Charles Ellicott Commentary 1 Chronicles 21

And Satan stood up against Israel. —Perhaps, And an adversary (hostile influence) arose against Israel. So in 2 Samuel 19:23 the sons of Zeruiah are called “adversaries” (Hebrew, a Satan) to David. (Compare to 1 Kings 11:14; 1 Kings 11:25.) When the adversary, the enemy of mankind, is meant, the word takes the article, which it does not have here. (Compare to Job 1:2 and Zechariah 3:1-2.)

And provoked David. — Pricked him on, incited him. 2 Samuel 24:0 begins: And again the anger of Jehovah burned against Israel, and He (or it) incited David against them, saying, Go, number Israel and Judah. It thus appears that the adversary of our text, the influence hostile to Israel, was the wrath of God.

The wrath of God is the Scriptural name for that aspect of the Divine nature under which it pursues to destruction whatever is really opposed to its own perfection (Delitzsch); and it is only sin, that is, a breach of the Divine law, which can necessarily direct that aspect towards humans.

If Divine wrath urged David to number Israel, it can only have been in consequence of evil thoughts of pride and self-sufficiency, which had intruded into a heart that until then had been humbly reliant upon its Maker.

One evil thought led to another, quite naturally; that is, by the laws which God has imposed upon human nature. God did not interpose but allowed David’s corrupt motive to work out its own penal results. (Romans 1:24; Romans 1:26; Romans 1:28.)

The true reading in Samuel may well be, “And an adversary incited David,” etc., the word Satan having fallen out of the text. Yet the expression Jehovah provoked or incited against ... occurs (1 Samuel 26:19).

To number Israel —Samuel adds, and Judah.

The Census.

And to the rulers (captains) of the people. —Omitted in Samuel, which reads, Joab, the captain of the host, who was with him. The captains of the host are, however, associated in the work of the census with Joab (2 Samuel 24:4). The fact that Joab and his staff were deputed to take the census seems to prove that it was of a military character.

Go. —Plural.

Number. — Enrol, or register (sifrû). A different word (mânâh) is used in 1 Chronicles 21:1, and in the parallel place. Samuel has, Run over, I pray, all the tribes of Israel from Dan to Beersheba, using the very word (shût) which, in the prologue of Job (1 Chronicles 1:7; 1 Chronicles 2:2), Satan uses of his own wanderings over the earth.

From Beersheba even to Dan. —As if the party were to proceed from south to north (see 1 Chronicles 21:4). The reverse order is usual (1 Samuel 3:20).

Answered. —Hebrew, said.

The Lord ... as they be. —Literally, Jehovah add upon his people like them a hundred times, an abridged form of what is read in Samuel.

But, my lord the king, are they not ...? —Instead of this, Samuel records another wish, And may the eyes of my lord the king be seeing, that is, living (Genesis 16:13).

Why then does my lord require this thing? —So Samuel, in slightly different terms: And my lord the king, why desireth he this proposal?

Why will he be (why should he become) a cause of trespass to Israel? —Not in Samuel. It is an explanatory addition by the chronicler.

So Joab departed. —“Went out,” namely, from the king’s presence (Samuel). The chronicler omits the account of the route of Joab and his party, as described in 2 Samuel 24:4–8. They crossed Jordan, and went to Aroer, Jazer, Gilead, and Dan; then round to Zidon, “the fortress of Tyre, and all the cities of the Hivite and Canaanite, and came out at the nageb of Judah, to Beersheba.” The business occupied nine months and twenty days; and the fact that the generalissimo of David’s forces and his chief officers found leisure for the undertaking indicates a time of settled peace. The census, therefore, belongs to the later years of the reign.