Study

23. Balaam's Oracles

    ³ Then Balaam said to Balak, “Stay here beside your offering while I go aside. Perhaps the LORD will come to meet with me. Whatever he reveals to me I will tell you.” Then he went off to a barren height.

    ⁴ God met with him, and Balaam said, “I have prepared seven altars, and on each altar I have offered a bull and a ram.”

    ⁵ The LORD put a word in Balaam’s mouth and said, “Go back to Balak and give him this word.”

    ⁶ So he went back to him and found him standing beside his offering, with all the Moabite officials. ⁷ Then Balaam spoke his message:

   “Balak brought me from Aram,
   the king of Moab from the eastern mountains.
‘Come,’ he said, ‘curse Jacob for me;
   come, denounce Israel.’
⁸ How can I curse
   those whom God has not cursed?
How can I denounce
   those whom the LORD has not denounced?
⁹ From the rocky peaks I see them,
   from the heights I view them.
I see a people who live apart
   and do not consider themselves one of the nations.
¹⁰ Who can count the dust of Jacob
   or number even a fourth of Israel?
Let me die the death of the righteous,
   and may my final end be like theirs!”

    ¹¹ Balak said to Balaam, “What have you done to me? I brought you to curse my enemies, but you have done nothing but bless them!”

    ¹² He answered, “Must I not speak what the LORD puts in my mouth?”

Balaam’s Second Message

    ¹³ Then Balak said to him, “Come with me to another place where you can see them; you will not see them all but only the outskirts of their camp. And from there, curse them for me.” ¹⁴ So he took him to the field of Zophim on the top of Pisgah, and there he built seven altars and offered a bull and a ram on each altar.

    ¹⁵ Balaam said to Balak, “Stay here beside your offering while I meet with him over there.”

    ¹⁶ The LORD met with Balaam and put a word in his mouth and said, “Go back to Balak and give him this word.”

    ¹⁷ So he went to him and found him standing beside his offering, with the Moabite officials. Balak asked him, “What did the LORD say?”

    ¹⁸ Then he spoke his message:

   “Arise, Balak, and listen;
   hear me, son of Zippor.
¹⁹ God is not human, that he should lie,
   not a human being, that he should change his mind.
Does he speak and then not act?
   Does he promise and not fulfill?
²⁰ I have received a command to bless;
   he has blessed, and I cannot change it.

    ²¹ “No misfortune is seen in Jacob,
   no misery observed Or He has not looked on Jacob’s offenses / or on the wrongs found in Israel.
The LORD their God is with them;
   the shout of the King is among them.
²² God brought them out of Egypt;
   they have the strength of a wild ox.
²³ There is no divination against Or in Jacob,
   no evil omens against Or in Israel.
It will now be said of Jacob
   and of Israel, ‘See what God has done!’
²⁴ The people rise like a lioness;
   they rouse themselves like a lion
that does not rest till it devours its prey
   and drinks the blood of its victims.”

    ²⁵ Then Balak said to Balaam, “Neither curse them at all nor bless them at all!”

    ²⁶ Balaam answered, “Did I not tell you I must do whatever the LORD says?”

Balaam’s Third Message

    ²⁷ Then Balak said to Balaam, “Come, let me take you to another place. Perhaps it will please God to let you curse them for me from there.” ²⁸ And Balak took Balaam to the top of Peor, overlooking the wasteland.

    ²⁹ Balaam said, “Build me seven altars here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me.” ³⁰ Balak did as Balaam had said, and offered a bull and a ram on each altar.