2 Samuel 6 · a question people ask
What was Uzzah's error?
The verse gives the reason in one word: "God struck him there for his error" (6:7). In Hebrew it is shal (tap error), found only here in the Hebrew Bible, and the lexicons say little about it: Strong's gives "a fault", and Brown-Driver-Briggs gives only "for his hastiness". So the word itself doesn't settle what the error was. The verse before says what Uzzah did and why: he "reached for God’s ark and took hold of it, for the cattle stumbled" (6:6). Chronicles, telling the same day, says, "he struck him because he put his hand on the ark" (1 Chronicles 13:10). Christians read Uzzah's error in two main ways, and many hold the two together. Both agree on what the chapter says: Uzzah took hold of the ark (6:6), God struck him "for his error" (6:7), and David was displeased and afraid (6:8-9); the chapter doesn't say whether David's displeasure was right. 1 Samuel 6 asks a like question about the men of Beth Shemesh, who were struck "because they had looked into the LORD’s ark" (1 Samuel 6:19), and Numbers 4 gives the Law on touching the holy things and on seeing them (Numbers 4:15, 4:20).
How Christians read it
Where Christians differ, Favor sets out the main views side by side and doesn't pick one.
Touching the ark
Those who read it this way point to the Law for the sons of Kohath. When the camp moved, Aaron and his sons covered the ark (Numbers 4:5), and only then did the sons of Kohath come to carry the holy things: "they shall not touch the sanctuary, lest they die" (Numbers 4:15). Chronicles names the act: "he struck him because he put his hand on the ark" (1 Chronicles 13:10). On this reading Uzzah's error was the touch itself, which the Law had forbidden.
Numbers 4:5 · Numbers 4:15 · 1 Chronicles 13:10 · 2 Samuel 6:6-7
The way the ark was carried
Those who read it this way point to how the ark was moving. The Law had it carried on poles: "You shall put the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark to carry the ark" (Exodus 25:14). Of the wagons the princes brought, the sons of Kohath were given none, "because the service of the sanctuary belonged to them; they carried it on their shoulders" (Numbers 7:9). But "They set God’s ark on a new cart" (6:3), as the Philistines had been told to do: "take and prepare yourselves a new cart" (1 Samuel 6:7). When the ark was brought up again, David said, "No one ought to carry God’s ark but the Levites" (1 Chronicles 15:2), and "because you didn’t carry it at first, the LORD our God broke out in anger against us, because we didn’t seek him according to the ordinance" (1 Chronicles 15:13). Then "The children of the Levites bore God’s ark on their shoulders with its poles, as Moses commanded according to the LORD’s word" (1 Chronicles 15:15). On this reading Uzzah's hand was the last step of an error the whole company shared; David says "against us" (1 Chronicles 15:13).
Exodus 25:14 · Numbers 7:9 · 2 Samuel 6:3 · 1 Samuel 6:7 · 1 Chronicles 15:2 · 1 Chronicles 15:13-15
The verses
“When they came to the threshing floor of Nacon, Uzzah reached for God’s ark and took hold of it, for the cattle stumbled. The LORD’s anger burned against Uzzah, and God struck him there for his error; and he died there by God’s ark. David was displeased because the LORD had broken out against Uzzah; and he called that place Perez Uzzah to this day. David was afraid of the LORD that day; and he said, “How could the LORD’s ark come to me?””
“The LORD’s anger burned against Uzza, and he struck him because he put his hand on the ark; and he died there before God.”
“He struck of the men of Beth Shemesh, because they had looked into the LORD’s ark, he struck fifty thousand seventy of the men. Then the people mourned, because the LORD had struck the people with a great slaughter.”
““When Aaron and his sons have finished covering the sanctuary and all the furniture of the sanctuary, as the camp moves forward; after that, the sons of Kohath shall come to carry it; but they shall not touch the sanctuary, lest they die. The sons of Kohath shall carry these things belonging to the Tent of Meeting.”