1Again the anger of Yahweh was kindled against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, “Go, count Israel and Judah.”
2So the king said to Joab the commander of the army who was with him, “Go about now through all the tribes of Israel, from Dan to Beersheba, and register the people, so that I may know the number of the people.”
3But Joab said to the king, “May Yahweh your God add to the people a hundred times as many as they are, while the eyes of my lord the king still see it—but why does my lord the king delight in this thing?”
4Yet the king’s word prevailed against Joab and against the commanders of the army. So Joab and the commanders of the army went out from before the king to register the people, Israel.
5They crossed the Jordan and camped at Aroer, to the south of the city that is in the middle of the valley of Gad, and on to Jazer.
6Then they came to Gilead and to the land of Tahtim-hodshi, and they came to Dan-jaan and around toward Sidon.
7They came to the fortress of Tyre and to all the cities of the Hivites and the Canaanites, and they went out to the Negev of Judah, to Beersheba.
8So they went about through all the land, and at the end of nine months and twenty days they came to Jerusalem.
9Joab gave the number of the registration of the people to the king: Israel amounted to eight hundred thousand valiant men who drew the sword, and the men of Judah were five hundred thousand men.
10But David’s heart struck him after he had counted the people, and David said to Yahweh, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done. And now, O Yahweh, please take away the iniquity of your servant, for I have acted very foolishly.”
11When David rose in the morning, the word of Yahweh came to Gad the prophet, David’s seer, saying,
12“Go and speak to David: ‘Thus says Yahweh: I am laying three things upon you. Choose one of them for yourself, and I will do it to you.’”
13So Gad came to David and told him, and he said to him, “Shall seven years of famine come to you in your land? Or three months of fleeing before your foes while they pursue you? Or shall there be three days of pestilence in your land? Now consider and see what answer I shall bring back to the one who sent me.”
14David said to Gad, “I am in great distress. Let us fall into the hand of Yahweh, for his mercies are many, but do not let me fall into the hand of man.”
15So Yahweh sent a pestilence upon Israel from the morning until the appointed time, and seventy thousand men of the people died, from Dan to Beersheba.
16But when the angel stretched out his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, Yahweh relented concerning the disaster and said to the angel who was destroying the people, “Enough! Now stay your hand.” And the angel of Yahweh was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
17When David saw the angel who was striking the people, he said to Yahweh, “Behold, I am the one who has sinned, and I am the one who has done wrong; but these sheep—what have they done? Let your hand, please, be against me and against my father’s house.”
18That day Gad came to David and said to him, “Go up, raise an altar to Yahweh on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.”
19So David went up according to the word of Gad, as Yahweh had commanded.
20When Araunah looked down and saw the king and his servants crossing over toward him, Araunah went out and bowed before the king with his face to the ground.
21Araunah said, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?” David said, “To buy the threshing floor from you, in order to build an altar to Yahweh, so that the plague may be held back from the people.”
22Araunah said to David, “Let my lord the king take and offer up whatever is good in his eyes. See, here are the oxen for the burnt offering, and the threshing sledges and the yokes of the oxen for the wood.
23All this, O king, Araunah gives to the king.” And Araunah said to the king, “May Yahweh your God accept you.”
24But the king said to Araunah, “No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price. I will not offer up to Yahweh my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.
25Then David built there an altar to Yahweh and offered up burnt offerings and peace offerings. And Yahweh was entreated for the land, and the plague was held back from Israel.
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