1 Chronicles 21:4

1 Chronicles 21:1-30

¹Satan stood up against Israel and incited David to count Israel. ²David said to Joab and to the chiefs of the people, “Go, count Israel from Beersheba to Dan, and bring the report to me, so that I may know their number.” ³Joab said, “May YHWH add to his people a hundred times as many as they are! Are they not, my lord the king, all of them servants of my lord? Why does my lord seek this? Why should it become a cause of guilt for Israel?” ⁴But the word of the king prevailed over Joab. So Joab went out and went about through all Israel and came to Jerusalem. ⁵Joab gave the number of the census of the people to David. All Israel was a million and a hundred thousand men who drew the sword, and Judah four hundred and seventy thousand men who drew the sword. ⁶But Levi and Benjamin he did not count among them, for the word of the king was abhorrent to Joab. ⁷This matter was evil in the eyes of Elohim, and he struck Israel. ⁸David said to Elohim, “I have sinned greatly in doing this thing. And now, please, take away the iniquity of your servant, for I have acted very foolishly.” ⁹YHWH spoke to Gad, David’s seer, saying, ¹⁰“Go and speak to David, saying, ‘Thus says YHWH: Three things I am stretching out over you; choose for yourself one of them, and I will do it to you.’” ¹¹Gad came to David and said to him, “Thus says YHWH: ‘Accept for yourself: ¹²either three years of famine, or three months of being swept away before your adversaries, with the sword of your enemies overtaking you, or three days of the sword of YHWH, that is, pestilence in the land, with the angel of YHWH destroying throughout all the territory of Israel.’ Now consider what word I should bring back to the one who sent me.” ¹³David said to Gad, “I am in great distress. Let me fall, please, into the hand of YHWH, for very great are his mercies; but let me not fall into the hand of man.” ¹⁴YHWH put a pestilence on Israel, and there fell of Israel seventy thousand men. ¹⁵Elohim sent an angel to Jerusalem to destroy it; and as he was destroying it, YHWH saw and relented concerning the evil, and said to the angel who was destroying, “Enough! Now drop your hand.” And the angel of YHWH was standing by the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. ¹⁶David lifted his eyes and saw the angel of YHWH standing between the earth and the heavens, with his sword drawn in his hand, stretched out over Jerusalem. David and the elders, covered in sackcloth, fell on their faces. ¹⁷David said to Elohim, “Was it not I who said to count the people? It is I who have sinned and done great evil; but these sheep, what have they done? YHWH my Elohim, please let your hand be against me and against the house of my father, but not against your people, for a plague.” ¹⁸The angel of YHWH said to Gad to tell David that David should go up to set up an altar to YHWH on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. ¹⁹David went up at the word of Gad, which he had spoken in the name of YHWH. ²⁰Ornan turned and saw the angel, and his four sons who were with him hid themselves. Now Ornan was threshing wheat. ²¹David came to Ornan, and Ornan looked and saw David, and he went out from the threshing floor and bowed down to David with his face to the ground. ²²David said to Ornan, “Give me the site of the threshing floor, that I may build on it an altar to YHWH. Give it to me for the full price, so that the plague may be held back from the people.” ²³Ornan said to David, “Take it for yourself, and let my lord the king do what is good in his eyes. Look, I give the oxen for burnt offerings, and the threshing sledges for the wood, and the wheat for the grain offering; all of it I give.” ²⁴King David said to Ornan, “No, but I will certainly buy it for the full price; for I will not take what is yours for YHWH, nor offer a burnt offering for nothing.”

2 Samuel 24:1-25

¹Again the anger of YHWH burned against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, “Go, count Israel and Judah.” ²The king said to Joab, the commander of the army, who was with him, “Please go through all the tribes of Israel, from Dan to Beersheba, and count the people, so that I may know the number of the people.” ³Joab said to the king, “May YHWH your Elohim add to the people a hundred times as many as they are, and may the eyes of my lord the king see it; but my lord the king, why does he delight in this thing?” ⁴But the king’s word prevailed against Joab and against the commanders of the army, and Joab and the commanders of the army went out from before the king to count the people, Israel. ⁵They crossed the Jordan and camped at Aroer, south of the city that is in the middle of the wadi of Gad, and toward Jazer. ⁶They came to Gilead and to the land of Tahtim-hodshi; they came to Dan-jaan and around toward Sidon. ⁷They came to the fortified city of Tyre and all the cities of the Hivite and the Canaanite, and they went out to the Negev of Judah, to Beersheba. ⁸They went through all the land and came at the end of nine months and twenty days to Jerusalem. ⁹Joab gave the number of the census of the people to the king: Israel was eight hundred thousand valiant men who drew the sword, and the men of Judah five hundred thousand men. ¹⁰David’s heart struck him after he had counted the people. And David said to YHWH, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now then, YHWH, please take away the iniquity of your servant, for I have acted very foolishly.” ¹¹When David got up in the morning, the word of YHWH came to Gad the prophet, David’s seer, saying, ¹²“Go and speak to David: ‘Thus says YHWH: Three things I am laying before you; choose for yourself one of them, and I will do it to you.’” ¹³So Gad came to David and told him, and said to him, “Shall there come to you seven years of famine in your land? Or three months that you flee before your adversaries while they pursue you? Or shall there be three days of pestilence in your land? Now consider and see what answer I shall return to the one who sent me.” ¹⁴David said to Gad, “I am in great distress. Please let us fall into the hand of YHWH, for his mercies are many; but into the hand of man let me not fall.” ¹⁵YHWH sent a pestilence on Israel from the morning until the appointed time; and there died of the people, from Dan to Beersheba, seventy thousand men. ¹⁶When the angel stretched out his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, YHWH relented concerning the evil and said to the angel who was destroying among the people, “Enough! Now withdraw your hand.” And the angel of YHWH was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite. ¹⁷David said to YHWH, when he saw the angel who was striking among the people, and he said, “Look, I have sinned, and I have done iniquity; but these sheep, what have they done? Please let your hand be against me and against the house of my father.” ¹⁸Gad came to David on that day and said to him, “Go up, raise an altar to YHWH on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.” ¹⁹So David went up according to the word of Gad, as YHWH had commanded. ²⁰Araunah looked down and saw the king and his servants coming over toward him; and Araunah went out and bowed down to the king with his face to the ground. ²¹Araunah said, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?” David said, “To buy from you the threshing floor, to build an altar to YHWH, so that the plague may be stopped from the people.” ²²Araunah said to David, “Let my lord the king take and offer up what is good in his eyes. See, the oxen for the burnt offering, and the threshing sledges and the yokes of the oxen for the wood. ²³All this Araunah gives, O king, to the king.” And Araunah said to the king, “May YHWH your Elohim accept you.” ²⁴The king said to Araunah, “No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price; and I will not offer up to YHWH my Elohim burnt offerings for nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.