NHEB(i)
10 David's heart struck him after that he had numbered the people. David said to the LORD, "I have sinned greatly in that which I have done. But now, LORD, put away, I beg you, the iniquity of your servant; for I have done very foolishly."
11 When David rose up in the morning, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Gad, David's seer, saying,
12 "Go and speak to David, 'Thus says the LORD, "I offer you three things. 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 three 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 answer, and consider what answer I shall return to him who sent me."
14 David said to Gad, "I am in distress. Let me fall now into the hand of the LORD; for his mercies are great. Let me not fall into the hand of man."
15 So the LORD sent a pestilence on Israel from the morning even to the appointed time; and the destruction began among the people. And there died of the people from Dan even to Beersheba seventy thousand men.
16 When the angel stretched out his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, the LORD relented of the disaster, and said to the angel who destroyed the people, "It is enough. Now stay your hand." The angel of the LORD was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite. And David lifted up his eyes and saw the angel of the LORD standing between earth and the sky, having a drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders, clothed in sackcloth, fell down on their faces.
17 David spoke to the LORD when he saw the angel who struck the people, and said, "Look, I have sinned, and I, the shepherd, have done great evil. But these sheep, what have they done? Please let your hand be against me, and against my father's house."