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David and Batsheba ( 77 Minutes )

by Rabbi Dr. Nathan Lopes-Cardozo || d [mp3 download]

An Oral Essay on what happened between David and Batsheva

04:04 If there is any story ... that needs that kind of interpretation (of the Oral tradition) it is no doubt this story of David and Batsheba - a very difficult story

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00:32 ... They even managed to get some movies going for them in Hollywood - King David and his wife Batsheba

01:15 Very few people ... really have an insight into what actually went on between these two personalities

02:30 It may very well be ... that the references of values is in the Bible are very different from the ones we use today ... and as we all know on top of that it is accompanied with an Oral Tradition

03:19 Very often we can say that the Bible is something like short cliff notes of the much more complex situation.

04:04 If there is any story ... that needs that kind of interpretation (of the Oral tradition) it is no doubt this story of David and Batsheba - a very difficult story

05:15 Let me first tell the story ... so that we all know what we are speaking about. Time of war ... Israeli Army is fighting its way .... King David is in Jerusalem. One evening he's walking on the roof of his palace. When he looks into the garden of his neighbor he sees there a most beautiful woman ... Batsheba is brought to him ... we get totally taken back by one sentence. He happens to have relations with her ... after he sends her home hearing a little later that she is pregnant ...

10:40 Only a little problem - Somebody ... knows about it. First of all - G-d ... and this G-d happens to inform one of His best friends ... Natan Hanavi (the prophet)

11:05 Natan one day walks in to King David and says to King David "I want to ask you a question. We have a problem"

12:03 And then David understands and everything falls apart and he tries to repent, the baby gets born, but the baby dies and it's clear that it's because of punishment ... Batsheba stays the wife of King David ... the second child born out of this relationship was nobody else but King Solomon

13:34 After having read that story, is anybody of us still prepared to say any of the Psalms of David?

14:23 We speak about him (King David) that he was a great tzaddik - a righteous man ... the Bible goes out of its way to praise this King David

17:31 How then can the Talmud say in the end that David was never really guilty of anything which was said here? ... "Anybody who says that David sinned in that particular relationship with Batsheba ... makes a mistake"

18:32 The Rabbis question each other ... How can you say something like that? ... "If really David did anything like that ... the divine providence would never have been with him"

19:50 If you read that particular story more carefully you will see that something different actually happened

20:02 What are you doing with the statement that ... Natan said to King David "Why did you despise the word of G-d to do bad?"

21:03 It doesn't say "and he did bad" ... "you were going to do something evil" ... he never did it

22:01 Natan said to David ... "You killed this Uri Hachiti" the husband of this woman called Batsheba. ...The truth is that the reason why Uri Hachitti was killed by King David has nothing to do with the incident with Batsheba, but that he was already liable for the death penalty... Very difficult

23:15 Says the Talmud "I can't accept this ... Natan also said ... 'you took his wife to become your wife'" ... Says the Talmud ... That means that "she officially became your wife"

24:14 How? ... Whenever soldiers would go into the army ... they used to write a ... bill of divorce for their women ... a woman ... married to one man can marry another man under two conditions or he died and there is evidence he is dead or that she receives from him a bill of divorce in accordance to Jewish law

26:14 Our famous commentator Rashi said that it is a "get al tnai" (conditional bill of divorce)

27:07 We have made use of this particular condition even in Israeli war ... I even know in my own family

28:08 Therefore there is no adultery involved (due to this bill of divorce)

29:57 If that is true why then is it that David sends her home again?

31:01 Why was this man Uri Hachitti liable for the death penalty? ... He was rebellious against the kingdom of David ... if a person objects against who G-d wants as king he could very may well be liable of the death penalty

32:06 The Talmud says "A fantastic proof" (of Uri's rebelliousness) - when Uri Hachitti is called out of the army by King David for the first time ... What's the proof?

34:17 I'm only going to make it worse now ... "Learn things from it" they say (in the Talmud) ..."never ask for a trial in your life ... because King David once asked for a trial ... and he fell right through"

35:16 What was the trial he asked for? ... "I have an interesting comment to make,"said G-d, "I never put My name together with people who have had no trials " ...Said King David "Then I have a little request ... Try me and examine me" ... Says G-d ... "I will tell you in what I will try you ... with sexual immorality."... That (the impregnation) says the Talmud happens a few hours after G-d happens to tell him that he should be warned.

38:48 Would that ... happen to me? (joke) (If)G-d says to me at six o'clock in the evening "You better be a warned person" Well, I would at least wait forty-eight hours

39:26 If we're already on the way of making things worse, one more dimension to it King David ... writes one of his famous psalms ... just after the incident ... to express his real feelings of repentance ... "To you G-d alone I have sinned ... " (psalms 51) ... Have you ever heard about greater Chutzpah?

43:50 The Talmud ... says like "King David would never have done something wrong like this ... if not or the fact that he had to learn how to repent

45:01 Says the Talmud " what are Tzaddikim (righteous people) doing on Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur?" ... There is no man in this world that does not make transgressions.

45:45 Sometimes a Tzaddik (righteous person) is involved in a transgression that is a very small "black spot" ... that he may very well not know about it ... he can't do tshuva (repentance) (if he does not know what his problem is )

47:58 That was the problem of King David he had to step backward

48:21 What was that black spot? ... When King David said to G-d "Why (do) we say ... 'the G-d of Avraham, the G-d of Issac, the G-d of Jacob' ... and not the G-d of a man named David"(refer to request for trial) ... They say that David was somehow a proud man.

52:05 Indeed when David says ... "I indeed done wrong in Your eyes ... 'I was wrong'" ...

52:26 Can G-d make people to go and violate one of the commandments of the Torah ... to teach them a lesson? ... G-d has to manipulate the situation where from one perspective there is something basically going wrong to teach the person a lesson and another point of view that the laws of the Torah ... are not transgressed.

54:49 What are we going to do about the whole story afterwards that he tells Uri Hachitti to stay with his wife? ... King David knew that ... Uri Hachitti was a rouser ... and Batsheba refused to live any longer with him .... Batsheba was a woman very much in favor of the kingdom of David

57:03 (King David said to his people) "I will prove to you that I am right... I will call this Uri Hachitti out of the army and I will tell him to go home to his wife and ... he will not go because he is finally finished with her"

58:09 We obviously have to ask the question what Natan the prophet was doing over here ... Who was Uri Hachitti? ... Yoav (head of the army) ... wants to take over the kingdom of King David ... the architect of the whole rebellious act is called Uri Hachitti.

01:01:48 I would have said to ... (Sigmund) Freud ... He (Uri) makes an incredible blunder ...

01:03:43 We have again a problem - why then does Yoav help King David to get rid of Uri Hachitti? ... The moment that Yoav gets more into power, Uri Hachitti has second thoughts "Wait a moment! I'm the brain behind this ... I can replace King David." ... Yoav senses this ...

01:05:16 Now the question obviously is ... what is Natan doing at the end of the story? Natan should have walked in and given David a "Mazal Tov" ... Let's look once more into the ... story that King David hears from Natan the prophet. Natan walks in and he says ... "I have a question" ... There was a rich man and there was a poor man. The poor man had one sheep, the rich man takes the last sheep away. What do we do about the man? Says King David "Liable of death penalty" ... Why? ... Because a king can punish a person beyond the requirement of the Torah law.

01:07:30 Why didn't he (Natan) tell a story straight out about adultery?

01:07:55 Natan had to make up a story where in according to the letter of the law the person was not guilty of the liability of the death penalty

01:09:17 If indeed, says the Talmud, King David would have been involved in this kind of adultery ... how was it possible that afterward he could stay married with a woman named Batsheba? ... A man is completely prohibited to have anything to do with this woman after his relations with her ( in a forbidden way )

01:10:15 While King David tells his messengers to bring Batsheba ... Batsheba does not object.

01:11:05 "And she was purified from her impurity" ... she had immersed herself in the mikva (ritual bath) ... Would that make sense if at the same time... adultery involved?

01:13:37 That is where King David fails ... did not live up to the (moral) standards

01:14:04 The Talmud answers"Anybody who says David made a mistake in the case of Batsheba ... doesn't know what he is speaking about," because you are using your own standards

01:15:40 There is a very good reason why we continue to say the psalms of King David ... The great praises ... for his G-d he admired ... but he was a human being and was capable on his own level of making a mistake. This shows the greatness of the Jewish people of many of thousands of years ago.

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