After Solomon’s greeting to her and his arranging for her seating, Bathsheba made her request. She makes it in almost the exact language that Adonijah had made it to her. This included the exhortation, Do not refuse me.
This phrase provides a reason to question the suggestion that Bathsheba was well aware of the true nature of Adonijah’s request. Would she append that phrase if she considered the request to be fatal to Solomon and herself? It could be argued that she calculated that this manner of presenting the request would make the negative outcome more certain. She also labelled the request small,
which could be considered as a sarcastic remark that invited Solomon’s later response, Ask for him the kingdom also.
King Solomon seems to have believed that his mother was going to make a request of a personal nature. He said without hesitation that he would grant her request and not refuse her. We might ask, Had he bound himself to grant the request? My answer is No! First, he does not phrase it in the form of a binding oath. He did not swear by the Lord, which is in distinction to the manner in which he does swear in 1 Kings 2:23–24. Second, for him to have treated his statement as a binding oath would have resulted in consciously taking part in his own and his mother’s death. The result of Herod Antipas’s similar promise to Salome should warn us of the danger of feeling oneself bound to be a party to evil (Mark 6:14–29).
She requested that Abishag be given to Adonijah as his wife. She made her request in terms that were very specific. She referred to Abishag as the Shunammite, and she referred to Adonijah as your brother.
Whether she understood this or not, such precise reference could scarcely help from bringing Adonijah’s quest for the kingship to Solomon’s consciousness.
20 Then she said, “I have one small request to make of you; do not refuse me.” And the king said to her, “Make your request, my mother, for I will not refuse you.”