Reading Bathsheba Against Empire by iyree jarrett

I have continued thinking about Bathsheba since Sunday, especially alongside the violence of the Cornell Seven and the violence that continues to be enacted by people and institutions with power. The more I think about these stories, the more evident it becomes how vital it is that we hold space for conversations about abuses of power, mutuality, pleasure, and consent.

Biblical stories can be powerful sites of liberation, but they can also be wielded in ways that uphold empire and structures of harm. Many of us have heard the story of a king named David who abused his authority through murder and sexual violence. Yet, the narrative moves quickly toward his repentance and restoration, while David is remembered as a man after God’s own heart. This emphasis leaves little room to sit with the person who experienced the pain, and Bathsheba becomes a footnote in a story that centers the man who harmed her.

This pattern extends beyond biblical interpretation. It emerges whenever the reputation, authority, or perceived goodness of a powerful person becomes more important than the experiences of those they have harmed. It emerges when questions about consent are replaced with questions about what someone was wearing, where they were, whether they participated, or whether they should have known better. It also emerges when institutions become more invested in protecting themselves than in creating conditions where people can tell the truth.

This is why I think conversations about consent, pleasure, mutuality, and power are such important conversations. Mutuality requires that we take seriously the agency and humanity of everyone involved. Consent requires that we reckon honestly with power, and pleasure cannot be separated from the conditions under which people are actually free.

As we sit with these stories, both biblical and contemporary, may we cultivate a holy anger toward injustice. May we challenge empire’s tendency to protect the powerful at the expense of those they harm. May we resist interpretations of Scripture that make violence easier to dismiss, and may we practice a theology that takes seriously the agency, dignity, and humanity of all Bathshebas, whose stories have too often been relegated to the margins.