Charles Ellicott Commentary 1 Chronicles 21:13

"And David said unto Gad, I am in a great strait: let me fall, I pray, into the hand of Jehovah; for very great are his mercies: and let me not fall into the hand of man." — 1 Chronicles 21:13 (ASV)

And David said. —Almost identical with Samuel. “Let me fall” looks like an improvement on Samuel’s “Let us fall.” The word “very” (not in Samuel) is perhaps an accidental repetition from the Hebrew of I am in a great strait.

Let me not fall. —Samuel has a precative form of the same verb (’eppôlâh; here ’eppôl).

David confesses his inability to choose. Only this is clear to him: that it is better to be dependent on God’s compassion rather than on man’s. Thus, by implication, he decides against the second alternative, leaving the rest to God.

Famine, sword, and pestilence were each regarded as Divine visitations, but the last especially so, because of the apparent suddenness of its outbreak and the mysterious nature of its operation.