Why was taking census a bad thing?

the census is an attack on the promise to Abraham to multiply his seed as the sand of the seashore and stars of heaven. It is a violation of the promise of God and a demonic counteraction to the blessings promised. I have seen that whenever this is done there is a migration of people out of the place that it is conducted or serious deaths that take place. Census is demonic and is not a kingdom thing. No where in the bible is there ever an accurate number concerning people it is always given as approximates like 5000 men besides women and children or in the case of angels one third of the stars of heaven or in the case of those saved a number that no man can number. census is simply wrong.

It was a bad thing because of David's motivation for doing it. He was afraid of his enemies instead of trusting that God would take care of him.

In Matthew 6:25 Jesus says: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life"

If you look at the battles that ancient Israel fought in, they won most often when all the odds were against them. God always demanded they put ALL their trust in Him and not in circumstance.

I don't know that I would go so far as some of the assertions in user4705's downvoted answer, but in support of the assertion that the promise of the multiplication of Israel, and that they would be impossible to number (Genesis 13:16, 15:5, 16:10), should factor into the understanding of this passage, please see:

1Ch 27:23-24 But David took not the number of them from twenty years old and under: because the LORD had said he would increase Israel like to the stars of the heavens. (24) Joab the son of Zeruiah began to number, but he finished not, because there fell wrath for it against Israel; neither was the number put in the account of the chronicles of king David.

Little known fact: 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, and 2 Kings used to be 1 Kings, 2 Kings, 3 Kings, 4 Kings. Actually the naming of these books has a varied history (see Wikipedia's article, "Books of Kings"). I mention this just to set forth that perhaps "the chronicles of king David" points to 2 Samuel. That the number was not recorded would indicate the number itself as being an offense. In 2 Samuel:

2Sa 24:9 And Joab gave up the sum of the number of the people unto the king: and there were in Israel eight hundred thousand valiant men that drew the sword; and the men of Judah were five hundred thousand men.

But in 1 Chronicles:

1Ch 21:5 And Joab gave the sum of the number of the people unto David. And all they of Israel were a thousand thousand and an hundred thousand men that drew sword: and Judah was four hundred threescore and ten thousand men that drew sword.

Notice the discrepancy in numbers. Again, "neither was the number put..." Approximations seem to be the matter of course, and, again, the number itself seems to be the offense. Additionally:

Exo 30:12 When thou takest the sum of the children of Israel after their number, then shall they give every man a ransom for his soul unto the LORD, when thou numberest them; that there be no plague among them, when thou numberest them.

The Lord seems to have expected David to see past the explicit legality of the issue. Here in Exodus, beyond the explicit legality, we see, again, that numbering the people, and that alone without any mention of motive, is offensive. Which brings us again to the first passage quoted:

1Ch 27:23 But David took not the number of them from twenty years old and under: because the LORD had said he would increase Israel like to the stars of the heavens.

There are other places where explicit legality is not the only requirement: 2 Kings 13:14-19 (legally did the king do as he was asked?), Romans 14 (especially that last verse), and 1 Corinthians 8 and 10, to name some that I have seen. Also see John 17:19; Christ was a man, and could legally have experienced the pleasures of marriage and the blessings of earthly children, but thank the Lord that for our sakes He sanctified Himself.

Israel was a nation founded and elected by God.

You could only take a census of a nation/population/community, if you belonged to it.

Since Israel belonged to God, David was pridefully exalting his position to God's when he tried to conduct a census. It was nationalism in its most blasphemous form.

Have a nice day.

I find a comparison with this same event as recorded in II Samuel 24 quite intriguing. Here it says that the anger of the LORD burned against Israel and it incited David against them, indicating that there were nationwide sins at that time and also that David's motive came out of anger.

The census taking must have been a glaring offense against God, because even Joab, who never seemed to be godly or moral warned David that it would bring sin against Israel and the 3 choices of punishment that came were all against Israel, not against David personally.

In II Samuel, this account comes late in David's reign, after the kingdome is secure militarily, just before the peaceful days of Solomon. Within the halls of power, however, it has been a very different story with the kings sons vying for the crown. During these times of striving the priests, prophets and people all chose sides and were fickle and many disloyal to David. I would suspect that may have been why the LORD and David were angry at Israel and why the LORD allowed satan to incite David. The guilt of the people may have been thier rebellion against David as they followed various ones of his rebellious sons while David was still on the throne Psalm 105:15 says, "Do not touch my annointed ones, and do My prophets no harm." David himself had quoted this Scripture as he fled from Saul and when he refused to kill the foolish, murderous king when he was right in his grasp. David paid such a high price to obey this principle he must have been grievously hurt, offended and angered by the disloyalty of the people and his sons, who tried to usurp his right to appoint Solomon king as directed by God.

David's sin may have stemmed from his departure from his prior practice of seeking the LORD before decisions. He did not ask the prophet first, either. This is a departure from the Theocratic rule that had characterized his kingdom before. Nonetheless,when the plague took effect, David's heart and the LORD'S relented in mercy and David, like Moses, interceeded for the sinful Israelites. Like Moses, he pled to take the sin on himself so the people could be spared.

In Biblical times, censuses were taken for two basic reasons: taxation, and war. David took the census for one (or both of) those reasons, which was against the will of God.

Israel, at the time, was a fragile nation, having barely captured a capital (Jerusalem), thereby uniting north and south, and then driven out the Philistines, which threatened its western border. The country needed a period of peace and prosperity after these tremendous exertions.

Basically, David had won his earlier battles with an all-volunteer army. He told the people of Israel what he wanted to do (capture Jerusalem, drive out the Philistines), and through the grace of God, just enough of them volunteered for these projects. Later on, David wanted to conquer neighboring lands and peoples, which created two problems: 1) He would introduce foreign, non-believing people into Israel and 2) he would shed Israeli blood for this purpose. Worst of all, the purpose of the census was that David could DRAFT the soldiers he thought he'd need, instead of trusting God to give him "just enough" (along with God's power to "veto" certain projects by giving David "not enough").

But buoyed (and probably made overconfident) by his successes, David tried to push ahead and expand his kingdom for HIS wealth and glory (not God's). That was the sin.

The problem with the census Joab took under David's authority was that Joab began to number (count) those under twenty years of age, something forbidden by the Torah! 1 Chronicles 27:23-24

Chronicles places blame on Joab where it should be placed given that 1 Kings 15:5 only blames David in the matter of Uriah the Hittite.

Josephus relates that he did not collect the half-shekel temple tax requred by the Torah in taking this census.