The Meaning of 2 Samuel 11:26 Explained

2 Samuel 11:26

KJV: And when the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned for her husband.

YLT: And the wife of Uriah heareth that Uriah her husband is dead, and lamenteth for her lord;

Darby: And the wife of Urijah heard that Urijah her husband was dead, and she mourned for her husband.

ASV: And when the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she made lamentation for her husband.

Discover 2 Samuel 11:26

CONTEXT: What is the Context of 2 Samuel 11:26?

MEANING: What does 2 Samuel 11:26 Mean?

WORDS: What do the individual words in 2 Samuel 11:26 mean?

RELATIONS: What do the major concepts mean in 2 Samuel 11:26?

KJV Reverse Interlinear

And when the wife  of Uriah  heard  that Uriah  her husband  was dead,  she mourned  for her husband. 

What does 2 Samuel 11:26 Mean?

Verse Meaning

At first, David piously tried to salve Joab"s conscience for his complicity in Uriah"s death ( 2 Samuel 11:25). The Hebrew word translated "displease" literally means "be evil in your sight." David was calling what was sin something other than sin (cf. 1 John 1:9). What David had done was not only evil in Joab"s eyes, but, of infinitely greater importance, it was evil in God"s eyes. David further hardened his heart and covered up his sin by marrying Bathsheba ( 2 Samuel 11:27).
"The Hebrew phrase translated "had her brought [1]" ( 2 Samuel 11:27) is literally "sent and collected her" and emphasizes the abuse of royal power that David is increasingly willing to exercise..." [2]
The same phrase appears in 1 Samuel 14:52 where it describes Saul"s method of recruiting soldiers.
"How could a Prayer of Manasseh -a man after God"s own heart-fall to such a level? If you are honest about your own heart, it"s not hard to understand." [3]
Here are some suggestions for guarding oneself against similar sexual sin. First, realize that there is nothing that will guarantee you immunity from sinning in this way. We face the choice to yield to sexual temptation over and over again, and overcoming it once or many times is no guarantee that we will always overcome it (cf. 1 Corinthians 10:12). Second, cultivate your daily commitment to the Lord. We cannot afford to live one day out of fellowship with Him. We can strengthen our hearts against temptation that may assail us during the day by recommitting ourselves to pleasing Him and obeying Him daily in prayer before we encounter the temptations of that day (cf. Romans 6:12-13). Third, cultivate intimacy with your spouse, if you are married. Covetousness is less of a problem, though it will always be a problem, if you are content with the person whom God has given you. Contentment is something that we learn (cf. Philippians 4:11). Fourth, cultivate accountability with your mate, if you are married. Voluntarily tell your spouse where you have been, what you have been doing, and who you have been with. Do not wait for your mate to ask you these questions, but volunteer this information. If you do this regularly and know that you are going to have to do it, because you have made a commitment to yourself to do it, it will affect what you do. Fifth, anticipate temptation and avoid it. If you know that a particular individual attracts you strongly, do not spend too much time with him or her. Furthermore, refrain from saying anything to such a person that you would not say if your spouse, or that person"s spouse, were standing there with you.
About one year passed between the events of chapter11and those of chapter12. This seems clear from the fact that God struck David and Bathsheba"s child shortly after Nathan confronted David with his sin ( 2 Samuel 12:15). God graciously gave David months to confess his sin, but when he did not, the Lord sent Nathan to confront him. These must have been months of inner turmoil for David (cf. Psalm 32:3-4).
"David wasn"t relaxing and taking life easy, sipping lemonade on his patio, during the aftermath of his adultery. Count on it ... he had sleepless nights. He could see his sin written across the ceiling of his room as he tossed and turned in bed. He saw it written across the walls. He saw it on the plate where he tried to choke down his meals. He saw it on the faces of his counselors. He was a miserable husband, an irritable father, a poor leader, and a songless composer. He lived a lie but he couldn"t escape the truth.
"He had no joy. ("Restore to me the joy of Thy salvation" Psalm 51:12.) He was unstable. He felt inferior and insecure. ("Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me" Psalm 51:10.) Sin does that to you. It"s part of the wages that sin inevitably demands. A carnal Christian will dance all around and try to tell you, "Everything"s fine. Don"t press me. I"m really free ... really having fun ... I"m doing well. You just haven"t any idea." But down inside it"s there. Everything is empty, hollow, joyless, pointless. A true Christian cannot deny that. True guilt is there. Oppressively there. Constantly there." [4]
Finally the Lord sent His prophet to confront the king. This required considerable courage on Nathan"s part since David could have hardened his heart and had the prophet executed, as he had executed Uriah.
"In confronting someone in his sin, the timing is as important as the wording. Simply to tighten your belt, grab your Bible and, at your convenience, confront a person who is in sin is unwise. Most importantly, you need to be sure that you"re sent by God. Nathan was." [5]
Nathan"s parable (cf. 2 Samuel 14:1-20; 1 Kings 20:35-42; Isaiah 5:1-7; Jeremiah 3:1-5) appealed to David"s compassion as a shepherd and drew an emotional response from the king ( 2 Samuel 12:5). [6] Just like the man in the parable, David deserved to die, but David deserved to die for adultery ( Leviticus 20:10) and murder ( Leviticus 24:17). Hypocritically David ordered the man in Nathan"s story to make restitution, appealing to the Mosaic Law ( Exodus 22:1) that he himself had disregarded. The man in the parable was not under a death sentence according to the Mosaic Law. [7] David was reacting emotionally. He seems to have been trying to get rid of his own guilty conscience by condemning someone else while subconsciously passing judgment on himself. [8] It is interesting that four of David"s sons died, perhaps as a divine fulfillment of the fourfold restitution that David ordered. They were David"s first child by Bathsheba ( Acts 11:18), Amnon ( 2 Samuel 13:28-29), Absalom ( 2 Samuel 18:14-15), and Adonijah ( 1 Kings 2:23-25). [9]
"You are the man!" ( 2 Samuel 12:7) is certainly one of the most dramatic sentences in the Bible. Since several months had passed since David had committed his gross sins, they were probably not in the forefront of his thinking when Nathan entered his presence and told his story. We see a prophet exercising authority over a king here. This was always the case in Israel"s monarchy, as we shall see repeatedly in the Books of Kings. [9]8 David had abused the great blessings that God had given him. Notice that the Lord said that He had done five great things for David ( 2 Samuel 12:8), but David had done four sinful things in spite of God"s goodness ( 2 Samuel 12:9). He had despised God by disobeying His Word as though he were superior to it. David had seen what had happened to Saul for rejecting God"s word.
David"s punishment would be twofold (cf. Galatians 6:7): his own fertility (children) would be the source of his discipline, and God would remove the sources of his fertility (children) from him ( 2 Samuel 12:11). The executions of these sentences follow in the text ( 2 Samuel 13:11-14; 2 Samuel 13:38-39; 2 Samuel 16:22; 2 Samuel 18:15). Acts 11:9-10 of the twelfth chapter have been called "the literary, historical, and theological crux and center of2Samuel as a whole." [11] Compare David"s earlier curse of Joab"s house in 2 Samuel 3:29 where "never" also is in view.
"As David "took" Uriah"s wife ( 2 Samuel 11:9-10), so the Lord will "take" David"s wives ( 2 Samuel 11:11). As the Lord "gave" Saul"s property and Israel"s kingdom to David ( 2 Samuel 11:8), so he says that he will now "give" David"s wives to someone else, to "one who is close to you" ( 2 Samuel 11:11)-ironically, an expression earlier used of David himself in similar circumstances (see 1 Samuel 15:28; 1 Samuel 28:17 ...)." [12]
"Just as David willfully takes Bathsheba for himself ( 2 Samuel 11:2-4), so Amnon forces Tamar ( 2 Samuel 13:8-14), Absalom enters the royal harem ( 2 Samuel 16:22), and Adonijah tries to claim his deceased father"s concubine ( 1 Kings 2:13-17)." [13]
"We need to remember that, like many sins, David"s were carried out secretly-at least for a while [14]. One of the things that accompanies the promotion of individuals to higher positions of authority is an increase in privacy. This closed-door policy maintained by those in high office brings great temptation for things to be done in secret. Unaccountability is common among those in command. So it was with David." [4]
Psalm 32:3-4 probably records David"s misery during the time between his sinning and his confessing. This Psalm , and especially Psalm 51 , gives further insight into David"s feelings when he confessed his sins. God spared David"s life by pure grace; normally David would have died for his sins ( Leviticus 20:10; Leviticus 24:17). His pardon came as a special revelation from God through Nathan ( 2 Samuel 12:13). David"s confession was genuine. He called his sin what it was rather than trying to cover it up or explain it away, which was Saul"s typical response. Moreover he acknowledged that his sin was primarily against Yahweh, not just against Bathsheba and Uriah.
"Repentance has its reward (cf. 1 Samuel 7:3)." [16]
"This was the turning-point in the life of David, and the clearest indication that he was different from Saul in the most essential relationship of all, that of submission to the Lord God. For that reason he found forgiveness, whereas Saul never accepted his guilt or the rejection that followed from it." [17]
Whereas the Lord removed the guilt of David"s sin (forgiveness) he did not remove the consequences of it (discipline). Someone observed that after you hammer a nail in a board you may remove the nail, but the hole remains.
"Just as judges today sometimes commute a sentence, so too God has the right and the power to modify or even cancel his own decisions in the light of the human response. In this case David"s immediate signs of remorse allowed immediate forgiveness; but the deed itself could not be undone, and some consequences were inevitable." [18]
"David"s voyeurism in 2 Samuel 11:2 and Nathan"s curse in 2 Samuel 12:11 foreshadow Absalom"s rooftop orgy ( 2 Samuel 16:20-22)." [16]
This is how God deals with sin normally. He removes the guilt that would result in damnation, but He usually allows at least some of the consequences to follow and uses these for discipline and instruction. God"s punishment fit David"s crimes (cf. Galatians 6:7). In David"s case the infant he fathered died.
"God could not ignore David"s sin and thus let unbelievers impugn the holiness of His character." [3]6
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Context Summary

2 Samuel 11:14-27 - Adding Blood-Guiltiness To Adultery
Joab must have smiled grimly to himself when he received his master's letter. "This king of ours can sing psalms with the best, but I have to do his dirty work. He wants to rid himself of Uriah-I wonder why? Well, I'll help him to it. At any rate, he will not be able to talk to me about Abner!" 2 Samuel 3:27. It is an awful thing when the servants of God give the enemy such occasion to blaspheme.
Uriah was set in the battle-line and left to die. The king was duly notified and, on hearing the news, must have given a sigh of relief. The child could be born under cover of lawful wedlock. There was, however, a fatal flaw in the whole arrangement: The thing that David had done displeased the Lord. David and the world would hear of it again. But, oh, the bitter sorrow, that he who had spoken of walking in his house with a perfect heart, who had so great a faculty for divine fellowship, should have fallen into this double sin! The psalmist, king, lover of God-all trampled in the mud by one passionate act of self-indulgence! [source]

Chapter Summary: 2 Samuel 11

1  While Joab besieges Rabbah, David commits adultery with Bathsheba
6  Uriah, sent for by David to cover the adultery, would not go home
14  He carries to Joab the letter of his death
18  Joab sends the news thereof to David
26  David takes Bathsheba as his wife

What do the individual words in 2 Samuel 11:26 mean?

And when heard the wife of Uriah that was dead Uriah her husband and she mourned for her husband
וַתִּשְׁמַע֙ אֵ֣שֶׁת אֽוּרִיָּ֔ה כִּי־ מֵ֖ת אוּרִיָּ֣ה אִישָׁ֑הּ וַתִּסְפֹּ֖ד עַל־ בַּעְלָֽהּ

וַתִּשְׁמַע֙  And  when  heard 
Parse: Conjunctive waw, Verb, Qal, Consecutive imperfect, third person feminine singular
Root: שָׁמַע 
Sense: to hear, listen to, obey.
אֵ֣שֶׁת  the  wife 
Parse: Noun, feminine singular construct
Root: אִשָּׁה  
Sense: woman, wife, female.
אֽוּרִיָּ֔ה  of  Uriah 
Parse: Proper Noun, masculine singular
Root: אוּרִיָּה 
Sense: Hittite husband of Bathsheba.
כִּי־  that 
Parse: Conjunction
Root: כִּי 
Sense: that, for, because, when, as though, as, because that, but, then, certainly, except, surely, since.
מֵ֖ת  was  dead 
Parse: Verb, Qal, Perfect, third person masculine singular
Root: מוּת  
Sense: to die, kill, have one executed.
אוּרִיָּ֣ה  Uriah 
Parse: Proper Noun, masculine singular
Root: אוּרִיָּה 
Sense: Hittite husband of Bathsheba.
אִישָׁ֑הּ  her  husband 
Parse: Noun, masculine singular construct, third person feminine singular
Root: אִישׁ 
Sense: man.
וַתִּסְפֹּ֖ד  and  she  mourned 
Parse: Conjunctive waw, Verb, Qal, Consecutive imperfect, third person feminine singular
Root: סָפַד  
Sense: to wail, lament, mourn.
בַּעְלָֽהּ  her  husband 
Parse: Noun, masculine singular construct, third person feminine singular
Root: בָּעַל 
Sense: owner, husband, lord.

What are the major concepts related to 2 Samuel 11:26?

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Similar Scriptures for 2 Samuel 11:26

Genesis 27:41 [2]
2 Samuel 14:2 [2]
2 Samuel 3:31 [2]