2 Samuel 24

David counts the people

¹Once more the anger of the LORD flared up against Israel, and he stirred David up against them, saying, “Go and count Israel and Judah.”^{a 2}So the king said to Joab, the commander of the army who was with him, “Go through all the tribes of Israel, from Dan to Beersheba, and register the people, so that I may know how many there are.”

³But Joab said to the king, “May the LORD your God make the people a hundred times as many as they are, and may my lord the king see it with his own eyes! But why does my lord the king want to do this?” ⁴But the king’s order overruled Joab and the army commanders, so Joab and the commanders of the army left the king’s presence to register the people of Israel. ⁵They crossed the Jordan and camped at Aroer, on the south side of the town in the middle of the valley; then they went through Gad and on to Jazer.^{b 6}Then they went to Gilead and the land of Tahtim-hodshi, came on to Dan-jaan, and went around toward Sidon.^{c 7}They came to the fortress of Tyre and to all the towns of the Hivites and Canaanites, and then went out to the Negev of Judah, at Beersheba. ⁸When they had gone through the whole land, they came back to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days. ⁹Joab gave the king the total of the people who had been registered: in Israel there were 800,000 able-bodied men who could handle a sword, and in Judah 500,000.^{d 10}But after David had counted the people, his conscience struck him. David said to the LORD, “I have sinned greatly by doing this. Now, LORD, please take away your servant’s guilt, for I have acted very foolishly.” ¹¹When David got up in the morning, the word of the LORD had come to the prophet Gad, David’s seer: ¹²“Go and tell David, ‘The LORD says this: I am setting three things before you. Choose one of them, and I will do it to you.’” ¹³So Gad went to David and told him, “Shall seven years of famine come on your land? Or three months of running from your enemies while they chase you? Or three days of plague in your land? Now think it over and decide what answer I should take back to the one who sent me.”^e

¹⁴David said to Gad, “I am in deep distress. Let us fall into the hand of the LORD, for his mercy is great; but do not let me fall into human hands.” ¹⁵So the LORD sent a plague on Israel from that morning until the time that had been set, and 70,000 of the people died, from Dan to Beersheba.^{f 16}But as the angel reached out his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, the LORD relented from the disaster. He said to the angel who was bringing destruction on the people, “Enough! Now hold back your hand.” The angel of the LORD was then by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.^g

¹⁷When David saw the angel who was striking down the people, he said to the LORD, “I am the one who has sinned; I am the one who has done wrong. But what have these sheep done? Please let your hand be against me and my father’s family.”

David builds an altar

¹⁸That same day Gad came to David and told him, “Go up and set up an altar for the LORD on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.” ¹⁹So David went up as Gad had told him, just as the LORD had commanded. ²⁰When Araunah looked down and saw the king and his officials coming toward him, he went out and bowed before the king with his face to the ground. ²¹Araunah asked, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?” David answered, “To buy your threshing floor, so that I can build an altar to the LORD and the plague on the people may be stopped.” ²²Araunah said to David, “Let my lord the king take whatever he thinks best and offer it up. Look, here are the oxen for the burnt offering, and the threshing sledges and the oxen’s yokes for the wood. ²³All this, my king, Araunah gives to the king.” And Araunah said to the king, “May the LORD your God accept you.”^{h 24}But the king said to Araunah, “No, I insist on paying you a price for it. I will not offer the LORD my God burnt offerings at no cost to myself.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for about 1 1/4 pounds of silver.^{i 25}David built an altar to the LORD there and sacrificed burnt offerings and peace offerings. Then the LORD answered the prayers for the land, and the plague on Israel was stopped.