24 Then Yahweh was angry against Yisrael again and he incited David to cause problems for them by saying, “Go and order a census of Yisrael and Yehudah.” 2 So the king told Yoav, the commander of his army, who was with him at the time, “Travel throughout all the regions of the Israeli tribes, from Dan (in the far north) down to Beer-Sheva (in the far south), and count the people so that I’ll know the number of fighting men.”

3 “May your god Yahweh multiply the people a hundred times over,” Yoav responded, “add may my master the king see that happen, but why would my master the king want to do that?” 4 However, the king insisted, so even though Yoav and the army commanders disagreed, at the king’s command they set off to count the Israeli people.

5 They crossed the Yordan river and camped in Aroer, south of the city in the middle of the Gad valley, then proceeded to Yazer. 6 Then they went north to Gilead and the land of Tahtim-Hodshi, before coming to Dan-Yaan and around to Tsidon. 7 Then they came to the Tsor (Tyre) fortress and all the cities of the Hivites and the Canaanites before going east to Be’er-Sheva in the Negev wilderness (part of Yehudah). 8 So they travelled throughout the land for nine months and twenty days before returning to Yerushalem. 9 Then Yoav reported the census results to the king: 800,000 fighting swordsmen in Yisrael, and 500,000 in Yehudah.

10 However, David had a guilty conscience after he’d had the people counted and he told Yahweh, “I’ve disobeyed you badly, but now, Yahweh, please take away the iniquity of your servant because I’ve been very foolish.”

11 When David got up in the morning, Yahweh gave the prophet Gad this message 12 to take to David, “I, Yahweh, am offering you three choices. You decide which one I should carry out against you.” 13 Then Gad asked him, “Do you want seven years of famine in your country, or three months of fleeing from your enemies, or three days of plague in your country? Consider those and let me know which option to pass back to the one who sent me.”

14 David answered Gad, “This is very distressing, but please let Yahweh be the one to punish me because he’s very merciful—don’t let other men be the ones.”

15 So Yahweh sent a plague to Yisrael from the morning and until the time he’d decided. Seventy thousand people died from Dan in the north down to Beer-Sheva in the south. 16 When Yahweh’s messenger stretched out his hand to destroy Yerushalem with the plague, Yahweh relented concerning the disaster and told the messenger who was destroying many people, “Now lower your hand.” When he said that, his messenger was near the threshing floor of Aravnah the Yebusite.

17 David had complained to Yahweh when he saw the messenger afflicting the people, saying, “Listen, it’s me alone who sinned, and I myself who disobeyed you. But these innocent people—what have they done? Please, just punish only me and my relatives.”