Sunday 11 March 2012

19. Bathsheba - beauty and the bath

The thing about having a completely square house in a hot country is that you can use the flat roof for, say, hiding people on, or for outdoor parties, or even for taking a bath...

...which is what the beautiful Bathsheba is doing when she is spotted by King David in the cool of a spring evening (hey, even her name contains the word bath). He is missing the action - everyone else is away at the wars - including Bathsheba's husband...

I am ashamed to say David feels bored of his other wives...

He takes one more peek and sends for Bathsheba...

Quite shortly afterwards, David succeeds in breaking the 6th, 7th, 9th and 10th Commandments, getting Bathsheba pregnant and having her husband killed.

Is Bathsheba complicit? It is difficult to tell. I think not. Is it rape? Hard to tell. Maybe. Awkward to refuse the King...

However, judgement falls on David, though of course she suffers too. After a hasty marriage, their love child is born and dies. They then have another who becomes the most famous and blessed King of Israel, Solomon....so wise...until foreign wives ruin him...

So for the dubious pleasure of being first mistress, then mother, to a powerful King.

Here's to Bathsheba.

And to the prudence of taking a bath indoors.


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