Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary

Adam Clarke Commentary

Thou hast killed Uriah - Thou art the Murderer, as having planned his death; the sword of the Ammonites was Thy instrument only.

The Biblical Illustrator

2 Samuel 12:9

Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the Lord.

The sinner’s treatment of God’s law

Some men treat the law and testimony of the Lord as if it were like plaster of Paris, to be poured over their features to take the cast of their own boasted loveliness. Religion is to them a matter of opinion and not of fact; they talk about their “views,” and their ideas, as if Christians were no longer believers but inventors, and no more disciples but masters. This cometh of evil, and leadeth on to worse consequences. Our sentiments are like a tree, which must be trained to the wall of Scripture; but too many go about to bow the wall to their tree, and cut and trim texts to shape them to their mind. Let us never be guilty of this. Reverence for the perfect word should prevent our altering even a syllable of it. “The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul;” let it convert us, but never let us try to pervert it. Our ideas must take the mould of Scripture--this is wisdom: to endeavour to mould Scripture to our ideas would be presumption. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in his sight?.... The commandment referred to is the law of God, particularly the sixth and seventh precepts of it, Exodus 20:13; which David had shown no regard unto, and by his breaking them had slighted and despised them:

thou hast killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword; and so had despised and broken the sixth command, Exodus 20:13; for though he had not taken away his life with his own hand, he had plotted and contrived it, and had given orders to put him in such a position as would issue in it:

and hast taken his wife to be thy wife; after he had defiled her, being another man's wife, and had taken such unlawful methods to make her his wife, whereby he had despised and broken both the sixth and the seventh commands, Exodus 20:13,

and hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon; though he had not put him to death with his own sword, he had done that which was as bad or worse in some respects, he had exposed him to the sword of the Ammonites, by which it was taken away; and not his only, but that of some of the Israelites also, which gave that uncircumcised people reason to triumph over the children of Israel, and even to blaspheme the God of Israel.

Geneva Study Bible

Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the LORD, to do evil in his sight? thou hast killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword, and hast taken his wife [to be] thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the ^e children of Ammon.

(e) You have most cruelly given him into the hands of God's enemies.

Wesley's Explanatory Notes

Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the LORD, to do evil in his sight? thou hast killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword, and hast taken his wife to be thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon.

To be thy wife — To marry her whom he had defiled, and whose husband he had slain, was an affront upon the ordinance of marriage, making that not only to palliate, but in a manner to consecrate such villainies. In all this he despised the word of the Lord; (so it is in the Hebrew.) Not only his commandment in general, but the particular word of promise, which God had before sent him by Nathan, that he would build him an house: which sacred promise if he had had a due value for, he would not have polluted his house with lust and blood.

John Trapp Complete Commentary

2 Samuel 12:9 Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the LORD, to do evil in his sight? thou hast killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword, and hast taken his wife [to be] thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon.

Ver. 9. Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment?] Yea, not one, but many: especially the sixth and seventh commandment: although the truth is, the whole law is but one copulative, as the schools speak, [Exodus 16:18 Ezekiel 18:10-13] and he that breaketh one commandment is guilty of all, [James 2:10] since God will not be served with an exception, neither brooketh he a dispensatory conscience.

Thou hast killed Uriah.] A wretched reward for all his good service: a valiant man that ventured his life for thy sake, and would have laid it down for thy safeguard. Like as we read in our chronicles of one Hubert de St Clare, that at the siege of Bridgenorth, A.D. 1155, he cast himself between death and King Henry II, taking the arrow into his own bosom to preserve his sovereign’s life. (a) Uriah likely would have done as much for David.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

The commandment of the Lord, i. e. those laws of God which forbade thee to do this thing, by not giving them that respect and observance which they deserved.

Uriah the Hittite; that valiant, and generous, and noble person.

Hast taken his wife to be thy wife: this he mentions amongst his other sins; partly because he had rewarded her, who by God’s law should have been severely punished; partly because he compassed this marriage by wicked practices, even by Uriah’s murder, and for sinful ends, even for the gratification of his inordinate and sensual lusts, and for the concealment of that sin which he was obliged to confess and lament.

Hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon; those cursed enemies of God, and of his people, whom thou hast encouraged and hardened in their idolatry, by giving up him and others of God’s people into their hands. And note here, that although David did not kill Uriah himself, nor command any to do it; but only that he should be put upon dangerous service (which a general of an army oft doth to soldiers under him, on justifiable accounts, without being therefore legally chargeable with murder, though the person so employed die in the service); yet in God’s account, who judged of David’s design therein, it is justly so reputed. And therefore, though the Ammonites slew Uriah, yet David is said to have killed him with their sword.

Whedon's Commentary on the Bible

9.Despised the commandment of the Lord — Which says, “Thou shalt not kill.” David was guilty of murder.

Thou hast killed Uriah’ with the sword’ hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon — This is not tautology, for to slay with the sword of the heathen Ammonites was even more aggravating than to kill one outright; and the last term, hast slain — from הרג, to murder — is stronger than the former, hast killed — from נכה, to smite.

Joseph Benson's Commentary of the Old and New Testaments

2 Samuel 12:9. Thou hast killed Uriah — David’s contriving his death was as bad as if he had killed him with his own hand. With the sword of the children of Ammon — This was an aggravation of his crime, that he caused him to be slain by the professed enemies of God, who doubtless triumphed in the slaughter of so great a man. Hast taken his wife, &c. — To marry her whom he had defiled, and whose husband he had slain, was an affront upon the ordinance of marriage, making that not only to palliate, but in a manner to consecrate such villanies. In all this he despised the word of the Lord; (so it is in the Hebrew;) not only his commandment in general, but the particular word of promise, which God had before sent him by Nathan, that he would build him a house: which sacred promise if he had had a due value for, he would not have polluted his house with lust and blood.

E.W. Bullinger's Companion Bible Notes

evil. Hebrew. ra"a`. App-44. with Art.

thou hast killed. Not Joab, or the Ammonites.

children = sons.

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(9) Hast slain him.—This is a different and stronger word than “killed” in the first part of the verse, and might well be translated murdered. It was murder in the eyes of the Lord, although accomplished indirectly by the sword of the Ammonites.

Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the LORD, to do evil in his sight? thou hast killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword, and hast taken his wife to be thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon.

despised

10; 11:4,14-17; Genesis 9:5,6; Exodus 20:13,14; Numbers 15:30,31; 1 Samuel 15:19,23; Isaiah 5:24; Amos 2:4; Hebrews 10:28,29

to do evil

2 Chronicles 33:6; Psalms 51:4; 90:8; 139:1,2; Jeremiah 18:10

thou hast

11:15-27

Reciprocal: Genesis 3:13 - What;  Genesis 37:27 - let not;  Genesis 38:23 - lest we;  Exodus 32:30 - Ye have;  Exodus 32:35 - General;  Leviticus 26:15 - despise;  Deuteronomy 27:24 - General;  1 Samuel 2:30 - that despise;  1 Samuel 18:17 - Let not mine;  1 Samuel 24:5 - David's heart;  1 Samuel 26:6 - Hittite;  2 Samuel 11:17 - there fell;  2 Samuel 11:27 - fetched her;  2 Samuel 16:7 - bloody man;  2 Samuel 23:39 - Uriah;  2 Samuel 24:12 - that 1may;  1 Kings 11:11 - I will surely;  1 Kings 13:21 - thou hast disobeyed;  1 Kings 15:5 - save only;  1 Kings 21:19 - Hast thou killed;  2 Chronicles 24:20 - transgress;  Psalm 10:13 - contemn;  Psalm 32:5 - iniquity;  Psalm 51:14 - Deliver;  Psalm 139:3 - and art acquainted;  Proverbs 6:29 - he that;  Proverbs 7:26 - General;  Proverbs 11:31 - General;  Proverbs 13:13 - despiseth;  Isaiah 30:12 - Because;  Ezekiel 20:13 - and they