless, David agreed and named Solomon as his successor.
After Solomon was crowned, Adonijah asked her to request Solomon for Abishag’s hand in marriage. Abishag was one of David’s concubines who “kept him warm” when he was on his death bed. While they never consummated their relationship, she was part of his harem, and the act of marrying her could have been interpreted as Adonijah attempting to undermine Solomon and reclaim the kingship. Bathsheba passed along this request, which resulted in Adonijah’s execution.
Bathsheba became the most powerful woman in the kingdom, even more powerful than Solomon’s wives. She was the Queen Mother, often called the Great Lady, and seated on a throne next to Solomon in court.
An additional piece of the story I want to touch on is Bathsheba’s first son with David—the one who died soon after birth. Had this child lived, he would likely have had a difficult life. People would either assume he was Uriah’s child or understand that he was conceived out of an unlawful union and have the stigma of being a bastard; either way, he would not be able to claim the Davidic throne.
While nothing can erase the pain of losing her first husband and child, God orchestrated a redemptive ending—both earthly and eternal—for Bathsheba through her legitimate son, Solomon. Her legacy lived on, as she is included in the lineage of Christ in the Gospel of Matthew. Bathsheba’s pain and loss led to the birth of the savior of the world.
These actions show that Bathsheba was far more than the simpering adultress she is often painted as in literature, film, and sermon. Her intelligence and political acumen took her from victimhood to victory, seating her in the highest position a woman could hold at that time in history.
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