2 Samuel 24
He Would Not Offer What Cost Him Nothing
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David Numbers Israel
24:1The Lord’s anger again blazed against Israel, and He incited David against them, saying, “Go, count Israel and Judah.”
24:2The king said to Joab, the commander of the force who was with him, “Please go through all Israel’s tribes, from Dan to Beersheba, and muster the people, so that I may know the people’s number.”
24:3Joab said to the king, “May the Lord your God add to the people as many as they are, and as many again, a hundredfold, while my lord the king’s eyes see it! But why does my lord the king desire this thing?”
24:4The king’s word prevailed over Joab and the army officers. Joab and the commanders of the force went out from the king’s presence to muster the people Israel.
24:5They crossed the Jordan and camped at Aroer, to the right of the city in the middle of the ravine of Gad and Eliezer,
24:6and came to Gilead and the land of Thabason, which is Adasai; they arrived at Danidan and Oudan and went around to Sidon,
24:7and came to Mapsar of Tyre and all the Hivite and Canaanite cities, and came southward through Judah to Beersheba.
24:8They traveled throughout the whole land and arrived at Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days.
24:9Joab gave the king the number of the people’s muster: Israel had eight hundred thousand men of strength who drew the sword, and Judah had five hundred thousand fighting men.
The Three Choices Set Before David
24:10After David had counted the people, his heart struck him. David said to the Lord, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now, Lord, please take away Your servant’s lawlessness, for I have acted very foolishly.”
24:11David rose in the morning. The Lord’s word came to Gad the prophet, David’s seer, saying,
24:12“Go and speak to David, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord: Three things—I Myself lay them upon you. Choose one of them for yourself, and I will do it to you.’”
24:13Gad entered David’s presence and told him, saying, “Choose for yourself what shall happen: whether three years of famine come upon you in your land, or you flee three months before your enemies and they pursue you, or there are three days of death in your land. Now therefore consider and see what answer I should give the One who sent me.”
24:14David said to Gad, “I am greatly hemmed in on every side. I will fall into the Lord’s hand, for His compassions are very many; I certainly will not fall into human hands.” David chose death for himself.
The Angel at Jerusalem
24:15It was the time of the wheat harvest. The Lord sent death upon Israel from morning until the time of the morning meal; the devastation began among the people, and seventy thousand men of the people died from Dan to Beersheba.
24:16God’s angel stretched his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, but the Lord relented concerning the calamity and said to the angel destroying the people, “Enough! Now withdraw your hand.” The Lord’s angel was beside the threshing floor of Orna the Jebusite.
24:17When David saw the angel striking the people, he spoke to the Lord and said, “Look, I myself have done wrong; I, the shepherd, have done evil. But these sheep—what have they done? Please let Your hand be against me and my father’s house.”
David Buys the Threshing Floor of Orna
24:18Gad came to David that day and said to him, “Go up and establish an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of Orna the Jebusite.”
24:19David went up according to Gad’s word, as the Lord had commanded him.
24:20Orna bent forward and saw the king and his servants passing toward him. Orna went out and bowed to the king with his face to the ground.
24:21Orna said, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?” David said, “To acquire the threshing floor from you, to build an altar to the Lord, so that the devastation may be restrained from the people.”
24:22Orna said to David, “Let my lord the king take and offer to the Lord what is good in his eyes. Look: the oxen for the whole burnt offering, and the wheels and oxen’s equipment for wood.”
24:23Orna gave everything to the king. Orna said to the king, “May the Lord your God bless you.”
24:24The king said to Orna, “No! I will certainly acquire it from you in exchange; I will not offer the Lord my God a whole burnt offering that costs me nothing.” David acquired the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.
24:25David built an altar to the Lord there and offered whole burnt offerings and peace offerings. Solomon enlarged the altar afterward, because it had been small at first. The Lord listened to the land, and the devastation was restrained from Israel.
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Saints Translation · Liturgical reading edition · V2 · working draft awaiting specialist review.