2 Samuel 11:1-15
Proper 12 (17) - Year B
We can all see David's betrayal of his army by staying home and breaking the adultery commandment. No higher purpose is here to oppose his desires.
It is not so easy to see Uriah's betrayal of his commander-in-chief. He gets a pass because of his dedication to his army buddies, as though one faithfulness outweighs one betrayal. Presuming loyalty to his king is at least as important as loyalty to his troops, why not go home to a spouse?
Bathsheba has often been exonerated as an innocent and as powerless. A question is -- how conniving she is here. Consider the end of David's life and, coming in on Abishag warming David, she proceeds to further a plot to have Solomon, her son, ascend to the throne. Does that end require this beginning? Does this remind you of Rebekah and Jacob and the various betrayals there?
Perhaps the trickiest question has to do with your betrayal and mine. We wrap them in such wonderful justification of loyalty to some higher good and to further our favorites that we seem to be no better than our ancestors.
Can we apply to ourselves the same high standard we expect of others? This is tough stuff, being conscious about our own lives as we are conscious of the lives of others. This is part of our work of progressing in our own lives as well as doing what we can to assist the society around us to progress.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2003/july2003.html
Bathsheba and Jesus were both faced with being taken by force. Their circumstances and options were different. Male and Female, Subject and Master, are significant variations.
Both Bathsheba and Jesus were strengthened that they could live through their respective situations.
Bathsheba acquiesced to force; Jesus withdrew from it. There probably isn't one right response to a test.
Of interest is the use of intermediaries by David and Jesus. There were those who responded to inquiries about Bathsheba and Uriah carrying his own death warrant to Joab, who undertook it. There was Philip who didn't play along, Andrew who did, and the disciples who facilitated a feast.
Questions of how we respond to force come at us every day. Likewise, choices of how we are going to respond to requests from authorities. So, how's today for you? Whose intermediary have you been so far and whose do you anticipate being later today?
- - -
evil requires
accessories
before and after
the factunder this spreading net
a village smithy stands
strong of arm
stronger of heartrooted elsewhere
bringing solidarity of port
to those adrift
on the seaan adult
remembering their child
rich in fish and bread
richer in sharing
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_07_01_archive.html
Want to make a difference? Popular opinion says, be a leader. The more leader you are, a leader of leaders, a king, the more difference you can make.
Trouble is that this runs contrary to a reality that we are in life together. As the old nursery rhyme or proverb has it, for want of a nail a kingdom was lost.
With no balance, kings get themselves into all manner of difficulty. If their difficulty is not on the battlefied it is within their desires as deep as biologic urges. In our day we are not dealing with political kings, but economic kings. Yes there is a direct relationship between politics and economics, but the question of accountability is different. Ultimately political kings need a modicum of attention given to the well-being of the populace. Economic kings don’t have people as their arbiter, but profit. Needed work can be shifted from populace to populace with no care for any populace at all.
We can tsk-tsk all we want about David and sex, but if we miss conspiratorial murder we have revealed ourselves as questionless careerists or privatized kings.
This is what Jesus might well have been afraid of with the beginning of a Draft Jesus for King campaign. We wouldn’t just have later innuendo about Mary Magdaline and institutionalized male descendants, but Jesus would be zapping Syro-Phoenicians, Romans, and Pharisees with nary a second thought. Jesus knew Samuel even better than David’s first-hand experience.
Looking beyond the immediate text we might wonder about Nathan being a night’s sleep off of challenging David’s plan for a Temple and showing up late regarding Bathsheba. Where are Jiminy Cricket or Nathan when you are facing your temptation. Community hasn’t yet designed any mechanisms for aiding folks in their lonesome valley of temptation (whether rather mundane or murderous), so what have you learned about walking that valley by yourself?
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2012/07/2-samuel-111-15.html