1 Kings 1:16-19

1 Kings 1:16-19King James Version (KJV)
16 And Bathsheba bowed, and did obeisance unto the king. And the king said, What wouldest thou?
17 And she said unto him, My lord, thou swarest by the Lord thy God unto thine handmaid, saying, Assuredly Solomon thy son shall reign after me, and he shall sit upon my throne.
18 And now, behold, Adonijah reigneth; and now, my lord the king, thou knowest it not:
19 And he hath slain oxen and fat cattle and sheep in abundance, and hath called all the sons of the king, and Abiathar the priest, and Joab the captain of the host: but Solomon thy servant hath he not called.

American English Bible

16 Then BathSheba bowed low before the king and he asked her: 'What do you want?'
17 And she replied: 'My lord; Didn't you swear to your handmaid by Jehovah your God, saying, Your son Solomon will reign after me and sit on my throne? 18 But look! AdoniJah has started to rule; and you, my lord the king, don't even know about it! 19 Why, he has already sacrificed many calves, lambs, and sheep, and he has invited all of the king's sons, AbiAthar the Priest, and JoAb, the commander-in-chief of your army, to come with him. However, he didn't invite your servant Solomon.

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16 She showed the proper respect to her king not trying to suck up to him but treat with honor because he is the king, this is something his son did not do because he tried to steal the throne from his father. If the king did not ask her she would have had to go away but he allowed her to speak.

17 When you swear by God it was to be kept. David had made this swear so that Solomon would be king because of this word. To break an oath with God often lead people away from God and they were cut off. An oath was to be kept at any cost we see this to the extreme in the book of Judges when a man kills his daughter to keep an oath he made in God’s name.

18 If David had known about it he would have stopped him before he split the kingdom and caused division. We often times need to react as soon as we hear but it would have been easier if we heard earlier, this was the case here.

19 Sometimes we will recive bad news we need to react as God wants us to after hearing it. We do not need to let the news make us sin.
 
Contextually, within the chapter, Nathan wants to bring this matter before King David, who is basically on his deathbed, and does it in an honorable way, by sending young Solomon's mother to petition the king and inform him of the underhanded seizing of the kingship.
 
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