1Then Satan stands up against Israel, and persuades David to number Israel, 2and David says to Joab and to the heads of the people, “Go, number Israel from Beer-Sheba even to Dan, and bring [the account] to me, and I know their number.” 3And Joab says, “YHWH adds to His people as they are one hundred times; are they not, my lord, O king, all of them for servants to my lord? Why does my lord seek this? Why is he for a cause of guilt to Israel?” 4And the word of the king [is] severe against Joab, and Joab goes out, and goes up and down in all Israel, and comes to Jerusalem. 5And Joab gives the account of the numbering of the people to David, and all Israel is one million and one hundred thousand, each drawing sword, and Judah [is] four hundred and seventy thousand, each drawing sword. 6And he has not numbered Levi and Benjamin in their midst, for the word of the king was abominable with Joab.

7And it is evil in the eyes of God concerning this thing, and He strikes Israel, 8and David says to God, “I have sinned exceedingly in that I have done this thing; and now, please cause the iniquity of Your servant to pass away, for I have acted very foolishly.”

9And YHWH speaks to Gad, seer of David, saying, 10“Go, and you have spoken to David, saying, Thus said YHWH: I am extending three [choices] to you; choose one of these for yourself, and I do [it] to you.” 11And Gad comes to David and says to him, “Thus said YHWH: Take for yourself— 12either famine for three years, or three months to be consumed from the face of your adversaries (even [for] the sword of your enemies to overtake), or three days of the sword of YHWH (even pestilence in the land, and a messenger of YHWH destroying in all the border of Israel); and now, see; what word do I return to Him who is sending me?” 13And David says to Gad, “I am greatly distressed, please let me fall into the hand of YHWH, for His mercies [are] very many, and do not let me fall into the hand of man.”

14And YHWH gives a pestilence in Israel, and there falls from Israel seventy thousand men, 15and God sends a messenger to Jerusalem to destroy it, and as he is destroying, YHWH has seen, and is comforted concerning the calamity, and says to the messenger who [is] destroying, “Enough now, cease your hand.” And the messenger of YHWH is standing by the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite, 16and David lifts up his eyes, and sees the messenger of YHWH standing between the earth and the heavens, and his sword [is] drawn in his hand, stretched out over Jerusalem, and David falls, and the elderly, covered with sackcloth, on their faces. 17And David says to God, “Did I not command to number the people? Indeed, it [is] I who have sinned, and done great evil: and these, the flock, what did they do? O YHWH, my God, please let Your hand be on me, and on the house of my father, and not on Your people—to be plagued.”

18And the messenger of YHWH commanded to Gad to say to David, “Surely David goes up to raise an altar to YHWH in the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite.” 19And David goes up by the word of Gad, that he spoke in the Name of YHWH. 20And Ornan turns back and sees the messenger, and his four sons [are] with him hiding themselves, and Ornan is threshing wheat. 21And David comes to Ornan, and Ornan looks attentively and sees David, and goes out from the threshing-floor, and bows himself to David—face to the earth. 22And David says to Ornan, “Give the place of the threshing-floor to me, and I build an altar to YHWH in it; give it to me for full price, and the plague is restrained from the people.” 23And Ornan says to David, “Take [it] to yourself, and my lord the king does that which is good in his eyes; see, I have given the oxen for burnt-offerings, and the threshing instruments for wood, and the wheat for a present; I have given the whole.” 24And King David says to Ornan, “No, for I surely buy [it] for full price; for I do not lift up that which is yours to YHWH, so as to offer a burnt-offering without cost.” 25And David gives to Ornan six hundred shekels of gold [in] weight for the place; 26and David builds an altar to YHWH there, and offers burnt-offerings and peace-offerings, and calls to YHWH, and He answers him from the heavens with fire on the altar of the burnt-offering. 27And YHWH speaks to the messenger, and he turns back his sword to its sheath.

28At that time, when David sees that YHWH has answered him in the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite, then he sacrifices there; 29and the Dwelling Place of YHWH that Moses made in the wilderness, and the altar of the burnt-offering, [are] at that time at a high place in Gibeon; 30and David is not able to go before it to seek God, for he has been afraid because of the sword of the messenger of YHWH.