JPS - I Chronicles - 21

21:1  And Satan stood up against Israel, and moved David to number Israel.

21:2  And David said to Joab and to the princes of the people: 'Go, number Israel from Beersheba even to Dan; and bring me word, that I may know the sum of them.'

21:3  And Joab said: 'The HaShem make His people a hundred times so many more as they are; but, my lord the king, are they not all my lord's servants? why doth my lord require this thing? why will he be a cause of guilt unto Israel?'

21:4  Nevertheless the king's word prevailed against Joab. Wherefore Joab departed and went throughout all Israel, and came to Jerusalem.

21:5  And Joab gave up the sum of the numbering of the people unto David. And all they of Israel were a thousand thousand and a hundred thousand men that drew sword; and Judah was four hundred three-score and ten thousand men that drew sword.

21:6  But Levi and Benjamin he did not number among them; for the king's word was abominable to Joab.

21:7  And G-d was displeased with this thing; therefore He smote Israel.

21:8  And David said unto G-d: 'I have sinned greatly, in that I have done this thing; but now, put away, I beseech Thee, the iniquity of Thy servant; for I have done very foolishly.'

21:9  And HaShem spoke unto Gad, David's seer, saying:

21:10  'Go and speak unto David, saying: Thus saith HaShem: I offer thee three things; choose thee one of them, that I may do it unto thee.'

21:11  So Gad came to David, and said unto him: 'Thus saith HaShem: Take which thou wilt:

21:12  either three years of famine; or three months to be swept away before thy foes, while the sword of thine enemies overtaketh thee; or else three days the sword of HaShem, even pestilence in the land, and the angel of HaShem destroying throughout all the borders of Israel. Now therefore consider what answer I shall return to Him that sent me.'

21:13  And David said unto Gad: 'I am in a great strait; let me fall now into the hand of HaShem, for very great are His mercies; and let me not fall into the hand of man.'

21:14  So HaShem sent a pestilence upon Israel; and there fell of Israel seventy thousand men.

21:15  And G-d sent an angel unto Jerusalem to destroy it; and as he was about to destroy, HaShem beheld, and He repented Him of the evil, and said to the destroying angel: 'It is enough; now stay thy hand.' And the angel of HaShem was standing by the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

21:16  And David lifted up his eyes, and saw the angel of HaShem standing between the earth and the heaven, having a drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders, clothed in sackcloth, fell upon their faces.

21:17  And David said unto G-d: 'Is it not I that commanded the people to be numbered? even I it is that have sinned and done very wickedly; but these sheep, what have they done? let Thy hand, I pray Thee, O HaShem my G-d, be against me, and against my father's house; but not against Thy people, that they should be plagued.'

21:18  Then the angel of HaShem commanded Gad to say to David, that David should go up, and rear an altar unto HaShem in the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

21:19  And David went up at the saying of Gad, which he spoke in the name of HaShem.

21:20  And Ornan turned back, and saw the angel; and his four sons that were with him hid themselves. Now Ornan was threshing wheat.

21:21  And as David came to Ornan, Ornan looked and saw David, and went out of the threshing-floor, and bowed down to David with his face to the ground.

21:22  Then David said to Ornan: 'Give me the place of this threshing-floor, that I may build thereon an altar unto HaShem; for the full price shalt thou give it me; that the plague may be stayed from the people.'

21:23  And 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 for burnt-offerings, and the threshing-instruments for wood, and the wheat for the meal-offering; I give it all'

21:24  And 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 HaShem, nor offer a burnt-offering without cost.'

21:25  So David gave to Ornan for the place six hundred shekels of gold by weight.

21:26  And David built there an altar unto HaShem, and offered burnt-offerings and peace-offerings, and called upon HaShem; and He answered him from heaven by fire upon the altar of burnt-offering.

21:27  And HaShem commanded the angel; and he put up his sword back into the sheath thereof.

21:28  At that time, when David saw that HaShem had answered him in the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite, then he sacrificed there.

21:29  For the tabernacle of HaShem, which Moses made in the wilderness, and the altar of burnt-offering, were at that time in the high place at Gibeon.

21:30  But David could not go before it to inquire of G-d; for he was terrified because of the sword of the angel of HaShem.