1 Chronicles 21

1Satan arose against Israel and incited David to count Israel.

2David said to Joab and the chiefs of the people, “Go, count Israel from Beersheba to Dan, and bring their number to me, that I may know it.”

3Joab replied, "May Yahweh increase his people a hundred times as they are. But my lord the king, are they not all my lord's servants? Why does my lord seek this? Why will he bring guilt on Israel?"

4But the king's command was strong against Joab, and Joab departed, went through all Israel, and came to Jerusalem.

5Joab gave David the tally of the people’s census, and all Israel totaled a thousand thousand plus a hundred thousand men who drew the sword, while Judah totaled four hundred seventy thousand men who drew the sword.

6He did not number Levi and Benjamin among them, for Joab abhorred the king's word.

7This matter was evil in God's eyes, so he struck Israel.

8David said to God, "I have sinned greatly because I did this thing; but now, please pass over the iniquity of your servant, for I have acted very foolishly."

9Yahweh spoke to Gad, David's seer, saying,

10Go and speak to David: Thus says Yahweh, I hold three out to you; choose one of them for yourself, and I will do it to you.

11Gad came to David and said to him, "Thus says Yahweh: Choose for yourself."

12either three years of famine, or three months being devoured before your foe while your enemy's sword reaches you, or three days of Yahweh's sword and plague in the land, with Yahweh's angel laying waste throughout all Israel's territory. Now then, consider what answer I shall give to him who sent me.

13David said to Gad, "I am greatly distressed. Please let me fall into the hand of Yahweh, for his mercies are exceedingly great; let me not fall into the hand of man."

14Yahweh inflicted plague on Israel, and seventy thousand men of Israel fell.

15God sent an angel to Jerusalem to destroy it, and as he was destroying it, Yahweh saw and relented over the calamity, then said to the destroying angel, "Enough now—stay your hand." The angel of Yahweh stood by the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

16David raised his eyes and saw Yahweh's angel standing between earth and heaven, his sword drawn in his hand and stretched out over Jerusalem. David and the elders, covered in sackcloth, fell on their faces.

17David said to God, "Was it not I who ordered the people counted? I am the one who sinned and did evil, who acted wickedly, but these sheep—what wrong have they done? Let your hand now, Yahweh my God, be against me and my father's house, but not against your people to plague them."

18The angel of Yahweh commanded Gad to tell David that David should go up and erect an altar to Yahweh in the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

19David went up at the word of Gad, which he spoke in the name of Yahweh.

20Ornan turned back and saw the angel, while his four sons with him hid themselves. Ornan was threshing wheat.

21David came to Ornan, who looked and saw David, then left the threshing floor and bowed to David with his face to the ground.

22David said to Ornan, “Give me the site of the threshing floor, and I will build an altar to Yahweh on it. Sell it to me at full price, so 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. See, I have given the oxen for burnt offerings, the threshing instruments for wood, and the wheat for the grain offering; I have given it all."

24King David said to Ornan, "No, for I will surely buy it for its full price in silver, since I will not take what is yours to Yahweh, nor present a burnt offering without payment."

25David gave Ornan six hundred shekels of gold by weight for the place.

26David built an altar to Yahweh there, offered burnt offerings and peace offerings, and called to Yahweh; Yahweh answered him from heaven by fire upon the burnt offering altar.

27Yahweh spoke to the angel, and he put his sword back into its sheath.

28At that time, when David saw that Yahweh had answered him on Ornan the Jebusite's threshing floor, he sacrificed there.

29Yahweh’s tabernacle, which Moses made in the wilderness, and the altar of burnt offering were at that time in the high place at Gibeon.

30But David could not go before it to seek God, for he was terrified because of the sword of the angel of Yahweh.