Did David Rape Bathsheba?

In the last six months I have observed some argue that the fact that David was a king during his extramarital sex with Bathsheba brought a massive power imbalance that made the sex coercive in some way.  If true, this makes David's offense in 2 Samuel 11 even greater, also meaning that Bathsheba did not actually sin with David at all, as victims of rape have committed no sin in being the recipients of forced sex (Deuteronomy 22:25-27).  If true, many Christians have been taught a very sanitized version of an already dark story.

But this is a misrepresentation of what the Bible actually says.  That David was king does not mean that he committed rape; this doesn't follow at all.  There is nothing at all in the text that indicates in any way that a rape occurred.  Yes, rape is more degrading and depraved than consensual adultery, but David and Bathsheba engaged in consensual adultery.  This means 1) that Bathsheba was not an innocent victim of another person's force and 2) that David was not as evil as some might represent him as being.

David was an adulterer just like Bathsheba was an adulteress, and both of them deserved to die (Deuteronomy 22:22).  But in the Biblical account of their infidelity neither party raped the other--yes, women can and have raped men, and even the Bible records at least one example of this (Lot's daughters having sex with him while he was drunk in Genesis 19) and an example of an attempted female-on-male rape (Potiphar's wife sexually assaulting Joseph in Genesis 37).  Asinine cultural beliefs and assumptions interfere with some people's right understanding of this, unfortunately.  Potiphar's wife came far closer to raping Joseph, who might have been far younger than her, than David did to raping Bathsheba.

2 Samuel 11-12 contains a story of a grave sin.  But it is not a story of nonconsensual sex.  There are accounts in the Bible where one can read of women raping men (or trying to) or men raping women, but the account of David and Bathsheba sleeping together is not among them.