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SERIES K --- ISRAEL’S GOLDEN AGE --- LESSON 16

DAVID NUMBERS ISRAEL

DAVID TAKES A CENSUS OF THE PEOPLE

From 2 Samuel 24; 1 Chronicles 21

One day David had the urge to take a census of the people. Although this was not in the best interests of the nation, he summoned Joab, the commander-in-chief of his army and gave him orders to proceed. ‘Go throughout the land and count the people, so that I may know how many men of military age we have,’ David ordered. Joab did not like what the king was doing. ‘May Adonai give you one hundred times as many subjects as you now have,’ Joab said. ‘Why are you trying to learn how many men of military age you have? Is it so you can delight in your strength? That is not right!’ King David however, insisted that the census be taken, so Joab obeyed, sending his men throughout the land from Dan to Beersheba to count the people. After they crossed the Jordan River, they camped at Aroer, south of the city in the middle of the valley in the territory of Gad and then moved to Jazer. From there the census-takers went to Gilead and the land of Tahtim-hodshi, then to Dan-jaan and thence around to Sidon. They moved to Tyre and the cities of the Hivites and Canaanites, then down through Judah to Beersheba. The whole project took nine months and twenty days. When it was completed, Joab brought the figures back to King David at Jerusalem. He reported one million and one hundred-thousand men of military age in Israel, as well as four hundred and seventy thousand in Judah. However, because Joab disagreed with David about the project, he did not include the tribes of Levi and Benjamin. Adonai was displeased with the census and David realized this as soon as it had been completed. In fact, his conscience troubled him so much that he prayed about his foolish decision. ‘Adonai, I have sinned in ordering this census,’ David prayed. ‘Please forgive me for being so foolish and take away my sin.’ The next morning Adonai sent David His answer through the prophet Gad. ‘Tell David that I offer him three choices,’ Adonai told Gad. ‘He may have seven years of famine, three months of defeat by his enemies or three days of plague.’ Gad presented the three choices to David. ‘Decide what you will do,’ he said. ‘Then I will give your decision to Adonai.’ ‘These distresses me greatly,’ David answered. ‘But since I must make a choice, I will place myself at Adonai’s mercy instead of man’s vengeance; I will choose the plague rather than defeat at the hands of my enemies.’ Accordingly, the plague began that very morning and swept across the land for three days, killing seventy thousand people. As the Angel of Death reached out to destroy Jerusalem, Adonai had compassion and told the Angel to stop. ‘Enough!’ Adonai Commanded. ‘Stop!’ David and the elders of Israel were by the threshing floor of Araunah [Oman] the Jebusite when they looked up and saw the Angel of Death with his sword drawn and stretched out toward Jerusalem. David and the elders put on garments made of a coarse cloth called sackcloth to show their repentance and fell to the ground before Adonai. ‘I am the one who ordered this census,’ David said to Adonai. ‘Why are You punishing these innocent people? Send Your punishment on me and my family instead of them.’ The prophet Gad came back to David that same day, bringing a message from the Angel of Adonai. ‘Build an altar to Adonai at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite,’ he commanded. David went immediately to see Araunah. When this man saw the king coming with his men, he fell with his face to the ground before David. ‘Why has the king come here to see his servant?’ he asked. ‘I have come to buy your threshing floor, so that I may build an altar to Adonai and stop the plague,’ David answered. ‘You may have anything I have,’ Araunah told King David. ‘You may take my oxen for the burnt offering and the threshing sledges and ox yokes for the wood. All this I give to you. Now may Adonai accept you favourably.’ ‘I will not take these things as a gift,’ David answered. ‘I will not offer burnt offerings which have cost me nothing. No, I want to buy them from you.’ David paid Araunah six hundred shekels in gold, about six thousand dollars, for his property and built an altar there to Adonai. He presented burnt offerings and peace offerings to Adonai upon the altar. Adonai heeded David’s prayer and answered by sending fire to burn the offerings. Also, He Commanded the Angel to put his sword into its sheath. Realizing that Adonai had answered his prayers at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite, David then presented another offering to Him. The tabernacle and the altar which Moses had made were still located on the hill in Gibeon. David did not have time to go there to pray to Adonai, for he had been terrified by the Angel with the drawn sword.

COMMENTARY

THE CENSUS

In the time of the kings, a census was taken usually for the purposes of taxation. Each district or tribe was taxed and the amount depended on the number of people in the tribe. Solomon divided Israel into twelve districts. The tax officer in charge was responsible for seeing that the district kept the king and his court supplied for one month. This was a heavy tax to pay, since the supplies for only one day were approximately the following: one hundred ninety-five bushels of flour, three hundred ninety bushels of meal, ten oxen, twenty cattle, one hundred sheep, and various other wild animals and fowl. Exactly how a census was taken is unknown. Probably the people were summoned to the district’s main city to enrol. The market, always any city’s busiest place, was set up at the gates and the census takers probably worked from there as well. The census takers began east of the Jordan River in the Arnon Valley, moved northward, then westward and finally to the south. Levi and Benjamin were not enrolled. The totals were given not by district, but for Judah and Israel separately. Although David had welded these two countries together into one kingdom, they still thought of themselves as separate areas.

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