1 Chronicles 21

Then Satan rose up against Israel and pushed David to count the people of Israel.

1And Satan stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel.

Note"Satan" here translates a Hebrew word that ordinarily means "adversary" or "accuser", the term is used elsewhere for human opponents and for a prosecuting figure in a heavenly court. A national count of this kind was a muster of men fit for war, the first step toward conscription and taxation; the parallel account in 2 Samuel 24:1 says instead that the LORD's anger moved David to order it.

2So David said to Joab and to the commanders of the army, "Go and count the people of Israel, from Beersheba in the far south to Dan in the far north. Bring me the total, so I will know how many there are."

2And David said to Joab and to the rulers of the people, Go, number Israel from Beersheba even to Dan; and bring the number of them to me, that I may know it.

Note"From Beersheba to Dan" was the standard way of saying "the whole country, end to end", Beersheba marked the southern edge of settled Israelite land and Dan the northern. The listing here runs south to north, the reverse of the more usual "from Dan to Beersheba."

3Joab answered, "May the LORD make his people a hundred times more than they are now. But my lord the king, are they not all my lord's servants already? Why does my lord want this? Why should he bring guilt on Israel?"

3And Joab answered, The LORD make his people an hundred times so many more as they be: but, my lord the king, are they not all my lord’s servants? why then doth my lord require this thing? why will he be a cause of trespass to Israel?

4Even so, the king's word won out over Joab's objection. So Joab left, traveled through all of Israel, and then came back to Jerusalem.

4Nevertheless the king’s word prevailed against Joab. Wherefore Joab departed, and went throughout all Israel, and came to Jerusalem.

5Joab gave David the total count of the people. In all Israel there were 1,100,000 men able to fight with a sword, and in Judah there were 470,000 men able to fight with a sword.

5And Joab gave the sum of the number of the people unto David. And all they of Israel were a thousand thousand and an hundred thousand men that drew sword: and Judah was four hundred threescore and ten thousand men that drew sword.

Note"Men able to fight with a sword" is the ancient formula for men of military age, so these are army figures rather than a total population. The parallel account in 2 Samuel 24:9 gives different numbers, 800,000 for Israel and 500,000 for Judah.

6But Joab did not count the tribes of Levi and Benjamin along with the rest, because he found the king's order disgusting.

6But Levi and Benjamin counted he not among them: for the king’s word was abominable to Joab.

NoteUnder the census law in Numbers 1:47–49 the tribe of Levi was exempt from a military count because its men served at the sanctuary. Benjamin was the tribe in whose territory Jerusalem lay. Chronicles does not say why Joab stopped where he did, only that he refused to finish.

7God was displeased with what had been done, so he struck Israel.

7And God was displeased with this thing; therefore he smote Israel.

8David said to God, "I have sinned badly by doing this. Now I beg you, take away your servant's guilt, because I have acted very foolishly."

8And David said unto God, I have sinned greatly, because I have done this thing: but now, I beseech thee, do away the iniquity of thy servant; for I have done very foolishly.

9Then the LORD spoke to Gad, David's seer, the man who received messages from God for him. The LORD said:

9And the LORD spake unto Gad, David’s seer, saying,

10"Go and tell David: This is what the LORD says. I am offering you three things. Choose one of them, and that is what I will do to you."

10Go and tell David, saying, Thus saith the LORD, I offer thee three things: choose thee one of them, that I may do it unto thee.

11So Gad came to David and said, "This is what the LORD says: Choose for yourself.

11So Gad came to David, and said unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Choose thee

12You may have three years of famine. Or three months of being driven back by your enemies while their swords catch up with you. Or three days of the sword of the LORD, which means a deadly disease in the land, with the angel of the LORD destroying people all through the territory of Israel. Now decide what answer I should take back to the one who sent me."

12Either three years’ famine; or three months to be destroyed before thy foes, while that the sword of thine enemies overtaketh thee; or else three days the sword of the LORD, even the pestilence, in the land, and the angel of the LORD destroying throughout all the coasts of Israel. Now therefore advise thyself what word I shall bring again to him that sent me.

NoteA famine here means crop failure and mass starvation, the ordinary consequence of drought in a farming economy. "The sword of the LORD" is named in the same breath as plague, the three options are the three great killers of the ancient world: hunger, war, and epidemic. In 2 Samuel 24:13 the first option is seven years rather than three.

13David said to Gad, "I am in a terrible spot. Please let me fall into the hand of the LORD, because his mercy is very great. But do not let me fall into human hands."

13And David said unto Gad, I am in a great strait: let me fall now into the hand of the LORD; for very great are his mercies: but let me not fall into the hand of man.

14So the LORD sent a deadly disease on Israel, and seventy thousand men of Israel died.

14So the LORD sent pestilence upon Israel: and there fell of Israel seventy thousand men.

15God sent an angel to Jerusalem to destroy it. But as the angel was destroying, the LORD saw it and held back from the harm he was doing. He said to the destroying angel, "That is enough. Stop your hand now." The angel of the LORD was then standing beside the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite, the flat open ground where Ornan beat the grain out of his wheat.

15And God sent an angel unto Jerusalem to destroy it: and as he was destroying, the LORD beheld, and he repented him of the evil, and said to the angel that destroyed, It is enough, stay now thine hand. And the angel of the LORD stood by the threshingfloor of Ornan the Jebusite.

NoteThe Jebusites were the people who held Jerusalem before David captured it; Ornan is a Jebusite still living on the land after the conquest of his city. A threshing floor was a flat, hard, exposed patch of ground, usually on a rise where the wind could carry off the chaff, which is why it stood outside the built-up city and was visible from a distance.

16David looked up and saw the angel of the LORD standing between heaven and earth, holding a drawn sword in his hand, stretched out over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders of Israel, who were dressed in rough cloth to show their grief, fell facedown on the ground.

16And David lifted up his eyes, and saw the angel of the LORD stand between the earth and the heaven, having a drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders of Israel, who were clothed in sackcloth, fell upon their faces.

NoteSackcloth was coarse dark cloth, normally woven from goat hair, worn next to the skin as a public sign of mourning or of pleading with God. Falling face down was the standard posture of submission before a superior.

17David said to God, "Was it not I who gave the order to count the people? I am the one who sinned and did evil. But these people are like sheep. What have they done? LORD my God, please let your hand fall on me and on my father's family, but not on your people, so they are not struck by this plague."

17And David said unto God, Is it not I that commanded the people to be numbered? even I it is that have sinned and done evil indeed; but as for these sheep, what have they done? let thine hand, I pray thee, O LORD my God, be on me, and on my father’s house; but not on thy people, that they should be plagued.

Note"My father's house" means David's whole household and line of descent, not just his immediate family, in ancient legal thinking a household could be held answerable together.

18Then the angel of the LORD told Gad to say to David that David should go up and set up an altar to the LORD on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

18Then the angel of the LORD commanded Gad to say to David, that David should go up, and set up an altar unto the LORD in the threshingfloor of Ornan the Jebusite.

19So David went up, doing what Gad had told him in the name of the LORD.

19And David went up at the saying of Gad, which he spake in the name of the LORD.

20Ornan was threshing wheat at the time. He turned around and saw the angel, and his four sons who were with him hid themselves.

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

NoteThe same man is called Araunah in the parallel account in 2 Samuel 24. Threshing meant driving oxen over the cut stalks to break the grain loose from the husks.

21As David came to Ornan, Ornan looked up and saw him. He left the threshing floor and bowed down to David with his face to the ground.

21And as David came to Ornan, Ornan looked and saw David, and went out of the threshingfloor, and bowed himself to David with his face to the ground.

22Then David said to Ornan, "Give me the ground where this threshing floor is, so I can build an altar to the LORD on it. Sell it to me for the full price, so the plague on the people will stop."

22Then David said to Ornan, Grant me the place of this threshingfloor, that I may build an altar therein unto the LORD: thou shalt grant it me for the full price: that the plague may be stayed from the people.

NoteInsisting on "the full price" was a legal point as much as a moral one: land acquired by outright purchase, publicly and at market value, could not later be reclaimed by the seller's family, whereas a gift could be disputed.

23Ornan said to David, "Take it, and let my lord the king do whatever seems good to him. Look, I will also give you the oxen for burnt offerings, the threshing sledges for firewood, and the wheat for the grain offering. I give it all."

23And Ornan said unto David, Take it to thee, and let my lord the king do that which is good in his eyes: lo, I give thee the oxen also for burnt offerings, and the threshing instruments for wood, and the wheat for the meat offering; I give it all.

NoteA threshing sledge was a heavy wooden board studded on the underside with sharp stones or iron teeth, dragged over the grain by oxen, bulky enough to make substantial firewood. A burnt offering was an animal burned whole on the altar, with none of it eaten. A grain offering was an offering of flour or grain rather than an animal. Ornan is offering the animals, the fuel, and the grain all at once.

24But King David said to Ornan, "No. I will truly buy it for the full price. I will not take what belongs to you and give it to the LORD, and I will not offer burnt offerings that cost me nothing."

24And king David said to Ornan, Nay; but I will verily buy it for the full price: for I will not take that which is thine for the LORD, nor offer burnt offerings without cost.

25So David paid Ornan six hundred shekels of gold, weighed out, for the site.

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

NoteCoined money did not yet exist, so precious metal was weighed out, hence "weighed out." A shekel was roughly eleven or twelve grams, making six hundred shekels somewhere near fifteen pounds of gold. The parallel account in 2 Samuel 24:24 records a much smaller payment, fifty shekels of silver, for the threshing floor and the oxen.

26David built an altar to the LORD there and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. He called out to the LORD, and the LORD answered him with fire from heaven on the altar of burnt offering.

26And David built there an altar unto the LORD, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings, and called upon the LORD; and he answered him from heaven by fire upon the altar of burnt offering.

NoteA peace offering (sometimes called a fellowship offering) was an animal sacrifice of which only certain portions were burned; the rest was eaten as a shared meal by the worshiper and his household. Fire falling from heaven onto an altar appears elsewhere in the Hebrew scriptures as the recognized sign that an offering had been accepted.

27Then the LORD gave an order to the angel, and the angel put his sword back into its sheath.

27And the LORD commanded the angel; and he put up his sword again into the sheath thereof.

28At that time, when David saw that the LORD had answered him at the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite, he offered sacrifices there.

28At that time when David saw that the LORD had answered him in the threshingfloor of Ornan the Jebusite, then he sacrificed there.

29He did this because the tabernacle of the LORD, the tent Moses had made in the desert, and the altar of burnt offering were at that time at the worship site on the hill at Gibeon.

29For the tabernacle of the LORD, which Moses made in the wilderness, and the altar of the burnt offering, were at that season in the high place at Gibeon.

NoteThe tabernacle was the portable tent-sanctuary built in the wilderness under Moses, the place of national worship before any permanent temple existed. A "high place" was an open-air hilltop shrine; Gibeon lay about six miles northwest of Jerusalem, so the tabernacle and its altar were then a half-day's journey away, while David was standing at a different site altogether.

30But David could not go there to ask God for guidance, because he was afraid of the sword of the angel of the LORD.

30But David could not go before it to enquire of God: for he was afraid because of the sword of the angel of the LORD.

NoteTo "inquire of God" was a formal procedure, putting a question to God through a priest or prophet at a sanctuary and waiting for an answer, not private prayer.