1 Chronicles 21

And an adversary stood up against Israel and incited David to number Israel.

And King David said to Joab and to the rulers of the army, "Go, number Israel from Beersheba even to Dan, and bring word to me, that I may know their number."

And Joab said, "May the Lord add to his people a hundredfold as many as they are; and the eyes of my lord the king are looking on—all of them are servants to my lord. Why does my lord seek this thing, lest it become a sin for Israel?"

But the word of the king prevailed over Joab, and Joab went out and passed through all the territory of Israel, and he came to Jerusalem.

And Joab gave the number of the registration of the people to David; and all Israel was one thousand thousands and one hundred thousand men who drew the sword, and Judah was four hundred and eighty thousand men who drew the sword.

But he did not number Levi and Benjamin among them, because the word of the king overpowered Joab.

And concerning this matter it appeared evil before God, and he struck Israel.

And David said to God, "I have sinned exceedingly, because I did this thing. And now take away, I pray, the wickedness of your servant, for I have acted very foolishly."

And the Lord spoke to Gad, David's seer, saying,

"Go and speak to David, saying, 'Thus says the Lord: Three things I lift up against you; choose for yourself one of them, and I will do it to you.'"

And Gad came to David and said to him, "Thus says the Lord: Choose for yourself—

either three years of famine, or three months of fleeing from before your enemies with the sword of your enemies destroying you, or three days of the sword of the Lord and death in the land, with the angel of the Lord destroying in all the inheritance of Israel. And now see what word I shall answer to the one who sent me."

And David said to Gad, "All three are exceedingly hard for me. Let me fall into the hands of the Lord, for his compassions are exceedingly many; but into the hands of men let me not fall."

And the Lord sent death upon Israel, and there fell of Israel seventy thousand men.

And God sent an angel to Jerusalem to destroy it; and as he was destroying, the Lord saw and relented concerning the evil, and said to the angel who was destroying, "Let it be enough for you; relax your hand." And the angel of the Lord was standing at the threshing floor of Orna the Jebusite.

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

And David said to God, "Was it not I who said to number the people? And I am the one who sinned; doing evil I have done evil. But these sheep, what have they done? O Lord God, let your hand be against me and against my father's house, and not against your people for destruction, O Lord."

And the angel of the Lord told Gad to say to David that he should go up to set up an altar to the Lord at the threshing floor of Orna the Jebusite.

And David went up according to the word of Gad which he spoke in the name of the Lord.

And Orna turned and saw the king, and his four sons with him, methachabin; and Orna was threshing wheat.

And David came to Ornan, and Orna went out from the threshing floor and did obeisance to David with his face to the ground.

And David said to Orna, "Give me your place of the threshing floor, and I will build on it an altar to the Lord; for its worthy price give it to me, and the plague will cease from the people."

And Orna said to David, "Take it for yourself, and let my lord the king do what is good before him. See, I have given the oxen for a whole burnt offering, and the plow and the wagons for wood, and the wheat for a sacrifice; all of it I have given."

And King David said to Orna, "No; for buying I will buy it for its worthy price, for I will not take what is yours for the Lord, to offer up a whole burnt offering to the Lord for nothing."

And David gave to Orna for his place shekels of gold, six hundred by weight.

And David built there an altar to the Lord and offered up whole burnt offerings and offerings of deliverance, and he cried out to the Lord, and he answered him with fire from heaven upon the altar of the whole burnt offering, and it consumed the whole burnt offering.

And the Lord spoke to the angel, and he put back the sword into the sheath.

At that time, when David saw that the Lord had answered him at the threshing floor of Orna the Jebusite, he sacrificed there.

And the tent of the Lord which Moses made in the wilderness, and the altar of the whole burnt offerings, were at that time in Bama in Gabaon.

But David was not able to go before it to seek God, because he had hurried away from before the sword of the angel of the Lord.