B'midbar

(1) On the first day of the second month, in the second year following the exodus from the land of Egypt, יהוה spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the Tent of Meeting, saying: (2) Take a census of the whole Israelite company by the clans of its ancestral houses, listing the names, every male, head by head. (3) You and Aaron shall record them by their groups, from the age of twenty years up, all those in Israel who are able to bear arms.

(1)The anger of יהוה again flared up against Israel; and God incited David against them, saying, “Go and number Israel and Judah.” (2) The king said to Joab, “Make the rounds of all the tribes of Israel, from Dan to Beer-sheba, and take a census of the people, so that I may know the size of the population.” (3) Joab answered the king, “May יהוה your God increase the number of the people a hundredfold, while your own eyes see it! But why should my lord king want this?” (4) However, the king’s command to Joab and to the officers of the army remained firm; and Joab and the officers of the army set out, at the instance of the king, to take a census of the people of Israel. (5) They crossed the Jordan and encamped at Aroer, on the right side of the town, which is in the middle of the wadi of Gad, and-d [went on] to Jazer. (6) They continued to Gilead and to the region of Tahtim-hodshi, and they came to Dan-jaan and around to-Sidon. (7) They went onto the fortress of Tyre and all the towns of the Hivites and Canaanites, and finished at Beer-sheba in southern Judah. (8) They traversed the whole country, and then they came back to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days. (9) Joab reported to the king the number of the people that had been recorded: in Israel there were 800,000 soldiers ready to draw the sword, and the men of Judah numbered 500,000. (10) But afterward David reproached himself for having numbered the people. And David said to יהוה, “I have sinned grievously in what I have done. Please, יהוה, remit the guilt of Your servant, for I have acted foolishly.” (11) When David rose in the morning, the word of יהוה had come to the prophet Gad, David’s seer: (12) “Go and tell David, ‘Thus said יהוה: I hold three things over you; choose one of them, and I will bring it upon you.’” (13) Gad came to David and told him; he asked, “Shall a seven-year famine come upon you in the land, or shall you be in flight from your adversaries for three months while they pursue you, or shall there be three days of pestilence in your land? Now consider carefully what reply I shall take back to Him who sent me.” (14) David said to Gad, “I am in great distress. Let us fall into the hands of יהוה, for His compassion is great; and let me not fall into the hands of men.” (15) יהוה sent a pestilence upon Israel from morning until the set time and 70,000 of the people died, from Dan to Beer-sheba.

(4) God reckoned the number of the stars; to each God gave its name.