Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Nehemiah 13:2
Because they met not the children of Israel with bread and with water, but hired Balaam against them, that he should curse them: howbeit our God turned the curse into a blessing.
2. because they met not, &c.] Cf. Deu 23:4, ‘ Because they met you not with bread and with water in the way when ye came forth out of Egypt; and because they (Heb. he) hired against thee Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia to curse thee.’
Balaam is referred to by the Deuteronomist as the prophet whose curse would be fatal; the Deuteronomist writer, like the prophet Micah (Neh 6:5) follows the Jehovist account in Numbers 22-24, and shows no sign of acquaintance with the Elohist’s description of Balaam (Num 31:8; Num 31:16) as an instigator of the Midianite plot to corrupt the children of Israel.
but hired ] The verb in the Hebrew is in the singular ‘he hired’, as in Deu 23:4, referring possibly to Balak the son of Zippor in Num 22:2.
against them ] Literally ‘against him’, i.e. Israel, corresponding to the singular ‘against thee’ in Deu 23:4.
that he should curse them ] R.V. to curse them.
howbeit our God ] The remainder of the verse gives in general terms the substance of Deu 23:5-6.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Neh 13:2
Howbeit our God turned the curse into a blessing.
The curse turned into a blessing
This was just like God, whose name and nature are love.
1. The devil turns the blessing into a curse. When God created man He endowed him with the power of choice, made his will free, so that he might choose good and evil. The creature was thus endowed with an inestimable blessing. The devil, by the subtlety and force of temptation, turned mans dignity against himself and effected his ruin, and through successive generations he has sought to turn the blessing into a curse.
2. Man often turns the blessing into a curse. Physical strength, intellectual endowments, social position, wealth, opportunities for usefulness–things good in themselves–are often transformed by mans depraved nature into instruments and occasions of evil. Of all the plots and assaults of the devil, all the mischievous purposes of wicked men, all the disasters of life, all the forms of evil we may have to encounter we may say, Howbeit our God turned the curse into a blessing.
I. God has turned the curse of sin into a blessing. The existence of sin is an awful and mysterious fact, permitted by God for wise and gracious issues. We can conceive of no greater curse. It separated man from God. It destroyed his original righteousness. It cut him off from happiness. It brought upon him condemnation and death. God comes to man in this state with the blessings of His grace.
1. The fall of man furnished an occasion for the exercise of the restoring grace of God. Sin prepared the way for salvation. Paradise Regained is more than Paradise Lost.
2. The curse of sin has supplied an opportunity for such an exhibition of the character and glory of God as we nowhere else behold. Gods brightest glory shines in the method of mans salvation. God in Christ is more glorious far than God in creation. In the Saviour of the world we have the most perfect manifestation of God.
3. Throughout the earth, following in the track of the destroyer, God bestows the blessings of His great salvation. God is still in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself.
II. God turns sorrow into a blessing.
1. Sorrow is a teacher. Sorrow seems sent for our instruction as we darken the cages of birds when we would teach them to sing. As the night brings out the stars, so trouble reveals to us many truths that would otherwise remain unseen. It clears our visions, so that we get new views of God and ourselves, of truths and duty, of this world and the next.
2. It awakens thoughtfulness.
3. Under this gracious ministry and discipline the noblest characters have been perfected. Poets, it is said, learn in suffering what they teach in song. Sorrow is one of the best nurses of godliness. Some plants thrive better in a poor than in a rich soil; so some virtues come to speedier and fuller perfection in grief than in gladness. When spices are crushed, then they emit their odours. After the diamond is ground and polished On the wheel, its facets flash with lustre. It is said that when growers of roses want to develop the bloom of a favourite tree in special richness and beauty they sometimes deprive it for a season of light and moisture. In this condition its leaves fall off. But while this process is going on, and the tree is almost leafless, a new life is springing, from which come in due season a tenderer foliage and a choicer and more abundant bloom. This suggests some of the sweet uses of sorrow,
4. In the gracious arrangements of God sorrow is often succeeded by joy,
5. God is preparing the way for the extinction of sorrow on the earth.
III. God turns the curse of death into a blessing. To the Christian man death ceases to be the king of terrors, and becomes a friend to call him home, He delivers him from the infirmities of the flesh, the corruptions of sin, the temptations of Satan, and the sufferings and troubles of life. Death is the gate of life. In conclusion–
1. The subject teaches us the benevolence of God.
2. Learn the loving confidence you may cherish in God. Let us learn to imitate God. Let us endeavour through life to turn the curse into a blessing. (William Walters.)
Sorrows turned to blessings
We might tell of the blessed effects of the captivity of Joseph–the means of preserving his fathers household and the lives of the thousands of Egypt. We might speak of the happy results of Israels national calamities; how they were led to seek the Lord in their sorrow, and the Lord hearkened and heard them. We might tell of Pauls imprisonment issuing in the conversion of his jailor and his household; or we might speak of Johns banishment to the lonely Isle of Patmos, where his spirit was refreshed with those wondrous discoveries of Gods doings and purposes that form the last book in the Canon of Sacred Writ. In these instances sorrow is not to be denominated a cures, but a blessing–not a punishment, but a medicine. True it is that sorrow has been Styled the winter of the soul, because it freezes up the streams of comfort, and ices the soul over with the frosts of sadness; but, like as that season, rough and stormy and bleak as it is, is conducive to the ultimate fertility of the earth, so the moral Winter at once prepares for the fuller enjoyment of the coming spring of peace, and is productive of a richer harvest of righteousness to the praise and glory of our God. Affliction has been styled the storm of life; but, like as those tempests that agitate the bosom of the ocean serve alike to overpower the shattered bark, and to urge forward others more speedily to their desired haven, so these moral tempests, while they may overwhelm the wicked and impenitent, are ever conducive in speeding forward the journey of the children of the kingdom to heaven and to God. (J. Macnaughton, A. M.)
Curses and blessings
Nehemiah sees God at work in this transformation, and openly, gladly, gratefully acknowledge that the transformation of the curse was not the work of human good-will or of human genius, but a direct operation of the Divine almightiness itself. We lose so much by not seeing God immediately. Why do we allow God to go so far sway from our consciousness and appreciation and love? Why do we not cry for Him, and bid Him come to us, and give Him no rest until He draws near? This is the true religion; this is the noble piety.
I. To be cursed of man is really no proof of Gods disapprobation.
II. He ought to be a very great man, and a very pure, lofty, and godly soul, who under takes to curse anybody else.
III. To be blessed of man is no proof of Gods favour iv. The vanity of trusting in anything which can be turned into a curse. Application of these truths to your personal experience:
1. The frowns of society.
2. Wronged in business.
3. The seeming opposition of nature, God is willing and able to turn all curses into blessings.
But the blessing will not be given without action on our part. Art thou suffering? Go to thy knees; tell God thy sin; then the film shall be taken from thine eyes–thou shall see the great, mighty, redeeming Cross of Christ, and He shall say, Thy sins, which are many, are all forgiven thee The curse will be turned into a blessing, and thou shalt be the better for the abasement. (Joseph Parker, D. D.)
Sorrows keeping front worldliness
An evangelist tells of a young lad who left his fathers home to be a sailor. He was absent for three years, and on the return voyage, just as he was thinking of how soon he should see all the dear ones at home, his ship was wrecked off the coast of Norway. Many were lost, but he and some others managed to get into a boat. They tried to row for the shore, but the men being wet, and the cold so intense, many of them were frozen to death. The first mate had command of the boat, and the lad being a favourite of his, he was afraid that he should fall a victim to the cold, and whenever he saw him dozing, or showing any signs of sleeping, he thrashed him with a ropes-end. In vain the lad expostulated, the thrashing continued until all drowsiness was gone. At length they reached land, and were hospitably entertained by the natives, and in time were forwarded home. That young man often says he owes his life to the mate who administered to him that timely discipline. The sufferings and sorrows which God puts upon His people are like that thrashing. Only to keep them from falling into the sleep of worldliness that leads to death, to keep them alive in grace, looking unto Him, does He afflict them.
Gods Providences not to be feared
We ought never to be afraid of Gods providences when they seem to break up our lives and crush our hopes, and even to turn us away from our chosen paths usefulness and service. God knows what He wants to do with us, how He san boot use us, and where and in what lines of ministry He would have us serve. When He shuts one door it is because He has another standing open for our feet. Whoa He breaks our lives to pieces it is because they will do more for His glory and the worlds good broken and shattered than whole.
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Because they met not the children of Israel with bread,…. The same reason is given, and what follows in this verse is observed in
De 23:4;
[See comments on De 23:4] [See comments on De 23:5].
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
VIII
BALAAM: HIS IMPORTANT PROPHECIES, HIS CHARACTER, AND HIS BIBLE HISTORY
Numbers 22-24; Num 31:8
These scriptures give you a clue to both Balaam’s history and character: Numbers 22-24; Num 31:8 , and especially Num 31:16 ; Deu 23:4-5 ; Jos 13:22 ; Jos 24:9-10 ; Mic 6:5 ; Neh 13:2 ; Jud 1:2 ; 2Pe 2:15 ; and, most important of all, Rev 2:14 . Anybody who attempts to discuss Balaam ought to be familiar with every one of these scriptures.
Who was Balaam? He was a descendant of Abraham, as much as the Israelites were. He was a Midianite and his home was near where the kinsmen of Abraham, Nahor and Laban, lived. They possessed from the days of Abraham a very considerable knowledge of the true God. He was not only a descendant of Abraham and possessed the knowledge of the true God through traditions handed down, as in the case of Job and Melchizedek, but he was a prophet of Jehovah. That is confirmed over and over again. Unfortunately he was also a soothsayer and a diviner, adding that himself to his prophetic office for the purpose of making money. People always approach soothsayers with fees.
His knowledge of the movements of the children of Israel could easily have been obtained and the book of Exodus expressly tells that that knowledge was diffused over the whole country. Such a poem as Jacob’s dying blessing on his children would circulate all over the Semitic tribes, and such an administration as that of Joseph would become known over all the whole world, such displays of power as the miracles in Egypt, the deliverance at the Red Sea and the giving of the law right contiguous to the territory of Balaam’s nation make it possible for him to learn all these mighty particulars. It is a great mistake to say that God held communication only with the descendants of Abraham. We see how he influenced people in Job’s time and how he influenced Melchizedek, and there is one remarkable declaration made in one of the prophets that I have not time to discuss, though I expect to preach a sermon on it some day, in which God claims that he not only brought Israel out of Egypt but the Philistines out of Caphtor and all peoples from the places they occupied (Amo 9:7 ). We are apt to get a very narrow view of God’s government of the human race when we attempt to confine it to the Jews only.
Next, we want to consider the sin of Balaam. First, it was from start to finish a sin against knowledge. He had great knowledge of Jehovah. It was a sin against revelation and a very vile sin in that it proceeded from his greed for money, loving the wages of unrighteousness. His sin reached its climax after he had failed to move Jehovah by divinations, and it was clear that Jehovah was determined to bless these people, when for a price paid in his hand be vilely suggested a means by which the people could be turned from God and brought to punishment. That was about as iniquitous a thing as the purchase of the ballots in the late prohibition election in Waco, for the wages of unrighteousness. His counsel was (Num 31:16 ) to seduce the people of Israel by bringing the Moabitish and Midianite evil women to tempt and get them through their lusts to attend idolatrous feasts.
In getting at the character of this man, we have fortunately some exceedingly valuable sermon literature. The greatest preachers of modern times have preached on Balaam, and in the cross lights of their sermons every young preacher ought to inform himself thoroughly on Balaam. The most famous one for quite a while was Bishop Butler’s sermon. When I was a boy, everybody read that sermon, and, as I recall it, the object was to show the self-deception which persuaded Balaam in every case that the sin he committed could be brought within the rules of conscience and revelation, so that he could say something at every point to show that he stood right, while all the time he was going wrong.
Then the great sermon by Cardinal Newman: “The dark shadow cast over a noble course by standing always on the ladder of advancement and by the suspense of a worldly ambition never satisfied.” He saw in Balaam one of the most remarkable men of the world, high up on the ladder and the way to the top perfectly open but shaded by the dark shadow of his sin. Then Dr. Arnold’s sermon on Balaam, as I recall, the substance being the strange combination of the purest form of religious belief with action immeasurably below it. Next the great sermon by Spurgeon with seven texts. He takes the words in the Bible, “I have sinned,” and Balaam is one of the seven men he discusses. Spurgeon preached Balaam as a double-minded man. He could see the right and yet his lower nature turned him constantly away from it, a struggle between the lower and higher nature. These four men were the greatest preachers in the world since Paul. I may modestly call attention to my own sermon on Balaam; that Balaam was not a double-minded man; that from the beginning this man had but one real mind, and that was greed and power, and he simply used the religious light as a stalking horse. No rebuff could stop him long. God might say, “You shall not go,” and he would say, “Lord, hear me again and let me go.” He might start and an angel would meet him and he might hear the rebuke of the dumb brute but he would still seek a way to bring about evil. I never saw a man with a mind more single than Balaam.
I want you to read about him in Keble’s “Christian Year.” Keble conceives of Balaam as standing on the top of a mountain that looked over all those countries he is going to prophesy about and used this language:
O for a sculptor’s hand,
That thou might’st take thy stand
Thy wild hair floating in the eastern breeze,
Thy tranc’d yet open gaze
Fix’d on the desert haze,
As one who deep in heaven some airy pageant aeea.
In outline dim and vast
Their fearful shadows cast
The giant forms of empires on their way
To ruin: one by one
They tower and they are gone,
Yet in the Prophet’s soul the dreams of avarice stay.
That is a grand conception. If he just had the marble image of a man of that kind, before whose eyes, from his lofty mountain pedestal were sweeping the pageants of mighty empires and yet in whose eyes always stayed the dreams of avarice. The following has been sculptured on a rock:
No sun or star so bright
In all the world of light
That they should draw to Heaven his downward eye:
He hears th’ Almighty’s word,
He sees the Angel’s sword,
Yet low upon the earth his heart and treasure lie.
That comes nearer giving a true picture of Balaam. That shows you a man so earth bound in his heart’s desire, looking at low things and grovelling that no sun or star could lift his eye toward heaven. Not even God Almighty’s word could make him look up, without coercion of the human will.
Now, you are to understand that the first two prophecies of Balaam came to him when he was trying to work divinations on God. In those two he obeys as mechanically as a hypnotized person obeys the will of the hypnotist. He simply speaks under the coercive power of God. In these first two prophecies God tells him what to say, as if a mightier hand than his had dipped the pen in ink and moved his hand to write those lines.
At the end of the second one when he saw no divination could possibly avail against those people, the other prophecies came from the fact that the Spirit of the Lord comes on him just like the Spirit came on Saul, the king of Israel, and he prophesied as a really inspired man. In the first prophecy he shows, first, a people that God has blessed and will not curse; second, he is made to say, “Let me die the death of the righteous and let my, last end at death and judgment be like his.” That shows God’s revelation to that people. The second prophecy shows why that is so: “God is not a man that he should repent.” “It is not worth while to work any divination. He has marked out the future of this nation.” Second, why is it that he will not regard iniquity in Jacob? For the purpose he has in view he will not impute their trespasses to them. The prophecy stops with this thought, that when you look at what this people have done and will do, you are not to say, “What Moses did, nor Joshua did, nor David,” but you are to say, “What God hath wrought!”
The first time I ever heard Dr. Burleson address young preachers, and I was not even a Christian myself, he took that for his text. He commenced by saying, “That is a great theme for a preacher. Evidently these Jews had not accomplished all those things. They were continually rebelling and wanting to go back, and yet you see them come out of Egypt, cross the Sea, come to Sinai, organized, fed, clothed, the sun kept off by day and darkness by night, marvellous victories accomplished and you are to say, ‘What God hath wrought!’ “
When the spiritual power comes on him he begins to look beyond anything he has ever done yet, to messianic days. There are few prophecies in the Bible more far-reaching than this last prophecy of Balaam. When he says of the Messiah, “I shall see him but not now,” it is a long way off. “My case is gone, but verily a star” the symbol of the star and sceptre carried out the thought of the power of the Messiah. So much did that prophecy impress the world that those Wise Men who came right from Balaam’s country when Jesus was born, remember this prophecy: “We have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him.”
He then looks all around and there are the nations before him from that mountain top, and he prophesies about Moab and Amalek and passes on beyond, approaching even to look to nations yet unborn. He looks to the Grecian Empire arising far away in the future, further than anybody but Daniel. He sees the ships of the Grecians coming and the destruction of Asshur and the destruction of Eber, his own people. Then we come to the antitypical references later.
If you want a comparison of this man, take Simon Magus who wanted to purchase the power of the Holy Spirit so as to make money. That is even better than Judas, though Judas comes in. Judas had knowledge, was inspired, worked miracles, and yet Judas never saw the true kingdom of God in the spirit of holiness, and because he could not bring about the kingdom of which he would be treasurer for fifteen dollars he sold the Lord Jesus Christ. Those are the principal thoughts I wanted to add.
QUESTIONS
1. Who was Balaam?
2. How did he obtain his knowledge of God?
3. What was the sin of Balaam?
4. What was the climax of his sin?
5. What five sermons on Balaam are referred to? Give the line of thought in each.
6. Give Keble’s conception of Balaam.
7. What was the testimony sculptured on a rock?
8. Now give your own estimate of the character of Balaam.
9. How do you account for the first two prophecies?
10. How do you account for the other two?
11. In the first prophecy what does he show, what is he made to say and what does that show?
12. Give a brief analysis of the second prophecy.
13. Of what does the third prophecy consist?
14. Give the items of the fourth prophecy.
15. How did his messianic prophecy impress the world?
16. When was this prophecy concerning Amalek fulfilled? Ana. In the days of Saul. (1Sa 15 ).
17. Who was Asshur and what was his relation to the Kenites?
18. What reference here to the Grecians?
19. Who was Eber?
20. With what two New Testament characters may we compare?
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
Neh 13:2 Because they met not the children of Israel with bread and with water, but hired Balaam against them, that he should curse them: howbeit our God turned the curse into a blessing.
Ver. 2. Because they met not the children of Israel ] A bare omission of observance subjected them to divine vengeance. As God requiteth the least courtesy done to his people, be it but a cup of cold water; so he repayeth the least discourtesy, or but neglect of them, to whom the glorious angels are ministering spirits, and may not think themselves too good to serve them, Heb 1:14 .
But hired Balaam against them
Howbeit our God turned the curse into a blessing
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Because they (plural) Num 22:56. Deu 23:3, Deu 23:4.
children = sons.
hired Balaam. Num 22:5, Num 22:6. Jos 24:9, Jos 24:10.
them (singular), i.e. Israel.
curse. Hebrew. kalal = reproach, imprecate.
God. Hebrew. Elohim. App-4.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Because: Mat 25:40
hired Balaam: Num 22:3-6, Jos 24:9, Jos 24:10
our God: Num 23:8-11, Num 23:18, Num 24:5-10, Deu 23:5, Psa 109:28, Mic 6:5
Reciprocal: Num 22:5 – sent Num 22:6 – curse me Num 24:10 – I called Deu 23:3 – Ammonite Deu 23:4 – because they hired Pro 26:2 – so Jer 49:1 – their king