Matthew 1:6
“Jesse became the father of King David. David became the father of Solomon by her who had been Uriah’s wife.”
What does Matthew 1:6 mean?
This verse traces the genealogy of Jesus through King David, but it pauses to mention something unusual: it identifies Solomon's mother specifically as "her who had been Uriah's wife," rather than simply naming her as Bathsheba. That choice of words points us back to one of the Bible's most difficult stories, in which David committed adultery with Bathsheba and arranged for her husband Uriah to be killed in battle. By naming her this way, Matthew refuses to let readers forget the moral complexity of Jesus's ancestry. The point isn't to shame David or Bathsheba, but to show that God's plan moves forward not through perfect people, but through real people with real failures, and that God's grace is big enough to work through broken stories. Matthew is preparing us to understand Jesus as someone who came not for the righteous, but for sinners.