2 Samuel 22:31–24:25
31 This God—lhis way is perfect;
the mword of the Lord proves true;
he is na shield for all those who take refuge in him.
32 “For who is God, but the Lord?
oAnd who is a rock, except our God?
33 This God is my pstrong refuge
and has made my4 way blameless.5
34 qHe made my feet like the feet of a deer
and set me secure ron the heights.
35 sHe trains my hands for war,
so that my arms can bend a bow of bronze.
36 You have given me the shield of your salvation,
and your gentleness made me great.
37 tYou gave a wide place for my steps under me,
and my feet6 did not slip;
38 I pursued my enemies and destroyed them,
and did not turn back until they were consumed.
39 I consumed them; I thrust them through, so that they did not rise;
they fell uunder my feet.
40 For you equipped me with strength for the battle;
you made vthose who rise against me sink under me.
41 You wmade my enemies turn their backs to me,7
those who hated me, and I destroyed them.
42 They looked, but there was none to save;
they cried to the Lord, but xhe did not answer them.
43 I beat them fine yas the dust of the earth;
I crushed them and stamped them down zlike the mire of the streets.
44 “You delivered me from strife with my people;8
you kept me as the head of athe nations;
bpeople whom I had not known served me.
45 Foreigners came cringing to me;
as soon as they heard of me, they obeyed me.
and came trembling9 cout of their fortresses.
47 “The Lord lives, and blessed be my rock,
and exalted be dmy God, ethe rock of my salvation,
48 the God who gave me vengeance
and fbrought down peoples under me,
49 who brought me out from my enemies;
you exalted me above vthose who rose against me;
you delivered me from gmen of violence.
50 h“For this I will praise you, O Lord, among the nations,
and sing praises to your name.
51 iGreat salvation he brings10 to his king,
and shows steadfast love to jhis anointed,
to David and his offspring kforever.”
23 Now these are the last words of David:
The oracle of David, the son of Jesse,
the oracle of lthe man who was raised on high,
jthe anointed of the God of Jacob,
the sweet psalmist of Israel:1
2 m“The Spirit of the Lord speaks by me;
his word is on my tongue.
3 The God of Israel has spoken;
nthe Rock of Israel has said to me:
When one rules justly over men,
ruling oin the fear of God,
4 he pdawns on them like the morning light,
like the sun shining forth on a cloudless morning,
like rain2 that makes grass to sprout from the earth.
5 “For does not my house stand so with God?
qFor he has made with me an everlasting covenant,
ordered in all things and secure.
For will he not cause to prosper
all my help and my desire?
6 But worthless men3 are all like thorns that are thrown away,
for they cannot be taken with the hand;
7 but the man who touches them
arms himself with iron and the shaft of a spear,
and they are utterly consumed with fire.”4
8 rThese are the names of the mighty men whom David had: sJosheb-basshebeth a Tahchemonite; he was chief of the three.5 He wielded his spear6 against eight hundred whom he killed at one time.
9 And next to him among the three mighty men was Eleazar the son of tDodo, son of uAhohi. He was with David when they defied the Philistines who were gathered there for battle, and the men of Israel withdrew. 10 He rose and struck down the Philistines until his hand was weary, and his hand clung to the sword. And the Lord brought about a great victory that day, and the men returned after him only to strip the slain.
11 And next to him was Shammah, the son of Agee the vHararite. The Philistines gathered together at Lehi,7 where there was a plot of ground full of lentils, and the men fled from the Philistines. 12 But he took his stand in the midst of the plot and defended it and struck down the Philistines, and the Lord worked a great victory.
13 And three of the thirty chief men went down and came about harvest time to David at the wcave of Adullam, when a band of Philistines was encamped xin the Valley of Rephaim. 14 David was then yin the stronghold, and zthe garrison of the Philistines was then at Bethlehem. 15 And David said longingly, “Oh, that someone would give me water to drink from the well of Bethlehem that is by the gate!” 16 Then the three mighty men broke through the camp of the Philistines and drew water out of the well of Bethlehem that was by the gate and carried and brought it to David. But he would not drink of it. He poured it out to the Lord 17 and said, “Far be it from me, O Lord, that I should do this. Shall I drink athe blood of the men who went at the risk of their lives?” Therefore he would not drink it. These things the three mighty men did.
18 Now Abishai, the brother of Joab, the son of Zeruiah, was chief of the thirty.8 And he wielded his spear against three hundred men9 and killed them and won a name beside the three. 19 He was the most renowned of the thirty10 and became their commander, but he did not attain to bthe three.
20 And cBenaiah the son of Jehoiada was a valiant man11 of dKabzeel, a doer of great deeds. He struck down two ariels12 of Moab. He also went down and struck down a lion in a pit on a day when snow had fallen. 21 And he struck down an Egyptian, a handsome man. The Egyptian had a spear in his hand, but Benaiah went down to him with a staff and snatched the spear out of the Egyptian’s hand and killed him with his own spear. 22 These things did Benaiah the son of Jehoiada, and won a name beside the three mighty men. 23 He was renowned among the thirty, but he did not attain to the three. And David set him over his bodyguard.
24 eAsahel the brother of Joab was one of the thirty; Elhanan the son of Dodo of Bethlehem, 25 fShammah of Harod, Elika of Harod, 26 Helez the Paltite, Ira the son of Ikkesh gof Tekoa, 27 Abiezer hof Anathoth, Mebunnai ithe Hushathite, 28 Zalmon jthe Ahohite, Maharai kof Netophah, 29 Heleb the son of Baanah kof Netophah, Ittai the son of Ribai of lGibeah of the people of Benjamin, 30 Benaiah mof Pirathon, Hiddai of the brooks of nGaash, 31 Abi-albon the Arbathite, Azmaveth of oBahurim, 32 Eliahba the Shaalbonite, the sons of Jashen, Jonathan, 33 pShammah the Hararite, Ahiam the son of Sharar the Hararite, 34 Eliphelet the son of Ahasbai qof Maacah, rEliam the son of sAhithophel the Gilonite, 35 Hezro13 tof Carmel, Paarai the Arbite, 36 Igal the son of Nathan uof Zobah, Bani the Gadite, 37 Zelek the Ammonite, Naharai vof Beeroth, the armor-bearer of Joab the son of Zeruiah, 38 wIra the xIthrite, Gareb the Ithrite, 39 yUriah the Hittite: thirty-seven in all.
24 zaAgain the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, b“Go, number Israel and Judah.” 2 So the king said to Joab, the commander of the army,1 who was with him, “Go through all the tribes of Israel, cfrom Dan to Beersheba, and number the people, that I may know the number of the people.” 3 But Joab said to the king, d“May the Lord your God add to the people a hundred times as many as they are, while the eyes of my lord the king still see it, but why does my lord the king delight in this thing?” 4 But the king’s word prevailed against Joab and the commanders of the army. So Joab and the commanders of the army went out from the presence of the king to number the people of Israel. 5 They crossed the Jordan and began from eAroer,2 and from the city that is in the middle of the fvalley, toward Gad and on to gJazer. 6 Then they came to Gilead, and to Kadesh in the land of the Hittites;3 and they came to Dan, and from Dan4 they went around to hSidon, 7 and came to the fortress of Tyre and to all the cities of the iHivites and iCanaanites; and they went out to the Negeb of Judah at Beersheba. 8 So when they had gone through all the land, they came to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days. 9 And Joab gave the sum of the numbering of the people to the king: in Israel there were 800,000 valiant men jwho drew the sword, and the men of Judah were 500,000.
The Lord’s Judgment of David’s Sin
10 But kDavid’s heart struck him after he had numbered the people. And David said to the Lord, l“I have sinned greatly in what I have done. But now, O Lord, please take away the iniquity of your servant, for I have done mvery foolishly.” 11 And when David arose in the morning, the word of the Lord came to nthe prophet Gad, David’s oseer, saying, 12 “Go and say to David, ‘Thus says the Lord, Three things I offer5 you. Choose one of them, that I may do it to you.’ ” 13 So Gad came to David and told him, and said to him, “Shall pthree6 years of famine come to you in your land? Or will you flee three months before your foes while they pursue you? Or shall there be three days’ pestilence in your land? Now consider, and decide what answer I shall return to him who sent me.” 14 Then David said to Gad, “I am in great distress. Let us fall into the hand of the Lord, qfor his mercy is great; but let me not fall into the hand of man.”
15 rSo the Lord sent a pestilence on Israel from the morning until the appointed time. And there died of the people from sDan to Beersheba 70,000 men. 16 And when tthe angel stretched out his hand toward Jerusalem uto destroy it, vthe Lord relented from the calamity and said to the angel uwho was working destruction among the people, “It is enough; now stay your hand.” And tthe angel of the Lord was by the threshing floor of wAraunah the Jebusite. 17 Then David spoke to the Lord when he saw the angel who was striking the people, and said, “Behold, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly. But these sheep, what have they done? Please let your hand be against me and against my father’s house.”
18 And Gad came that day to David and said to him, “Go up, raise an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of xAraunah the Jebusite.” 19 So David went up at Gad’s word, as the Lord commanded. 20 And when Araunah looked down, he saw