And David made all Israel come together at Jerusalem, to take the ark of the Lord to its place, which he had got ready for it.

And David sent for Zadok and Abiathar the priests, and for the Levites, Uriel, Asaiah and Joel, Shemaiah and Eliel and Amminadab,

And said to them, You are the heads of the families of the Levites: make yourselves holy, you and your brothers, so that you may take the ark of the Lord, the God of Israel, to the place which I have made ready for it.

For because you did not take it at the first, the Lord our God sent punishment on us, because we did not get directions from him in the right way.

And Berechiah and Elkanah were door-keepers for the ark.

And Shebaniah and Joshaphat and Nethanel and Amasai and Zechariah and Benaiah and Eliezer, the priests, made music on the horns before the ark of God; and Obed-edom and Jehiah were door-keepers for the ark.

And David was clothed with a robe of fair linen, as were all the Levites who took up the ark, and those who made melody, and Chenaniah the master of those who made melody; and David had on a linen ephod;

Then they took in the ark of God and put it inside the tent which David had put up for it; and they made offerings, burned offerings and peace-offerings before God.

Let your search be for the Lord and for his strength; let your hearts ever be turned to him.

He has kept his agreement in mind for ever, the word which he gave for a thousand generations;

And he gave it to Jacob for a law, and to Israel for an eternal agreement;

For the Lord is great, and greatly to be praised; and he is more to be feared than all other gods.

For all the gods of the nations are false gods; but the Lord made the heavens.

Be in fear before him, all the earth: the world is ordered so that it may not be moved.

Then let all the trees of the wood be sounding with joy before the Lord, for he is come to be the judge of the earth.

O give praise to the Lord, for he is good: for his mercy is unchanging for ever.

Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, for ever and for ever. And all the people said, So be it; and gave praise to the Lord.

And with them Heman and Jeduthun, and the rest who were marked out by name to give praise to the Lord, for his mercy is unchanging for ever;

And Heman and Jeduthun had horns and brass instruments sounding loudly, and instruments of music for the songs of God; and the sons of Jeduthun were to be at the door.

And Nathan said to David, Do whatever is in your heart, for God is with you.

Go and say to David my servant, The Lord says, You are not to make me a house for my living-place:

For from the day when I took Israel up, till this day, I have had no house, but have gone from tent to tent, and from living-place to living-place.

In all the places where I have gone with all Israel, did I ever say to any of the judges of Israel, whom I made the keepers of my people, Why have you not made for me a house of cedar?

And I will make a resting-place for my people Israel, planting them there, so that they may be in the place which is theirs and never again be moved; and never again will they be made waste by evil men, as they were at first,

And when the time comes for you to go to your fathers, I will put in your place your seed after you, one of your sons, and I will make his kingdom strong.

He will be the builder of my house, and I will make the seat of his authority certain for ever.

But I will make his place in my house and in my kingdom certain for ever; and the seat of his authority will never be overturned.

And this was only a small thing to you, O God; but your words have even been about the far-off future of your servant's family, looking on me as on one of high position, O Lord God.

What more may David say to you? for you have knowledge of your servant.

And what other nation in the earth, like your people Israel, did a god go out to take for himself, to be his people, making his name great and to be feared, driving out the nations from before your people whom you made free and took out of Egypt?

For your people Israel you made yours for ever; and you, Lord, became their God.

And now, Lord, let your words about your servant and about his family be made certain for ever, and do as you have said.

For you, O my God, have let your servant see that you will make him head of a line of kings; and so it has come into your servant's heart to make his prayer to you.

And now you have been pleased to give your blessing to the family of your servant, so that it may go on for ever before you; you, O Lord, have given your blessing, and a blessing will be on it for ever.

And David took from him a thousand war-carriages and seven thousand horsemen and twenty thousand footmen: and he had the leg-muscles of all the horses cut, keeping only enough of them for a hundred war-carriages.

He sent his son Hadoram to King David, to give him words of peace and blessing, because he had overcome Hadadezer in the fight, for Hadadezer had been at war with Tou; and he gave him all sorts of vessels of gold and silver and brass.

So David was king over all Israel, judging and giving right decisions for all his people.

Then certain men went and gave David word of what had been done to them. And he sent out with the purpose of meeting them; for the men were greatly shamed. And the king said, Keep where you are at Jericho till your hair is long again, and then come back.

And when the children of Ammon saw that they had made themselves hated by David, Hanun and the children of Ammon sent a thousand talents of silver as payment for war-carriages and horsemen from Mesopotamia and Aram-maacah and Zobah.

So with this money they got thirty-two thousand war-carriages, and the help of the king of Maacah and his people, who came and took up their position in front of Medeba. And the children of Ammon came together from their towns for the fight.

Take heart, and let us be strong for our people and for the towns of our God; and may the Lord do what seems good to him.

And again there was war at Gath, where there was a very tall man, who had twenty-four fingers and toes, six fingers on his hands and six toes on his feet; he was one of the offspring of the Rephaim.

And Joab gave David the number of all the people; all the men of Israel, able to take up arms, were one million, one hundred thousand men; and those of Judah were four hundred and seventy thousand men, able to take up arms.

But Levi and Benjamin were not numbered among them, for Joab was disgusted with the king's order.

Then David said to God, Great has been my sin in doing this; but now, be pleased to take away the sin of your servant, for I have done very foolishly.

And David said to Gad, This is a hard decision for me to make: let me come into the hands of the Lord, for great are his mercies: let me not come into the hands of men.

And God sent an angel to Jerusalem for its destruction: and when he was about to do so, the Lord saw, and had regret for the evil, and said to the angel of destruction, It is enough; do no more. Now the angel of the Lord was by the grain-floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

And David said to God, Was it not I who gave the order for the people to be numbered? It is I who have done the sin and the great wrong; but these are only sheep; what have they done? let your hand, O Lord God, be lifted up against me and against my family, but not against your people to send disease on them.

And Ornan, turning back, saw the angel, and his four sons who were with him went to a secret place. Now Ornan was crushing his grain.

Then David said to Ornan, Give me the place where this grain-floor is, so that I may put up an altar here to the Lord: let me have it for its full price; so that this disease may be stopped among the people.

And Ornan said to David, Take it, and let my lord the king do what seems right to him. See, I give you the oxen for burned offerings and the grain-cleaning instruments for fire-wood, and the grain for the meal offering; I give it all.

And King David said to Ornan, No; I will certainly give you the full price for it, because I will not take for the Lord what is yours, or give a burned offering without payment.

So David gave Ornan six hundred shekels of gold by weight for the place.

And David put up an altar there to the Lord, offering burned offerings and peace-offerings with prayers to the Lord; and he gave him an answer from heaven, sending fire on the altar of burned offering.

For the House of the Lord, which Moses had made in the waste land, and the altar of burned offerings, were at that time in the high place at Gibeon.

But David was not able to go before it to get directions from the Lord, so great was his fear of the sword of the angel of the Lord.

Then David said, This is the house of the Lord God, and this is the altar for Israel's burned offerings.

And David gave orders to get together all the men from strange lands who were in the land of Israel; and he put stone-cutters to work, cutting stones for building the house of God.

And he got together a great store of iron, for the nails for the doors and for the joins; and brass, more in weight than might be measured;

And cedar-trees without number, for the Zidonians and the men of Tyre came with a great amount of cedar-trees for David.

And David said, Solomon my son is young and untested, and the house which is to be put up for the Lord is to be very great, a thing of wonder and glory through all countries; so I will make ready what is needed for it. So David got ready a great store of material before his death.

Then he sent for his son Solomon, and gave him orders for the building of a house for the Lord, the God of Israel.

And David said to Solomon, My son, it was my desire to put up a house for the name of the Lord my God.

But the word of the Lord came to me saying, You have taken lives without number and made great wars; I will not let you be the builder of a house for my name, because of the lives you have taken on the earth before my eyes.

He will be the builder of a house for my name; he will be to me a son, and I will be to him a father; and I will make the seat of his rule over Israel certain for ever.

Only may the Lord give you wisdom, and knowledge of his orders for Israel, so that you may keep the law of the Lord your God.

And all will go well for you, if you take care to keep the laws and the rules which the Lord gave to Moses for Israel: be strong and take heart; have no fear and do not be troubled.

Now see, poor though I am, I have got ready for the house of the Lord a hundred thousand talents of gold and a million talents of silver; and a weight of brass and iron greater than may be measured; and wood and stone have I made ready, and you may put more to it.

Is not the Lord your God with you? and has he not given you rest on every side? for the Lord has given the people of the land into my hands, and the land is overcome before the Lord and before his people.

Now give your heart and soul to the worship of the Lord your God; and get to work on the building of the holy place of the Lord God, so that you may put the ark of the Lord's agreement and the holy vessels of God in the house which is to be made for the name of the Lord.

Of these, twenty-four thousand were to be overseers of the work of the house of the Lord, and six thousand were judges and men of authority

Four thousand were door-keepers; and four thousand gave praise to the Lord with the instruments which I made, said David, for giving praise.

And the sons of Shimei: Jahath, Zizah and Jeush and Beriah; these four were the sons of Shimei.

The sons of Kohath: Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel, four.

The sons of Amram: Aaron and Moses; and Aaron was made separate and holy, he and his sons for ever, for the care of the most holy things and the burning of offerings before the Lord, to do his work and give blessings in his name for ever.

For David said, The Lord, the God of Israel, has given his people rest, and he has made his resting-place in Jerusalem for ever;

And from now, there will be no need for the House of the Lord, and the vessels used in it, to be moved about by the Levites.

The holy bread was in their care, and the crushed grain for the meal offering, of unleavened cakes or meal cooked over the fire or in water; they had control of all sorts of weights and measures;

And they had the care of the Tent of meeting and the holy place, under the direction of the sons of Aaron their brothers, for the work of the house of the Lord.

And David, with Zadok of the sons of Eleazar, and Ahimelech of the sons of Ithamar, made distribution of them into their positions for their work.

So they were put into groups, by the Lord's decision, one with another; for there were rulers of the holy place and rulers of the house of God among the sons of Eleazar and the sons of Ithamar.

And Shemaiah, the son of Nethanel the scribe, who was a Levite, put down their names in writing, the king being present with the rulers, and Zadok the priest, and Ahimelech, the son of Abiathar, and the heads of families of the priests and the Levites; one family being taken for Eleazar and then one for Ithamar, and so on.

Further, David and the chiefs of the servants of the holy place made selection of certain of the sons of Asaph and of Heman and of Jeduthun for the work of prophets, to make melody with corded instruments and brass; and the number of the men for the work they had to do was:

All these, under the direction of their father, made music in the house of the Lord, with brass and corded instruments, for the worship of the house of God; Asaph, Jeduthun, and Heman being under the orders of the king.

And selection was made of them for their special work, all having equal chances, small as well as great, the teacher as the learner.

For the divisions of the door-keepers: of the Korahites, Meshelemiah, the son of Kore, of the sons of Ebiasaph.

Ammiel the sixth, Issachar the seventh, Peullethai the eighth; for the blessing of God was on him.

And Shemaiah his son had sons, rulers over the family of their father, for they were able men.

All these were sons of Obed-edom: they and their sons and their brothers, able men and strong for the work; sixty-two sons of Obed-edom.

And Hosah, a son of the children of Merari, had sons: Shimri the chief (for though he was not the oldest, his father made him chief);

And the families were taken by the decision of the Lord for every door; the small family had the same chance as the great.

And the care of the door on the east came out for Shelemiah. Then the name of Zechariah his son, a man wise in discussion, came out, and the door on the north was given to him.

On the east were six Levites a day, and on the north and the south four a day, and for the store-house two and two.

For the pillared way, on the west, four at the footway and two at the pillared way itself.

And the Levites their brothers were responsible for the stores of the house of God and the holy things.

Shelomoth and his brothers were responsible for all the store of holy things which David the king and the heads of families, the captains of thousands and of hundreds, and the captains of the army, had given to the Lord.

From the goods taken in war, they gave, as a holy offering, materials for the building of the house of the Lord.

Of the Hebronites, Hashabiah and his brothers, seventeen hundred able men, were overseers of Israel on the other side of the Jordan, to the west, being responsible for all the work of the Lord's house and for the work done by the king's servants.

And his brothers were two thousand, seven hundred able men, heads of families, whom King David made overseers over the Reubenites and the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh, in everything to do with God, and for the king's business.

Now the number of the children of Israel, that is, the heads of families, and the captains of thousands and of hundreds, and the men in authority who were servants of the king in anything to do with the divisions which came in and went out month by month through all the months of the year, in every division were twenty-four thousand.