2 Samuel 24:15

THE GREAT PESTILENCE CAME; AND DAVID PRAYED TO GOD

"So the Lord sent a pestilence upon Israel from the morning till the appointed time; and there died of the people from Dan to Beersheba seventy thousand men. And when the angel stretched forth his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, the Lord repented of the evil, and said to the angel who was working destruction among the people, "It is enough; now stay your hand." And the angel of the Lord was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite. Then David spoke to the Lord when he saw the angel who was smiting the people, and said, `Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly; but these sheep, what have they done? Let thy hand, 50pray thee, be against me and against my father's house.'"

"Till the appointed time" (2 Samuel 24:15). This is ambiguous, for it could refer either to the end of the three days or to something else. Due to the fact that the death-angel was in the act of continuing the slaughter, and to certain characteristics of the text, Willis wrote that, "This was the first of the three days."[15] Cook referred it to the "Time of the evening sacrifice, at 3 o'clock p.m., when the people assembled for prayer."[16] The same author pointed out that, "The death of seventy thousand men, as reported here, was the most destructive plague recorded as having fallen upon Israel, there having been the death of only 14,700 following the rebellion of Korah, and only 24,000 after the disaster at Baal-Peor."[17]

"Even in this pestilence was seen the mercy of God; and an altar was built at the place where the destroying angel stayed his hand. That place, the threshing floor of Araunah, located just north of David's capital, was the place where God's presence was remembered, in all its terror and mercy; and there, very appropriately, Solomon's Temple was soon erected."[18]