2 Samuel 24

¹ And the anger of Yahweh adds to burn against Israel, and [an adversary] moves David about them, saying, "Go, number Israel and Judah." ² And the king said unto Joab, head of the host that [is] with him, "Go to and fro, I pray you, through all the tribes of Israel, from Dan even unto Beer-Sheba, and inspect you the people - and I have known the number of the people." ³ And Joab said unto the king, "Yea, Yahweh your Elohim does add unto the people, as they are, a hundred times, and the eyes of my lord the king are seeing; and my lord the king, why is he desirous of this thing?" ⁴ And the word of the king is severe towards Joab, and against the heads of the force, and Joab goes out, and the heads of the force, [from] before the king to inspect the people, even Israel; ⁵ and they pass over the Jordan, and encamp in Aroer, on the right of the city that [is] in the midst of the brook of Gad, and unto Jazer, ⁶ and they come in to Gilead, and unto the land of Tahtim-Hodshi, and they come in to Dan-Jaan, and round about unto Zidon, ⁷ and they come in to the fortress of Tyre, and all the cities of the Hivite, and of the Canaanite, and go out unto the south of Judah, to Beer-Sheba. ⁸ And they go to and fro through all the land, and come in at the end of nine months and twenty days to Jerusalem, ⁹ and Joab gives the account of the inspection of the people unto the king, and Israel is eight hundred thousand men of valor, drawing sword, and the men of Judah five hundred thousand men. ¹⁰ And the heart of David smites him, after that he has numbered the people, and David said unto Yahweh, "I have sinned greatly in that which I have done, and now, O Yahweh, cause to pass away, I pray You, the iniquity of Your servant, for I have acted very foolishly." ¹¹ And David rises in the morning, and the word of Yahweh has been unto Gad the prophet, seer of David, saying, ¹² "Go, and you have spoken unto David, Thus said Yahweh: Three - I am lifting up for you, choose you one of them, and I do [it] to you." ¹³ And Gad comes in unto David, and declares to him, and said to him, "Do seven years of famine come in to you in your land? or three months are you fleeing before your adversary - and he pursuing you? or are three days' pestilence in your land? now, know and see what word I take back to Him sending me." ¹⁴ And David said unto Gad, "I have great distress, let us fall, I pray you, into the hand of Yahweh, for many [are] His mercies, and into the hand of man let me not fall." ¹⁵ And Yahweh gives a pestilence on Israel from the morning even unto the time appointed, and there die of the people, from Dan even unto Beer-Sheba, seventy thousand men, ¹⁶ and the messenger puts forth his hand to Jerusalem to destroy it, and Yahweh repents concerning the evil, and said to the messenger who is destroying among the people, "Enough, now, cease your hand"; and the messenger of Yahweh was near the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite. ¹⁷ And David speaks unto Yahweh, when he sees the messenger who is smiting among the people, and said, "Lo, I have sinned, yea, I have done perversely; and these - the flock - what have they done? Let, I pray You, Your hand be on me, and on the house of my father." ¹⁸ And Gad comes in unto David on that day, and said to him, "Go up, raise to Yahweh an altar in the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite"; ¹⁹ and David goes up, according to the word of Gad, as Yahweh commanded. ²⁰ And Araunah looks, and sees the king and his servants passing over unto him, and Araunah goes out and bows himself to the king - his face to the earth. ²¹ And Araunah said, "Wherefore has my lord the king come unto his servant?" and David said, "To buy from you the threshing-floor, to build an altar to Yahweh, and the plague is restrained from the people." ²² And Araunah said unto David, "Let my lord the king take and cause to ascend that which is good in his eyes; see, the oxen for a burnt-offering, and the threshing instruments, and the instruments of the oxen, for wood"; ²³ the whole has Araunah given, [as] a king to a king; and Araunah said unto the king, "Yahweh your Elohim does accept you." ²⁴ And the king said unto Araunah, "Nay, for I do surely buy from you for a price, and I do not cause to ascend to Yahweh my Elohim burnt-offerings for nought"; and David buys the threshing-floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver, ²⁵ and David builds there an altar to Yahweh, and causes to ascend burnt-offerings and peace-offerings, and Yahweh is entreated for the land, and the plague is restrained from Israel.