This is the story of a Canaanite woman who, having married into the line of Christ, took very special steps to preserve the inheritance even though she was widowed and dishonored by the family. This story opens shortly after the sons of Jacob shamefully sold their brother into slavery. In disgust, Judah left the family and went to live elsewhere.
Gen 38:1-5 At that time, Judah left his brothers and went down to stay with a man of Adullam named Hirah. There Judah met the daughter of a Canaanite man named Shua. He married her and lay with her; she became pregnant and gave birth to a son, who was named Er. She conceived again and gave birth to a son and named him Onan. She gave birth to still another son and named him Shelah. It was at Kezib that she gave birth to him.
Judah took a wife from among the gentiles and had 3 sons.
According to the customs of the day, as Judah's sons began to reach maturity he made arrangements for their marriage.
Vs 6-10 Judah got a wife for Er, his firstborn, and her name was Tamar. But Er, Judah’s firstborn, was wicked in the Lord’s sight so the Lord put him to death. Then Judah said to Onan, “Lie with your brother’s wife and fulfill your duty to her as a brother-in-law to produce offspring for your brother.” But Onan knew that the offspring would not be his; so whenever he lay with his brother’s wife, he spilled his semen on the ground to keep from producing offspring for his brother. What he did was wicked in the Lord’s sight; so he put him to death also.
Looking back for a moment, we can note that when Jacob was dying, he named Judah as the son who would receive "the inheritance." However, in so doing he specifically indicated that Judah would only be holding the inheritance “in trust” until the rightful heir appeared to claim it. That heir would be Messiah.
Judah’s oldest son, Er, was next in line to carry the Messiah’s inheritance, but he didn’t seem to appreciate the importance of this so God rejected him from the messianic line by killing him in his wedding tent before he could produce an heir.
Under the principle of the levirate marriage, Judah then sent his second son, Onan, in to Tamar for the purpose of giving her a son to bear Er’s name. Had this been successful, the inheritance still would have been passed down in Er’s name and he would be mentioned in the line of Christ.
However, Onan, knowing the inheritance would pass to Er rather than to himself, tried to deceive the community into believing that it was actually Tamar who was barren by “dropping his seed on the ground.” In this he dishonored his brother by refusing to give to give him an heir…and for this, God killed him as well.
Vs 11-12 Judah then said to his daughter-in-law Tamar, “Live as a widow in your father’s house until my son Shelah grows up.” For he thought, “He may die too, just like his brothers.” So Tamar went to live in her father’s house. After a long time Judah’s wife, the daughter of Shua, died. When Judah had recovered from his grief, he went up to Timnah, to the men who were shearing his sheep, and his friend Hirah the Adullamite went with him.
At this point Shelah was too young to fulfill his levirate responsibility, but that really didn't matter because Judah wasn’t about to risk another son in her tent anyway; so he sent Tamar home to her father, indicating (deceitfully) that he would call her back when Shelah came of age.
By sending her back to her father, Judah disgraced Tamar, effectively giving notice to the community that the family was “divorcing” her.
Years passed (Judah’s wife died) and the family’s intent regarding Tamar was confirmed as she was not invited back when Shelah came of age.
However, Tamar was not so easily put off. When she became a member of the family of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, she learned what she had married into and came to know and understand the value of the inheritance.
Also, when she realized she was being denied access to the surrogate father who would normally give her the seed that would keep the inheritance in the line of her deceased husband, she realized there was another possibility. There was another man who carried the seed of the line.
Now to Judah, who was the other man, to have relations with his daughter-in-law, would be unthinkable. But on the other hand, he was a man and he thought like a man, which made him vulnerable. So when word came to Tamar that Judah would be traveling, she positioned herself to get what she needed.
Vs. 13-24 When Tamar was told, “Your father-in-law is on his way to Timnah to shear his sheep,” she took off her widow’s clothes, covered herself with a veil to disguise herself, and then sat down at the entrance to Enaim, which is on the road to Timnah. For she saw that, though Shelah had now grown up, she had not been given to him as his wife. When Judah saw her, he thought she was a prostitute, for she had covered her face. Not realizing that she was his daughter-in-law, he went over to her by the roadside and said, “Come now, let me sleep with you.” “And what will you give me to sleep with you?” she asked. “I’ll send you a young goat from my flock,” he said. “Will you give me something as a pledge until you send it?” she asked. He said, “What pledge should I give you?” “Your seal and its cord, and the staff in your hand,” she answered. So he gave them to her and slept with her, and she became pregnant by him. After she left, she took off her veil and put on her widow’s clothes again.
Meanwhile Judah sent the young goat by his friend the Adullamite in order to get his pledge back from the woman, but he did not find her. He asked the men who lived there, “Where is the shrine prostitute who was beside the road at Enaim?” “There hasn’t been any shrine prostitute here,” they said. So he went back to Judah and said, “I didn’t find her. Besides, the men who lived there said, ‘There hasn’t been any shrine prostitute here.’ ” Then Judah said, “Let her keep what she has, or we will become a laughingstock. After all, I did send her this young goat, but you didn’t find her.”
About three months later Judah was told, “Your daughter-in-law Tamar is guilty of prostitution, and as a result she is now pregnant.” Judah said, “Bring her out and have her burned to death!”
Note the culture. The family dishonored Tamar by divorcing her…no consequences; but when she seemed to have dishonored the family – even though it was a family that had disowned her – the penalty was death, and a horrible one at that.
Vs. 25-26 As she was being brought out, she sent a message to her father-in-law. “I am pregnant by the man who owns these,” she said. And she added, “See if you recognize whose seal and cord and staff these are.” Judah recognized them and said, “She is more righteous than I, since I wouldn’t give her to my son Shelah.”
Judah recognized her right to the seed and, at least according to his judgment, his crime was worse than hers. Again, it’s interesting to note how this culture worked.
And he did not sleep with her again.
Of course not.
Vs. 27-30 When the time came for her to give birth, there were twin boys in her womb. As she was giving birth, one of them put out his hand; so the midwife took a scarlet thread and tied it on his wrist and said, “This one came out first.” But when he drew back his hand, his brother came out, and she said, “So this is how you have broken out!” And he was named Perez. Then his brother, who had the scarlet thread on his wrist, came out and he was given the name Zerah.
Judah unwittingly participated in Tamar’s plot and she was given a son to carry on the inheritance that would eventually pass to Christ.
Note that the midwife does not always have the say. The midwife tagged Zerah as the firstborn (his name means “rising”). As the firstborn, Zerah would be the heir. Perez was given a name that indicates he broke out ahead of time – let’s say he breached protocol by jumping ahead of his brother. But when Zerah pulled his arm back in, Perez came out first, and Matthew gives us Perez, not either Er or Zerah, as the son of Judah through whom the messianic line passed. That was God’s choice, and Tamar got an honorable mention for her faith in propagating the line of Christ, even though her methods are hard to understand in western culture.
This is the story of how a Canaanite harlot turned woman of faith, beat the “ban” – and how she providentially preserved the line of Christ by the expression of her faith, apparently just by respecting the God of Israel without realizing the full impact of what she was doing.
Josh. 2:1-7 Then Joshua, the son of Nun, secretly sent two spies from Shittim. “Go, look over the land,” he said, “especially Jericho.” So they went and entered the house of a prostitute named Rahab and stayed there.
The king of Jericho was told, “Look! Some of the Israelites have come here tonight to spy out the land.” So the king of Jericho sent this message to Rahab: “Bring out the men who came to you and entered your house, because they have come to spy out the whole land.”
But the woman had taken the two men and hidden them. She said, “Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they had come from. At dusk, when it was time to close the city gate, the men left. I don’t know which way they went. Go after them quickly. You may catch up with them.” (But she had taken them up to the roof and hidden them under the stalks of flax she had laid out on the roof.) So the men set out in pursuit of the spies on the road that leads to the fords of the Jordan, and as soon as the pursuers had gone out, the gate was shut.
At this point in the story, Rahab was really just trying to save her own life and the lives of her family, but in the process she was expressing her understanding of the situation and her willingness to submit to it. As it was worked out, this became an expression of faith because she believed what she heard about the God of Israel! Now as she explains in the next segment, everyone else in Jericho understood it as well. However, since they were unwilling to act on their knowledge, their understanding did not become an expression of faith.
Vs 8-16 Before the spies lay down for the night, she went up on the roof and said to them, “I know that the Lord has given this land to you and that a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. We have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east of the Jordan, whom you completely destroyed. When we heard of it, our hearts melted and everyone’s courage failed because of you, for the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below.
Now then, please swear to me by the Lord that you will show kindness to my family, because I have shown kindness to you. Give me a sure sign that you will spare the lives of my father and mother, my brothers and sisters, and all who belong to them, and that you will save us from death.”
“Our lives for your lives!” the men assured her. “If you don’t tell what we are doing, we will treat you kindly and faithfully when the Lord gives us the land.”
So she let them down by a rope through the window, for the house she lived in was part of the city wall. Now she had said to them, “Go to the hills so the pursuers will not find you. Hide yourselves there three days until they return, and then go on your way.”
The spies followed her instructions and reported back to Joshua, who then launched his famous attack in which the walls of Jericho fell and the city was taken. Note in the next verse (below) that the city was placed under the “ban.”
Josh. 6:17 “The city shall be under the ban, it and all that is in it belongs to the Lord; only Rahab the harlot and all who are with her in the house shall live, because she hid the messengers whom we sent. (NASB)
By faith, Rahab beat the ban. Grace and mercy always supersede curses!
Josh 6:22-25 Joshua said to the two men who had spied out the land, “Go into the prostitute’s house and bring her out and all who belong to her, in accordance with your oath to her.” So the young men who had done the spying went in and brought out Rahab, her father and mother and brothers and all who belonged to her. They brought out her entire family and put them in a place outside the camp of Israel.
Then they burned the whole city and everything in it, but they put the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron into the treasury of the Lord’s house. But Joshua spared Rahab the prostitute, with her family and all who belonged to her, because she hid the men Joshua had sent as spies to Jericho—and she lives among the Israelites to this day.
Rahab not only received honorable mention in the genealogy of Christ, but she married an heir, gave birth to one of the members of the line of Christ, and is mentioned in the Faith Hall of Fame! (Heb. 11:31)
This is the story of how a woman of faith beat the Moabite curse, came into possession of an inheritance in Israel, and even gained a place in the line of Christ by simply living out the natural course of her faith. First, note the Moabite Curse:
Deut. 23:3-4 No Ammonite or Moabite shall enter the assembly of the Lord; none of their descendants, even to the tenth generation, shall ever enter the assembly of the Lord, because they did not meet you with food and water on the way when you came out of Egypt, and because they hired against you Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you.
Note that the curse is indefinite – “even to the 10th generation” – but Ruth would have been in about the second generation when she beat it through faith.
Vs 1:1 In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land, and a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab.
Elimelech and his family had a home and an inheritance (land) in the vicinity of Bethlehem. They did not sell it, but just went to Moab for a while to escape the famine.
Vs 1:2-4 The man’s name was Elimelech, his wife’s name Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem of Judah. And they went to Moab and lived there. Now Elimelech, Naomi’s husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. They married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth.
Elimelech has died so the inheritance now belongs to the eldest son.
Vs 1:5 After they had lived there about ten years, both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband.
At this point, with all the men gone, Naomi and Orpah are both candidates for the inheritance, depending on who produces a son to claim it. Note that a woman can’t really claim the inheritance. There was a reason for this: if she marries outside the family then the family loses land to her husband and another family. In an agricultural society land constitutes the family's livelihood. So the way the woman claims the inheritance is to marry a “kinsman redeemer” so the inheritance goes to him. That way it’s kept in the family, thus keeping the corporate inheritance intact.
Kinsman redeemer is both a right and a responsibility that goes to the nearest relative of the deceased; but it's optional so it can default to the next nearest relative if the nearest relative declines.
Naomi has first right to the inheritance. So if she marries a kinsman redeemer, she claims the inheritance. Then Orpah can go off and marry whomever she pleases but the inheritance stays with Naomi because she married someone in the family. However, Naomi is well advanced in age, having already lost two adult sons, so her prospects for marriage aren’t very good.
If Naomi remains single and Orpah marries a kinsman redeemer, the inheritance will go with Orpah, and Naomi will go with the inheritance – which is fine because it accomplishes essentially the same end.
However, there were no weddings and the famine in Israel has ended.
Vs 1:6-13 When she heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, Naomi and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah.
Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show kindness to you, as you have shown to your dead and to me. May the Lord grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband.” Then she kissed them and they wept aloud and said to her, “We will go back with you to your people.” But Naomi said, “Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands? Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me—even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons—would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the Lord’s hand has gone out against me!”
Clearly, Naomi has no hope that any of them will find a kinsman redeemer, least of all herself.
Vs 1:14-22 At this they wept again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law good-by, but Ruth clung to her. “Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.” But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me.” When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.
So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they arrived in Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them, and the women exclaimed, “Can this be Naomi?”
“Don’t call me Naomi,” she told them. “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? The Lord has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me.”
So Naomi returned from Moab accompanied by Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, arriving in Bethlehem as the barley harvest was beginning.
The stage is set…
Vs 2:20 Now Naomi had a relative on her husband’s side, from the clan of Elimelech, a man of standing, whose name was Boaz.
And Ruth the Moabitess said to Naomi, “Let me go to the fields and pick up the leftover grain behind anyone in whose eyes I find favor.”
Naomi said to her, “Go ahead, my daughter.” So she went out and began to glean in the fields behind the harvesters. As it turned out, she found herself working in a field belonging to Boaz, who was from the clan of Elimelech.
Just then Boaz arrived from Bethlehem and greeted the harvesters, “The Lord be with you!”
“The Lord bless you!” they called back.
Boaz asked the foreman of his harvesters, “Whose young woman is that?”
The foreman replied, “She is the Moabitess who came back from Moab with Naomi. She said, ‘Please let me glean and gather among the sheaves behind the harvesters.’ She went into the field and has worked steadily from morning till now, except for a short rest in the shelter.”
So Boaz said to Ruth, “My daughter, listen to me. Don’t go and glean in another field and don’t go away from here. Stay here with my servant girls. Watch the field where the men are harvesting, and follow along after the girls. I have told the men not to touch you. And whenever you are thirsty, go and get a drink from the water jars the men have filled.”
At this, she bowed down with her face to the ground. She exclaimed, “Why have I found such favor in your eyes that you notice me—a foreigner?”
Boaz replied, “I’ve been told all about what you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband—how you left your father and mother and your homeland and came to live with a people you did not know before. May the Lord repay you for what you have done.
May you be richly rewarded by the Lord, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge.”
“May I continue to find favor in your eyes, my lord,” she said. “You have given me comfort and have spoken kindly to your servant—though I do not have the standing of one of your servant girls.”
At mealtime Boaz said to her, “Come over here. Have some bread and dip it in the wine vinegar.”
When she sat down with the harvesters, he offered her some roasted grain. She ate all she wanted and had some left over. As she got up to glean, Boaz gave orders to his men, “Even if she gathers among the sheaves, don’t embarrass her. Rather, pull out some stalks for her from the bundles and leave them for her to pick up, and don’t rebuke her.”
So Ruth gleaned in the field until evening. Then she threshed the barley she had gathered, and it amounted to about an ephah. She carried it back to town, and her mother-in-law saw how much she had gathered. Ruth also brought out and gave her what she had left over after she had eaten enough.
Her mother-in-law asked her, “Where did you glean today? Where did you work? Blessed be the man who took notice of you!”
Then Ruth told her mother-in-law about the one at whose place she had been working. “The name of the man I worked with today is Boaz,” she said.
“The Lord bless him!” Naomi said to her daughter-in-law. “He has not stopped showing his kindness to the living and the dead.” She added, “That man is our close relative; he is one of our kinsman-redeemers.”
The plot thickens…
Vs 2:21-23 Then Ruth the Moabitess said, “He even said to me, ‘Stay with my workers until they finish harvesting all my grain.’
” Naomi said to Ruth her daughter-in-law, “It will be good for you, my daughter, to go with his girls, because in someone else’s field you might be harmed.”
So Ruth stayed close to the servant girls of Boaz to glean until the barley and wheat harvests were finished. And she lived with her mother-in-law.
Vs 3:1-11 One day Naomi her mother-in-law said to her, “My daughter, should I not try to find a home for you, where you will be well provided for? Is not Boaz, with whose servant girls you have been, a kinsman of ours? Tonight he will be winnowing barley on the threshing floor. Wash and perfume yourself, and put on your best clothes. Then go down to the threshing floor, but don’t let him know you are there until he has finished eating and drinking. When he lies down, note the place where he is lying. Then go and uncover his feet and lie down. He will tell you what to do.”
“I will do whatever you say,” Ruth answered. So she went down to the threshing floor and did everything her mother-in-law told her to do.
When Boaz had finished eating and drinking and was in good spirits, he went over to lie down at the far end of the grain pile. Ruth approached quietly, uncovered his feet and lay down. In the middle of the night something startled the man, and he turned and discovered a woman lying at his feet.
“Who are you?” he asked. “I am your servant Ruth,” she said. “Spread the corner of your garment over me, since you are a kinsman-redeemer.”
“The Lord bless you, my daughter,” he replied. “This kindness is greater than that which you showed earlier: You have not run after the younger men, whether rich or poor. And now, my daughter, don’t be afraid. I will do for you all you ask. All my fellow townsmen know that you are a woman of noble character.
However…
Vs 3:12-18 Although it is true that I am near of kin, there is a kinsman-redeemer nearer than I. Stay here for the night, and in the morning if he wants to redeem, good; let him redeem. But if he is not willing, as surely as the Lord lives I will do it. Lie here until morning.”
So she lay at his feet until morning, but got up before anyone could be recognized; and he said, “Don’t let it be known that a woman came to the threshing floor.”
He also said, “Bring me the shawl you are wearing and hold it out.” When she did so, he poured into it six measures of barley and put it on her. Then he went back to town.
When Ruth came to her mother-in-law, Naomi asked, “How did it go, my daughter?”
Then she told her everything Boaz had done for her 17 and added, “He gave me these six measures of barley, saying, ‘Don’t go back to your mother-in-law empty-handed.’ ”
Then Naomi said, “Wait, my daughter, until you find out what happens. For the man will not rest until the matter is settled today.”
Vs 4:1 Meanwhile Boaz went up to the town gate and sat there.
The town gate is where men conduct business.
Vs 4:2 When the kinsman-redeemer he had mentioned came along, Boaz said, “Come over here, my friend, and sit down.” So he went over and sat down. Boaz took ten of the elders of the town and said, “Sit here,” and they did so.
The business meeting has been called to order.
Vs 4:3-6 Then he said to the kinsman-redeemer, “Naomi, who has come back from Moab, is selling the piece of land that belonged to our brother Elimelech. I thought I should bring the matter to your attention and suggest that you buy it in the presence of these seated here and in the presence of the elders of my people. If you will redeem it, do so. But if you will not, tell me, so I will know. For no one has the right to do it except you, and I am next in line.”
“I will redeem it,” he said.
Then Boaz said, “On the day you buy the land from Naomi and from Ruth the Moabitess, you acquire the dead man’s widow, in order to maintain the name of the dead with his property.”
At this, the kinsman-redeemer said, “Then I cannot redeem it because I might endanger my own estate. You redeem it yourself. I cannot do it.”
At first the nearest relative saw the property as an opportunity to add to his personal wealth, but then realized that, because it would actually remain in the name of Elimelech’s family, it might endanger his own estate. Apparently he already had sons, so in the future there could be conflict over who was the rightful heir to this piece of property.
Vs 4:7-10 (Now in earlier times in Israel, for the redemption and transfer of property to become final, one party took off his sandal and gave it to the other. This was the method of legalizing transactions in Israel.)
So the kinsman-redeemer said to Boaz, “Buy it yourself.” And he removed his sandal.
Then Boaz announced to the elders and all the people, “Today you are witnesses that I have bought from Naomi all the property of Elimelech, Kilion and Mahlon. I have also acquired Ruth the Moabitess, Mahlon’s widow, as my wife, in order to maintain the name of the dead with his property, so that his name will not disappear from among his family or from the town records. Today you are witnesses!”
Since Boaz does not yet have children, one son, the child of Boaz and Ruth, will inherit both estates, one to remain in the name of Boaz, and one in the name of Elimelech.
Vs 4:11-12 Then the elders and all those at the gate said, “We are witnesses. May the Lord make the woman who is coming into your home like Rachel and Leah, who together built up the house of Israel. May you have standing in Ephrathah and be famous in Bethlehem. Through the offspring the Lord gives you by this young woman, may your family be like that of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah.”
Little could they know how true this prophetic blessing would be!
Vs 4:13-22 So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. Then he went to her, and the Lord enabled her to conceive, and she gave birth to a son. The women said to Naomi: “Praise be to the Lord, who this day has not left you without a kinsman-redeemer. May he become famous throughout Israel! He will renew your life and sustain you in your old age. For your daughter-in-law, who loves you and who is better to you than seven sons, has given him birth.”
Then Naomi took the child, laid him in her lap and cared for him. The women living there said, “Naomi has a son.” And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David.
This, then, is the family line of Perez: Perez was the father of Hezron, Hezron the father of Ram, Ram the father of Amminadab, Amminadab the father of Nahshon, Nahshon the father of Salmon, Salmon the father of Boaz, Boaz the father of Obed, Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David.
Because of the way she treated her mother-in-law, Ruth is declared to be better than seven sons! That’s high praise, especially in this culture.
Note how, in that culture, the son became “community property” in the sense that the women of the village attributed the son to Naomi as well as Ruth. There’s a certain beauty in this.
And Ruth, by simply living out the natural course of her faith, beat the Moabite curse and earned honorable mention in the Line of Christ – not to mention that her story has been preserved in the sacred annals of Jewish history.
Of course, Uriah, being a gentile, could not and did not contribute genetically to the line of Messiah, but he did receive honorable mention. (Some translations include Bathsheba’s name (in Matt. 1:7) to help identify Uriah, but the original manuscript, meaning the hand of Matthew, did not include her name.)
Bathsheba was a very beautiful young woman, the daughter of Eliam, one of David’s most trusted advisors. She married Uriah, a Hittite soldier who had become one of David’s “mighty men” and lived in a house a short distance down the hill from David’s castle.
David was about as dumb as they come in matters pertaining to women. Unlike his brothers who lived in the family home and enjoyed the influence of their mother, as the youngest son David spent his childhood among the sheep – so when he was suddenly thrust into the role of national hero and women began to throw them selves at his feet (literally) he had no scruples or self control, and that was a condition from which he never recovered (at least not until Bathsheba got her claws into him).
One day he rose from his afternoon nap and was taking in the sights from the roof of the castle when he chanced to observe a beautiful young woman bathing on the roof of a nearby residence. (We are not going to hold Bathsheba completely innocent here. Since it was common for people to ascend to their roofs in the cool of the evening, Jewish women did not normally denude themselves or act provocatively on the roof for all their neighbors to see.) So David, never mind he already had numerous wives and mistresses, insisted on sampling this young flower as well – which, of course, resulted in her pregnancy…and she was the wife of one of his general officers who was off at war where David should have been. To make a long story short, the ensuing intrigue that was intended to cover up this foolishness resulted in the murder of Uriah.
Uriah, a gentile, had become a national hero in Israel and David treated him like a dog, but God did not let the injustice go unnoticed. While David suffered many consequences for this indiscretion, under the inspirational ministry of the Holy Spirit, Uriah became the only gentile male to receive an honorable mention in the line of messiah.