7. They went to the fortress of Tyre and to all the towns of the Hivites and the Canaanites. They went out to Beer-sheba in the arid southern plain of Judah.
8. At the end of nine months and twenty days, after going through the entire country, they came back to Jerusalem.
9. Joab reported to the king the number of the people who had been counted: in Israel there were eight hundred thousand strong men who could handle a sword; in Judah the total was five hundred thousand men.
10. But after this David felt terrible that he had counted the people. David said to the Lord, "I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now, Lord, please take away the guilt of your servant because I have done something very foolish."
11. When David got up the next morning, the Lord’s word came to the prophet Gad, David’s seer:
12. Go and tell David, This is what the Lord says: I’m offering you three punishments. Choose one of them, and that is what I will do to you.
13. So Gad went to David and said to him, "Will three years of famine come on your land? Or will you run from your enemies for three months while they chase you? Or will there be three days of plague in your land? Decide now what answer I should take back to the one who sent me."
14. "I’m in deep trouble," David said to Gad. "Let’s fall into the Lord’s hands because his mercy is great, but don’t let me fall into human hands."
15. So the Lord sent a plague on Israel from that very morning until the allotted time. Seventy thousand people died, from Dan to Beer-sheba.
16. But when the divine messenger stretched out his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the Lord regretted doing this disaster and said to the messenger who was destroying the people, "That’s enough! Withdraw your hand." At that time the Lord’s messenger was by the threshing floor of Araunah from Jebus.