Araunah said, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?” David replied, “To buy from you the threshing floor so I can build an altar for the Lord, so that the plague may be removed from the people.”

But the king said to Araunah, “No, I insist on buying it from you! I will not offer to the Lord my God burnt sacrifices that cost me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty pieces of silver. ¹ 

God sent an angel ¹  to ravage ²  Jerusalem. As he was doing so, ³  the Lord watched ⁴  and relented from ⁵  his judgment. ⁶  He told the angel who was destroying, “That’s enough! ⁷  Stop now!” ⁸  Now the Lord’s angel was standing near the threshing floor of Ornan ⁹  the Jebusite.

David said to Ornan, “Sell me the threshing floor ¹  so I can build ²  on it an altar for the Lord – I’ll pay top price ³  – so that the plague may be removed ⁴  from the people.”

Solomon began building the Lord’s temple in Jerusalem ¹  on Mount Moriah, where the Lord had appeared to his father David. This was the place that David prepared at the threshing floor of Ornan ²  the Jebusite.

You must not muzzle your ¹  ox when it is treading grain.

Now the king of Israel and King Jehoshaphat of Judah were sitting on their respective thrones, dressed in their royal robes, at the threshing floor at ¹  the entrance of the gate of Samaria. All the prophets were prophesying before them.

Then the iron, clay, bronze, silver, and gold were broken in pieces without distinction ¹  and became like chaff from the summer threshing floors that the wind carries away. Not a trace of them could be found. But the stone that struck the statue became a large mountain that filled the entire earth.

This is what the Lord says: “Because Damascus has committed three crimes ¹  – make that four! ²  – I will not revoke my decree of judgment. ³  They ripped through Gilead like threshing sledges with iron teeth. ⁴ 

When the Canaanites who lived in the land saw them mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a very sad occasion ¹  for the Egyptians.” That is why its name was called ²  Abel Mizraim, ³  which is beyond the Jordan.

“People of Babylonia, ¹  you plundered my people. ²  That made you happy and glad. You frolic about like calves in a pasture. ³  Your joyous sounds are like the neighs of a stallion. ⁴ 

You will come to your grave in a full age, ¹  As stacks of grain are harvested in their season.

Grain is crushed, though one certainly does not thresh it forever. The wheel of one’s wagon rolls over it, but his horses do not crush it.

For it is written in the law of Moses, “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain.” ¹  God is not concerned here about oxen, is he?

The Lord’s angelic messenger ¹  came and sat down under the oak tree in Ophrah owned by Joash the Abiezrite. He arrived while Joash’s son Gideon ²  was threshing ³  wheat in a winepress ⁴  so he could hide it from the Midianites. ⁵ 

So David bought the place from Ornan for 600 pieces of gold. ¹ 

At that time ¹  the Lord will shake the tree, ²  from the Euphrates River ³  to the Stream of Egypt. Then you will be gathered up one by one, O Israelites. ⁴ 

Now Saul was sitting under a pomegranate tree in Migron, on the outskirts of Gibeah. The army that was with him numbered about six hundred men.

Crowds, great crowds are in the valley of decision, for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision! ¹ 

For the scripture says, “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain,” ¹  and, “The worker deserves his pay.” ²