The Gospel According to Nathan
David, Bathsheba, Uriah & Nathan
During the Ammonite war David, having fathered an illegitimate child, tried to cover his sin by involving the woman’s husband, Uriah (2 Sm 11:1–13; 23:39). When this attempt failed, Joab, the general of the army, successfully engineered Uriah’s death, whereupon David took Bathsheba openly as his wife (11:14–27). Nathan confronted the king, courageously exposing the enormity of David’s crime by a parable which provoked the king’s righteous anger and turned the finger of condemnation upon David himself (12:1–9). Nathan foretold the fearful consequences for David’s family resulting from his sin and evil example (12:10–12), a prophecy fulfilled in rape, the deaths of three of David’s sons, and civil war (2 Sm 13–18; 1 Kgs 1). Bathsheba’s child also would not live (2 Sm 12:14).
When David was near death, one of his sons, Adonijah, seized power (1 Kgs 1:1, 10). Nathan prompted Bathsheba to remind David of an earlier promise concerning Solomon’s succession, supporting her by his own timely intervention (1:10–27). David immediately authorized Solomon’s coronation (1:28–53).
3. Nathan Confronts King David
Nathan’s daring reprimand of King David is omitted by the Chronicler, but it features prominently in the Deuteronomistic History (2 Sam 12:1–14). Nathan is portrayed as diplomatic but forthright, courteous but uncompromising. His stand against David’s unacceptable behavior ranks him among that fearless band of OT prophets, such as Elijah and Amos, who condemned injustice wherever they saw it. The incident also shows the limitations of the Israelite monarch, who was not above the law. Although, as J. Baldwin points out, Nathan “is one of David’s subjects,” he also is God’s mouthpiece and David’s judge (Baldwin, 239). David’s confession is recognition of his guilt, but at the same time it is an acknowledgment of the authority and standing of Nathan as the prophet of Yahweh.
J. Lindblom draws attention to the striking resemblance between this story and that in 1 Kings 20:35–43, where a prophet deliberately sustains a wound so that he can convincingly play the role of someone who has failed in his duty. Having gained the king’s attention, he pronounces Yahweh’s guilty verdict on the royal policy. The difference, as Lindblom (53) points out, is that the unknown prophet in Kings employs an enacted parable, whereas Nathan uses a pure parable.
After the death of Bathsheba’s first child, as Nathan predicted, Nathan fulfills a supportive and pastoral role by delivering a message of reassurance to David, that in spite of all that had happened, Bathsheba’s and David’s son Solomon would be known as Jedidiah, which means “loved of the Lord” (2 Sam 12:25). This story shows that Nathan was more than a royal adviser. On the one hand, he was the king’s employee, but on the other hand, he represented divine authority and announced both criticism and encouragement in the name of Yahweh.
Context
The psalmist’s appeal to God for forgiveness of his sins is one of the most memorable in the book, due, perhaps in part, to the historical title (see Introduction) that situates its composition by David after Nathan the prophet confronted him about his sin with Bathsheba (2 Sam. 12). While the words of this prayer fit that occasion well, we should note that nowhere is this particular historical event mentioned specifically, indicating that the poem was written not to memorialize that moment, but to serve as a model prayer for others coming later who find themselves in similar, though not identical, circumstances.
The psalm is a lament, defined as a prayer uttered when one’s life is in turmoil. More specifically, the psalmist realizes that his disoriented life is a result of his own sin, and thus he asks God to forgive him and restore his relationship, based on his repentance. As such, in the history of interpretation, this psalm and those like it (besides Ps. 51, they include Pss 6; 32; 38; 102; 130; 143) are known as penitential psalms.
That said, the psalm takes an interesting turn in the last two verses (vv. 18–19). Rather than an individual asking for the restoration of his relationship with God, the psalmist asks for the restoration of the community. Two possible explanations may be given for this turn. The first recognizes that the original individual, the composer, is the king (David), and that his own situation is bound up with that of the community. The more likely explanation is that these verses were added later in Israel’s history, perhaps specifically in the post-exilic period (see commentary below).
For the title, see the Introduction.
Comment
51:1–2. Have mercy on me
The psalmist starts by appealing to God for help. The NIV represents the chiastic structure (A B B′ A′) of the first verse. The first and last cola (A and A′) make the appeal, while the middle cola (B and B′) state the basis on which the appeal is made. The psalmist begins by asking God to adopt a merciful attitude towards him, and he ends the verse by requesting a specific action emanating from that attitude, that is, to blot out his transgression. Although the title would identify that transgression as David’s adultery with Bathsheba, the psalm does not specify, because this psalm is a template for others to use David’s prayer as their own. The psalmist grounds the appeal not in anything that he has done, but rather in the character of God, who exhibits unfailing love (ḥesed, a word that could also be translated ‘loyalty’) and great compassion. Both of these characteristics are grounded in the covenant that God made with Israel and are cited in God’s great statement of self-definition found in Exodus 34:6 and elsewhere. Verse 2 continues the appeal for God to remove the psalmist’s transgression, this time using the metaphor of washing. Sin has made him dirty, and he wants to be clean.
51:3–6. I am a sinner
The following verses express the motivation (signalled by for [kî]) for his appeal, which of course is his sin. He is aware of his sin and acknowledges it, a prerequisite for restoration. Interestingly, he states that his sin is exclusively against God. This statement raises questions about the historical title. If the sin in mind is adultery with Bathsheba, the transgression involved others besides God—Bathsheba and certainly Uriah, who died because of David’s attempt to cover up his sin with Bathsheba (2 Sam. 11). Perhaps this statement is to be taken as a hyperbolic recognition that, as horrible as the consequences are to human beings, the most egregious part of sin is the rebellion against God. Again, the psalm, although inspired by the David and Bathsheba event, is not restricted to that event, since it is written for community use, but the principle still stands for all sins. Sin typically has ramifications for the people around us, but the psalmist reminds us that, as bad as that is, the worse offence is against God. In any case, on the basis of his recognition that he has sinned against God, he also affirms the fact that God is correct to offer his judgment. A contrast here can be drawn with Job, who correctly denied that he was properly the recipient of divine judgment.
Verse 5 continues the use of hyperbolic language when the psalmist states that he has been sinful from the beginning. In a classic A, what’s more, B parallelism, verse 5a states that his sin was manifest even on the day of his birth, but then the B colon takes it back to the moment of conception. Thus, the psalmist owns the fact that he is a sinner. It would be wrong, however, to use this hyperbolic poetic verse as a proof-text for the doctrine of original sin. Verse 6 points out that he had the responsibility and the resources to resist sin, in that God required faithfulness and had also taught him wisdom from the beginning.
51:7–9. Cleanse me
The psalmist reiterates his request to be cleansed of his sin, beginning with the idea that he be cleansed with hyssop. Hyssop is a general term for a type of partially woody plant. The background to this reference is its use in the Pentateuch in rituals that remove ceremonial and moral sin, including the ritual of the red heifer (Num. 19:6, 18) and rituals that deal with impurity caused by skin disease and mildew (Lev. 14:4, 6, 49, 51, 52). In addition, a branch of hyssop was used to smear blood on the top and sides of the doorframes of the Israelites, in anticipation of the coming of the angel of death on the eve of the Passover. In these passages, we can see the connection between hyssop and the purgation of sin. Verse 7b capitalizes on the bright white snow to indicate just how clean God can render the sinner if he so chooses. Verse 9 also appeals to God to remove, or at least not pay attention to (hide your face from), his sins. The result would be utter joy. The reference to his crushed bones (v. 8b) reveals that he has experienced painful consequences for his transgression.
51:1, 2. Appeal
The opening plea, have mercy, is the language of one who has no claim to the favour he begs. But steadfast love is a covenant word. For all his unworthiness, David knows that he still belongs; cf. the paradox of the prodigal’s words, ‘Father … I am no more worthy to be called thy son.’ Coming closer still, he appeals to God’s tender warmth, in the second word for mercy, an emotional term, used in, e.g., Genesis 43:30 when Joseph’s ‘heart’, or inmost being, yearned for his brother. It is akin to the New Testament’s visceral word for being ‘moved with compassion’.
1b, 2. But there is more to forgiveness than a tender spirit. The accusing record of the sin remains, and the pollution clings. The plea, blot out, means ‘wipe away’, like the writing from a book (cf. Exod. 32:32; Num. 5:23). Only the gospel could reveal at what cost ‘the bond which stood against us’ could be blotted out (cf. Col. 2:14). The companion metaphor, wash me thoroughly, uses a verb normally connected with the laundering of clothes, as if David is comparing himself to a foul garment needing to be washed and washed. The thought is still primarily of the guilt that makes him unfit for God’s presence or God’s people (cf. the potent object-lessons in Lev. 15). He will dwell on the more inward aspect of cleansing in verses 6–12.
51:3–5. Confession
In a new image, his sin looms up as an accusing presence: cf. NEB ‘my sins confront me all the day long’. But this is not all.
4. His sin was treason. To say ‘Against thee, thee only, have I sinned’ may invite the quibble that adultery and murder are hardly private wrongs. But it is a typically biblical way of going to the heart of the matter. Sin can be against oneself (1 Cor. 6:18) and against one’s neighbour; but the flouting of God is always the length and breadth of it, as Joseph saw long before (Gen. 39:9). Our bodies are not our own; and our neighbours are made in God’s image. Notice the immense contrast here to the self-absorbed outlook of 2 Samuel, where David’s only question was, in effect, ‘How do I cover my tracks?’ Now it is, ‘How could I treat God so?’
His complete acceptance of God’s verdict (4b) is matched in the New Testament by the penitent thief (Luke 23:41), and quoted in Romans 3:4 in its LXX form (‘when thou art judged’). In that form it makes the point with maximum force, but it is still the same point as in the Hebrew here (i.e. as in RSV, etc.): that no-one could find fault—even if it were our place to do so—with God’s judgment on the sinner.
5. The new perspective on his sin, as self-assertion against God, opens up a new self-knowledge. This crime, David now sees, was no freak event: it was in character; an extreme expression of the warped creature he had always been, and of the faulty stock he sprang from. Similarly Isaiah saw his people’s corruption as well, when he caught sight of his own (Isa. 6:5). David is, of course, not speaking against his mother in particular, nor against the process of conception. Nor is he excusing himself. It is the climax of the facts that he is facing: that his sins are his own (the fivefold my in verses 1–3), and inexcusable (4); worst of all, they are the very element he lives in (5).
51:6–9. Restoration
This crescendo begins at an ominous point, at the gulf between what God desires24 (6a) and what David has just confessed. But God’s wishes are intentions: desiring truth he will teach … wisdom, not deplore its absence. A series of futures, not imperatives, begins with 6b (Heb. 8b; lit. ‘thou shalt teach me …’), to the end of 8. Coverdale’s version, in the Prayer Book, is almost alone in reproducing them as the affirmations which they are.
7. Thou shalt purge me with hyssop alludes to the cleansing of the leper, sprinkled seven times with the sacrificial blood into which the bunch of hyssop was dipped as a sprinkler (Lev. 14:6f.); or it may refer to the ritual for cleansing those who had come into contact with a dead body (Num. 19:16–19). In either case it ended with the forthright pronouncement, ‘and he shall be clean’—a promise which David takes up in the first person. He also knows from that context the special word for purge, to which the nearest equivalent would be ‘de-sin’ (Lev. 14:49; Num. 19:19), and he pictures the final sequence in the ritual, the washing of clothes and body. But the descriptive touch, whiter than snow, is all his own: a flash of realization that with God there are no half-measures. Cf. Isaiah 1:18.
8. There is no need to substitute Fill me (RSV; cf. JB) for the Hebrew text ‘Thou shalt make me hear …’, by which David seems to picture the outcast’s return into society, greeted by the sounds of welcome and festivity. For the climax, NEB rightly takes the basic meaning of the verb rejoice (gîl): ‘let the bones dance which thou hast broken.’ Once again, he looks for no half-hearted help.
9. This verse, with its echo of verse 1, completes the first part of the psalm, in which the emphasis has been mostly on guilt and its cleansing. Now the centre of gravity will move to salvation.