2 Samuel 12:28 - Printer Friendly

ESV: Now then gather the rest of the people together and encamp against the city and take it, lest I take the city and it be called by my name."

NIV: Now muster the rest of the troops and besiege the city and capture it. Otherwise I will take the city, and it will be named after me."

NASB: Now then, gather the rest of the people and camp opposite the city and capture it, or I will capture the city myself and it will be named after me.'

CSB: Now therefore, assemble the rest of the troops, lay siege to the city, and capture it. Otherwise I will be the one to capture the city, and it will be named after me."

NLT: Now bring the rest of the army and capture the city. Otherwise, I will capture it and get credit for the victory.'

KJV: Now therefore gather the rest of the people together, and encamp against the city, and take it: lest I take the city, and it be called after my name.

NKJV: Now therefore, gather the rest of the people together and encamp against the city and take it, lest I take the city and it be called after my name.”

This battle started the previous year. The new Ammonite king dishonored David's men and hired soldiers from Syria and other nations to join a fight against the Israelites. The Syrians and their allies quickly fled, the Ammonites hid in their walled city, and Joab returned home. But the Syrians returned with greater numbers. David gathered the Israelites and defeated them so badly the Syrians refused to fight for the Ammonites anymore (2 Samuel 10).

Now, David returns to the battlefield to finish the job. This spring, he sent Joab to take care of the Ammonites once and for all. Joab is about to enter the city, but he sends one more message.

Joab's message to David from the battlefield is simple. Rabbah will soon be fully conquered. He wants David to come to lead the final march of the army into the defeated city so that he can get credit for defeating it. Joab adds a minor threat that the city will be called by his own name if David doesn't come to claim it for himself. Joab is likely not serious about this but uses it as motivation to get David to come quickly. He's David's nephew and has fought for David for a long time. David would have understood better than anyone that the one who gets credit for the military victory can become a threat to the one who sits on the throne. That's how he first became famous in Israel and a perceived threat to Saul's power (1 Samuel 18:7–8).

There's another reason David should be there. The war started because of Hunan's disgraceful treatment of David's messengers (2 Samuel 10:1–5). It's a matter of honor. Hunan needs to understand just how wrong he was.

Second Samuel 12:26–31 explains how David finishes what Hanun started. The Ammonite king disgraced David's messengers, and David sent Joab to war (2 Samuel 10). They fought to a stalemate until the spring, when Joab returned while David sinned against Bathsheba and Uriah. The walled city of Rabbah is set to fall, and Joab calls David to finish the fight. First Chronicles 20:4 gives a shortened version of 2 Samuel 10 and this passage.

In 2 Samuel 12, David learns the consequences of his sins against Bathsheba and Uriah (2 Samuel 11). David thought no one of consequence knew what he'd done. Nathan the prophet reveals that God knows; the Lord demands justice for David's victims. David's household will rebel, and Bathsheba's son will die. David humbly repents, and Bathsheba later conceives Solomon, the future king. Joab, about to defeat the Ammonites, calls David to finish the fight. In 2 Samuel 13, the seeds of the promised rebellion are sown. Psalm 51 is David's expression of remorse for his sins.

David begins to lose control of his seemingly perfect situation. While the respected soldier Uriah was fighting Ammonites with Joab (2 Samuel 10), David slept with Uriah's wife, Bathsheba. To cover her pregnancy, David arranged for Uriah to die in battle (2 Samuel 11). Nathan, the prophet, confronts David over his crimes. God takes the child's life and will allow David's household to rebel against him. This begins when David's son rapes his own half-sister, Tamar (2 Samuel 13), starting a series of events that will result in another son, Absalom, taking the throne from his father (2 Samuel 14—16).

Second Samuel continues the story of David, who will become king over Judah. The other tribes of Israel are resistant, eventually sparking a civil war. David wins and makes Jerusalem his capital. Early success is followed by moral failure and controversy in David's house. The book of 1 Kings will begin by detailing David's decline and death.