II Samuel 24:11
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When David got up in the morning, a revelation from the LORD had come to Gad the prophet, David’s seer:
Commentaries
Excerpts gathered from published commentaries to ground the reading.
Numbering of the People, and Pestilence - 2 Samuel 24 For the purpose of ascertaining the number of the people, and their fitness for war, David ordered Joab, his commander-in-chief, to take a census of Israel and Judah. Joab dissuaded him from such a step; but inasmuch as the king paid no attention to his dissuasion, he carried out the command with the help of the military captains (Sa2 24:1-9). David very speedily saw, however, that he had sinned; whereupon the prophet Gad went to him by the command of Jehovah to announce the coming punishment, and give him the choice of three different judgments which he placed before him (Sa2 24:10-13). As David chose rather to fall into the hand of the Lord than into the hand of men, God sent a pestilence, which carried off seventy thousand men in one day throughout the whole land, and had reached Jerusalem, when the Lord stopped the destroying angel in consequence of the penitential prayer of David (Sa2 24:14-17), and sent Gad to the king to direct him to build an altar to the Lord on the spot where the destroying angel had appeared to him (Sa2 24:18). Accordingly David bought the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite, built an altar upon it, and sacrificed burnt-offerings and thank-offerings, after which the plague was stayed (Sa2 24:19-25). This occurrence, which is introduced in the parallel history in 1 Chron 21 between David's wars and his arrangements for a more complete organization of the affairs of the nation, belongs undoubtedly to the closing years of David's reign. The mere taking of a census, as a measure that would facilitate the general organization of the kingdom, could not in itself be a sinful act, by which David brought guilt upon himself, or upon the nation, before God. Nevertheless it is not only represented…
Open source ↗24:11 Gad . . . David’s seer appears only here and in 1 Sam 22:5. Seer is an early name for a prophet (1 Sam 9:9, 19). Unlike pagan magicians or sorcerers, biblical seers had divinely inspired visions (see also 2 Kgs 17:13; Isa 29:10; 30:9-10; Amos 7:12; Mic 3:7) and functioned as God’s messengers.
Open source ↗Original language
The Hebrew and Greek words behind this passage, with Strong's numbers — from openscriptures (CC BY-SA).
Cross-references
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Then the prophet Gad said to David, “Do not stay in the stronghold. Depart and go into the land of Judah.” So David left and went to the forest of Hereth.
(Formerly in Israel, a man on his way to inquire of God would say, “Come, let us go to the seer.” For the prophet of today was formerly called the seer.)
Now the acts of King David, from first to last, are indeed written in the Chronicles of Samuel the Seer, the Chronicles of Nathan the Prophet, and the Chronicles of Gad the Seer,
When Azubah died, Caleb married Ephrath, who bore to him Hur.