1 Chronicles 21:21-30

21:21 When David came to Ornan, Ornan looked and saw David; he came out from the threshing floor and bowed to David with his face ¹  to the ground. 21:22 David said to Ornan, “Sell me the threshing floor ²  so I can build ³  on it an altar for the Lord – I’ll pay top price ⁴  – so that the plague may be removed ⁵  from the people.” 21:23 Ornan told David, “You can have it! ⁶  My master, the king, may do what he wants. ⁷  Look, I am giving you the oxen for burnt sacrifices, the threshing sledges for wood, and the wheat for an offering. I give it all to you.” 21:24 King David replied to Ornan, “No, I insist on buying it for top price. ⁸  I will not offer to the Lord what belongs to you or offer a burnt sacrifice ⁹  that cost me nothing. ¹⁰  21:25 So David bought the place from Ornan for 600 pieces of gold. ¹¹  21:26 David built there an altar to the Lord and offered burnt sacrifices and peace offerings. ¹²  He called out to the Lord, and the Lord ¹³  responded by sending fire from the sky and consuming the burnt sacrifice on the altar. 21:27 The Lord ordered the messenger ¹⁴  to put his sword back into its sheath.

21:28 At that time, when David saw that the Lord responded to him at the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite, he sacrificed there. 21:29 Now the Lord’s tabernacle (which Moses had made in the wilderness) and the altar for burnt sacrifices were at that time at the worship center ¹⁵  in Gibeon. 21:30 But David could not go before it to seek God’s will, for he was afraid of the sword of the Lord’s messenger.

¹ tn Heb “nostrils.”

² tn Heb “the place of the threshing floor.”

³ tn Following the imperative, the prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) conjunctive here indicates the immediate purpose/result: “so I can build.”

⁴ tn Heb “For full silver sell to me.”

⁵ tn Following the imperative and first person prefixed verbal form with vav (ו) conjunctive, this third person prefixed verbal form with vav conjunctive introduces the ultimate purpose/result: “so the plague may be removed.” Another option is subordinate this form to the preceding imperative, but the latter may be taken as a parenthetical expansion of the initial request.

³ tn Heb “take for yourself.”

⁴ tn Heb “what is good in his eyes.”

⁴ tn Heb “No, for buying I will buy for full silver.” The infinitive absolute precedes the finite verb for emphasis.

⁵ tc The parallel text in 2 Sam 24:24 has the plural “burnt sacrifices.”

⁶ tn Or “without [paying] compensation.”

⁵ tc The parallel text of 2 Sam 24:24 says David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for “fifty pieces of silver.” This would have been about 20 ounces (568 grams) of silver by weight.

⁶ tn Or “tokens of peace.”

⁷ tn Heb “he”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

⁷ tn Heb “spoke to the messenger.”

⁸ tn Or “high place.”