⁴ This is what you are to do: one-third of you, priests and Levites, who come on duty on the Sabbath shall be gatekeepers,^(A)

⁸ Once when he was serving as priest before God during his section’s turn of duty,^{(A) 9} he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to enter the sanctuary of the Lord to offer incense.^(B)

¹³ and they cast lots by ancestral houses, small and great alike, for their gates.^{(A) 14} The lot for the east fell to Shelemiah. They cast lots also for his son Zechariah, a prudent counselor, and his lot came out for the north. ¹⁵ Obed-edom’s came out for the south, and to his sons was allotted the storehouse. ¹⁶ For Shuppim and Hosah it came out for the west, at the gate of Shallecheth on the ascending road. Guard corresponded to guard.

³ Along with Zadok of the sons of Eleazar and Ahimelech of the sons of Ithamar, David organized them according to the appointed duties in their service. ⁴ Since more chief men were found among the sons of Eleazar than among the sons of Ithamar, they organized them under sixteen heads of ancestral houses of the sons of Eleazar and eight of the sons of Ithamar. ⁵ They organized them by lot, all alike, for there were officers of the sanctuary and officers of God among both the sons of Eleazar and the sons of Ithamar.^{(A) 6} The scribe Shemaiah son of Nethanel, a Levite, recorded them in the presence of the king, and the officers, and Zadok the priest, and Ahimelech son of Abiathar, and the heads of ancestral houses of the priests and of the Levites—one ancestral house being chosen for Eleazar and one chosen for Ithamar.

³ The Levites, thirty years old and up, were counted, and the total head count of men was thirty-eight thousand.^{(A) 4} “Twenty-four thousand of these,” David said, “shall have charge of the work in the house of the Lord, six thousand shall be officers and judges,^{(B) 5} four thousand gatekeepers, and four thousand shall offer praises to the Lord with the instruments that I have made for praise.”^{(C) 6} And David organized them in divisions corresponding to the sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari.^(D)

²⁵ and their kindred who were in their villages were obliged to come in every seven days, in turn, to be with them,^(A)