“Remembering Bathsheba”

Sermon by the Rev. Caela Simmons Wood

First Congregational UCC of Manhattan, KS

1 Samuel 12: 1-9

October 25, 2026

Do you remember the folktale about the emperor’s new clothes? The story goes like this: some guys showed up at the emperor’s palace and offered to make him the finest clothes. These clothes were said to not only be beautiful but they served as a litmus test of sorts. Only the wise could see the clothes. To the ignorant, they were invisible. 

Day after day, the guests worked away in their workshop. The emperor and his staff looked in but couldn’t see any fabric. Of course, they didn’t dare admit this because they didn’t want to sound stupid. The clothes were “finished” and the emperor put them on to wear to a celebration. The clothes were still invisible, but no one was willing to say so. Until a young child at the event called out the obvious: “Why does the emperor have no clothes?” 

It’s interesting to see the ways royalty are depicted in art across the centuries. There is a story about King David’s wife, Michal, scolding him for dancing half-naked before the Ark of the Covenant. It’s not clear whether she was more embarrassed by his attire or his dancing, but when I went looking for artistic depictions of King David, I only found one where he was scantily clad. 

Bathsheba on the other hand, has been stripped naked for the whole world to see. The King is not the only man who wanted to invade her privacy….a whole host of European male painters also commodified her body for the whole world to use. A one-dimensional Everywoman; her body objectified, but her voice nearly silent. 

Interestingly, many of the artists get the details of the story wrong, too. Perhaps they’re so distracted by Bathsheba’s beauty that they don’t quite take the time to notice the details. Bathsheba is often depicted “bathing on the roof” which is, incidentally, how Leonard Cohen saw her when he wrote his famous Hallelujah. But the text doesn’t say that at all. The only person on the roof in 1 Samuel is the king, using his high vantage point to invade Bathsheba’s privacy. 

The devil is often in the details and this story is no different. When I was taught this story as a child, I was told Bathsheba was bathing on the roof, which made it sound like she was a bit promiscuous - bathing in a highly visible space like that. I got this idea of Bathsheba as an exhibitionist - maybe lonely while her virtuous husband was away at war - and looking for a little diversion. So she seduced King David into adultery. 

The story written in black and white in 1 Samuel doesn’t say this at all. Here’s what it says instead:

First, we have David, starring in the role of the Bad King. It’s clear from the beginning he’s not doing what he’s supposed to do.  It’s the time of the year when “kings go out to battle,” but where is this particular King? At home, safely tucked into the lush confines of his palace. He is not following the rules. He’s not doing his job. 

But he is acting out the role of a king. Remember when the prophet Samuel warned the people about kings? He told them what would happen: a king will take your sons and get them killed in battle. He will take your daughters to “be perfumers”. He’ll take your money, your servants, your livestock, and more. [1] 

So David plays the role of the Biblical King well. He takes and takes. When he sees a woman that he wants, he takes, seizes, possesses, grabs. Furthermore, when he’s caught he knows how to “take care of things quietly.” In this particular instance, he’s even willing to commit murder to make sure his reputation isn’t harmed. 

Juxtaposed with David, of course, is Bathsheba’s husband, Uriah, who plays the role of the Good Guy. Uriah IS where he’s supposed to be: out on the battlefield like a good soldier. And when the King summons him home to rest, he’s so virtuous that he refuses to even go home to his wife. “How could I go home and sleep with my wife in our warm, safe bed when my fellow soldiers are sleeping in the mud tonight?” Uriah is such a tragic figure - righteous and used. One of those Good Guys who doesn’t stand a chance against the Big Bad King.

So we have the Bad King, the Good Guy Uriah, and, of course, the Wise Prophet - Nathan. Otherwise known as, “the guy who gets one of the sickest lines in the whole Bible.” 

Nathan is the one who sees what David has been up to and finds a way to confront him. You can’t overstate how courageous this was: David is a man who clearly has questionable morals, having just murdered one of his generals to cover up his own lascivious behavior. To approach him and condemn him directly? Surely Nathan was worried about possible consequences for this decision. Surely he knew he was putting his own life at risk. 

But Nathan not only finds a way to courageously approach the King - he gives a masterclass in effective confrontation, sliding into it through a slide door by way of a story. He says to the king, “Once upon a time, there were two men who lived in the same city. One was rich and the other poor. The rich man had everything he needed and more - so many flocks and herds he lost count of how many he owned. But the poor man just had one little lamb. And he loved that one lamb dearly. He raised the lamb from birth, named her, fed her his own food, cuddled her daily, and even let her drink from his own cup. The lamb was like a daughter to him. One day, a visitor arrived and the rich man needed to prepare a meal. He didn’t want to use one of his own sheep, so he went to the poor man’s house, took his one ewe lamb, slaughtered it, and served it to his guest.” 

Upon hearing this story, the King became incensed. He said to the Prophet Nathan, “What a horrible story! What a horrible man! I swear on God’s name, someone should kill the rich man for his crime!” 

King David can see the fault in this fictional rich man, but doesn’t see the plank in his own eye. He understands what happened in the story to be morally objectionable but has somehow decided the regular rules don’t apply to him. He can’t see himself in it at all. 

Nathan, apparently grown weary of trying to lead a King to water, forces him to drink. He says, “King David, you are this man! God gave you everything you could have ever wanted and more! And if you wanted even more, you could have simply asked God for more and he would have provided! But you weren’t satisfied. You stole Uriah’s wife and then you murdered him in cold blood. What on earth is wrong with you? How can you not see the error of your ways?”

And then, having seen it in the story before he could bear to see it pointed out in himself, David finally gets it. He sees his sin, ever before him. And he confesses it to God, right there in front of the Prophet Nathan. 

But there is no happy ending in this story. As Hermes sings at the beginning of Hadestown, “this is an old tale, a sad tale, a tragedy.” Because the punishment for King David’s sin is levied on his unborn child, who is cursed to die. 

This story is one of those in the Bible that convinces me humans wrote down these stories and that their interpretations of how God works were sometimes….off. I can’t imagine worshiping a God who would kill an innocent baby over his father’s sins. My word. So I choose to believe the Bible is a story written by humans trying to understand God, themselves, and the relationship between them. Sometimes they got it right. Sometimes they got it wrong. 

And what of Bathsheba in all of this? Devoted wife, sex object, widow, grieving mother. This whole tale revolves around her but in this episode we only hear her voice one time, when she writes to the King to say, “I am pregnant.” We aren’t told how she feels about being the object of the King’s desire. What we do know is that she wasn’t given any choice in the matter. Women weren’t allowed to say no to powerful men, especially God-ordained rulers. 

When I teach about human sexuality, I encourage people of all genders to look for “enthusiastic consent” in their desired partner. Enthusiastic consent can only really exist when a person has the ability to say yes or say no. If you’re not given any choice at all, consent becomes a moot point, doesn’t it? 

Although we don’t know as much about Bathsheba as we would prefer, the fact that her name is mentioned at all means that those who preserved these stories believed she was very important. After all, as the Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney points out, only 9% of the people named in the Hebrew Scriptures are women. [2] Her story matters, even as it is incomplete. 

Why does Bathsheba’s story matter? Why do we have her name? Well, the artists may have loved her because they could paint her naked, but the authors of the Biblical text saw her differently. She ends up playing a pivotal role in the story of Israel. The second child she has with David is named Solomon. Perhaps you’ve heard of him? 

And if you’d like to hear Bathsheba’s voice, I encourage you to read the first two chapters of 1st Kings. There, she deftly maneuvers for political power and secures the kingship for Solomon. As the Queen Mother she had unfettered access to the halls of power in ancient Israel. 

And her name is not forgotten. She is one of the four women who makes it into the genealogy of Jesus Christ at the beginning of the Gospel of Matthew. Though she is not named (that would have been nice), she IS right there, “David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah”  - that’s her. Interesting to note that the author of Matthew saw her still as very much Uriah’s wife, not David’s. 

Regardless of whose wife she was and how she was used: Bathsheba is still there. Still standing. Still important. The story of Jesus doesn’t happen without her. 

So perhaps when we speak of her, we can remember her as more than a sex object, more than the wife of whoever. Maybe when we hear a cover of that great Cohen song, we can take a moment and remember she wasn’t even bathing on the roof. Maybe when we see her image hanging on the fall of an art museum we can ask her if she’s cold, stripped naked for the world to see. Maybe we could even offer her the finest clothes. Clothes fit for an Empress. Not the invisible kind - the real kind. Whatever she wants, whether that’s a gorgeous ball gown or the comfiest sweatpants. 

Maybe we can remember her story and tell it to others. In doing so, we keep her memory alive. And we honor not only Bathsheba but every vulnerable and strong person who has ever seen themselves in her story. 

May it be so. 

NOTES:

[1] See 2 Samuel 8.

[2]  http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=2535