Chapter XXI
1–27 (= 2 Samuel xxiv. 1–25).
The Numbering and the Plague.
Comparison of these verses with the account given in Samuel discloses not a few interesting divergences, the more important of which are pointed out in the notes below (see especially the notes on verses 1, 6, 25). In general it may be said that the account in Chronicles curtails any features reflecting discredit on David and expands such as do him honour. Some scholars consider that the changes are of such a character that they may all be due directly to the Chronicler, but others see in them motives so various as to suggest the opinion that the Chronicler’s source is not Samuel but an intermediate source. There may be a measure of truth in both contentions. So famous a tale may well have been recounted with modifications in the telling to suit the later idealisation of David. The Chronicler may therefore have been working from the text of Samuel, but some of the changes he introduced may have been generally current, and for these he is in a sense not immediately responsible, although of course all were more or less in accordance with his taste.
The subject of the present section (David’s numbering of the people and the plague which followed) is interesting in itself, quite apart from the comparison with Samuel Why was the census considered a sin? Various replies may be made. (1) Because the pride of David and the ambitions which the census might promote revealed a transference of trust from God to self, from spirit to numbers, from justice to power. This view accords with our modern moralistic standpoint, but other considerations call for mention. (2) Because, unlike the two numberings in the wilderness (Numbers i. 1–16, iii. 39, xxvi. 1–65), it was not made by Divine command (compare verse 1, note). This thought may well have been present in the mind of the Chronicler. To it we may add (3) the popular dread of the census as a sinister and unlucky act. The ground of this dread was no doubt mainly practical, being due to the fear that the records might be used for purposes of fresh taxation or more stringent war-levies, but it may have its roots in an instinct, handed down from the thoughts of primitive ages, when written records were an uncanny mystery. Thus S. I. Curtiss, Primitive Semitic Religion To-day, p. 69, remarks that the persistence of this fear among modern Semites is partially chargeable for the lack of correct statistics as to the population of Oriental towns. Frazer (in Anthropological Essays to E. B. Tylor, p. 174) refers to the dread of enumeration felt by the Lapps and by a West African tribe.
¹And Satan¹ stood up against Israel, and moved David to number Israel.
¹ Or, an adversary.
1. And Satan stood up against Israel] In 2 Samuel “And again (a former occasion being at the time of the famine, 2 Samuel xxi. 1) the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he moved David against them.” The change is significant of the late date of Chronicles In an earlier stage of Hebrew thought human sin and folly are at times naïvely ascribed to the agency of God, e.g. “He hardens Pharaoh’s heart” (Exodus x. 1, etc.): “quem Deus vult perdere prius dementat.” At a later date the instigation of some subordinate “evil” spirit was adduced, e.g. 1 Kings xxii. 20–24; and eventually this spirit of temptation was expressly termed “The Satan” or “Satan,” i.e. “The Adversary.” He was then regarded as a hostile spiritual being, the opposite of a guardian angel such as the Michael of Daniel x. 13, 21, xii. 1. In the book of Job the Satan is very definitely said to act under the guidance and will of God. Here nothing is said of the Satan having been directed by Jehovah.
to number] Only those of military age (verse 5), over twenty years of age (xxvii. 23, 24), were included in the census.
²And David said to Joab and to the princes of the people, Go, number Israel from Beer-sheba even to Dan; and bring me word, that I may know the sum of them.
2. to Joab] The object being to number “those who drew sword,” the captain of the host was the most suitable person to entrust with the business.
from Beer-sheba even to Dan] From the extreme south to the extreme north of the land.
Dan] The modern Tell el-Kādī, about forty minutes distance from Bāniās (Paneas), north of Lake Huleh (Waters of Merom). For its original name Laish, see Judges xviii. 28.
that I may know] Either with a view to imposing a tax or to undertaking some fresh great military expedition.
³And Joab said, The Lord make his people an hundred times so many more as they be: 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?
3. The Lord make... are they not all my lord’s servants?] Counting will not increase their numbers, only Jehovah’s gracious favour can secure that. What more then can David desire than to know, as Joab now assures him, that one and all his subjects are loyal?
why will he be a cause of guilt unto Israel?] Compare Leviticus iv. 3, “if the anointed priest shall sin so as to bring guilt on the people” (Revised Version). The community is a unit, and the guilt of one falls on all.
⁴Nevertheless the king’s word prevailed against Joab. Wherefore Joab departed, and went throughout all Israel, and came to Jerusalem.
4. came to Jerusalem] In 2 Samuel xxiv. 4–8 the route is described and the time taken in the numbering is stated, nine months and twenty days.
⁵And Joab gave up the sum of the numbering of the people unto David. And all they of Israel were a thousand thousand and an hundred thousand men that drew sword: and Judah was four hundred threescore and ten thousand men that drew sword.
5. they of Israel] Chronicles gives Israel as 1,100,000 and Judah as 470,000; 2 Samuel gives Israel as 800,000 and Judah as 500,000. It is difficult to correlate these figures. There are, however, reasons for thinking that the last part of the verse and Judah was 470,000, etc., may be a gloss. If so, then the 200,000 less in Chronicles (1,300,000 in Samuel; 1,100,000 in Chronicles, where Israel would as so often denote both Israel and Judah) might well be explained as an allowance for the exclusion of Levi and Benjamin (see verse 6).
that drew sword] All males over twenty years of age; compare Numbers i. 20.
⁶But Levi and Benjamin counted he not among them: for the king’s word was abominable to Joab.
6. Levi] In Numbers i. 49 it is ordained that Levi is not to be numbered among the children of Israel, i.e. treated as liable to military service. The Levites were, however, numbered separately: Numbers iii. 15, xxvi. 57. In 2 Samuel there is nothing to correspond with this verse, Levi and Benjamin being there reckoned in the census. Why the Chronicler excludes Benjamin as well as Levi it is not easy to see.
⁷And God was displeased with this thing; therefore he smote Israel.
7. he smote Israel] with the plague.
⁸And David said unto God, 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.
8. put away... the iniquity] Render perhaps, remove the punishment; compare Genesis iv. 13, Revised Version with margin: also 1 Samuel xxviii. 10.
⁹And the Lord spake unto Gad, David’s seer, saying,
9. And the Lord spake] The historian now retraces his steps to describe the circumstances which heralded the approach of the plague.
Gad] He is three times mentioned in Chronicles, each time as a “seer,” viz. xxi. 9 (= 2 Samuel xxiv. 11); xxix. 29; 2 Chronicles xxix. 25. He was perhaps an older contemporary of Nathan, who bears the more modern title of “prophet” (compare 1 Samuel ix. 9).
¹⁰Go and speak unto David, saying, Thus saith the Lord, I offer¹ thee three things; choose thee one of them, that I may do it unto thee. ¹¹So Gad came to David, and said unto him, Thus saith the Lord, Take which thou wilt;
¹ Hebrew stretch out unto.
10. I offer thee three things] The offer is a test of David’s character, just as God’s different offer in 2 Chronicles i. 7 was a test of Solomon’s.
¹²either three years of famine; or three months to be consumed before thy foes, while that the sword of thine enemies overtaketh thee; or else three days the sword of the Lord, even¹ pestilence in the land, and the angel of the Lord destroying throughout all the coasts of Israel. Now therefore consider what answer I shall return to him that sent me.
¹ Or, and.
12. three years of famine] 2 Samuel, seven years of famine (LXX. however three, as Chronicles).
three months to be consumed] The correct text, however, is probably that found in 2 Samuel xxiv. 13, or wilt thou flee three months?
the angel of the Lord] Compare 2 Kings xix. 35; Acts xii. 23.
coasts] Render, borders, i.e. through the whole land.
¹³And David said unto Gad, I am in a great strait: let me fall now into the hand of the Lord; for very great¹ are his mercies: and let me not fall into the hand of man.
¹ Or, many.
13. into the hand of the Lord] The answer reveals the sincerity and efficacy of David’s penitence: a right spirit is renewed within him. He now chooses to trust in God.
¹⁴So the Lord sent a pestilence upon Israel: and there fell of Israel seventy thousand men.
14. there fell of Israel] 2 Samuel adds, from Dan even to Beer-sheba. The pestilence was throughout the whole land.
¹⁵And God sent an angel unto Jerusalem to destroy it: and as he was about to destroy, the Lord beheld, and he repented him of the evil, and said to the destroying angel, It is enough; now stay thine hand. And the angel of the Lord stood by the threshing-floor of Ornan¹ the Jebusite.
¹ In 2 Samuel xxiv. 16, &c., Araunah.
15. unto Jerusalem] The peril of the plague extends until Jerusalem itself is threatened.
he repented him] Compare Genesis vi. 6; 1 Samuel xv. 11, 35; Jonah iii. 10, etc.
It is enough] The sudden cessation of this pestilence has numerous parallels in the history of epidemics.
the threshing-floor of Ornan] The Chronicler makes this threshing-floor the site of the Temple. The author of Samuel is silent on the point. Compare notes on verses 25, 28, and especially xxii. 1.
Ornan] This is the form of the name throughout this chapter, but in 2 Samuel xxiv. the Ḳerī gives everywhere Araunah. The Kethīb of Samuel, however, offers various forms, one of which (to be read Ornah, verse 16) approximates to the form given in Chronicles Variation in reproducing foreign names is common; see note on xviii. 5 (Damascus), and on 2 Chronicles xxxvi. 6 (Nebuchadnezzar).
¹⁶And David lifted up his eyes, and saw the angel of the Lord stand 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.
16. saw the angel] The full description of the vision is peculiar to Chronicles; compare 2 Samuel xxiv. 17.
and the elders, clothed in sackcloth] The wearing of sackcloth was doubtless accompanied by fasting; compare Jonah iii. 5.
¹⁷And David said unto God, 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 thine hand, I pray thee, O Lord my God, be against me, and against my father’s house; but not against thy people, that they should be plagued. ¹⁸Then the angel of the Lord commanded Gad to say to David, that David should go up, and rear an altar unto the Lord in the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite. ¹⁹And David went up at the saying of Gad, which he spake in the name of the Lord.
17. let thine hand... be against me] Compare Moses’ intercession in Exodus xxxii. 32; but Moses was innocent, David guilty.
²⁰And Ornan turned back, and saw the angel; and his four sons that were with him hid themselves. Now Ornan was threshing wheat.
20. hid themselves] in fear, lest they too should see the angel of Jehovah and their lives be thereby imperilled, compare Judges vi. 22, xiii. 22.
²¹And as David came to Ornan, Ornan looked and saw David, and went out of the threshing-floor, and bowed himself to David with his face to the ground.
21. was threshing wheat] By driving oxen over it; compare verse 23.
²²Then David said to Ornan, Give me the place of this threshing-floor, that I may build thereon an altar unto the Lord: for the full price shalt thou give it me: that the plague may be stayed from the people.
22. the place of this threshing-floor] The expression implies perhaps that David bought more than the mere area of the threshing-floor.
for the full price] Genesis xxiii. 9 (Revised Version).
²³And 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. ²⁴And 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 the Lord, nor offer a burnt offering without cost.
23. the meal offering] Compare Leviticus ii. 1–16.
²⁵So David gave to Ornan for the place six hundred shekels of gold by weight.
25. gave... for the place six hundred shekels of gold by weight] In 2 Samuel xxiv. 24, bought the threshing-floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver. The huge discrepancy here between Chronicles and Samuel is noteworthy. If the price in Samuel, 50 shekels of silver for threshing-floor and oxen, seems somewhat small (compared with the 400 shekels paid by Abraham for the cave of Machpelah, Genesis xxiii. 15–17), the 600 shekels of gold in Chronicles is extravagantly large. It is accounted for by the fact that the Chronicler regarded the transaction, not as the acquisition merely of the site for the altar but of the area on which the Temple was afterwards built (see verse 22). No sum could well seem too large for the purchase of ground destined to be so holy. The figure 600 may have been chosen on the ground that it was equal to a payment of 50 shekels for each tribe.
²⁶And David built there an altar unto the Lord, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings, and called upon the Lord; and he answered him from heaven by fire upon the altar of burnt offering. ²⁷And the Lord commanded the angel; and he put up his sword again into the sheath thereof.
26. peace offerings] See xvi. 1, note. At the end of the verse LXX. (compare Peshitṭa) adds, and consumed the burnt offering. Compare Leviticus ix. 24; 1 Kings xviii. 38. The fire is not mentioned in 2 Samuel.
Chapter XXI. 28–Chapter XXII. 1.
The Selection of the Site of the Temple.
²⁸At that time, when David saw that the Lord had answered him in the threshing-floor of Ornan the Jebusite, then he sacrificed there.
28. At that time, etc.] The construction of this section must be carefully noted. chapter xxi. 28 is continued by chapter xxii. i, verses 29, 30 of chapter xxi. being a parenthesis. The division of chapters here is unfortunate.
At that time] The phrase is taken up by “Then” of xxii. 1. The Chronicler wishes us to note that David regarded the success of his intercession at the floor of Ornan as an indication that this floor was God’s approved site for the Temple.
²⁹For the tabernacle of the Lord, which Moses made in the wilderness, and the altar of burnt offering, were at that time in the high place at Gibeon.
29. For] The beginning of a parenthesis.
the tabernacle of the Lord] See the prefatory note to chapter xiii.; also compare xvi. 1, 39, and 2 Chronicles i. 3.
³⁰But David could not go before it to inquire of God: for he was afraid because of the sword of the angel of the Lord.
30. he was afraid] Or, he was terrified. The Hebrew word is unusual.