Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Numbers 22:1

And the children of Israel set forward, and pitched in the plains of Moab on this side Jordan [by] Jericho.

Num 22:1. The verse appears to be the continuation of P’s itinerary in Num 21:10-11; cf. Num 33:48.

the steppes of Moab ] A term, peculiar to P , which denotes the open plain, immediately to the north of the Dead Sea, about 9 miles from north to south and from 5 to 7 miles broad. The similar plain on the west of Jordan is named ‘the steppes of Jericho’ (Jos 4:13; Jos 5:10).

on the other side of the Jordan ] i.e. on the east. The expression is from the point of view of a writer in Palestine.

the Jordan at Jericho ] lit. ‘the Jordan of Jericho,’ i.e. that portion of the river which flows by the town. Cf. ‘the waters of Megiddo’ (Jdg 5:19).

Num 22:2-24. The story of Balaam (J E ).

The narratives of J and E are, to a large extent, so closely interwoven that it is difficult to separate them. But in certain portions the differences between them stand out clearly, and will be indicated in the notes.

An approximate analysis is as follows:

E . Num 22:2-3 a, Num 22:5 a (to ‘River’), Num 22:8-10 ; Num 22:12-16 ; Num 22:19-21 ; Num 22:35-41.

J . Num 22:3 b, Num 22:4, Num 22:5 b Num 22:7 ; Num 22:11 ; Num 22:17-18 ; Num 22:22-34.

The object of this well-known narrative is to illustrate the all-important thought ‘if God be for us who can be against us?’ Jehovah holds Israel under His protection, and therefore provides that they shall receive a blessing and not a curse. Pharaoh’s obstinacy in opposing Jehovah in Egypt is paralleled, at the end of the journeyings, by the obstinacy of Balak, and the result is that the divine curse falls upon Moab (Num 24:17) among other foes of Israel. A further interest in the story is the character of Balaam, which, however, has sometimes been allowed such undue prominence as to throw into the shade the real religious import of the narrative. His character has been very variously estimated according as one or another feature in the narrative is emphasized; see e.g. Stanley, Jewish Church, and Lock in J.Th.S. ii. 161 3. This variety of estimate results from the fact that the narrative is not homogeneous. In E , so far as it has been preserved, no blame attaches to his character. It is true that in J ( Num 22:5 b Num 22:7 ; Num 22:11 ; Num 22:17-18) Balak expects him to do the work of a prophet for money, but this did not necessarily imply avarice; it was a not uncommon feature of early Israelite life; Samuel (1Sa 9:8), Ahijah (1Ki 14:3), Elisha (2Ki 8:8 f.) and Amos (Amo 7:12) were expected to do the same. [Note: Amos’ reply to Amaziah (Amo 7:14) shews that the great prophets of Israel rose superior to the practice of the earlier ‘sons of the prophets’; he had never been one who would ‘eat bread’ by prophesying. And from that time onwards it is probable that prophesying for payment was condemned by the better minds in the nation.] And when it came to the point, Balaam declared that no amount of gold or silver would persuade him to oppose the will of Jehovah his God by cursing Israel. The idea that he was forced to utter blessings mechanically though he wanted to curse is quite absent from the story, and ought not to be read into it. In J we only learn that Jehovah was angry with him because he went (see on Num 22:22), no reason being assigned, or perhaps rather the reason assigned having dropped out of the narrative when it was combined with E . In D (Deu 23:4 f., Jos 24:9 f.) we meet for the first time with the thought that Balaam wanted to curse for hire, but was prevented by God, cf. Neh 13:2. Lastly in P (Num 31:16) a different, and terrible, sin is related of him. He persuaded the Israelites to commit sin with the Midianite women at Peor, and thus brought calamity upon God’s people after all (Num 31:16). The dark estimate of his character is adopted in the N.T.: avarice (Judges 11, 2Pe 2:15-16), and the teaching of idolatry and fornication (Rev 2:14).

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

The plains – Hebrew arabah; the word is the plural of that which is used to denote the whole depressed tract along the Jordan and the Dead Sea, and onward, where it is still called the Arabah (compare Num 21:4 note), to the Elanitic gulf.

On this side Jordan by Jericho – Rather, across the Jordan of Jericho, i. e., that part of Jordan which skirted the territory of Jericho. This form of expression indicates the site of the camp in its relation to the well-known city of Jericho. See Deu 1:1.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

CHAPTER XXII

The Israelites pitch in the plains of Moab, 1.

Balak, king of Moab, is greatly terrified, 2-4;

and sends to Balaam, a diviner, to come and curse them, 5, 6.

The elders of Moab take a reward and carry it to Balaam, 7.

He inquires of the Lord, and is positively ordered not to go

with them, 8-12.

He communicates this to the elders of Moab, 13.

They return to Balak with this information, 14.

He sends some of his princes to Balaam with promises of great

honour, 15-17.

He consults God, and is permitted! to go, on certain conditions,

18-20.

Balaam sets off, is opposed by an angel of the Lord, and the

Lord miraculously opens the mouth of his ass to reprove him,

21-30.

Balaam sees the angel, and is reproved by him, 31-33.

He humbles himself, and offers to go back, 34;

but is ordered to proceed, on the same conditions as before, 35.

The king of Moab goes out to meet him, 36.

His address to him, 37.

Balaam’s firm answer, 38.

Balak sacrifices, and takes Balaam to the high places of Baal,

that he may see the whole of the Israelitish camp, 39-41.

NOTES ON CHAP. XXII

Verse 1. And pitched in the plains of Moab] They had taken no part of the country that at present appertained to the Moabites; they had taken only that part which had formerly belonged to this people, but had been taken from them by Sihon, king of the Amorites.

On this side Jordan] On the east side. By Jericho, that is, over against it.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

The plains of Moab still retained their ancient title, though they had been taken away from the Moabites by Sihon, and from him by the Israelites.

By Jericho, i.e. over against Jericho; or, near the passage over Jordan to Jericho, or its territories.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

1. Israel . . . pitched in theplains of Moabso called from having formerly belonged to thatpeople, though wrested from them by Sihon. It was a dry, sunken,desert region on the east of the Jordan valley, opposite Jericho.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

And the children of Israel set forward,…. From the country of Bashan, where we read of them last, after they had conquered Og the king of it, and also Sihon king of the Amorites, and settled some of their tribes in both kingdoms; the particular place from whence they came hither, according to the account of their journeys, were the mountains of Abarim, Nu 33:48:

and pitched in the plains of Moab the part of them they encamped in reached from Bethjesimoth to Abelshittim, Nu 33:49,

on this side Jordan by Jericho; or Jordan of Jericho, as the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan; a river that flowed near to Jericho, running between the plains of Moab and the plains of Jericho; according to Josephus u it was sixty furlongs, or seven miles and a half from Jericho; but, according to Jerome w, it was but five miles: or rather, as some versions render it, “over against Jericho” x; for Jericho was on the other side of the river Jordan, and the plains of Moab, or that part of them where Israel now pitched, were right against that city; and so Josephus says y.

u Antiqu. l. 5. c. 1. sect. 4. w De locis Heb. fol. 87. G. x Sept. “ex opposito Heiricho”, Tigurine version. y Antiqu. l. 4. c. 6. sect. 1.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

After the defeat of the two Amorite kings, Sihon and Og, and the conquest of their kingdoms in Gilead and Bashan, the Israelites removed from the height of Pisgah, on the mountains of Abarim before Nebo (see at Num 21:20), and encamped in the “ Arboth Moab (the steppes of Moab), on the other side of the Jordan of Jericho,” i.e., that part of the Jordan which skirted the province of Jericho. Arboth Moab was the name given to that portion of the Arabah, or large plain of the Jordan, the present Ghor (see at Deu 1:1), which belonged to the territory of the Moabites previous to the spread of the Amorites under Sihon in the land to the east of the Jordan, and which probably reached from the Dead Sea to the mouth of the Jabbok. The site of the Israelitish camp is therefore defined with greater minuteness by the clause “beyond the Jordan of Jericho.” This place of encampment, which is frequently alluded to (Num 26:3, Num 26:63; Num 31:12; Num 33:48, Num 33:50; Num 35:1; Num 36:13; Jos 13:32), extended, according to Num 33:49, from Beth-jeshimoth to Abel-shittim. Beth-jeshimoth (i.e., house of wastes), on the north-eastern desert border ( Jeishimon, Num 21:20) of the Dead Sea, a town allotted to the tribe of Reuben (Jos 12:3; Jos 13:20), was situated, according to the Onom. (s. v . Beethasimou’th , Bethsimuth), ten Roman miles, or four hours, to the south (S.E.) of Jericho, on the Dead Sea; according to Josephus ( bell. jud. iv. 7, 6), it was to the south of Julias ( Livias), i.e., Beth-haram, or Rameh, on the northern edge of the Wady Hesban (see at Num 32:36), or in the Ghor el Seisabn, on the northern coast of the Dead Sea, and the southern end of the plain of the Jordan. Abel Shittim ( ), i.e., the acacia-meadow, or, in its briefer form, Shittim (Num 35:1), was situated, according to Josephus (Ant. iv. 8, 1), on the same spot as the later town of Abila, in a locality rich in date-palms, sixty stadia from the Jordan, probably by the Wady Eshtah to the north of the Wady Hesban; even if Knobel’s supposition that the name is connected with = with prost. should not be a tenable one. From Shittim or Sittim the Israelites advanced, under Joshua, to the Jordan, to effect the conquest of Canaan (Jos 3:1).

In the steppes of Moab the Israelites encamped upon the border of the promised land, from which they were only separated by the Jordan. But before this boundary line could be passed, there were many preparations that had to be made. In the first place, the whole congregation was to pass through a trial of great importance to all future generations, as bearing upon the relation in which it stood to the heathen world; and in the second place, it was here that Moses, who was not to enter Canaan because of his sin at the water of strife, was to bring the work of legislation to a close before his death, and not only to issue the requisite instructions concerning the conquest of the promised inheritance, and the division of it among the tribes of Israel, but to impress once more upon the hearts of the whole congregation the essential contents of the whole law, with all that the Lord had done for Israel, that they might be confirmed in their fidelity to the Lord, and preserved from the danger of apostasy. This last work of the faithful servant of God, with which he brought his mediatorial work to a close, is described in the book of Deuteronomy; whilst the laws relating to the conquest and partition of Canaan, with the experience of Israel in the steppes of Moab, fill up the latter portion of the present book.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

Balak Sends for Balaam.

B. C. 1452.

      1 And the children of Israel set forward, and pitched in the plains of Moab on this side Jordan by Jericho.   2 And Balak the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites.   3 And Moab was sore afraid of the people, because they were many: and Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel.   4 And Moab said unto the elders of Midian, Now shall this company lick up all that are round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field. And Balak the son of Zippor was king of the Moabites at that time.   5 He sent messengers therefore unto Balaam the son of Beor to Pethor, which is by the river of the land of the children of his people, to call him, saying, Behold, there is a people come out from Egypt: behold, they cover the face of the earth, and they abide over against me:   6 Come now therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people; for they are too mighty for me: peradventure I shall prevail, that we may smite them, and that I may drive them out of the land: for I wot that he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou cursest is cursed.   7 And the elders of Moab and the elders of Midian departed with the rewards of divination in their hand; and they came unto Balaam, and spake unto him the words of Balak.   8 And he said unto them, Lodge here this night, and I will bring you word again, as the LORD shall speak unto me: and the princes of Moab abode with Balaam.   9 And God came unto Balaam, and said, What men are these with thee?   10 And Balaam said unto God, Balak the son of Zippor, king of Moab, hath sent unto me, saying,   11 Behold, there is a people come out of Egypt, which covereth the face of the earth: come now, curse me them; peradventure I shall be able to overcome them, and drive them out.   12 And God said unto Balaam, Thou shalt not go with them; thou shalt not curse the people: for they are blessed.   13 And Balaam rose up in the morning, and said unto the princes of Balak, Get you into your land: for the LORD refuseth to give me leave to go with you.   14 And the princes of Moab rose up, and they went unto Balak, and said, Balaam refuseth to come with us.

      The children of Israel have at length finished their wanderings in the wilderness, out of which they went up (ch. xxi. 18), and are now encamped in the plains of Moab near Jordan, where they continued till they passed through Jordan under Joshua, after the death of Moses. Now we have here,

      I. The fright which the Moabites were in upon the approach of Israel, v. 2-4. They needed not to fear any harm from them if they knew (and it is probable that Moses let them know) the orders God had given to Israel not to contend with the Moabites, nor to use any hostility against them, Deut. ii. 9. But, if they had any notice of this, they were jealous that it was but a sham, to make them secure, that they might be the more easily conquered. Notwithstanding the old friendship between Abraham and Lot, the Moabites resolved to ruin Israel if they could, and therefore they will take it for granted, without any ground for the suspicion, that Israel resolves to ruin them. Thus it is common for those that design mischief to pretend that mischief is designed against them; and their groundless jealousies must be the colour of their causeless malice. They hear of their triumphs over the Amorites (v. 2), and think that their own house is in danger when their neighbour’s is on fire. They observe their multitudes (v. 3): They were many; and hence infer how easily they would conquer their country, and all about them if some speedy and effectual course were not taken to stop the progress of their victorious arms: “They shall lick up or devour us, and all that are round about us, as speedily and irresistibly as the ox eats up the grass” (v. 4), owning themselves to be an unequal match for so formidable an enemy. Therefore they were sorely afraid and distressed themselves; thus were the wicked in great fear where no fear was, Ps. liii. 5. These fears they communicated to their neighbours, the elders of Midian, that some measures might be concerted between them for their common safety; for, if the kingdom of Moab fall, the republic of Midian cannot stand long. The Moabites, if they had pleased, might have made a good use of the advances of Israel, and their successes against the Amorites. They had reason to rejoice, and give God and Israel thanks for freeing them from the threatening power of Sihon king of the Amorites, who had taken from them part of their country, and was likely to overrun the rest. They had reason likewise to court Israel’s friendship, and to come in to their assistance; but having forsaken the religion of their father Lot, and being sunk into idolatry, they hated the people of the God of Abraham, and were justly infatuated in their counsels and given up to distress.

      II. The project which the king of Moab formed to get the people of Israel cursed, that is, to set God against them, who, he perceived, hitherto fought for them. He trusted more to his arts than to his arms, and had a notion that if he could but get some prophet or other, with his powerful charms, to imprecate evil upon them, and to pronounce a blessing upon himself and his forces, then, though otherwise too weak, he should be able to deal with them. This notion arose, 1. Out of the remains of some religion; for it owns a dependence upon some visible sovereign powers that rule in the affairs of the children of men and determine them, and an obligation upon us to make application to these powers. 2. Out of the ruins of the true religion; for if the Midianites and Moabites had not wretchedly degenerated from the faith and worship of their pious ancestors, Abraham and Lot, they could not have imagined it possible to do any mischief with their curses to a people who alone adhered to the service of the true God, from whose service they had themselves revolted.

      III. The court which he made to Balaam the son of Beor, a famous conjurer, to engage him to curse Israel. The Balaam lived a great way off, in that country whence Abraham came, and where Laban lived; but, though it was probable that there were many nearer home that were pretenders to divination, yet none had so great a reputation for success as Balaam, and Balak will employ the best he can hear of, though he send a great way for him, so much is his heart upon this project. And to gain him, 1. He makes him his friend, complaining to him, as his confidant, of the danger he was in from the numbers and neighbourhood of the camp of Israel: They cover the face of the earth, and they abide over against me, v. 5. 2. In effect he makes him his god, by the great power he attributes to his word: He whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou cursest is cursed, v. 6. The learned bishop Patrick inclines to think, with many of the Jewish writers, that Balaam had been a great prophet, who, for the accomplishment of his predictions and the answers of his prayers, both for good and evil, had been looked upon justly as a man of great interest with God; but that, growing proud and covetous, God departed from him, and then, to support his sinking credit, he betook himself to diabolical arts. He is called a prophet (2 Pet. ii. 16,) because he had been one, or perhaps he had raised his reputation from the first by his magical charms, as Simon Magus, who bewitched the people so far that he was called the great power of God, Acts viii. 10. Curses pronounced by God’s prophets in the name of the Lord have wonderful effects, as Noah’s (Gen. ix. 25), and Elisha’s, 2 Kings ii. 24. But the curse causeless shall not come (Prov. xxvi. 2), no more than Goliath’s, when he cursed David by his gods, 1 Sam. xvii. 43. Let us desire to have the prayers of God’s ministers and people for us, and dread having them against us; for they are greatly regarded by him who blesseth indeed and curseth indeed. But Balak cannot rely upon these compliments as sufficient to prevail with Balaam, the main inducement is yet behind (v. 7): they took the rewards of divination in their hand, the wages of unrighteousness, which he loved, 2 Pet. ii. 15.

      IV. The restraint God lays upon Balaam, forbidding him to curse Israel. It is very probable that Balaam, being a curious inquisitive man, was no stranger to Israel’s case and character, but had heard that God was with them of a truth, so that he ought to have given the messengers their answer immediately, that he would never curse a people whom God had blessed; but he lodges the messengers, and takes a night’s time to consider what he shall do, and to receive instructions from God, v. 8. When we enter into a parley with temptations we are in great danger of being overcome by them. In the night God comes to him, probably in a dream, and enquires what business those strangers had with him. He knows it, but he will know it from him. Balaam gives him an account of their errand (v. 9-11), and God thereupon charges him not to go with them, or attempt to curse that blessed people, v. 12. Thus God sometimes, for the preservation of his people, was pleased to speak to bad men, as to Abimelech (Gen. xx. 3), and to Laban, Gen. xxxi. 24. And we read of some that were workers of iniquity, and yet in Christ’s name prophesied, and did many wondrous works. Balaam is charged not only not to go to Balak, but not to offer to curse this people, which he might have attempted at a distance; and the reason is given: They are blessed. This was part of the blessing of Abraham (Gen. xii. 3), I will curse him that curseth thee; so that an attempt to curse them would be not only fruitless, but perilous. Israel had often provoked God in the wilderness, yet he will not suffer their enemies to curse them, for he rewards them not according to their iniquities. The blessedness of those whose sin is covered comes upon them, Rom 4:6; Rom 4:7.

      V. The return of the messengers without Balaam. 1. Balaam is not faithful in returning God’s answer to the messengers, v. 13. He only tells them, the Lord refuseth to give me leave to go with you. He did not tell them, as he ought to have done, that Israel was a blessed people, and must by no means be cursed; for then the design would have been crushed, and the temptation would not have been renewed: but he, in effect, desired them to give his humble service to Balak, and let him know that he applauded his project, and would have been very glad to gratify him, but that truly he had the character of a prophet, and must not go without leave from God, which he had not yet obtained, and therefore for the present he must be excused. Note, Those are a fair mark for Satan’s temptation that speak diminishingly of divine prohibitions, as if they amounted to no more than the denial of a permission, and as if to go against God’s law were only to go without his leave. 2. The messengers are not faithful in returning Balaam’s answer to Balak. All the account they give of it is, Balaam refuseth to come with us (v. 14), intimating that he only wanted more courtship and higher proffers; but they are not willing Balak should know that God had signified his disallowance of the attempt. Thus are great men wretchedly abused by the flatteries of those about them, who do all they can to prevent their seeing their own faults and follies.

Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary

NUMBERS – TWENTY-TWO

Verses 1-4:

The exact time of this move may have been during the northern campaign, the conflict with Og in Bashan.

The “plains of Moab” or the steppes of Moab, that portion of the Jordan valley across from Jericho and extending as far north as the Jabbok. This was rich and fertile river-bottom land, well-suited to pastoral life.

Balak the son of Zippor was not the king whose territory Sihon had appropriated, Nu 21:26. He likely assumed the throne after the Amorite conquest.

The Moabites had sold supplies to Israel as they moved along their eastern border, De 2:29. But when they saw Israel’s sudden and dramatic conquest of their Amorite conquerors, they began to be afraid.

“Distressed,” guts, “weary, vexed,” translated “loatheth,” Nu 21:5, q.v.

“Elders of Midian.” Midian was a descendant of Abraham and Keturah, more kin to Israel than to Moab. They were semi-nomadic people, mainly merchants who traded with the caravans crossing that land. Part of their territory was the steppes of Moab and Ammon.

Balak feared that Israel would swallow up his people, and devastate his land.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

1. And the children, of Israel set forward. This narrative contains many circumstances worthy of record: First, it shews that there is no stone which Satan does not turn for the destruction of the Church, and that, after he has assailed her in vain by force of arms, he attacks her by snares and secret artifices, whilst the ungodly also work under his impulse, as far as they are able, to overthrow her by deceit, and to make the promises of God, and His unchangeable decree for the preservation of the Church which He has chosen, of none effect. But God shews, on the other hand, that He so watches over His own, as to turn to their salvation whatever plots their enemies may devise for their destruction. He likewise represents as in a mirror how foolish and vain are their attempts who endeavor to undermine the grace of God; and especially He demonstrates that God’s truth will always be so completely victorious as to receive the testimony even of its professed enemies; just as Balaam was made to proclaim it. These and other observations, however, will be better made in their several places.

We have already seen that there was no reason why Balak should devise any evil against God’s people, since he had no inconvenience to fear from them. Their faith had been voluntarily pledged; security had been promised him, and a treaty proposed. When, therefore, he and all the Moabites prepare themselves, and arouse their neighbors for resistance, they were ungrateful to God as well as men. In his very alarm we see the truth of what Scripture declares, viz., that the reprobate are always agitated by groundless terrors; and this is the just reward of those who seek not peace with God, that they should be constantly harassed by wretched disquietude. By special privilege God had exempted the Moabites from being at all interfered with; but they invent for themselves causes of anxiety, because they see that God’s people had overcome great and powerful kings. For as the brightness of the sun is painful and injurious to those who have weak eyes, so the blessings which God bestows upon the Church, in token of His paternal favor, torment the reprobate and stir them up to envy. If the Moabites had prudently considered their own advantage, they might have easily so arranged with their old connections as to provide for their own tranquillity; but now, by provoking their ill-will, they make the worst bargain possible for themselves. Nor is it the unwise alarm of Balak only which is described, but that of the whole nation of Moab. At first, indeed, the king’s name is introduced alone, but immediately afterwards Moses includes them all without exception, hence it is plain that this error was universal, by the contagion of which they presently corrupt others also. For they invite the Midianites to associate themselves with them in the work of repulsing the Israelites. The pretext alleged is, that as oxen consume the grass of the field, so there was imminent danger lest if the people of Israel were not resisted, they should as it were lick up and devour all the nations; whereas they had experienced quite the reverse, for the people had turned aside of their own accord into circuitous paths, in order to avoid doing them injury. This forbearance would have delivered them from all anxiety, unless their own malignity had taught them to entertain foul suspicions; for why had not the Israelites made a direct aggression upon their territories, except because they were desirous to leave them safe and intact? Otherwise they would have boldly made a way for themselves by force of arms.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

BALAK AND BALAAM.

Chapters 22-24.

Dr. Joseph Parker calls attention to the fact that though these men were introduced into this narrative suddenly, they never go out of it again. Balak will appear at the end of this Old Testament when Micah says, Oh my people, remember now what Balak consulted * * that ye may know the righteousness of the Lord (Mic 6:5). And Balaam and Balak will be the subject of concern when that last Book of the Bible is being written, namely, the Apocalypse. The reason for all this is evident. The history these men made was not that of their day merely, but that of every day up to the end of this age. It is the potentates attempt to coerce the prophet. It is the world of the flesh against the Word of the Spirit. Think of the three things illustrated in this instance!

First of all the potentate attempts to buy up the Prophet. In the 22nd chapter and the 7th and 8th verses we read,

And the elders of Moab, and the elders of Midian departed with the rewards of divination in their hand; and they came unto Balaam, and spake unto him the words of Balak.

And he said unto them, Lodge here this night, and I will bring you word again, as the Lord shall speak unto me; and the princes of Moab abode with Balaam.

In all of the time that has passed, the potentates of the world have not changed their tactics one whit. In very fact there never was a time when ministers were so tempted by money, to false prophecies, as now. Truly has it been said that the Church of God has come into too close alliance with the economic system, and the minister is too often the subject of intimidation by men of means. To preach what God has said, is to part with the reward of divination and to forfeit any expectation of Balaks silver and gold.

In the second instance Balak added men and proffered promotion to money!

And Balak sent yet again princes, more, and more honourable than they.

And they came to Balaam, and said to him, Thus saith Balak, the son of Zippor, Let nothing, I pray thee, hinder thee from coming unto me.

For I will promote thee unto very great honour, and I will do whatsoever thou sayest unto me: come therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people (Num 22:15-17).

That same opportunity of fellowship with notables of honorable office, and of increased emoluments is open to the present-day preacher who will commend the world and curse the people of God.

R. F. Horton says that he found in a fashionable English watering place a clergyman whose conduct was openly and notoriously out of harmony with the Gospel, but who fell back upon the articles of his church and encouraged his hearers to believe that the grace of the church was flowing through his unhallowed lips. And he reminds us that it is the degradation which is resulting in England from the revival of a debased ecclesiasticism, that this church is always crowded with people who were only too glad to find a doctrine which could reconcile a certain religious profession with an unmodified worldliness.

To his popularity was added the proud purse. What is that but a repeating of this ancient history, save that this heathen soothsayer had more conscience than some men who now profess themselves to be ministers of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, for even

Balaam answered and said unto the servants of Balak, If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the Word of the Lord my God, to do less or more (Num 22:18).

A further suggestion of this conversation is Balaams disposition to surrender coupled with his clear conviction of Gods will. His disposition to yield is expressed in his invitation to the honorable men to tarry over night that he might inquire again of the Lord, in his consent to attend them to Moab, and in his counsel to the people of God to commit trespass in the matter of Peor. Then again his strange steadfastness is expressed in the word, Behold I have received commandment to bless; and He hath blessed; and I cannot reverse it (Num 23:20).

That speech reminds us of the great Apostles, Peter and John, when they were enjoined by the Council that they should speak to no man in the Name of Christ, nor preach in the Name of Jesus.

But Peter and John answered and said unto them, Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye.

For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard (Act 4:19-20).

James Russell Lowell wrote most truly:

Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide,

In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side;

Some great cause, Gods new Messiah, offering each the bloom or blight,

Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep upon the right,

And the choice goes by forever twixt the darkness and that light.

Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched crust,

Ere her cause bring fame and profit and tis prosperous to be just;

Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside,

Doubting, in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified,

And the multitude make virtue of the faith they had denied.

The next suggestion of this Scripture is one of very present interest, namely,

Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley

CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES

We now enter upon the last division of this Book, which comprises fifteen chapters (2236).
In the steppes of Moab the Israelites encamped upon the border of the Promised Land, from which they were only separated by the Jordan. But before this boundary line could be passed, there were many preparations that had to be made. In the first place, the whole congregation was to pass through a trial of great importance to all future generations, as bearing upon the relation in which it stood to the heathen world; and in the second place, it was here that Moses, who was not to enter Canaan because of his sin at the water of strife, was to bring the work of legislation to a close before his death, and not only to issue the requisite instructions concerning the conquest of the promised inheritance, and the division of it among the tribes of Israel, but to impress once more upon the hearts of the whole congregation the essential contents of the whole law, with all that the Lord had done for Israel, that they might be confirmed in their fidelity to the Lord, and preserved from the danger of apostasy. This last work of the faithful servant of God, with which he brought his mediatorial work to a close, is described in the book of Deuteronomy; whilst the laws relating to the conquest and partition of Canaan, with the experience of Israel in the steppes of Moab, fill up the latter portion of the present book.Keil and Del.

In this and the succeeding two chapters we have the record of Balaam and his prophecies.

Num. 22:1. The plains. Heb. araboth; the word is the plural of that which is used to denote the whole depressed tract along the Jordan and the Dead Sea, and onward, where it is still called the Arabah, to the Elanitic gulf. Near the mouth of the Jordan this tract is about eleven miles across, a breadth of from four to five miles being on the eastern bank. The space occupied by the Israelitish camp consisted, in the main, of a large and luxuriant oasis upon this bank, slightly raised above the barren flat, sultry because sheltered by the Peraean hills which bear up the fertile plateau above, and watered by the brooks which, descending from those hills, run westward across the plain into the Jordan (see Tristram, Land of Israel, pp. 528 sqq.).Speakers Comm.

Plains of Moab: See on Num. 21:20.

On this side Jordan by Jericho. Keil and Del. translate, Beyond the Jordan of Jericho.

Num. 22:2. Balak = waster, destroyer.Fuerst.

Zippor = a bird.

Num. 22:3. Was distressed because of. Lit. shrank from before them in terror.Speakers Comm.

Num. 22:4. Midian. The Midianites, who are referred to here, must be distinguished from the branch of the same tribe which dwelt in the peninsula of Sinai (Num. 10:29-30; Exo. 2:15-16; Exo. 3:1). They had been settled for a long time (cf. Gen. 36:35) on the eastern border of the Moabitish and Amoritish territory, in a grassy but treeless steppe-landwhere many ruins and wells are still to be found belonging to very ancient timesand lived by grazing (Num. 31:32, sqq.) and the caravan trade. They were not very warlike, and were not only defeated by the Edomites (Gen. 36:35), but were also subdued and rendered tributary by Sihon, king of the Amorites.Keil and Del.

The elders of Midian are heads of tribes who administered the general affairs of the people, who, like the Israelites, lived under a patriarchal constitution. The most powerful of them bore the title of kings (Num. 31:8) or princes (Jos. 13:21).Ibid.

Num. 22:5. Balaam = devourer of the people (Hengstenberg); or, one not belonging to the people, i.e., a foreigner; or, conqueror, corrupter of the people.Fuerst.

Beor is regarded by many as derived from , to burn, to consume. Fuerst says it signifies shepherd, and is from , cattle. In 2Pe. 2:15 the name is written Bosor.

Pethor, which is by the river, &c. Rather, which was on the river (i.e., the Euphrates, so called here and elsewhere by pre-eminence) in his native land.Speakers Comm.

Pethor was a city of Mesopotamia (Deu. 23:4) on the Euphrates. Its site is unknown.

Num. 22:7. Rewards of divination. The soothsayers wages (comp. 2Pe. 2:15).

Num. 22:15. Princes, more, and more honourable; i.e., more in number and of more exalted rank, and with more splendid presents or proffers of reward.

Num. 22:36. A city of Moab. Heb., Ir-Moab. See on Num. 21:15.

Num. 22:39. Kirjath-huzoth. Margin: a city of streets. Fuerst: city of the steppes. From the context, it was apparently within Balaks dominions, and therefore south of the Arnon. Hardly however far south, for from it, on the morrow, the company proceeded to Bamoth-Baal, which lay north of the Arnon. It was probably a place of importance, and possibly that of Balaks residence. All the conditions implied as to the site of Kirjath-huzoth in the Scriptural notice of it are satisfied by the ruins of Shhn, four miles west by south of the site assigned to Ar or Ir. They stand on a slight but insulated eminence, and form a conspicuous object to all the country round.Speakers Comm.

Num. 22:41. The high places of Baal; or, Bamoth-Baal. See on Num. 21:19.

The utmost part of the people; or, the end of the people, i.e., the outermost portion of the camp of Israel. Balak seems to have thought that Balaam must have the Israelites in view to curse them effectually.

PILGRIMS NEARING HOME

(Num. 22:1)

The Israelites have now ended their wanderings. They have encamped for the last time. When they strike their tents again it will be to march forward towards the Jordan to enter the Promised Land. Viewing them in their present position, we regard them as an illustration of the Christian approaching the end of his pilgrimage. There is an analogy in the following particulars. The Christian as he draws near to the end of his pilgrimage,

I. Is cheered by delightful prospects.

From their present encampment the Israelites could behold the land promised to their fathers. They looked forward to

1. Rest from their toils and wanderings. The Christian nearing home anticipates rest from sin and sorrow, from toil and trial, from doubt and fear. Soon they shall rest from their labours, &c. (a)

2. Possession of the inheritance. The inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, will soon be entered upon by the Christian who has the end of his journey in view.

3. The realisation of precious and long-cherished hopes. For generations past the noblest of the Israelites had been animated by the hope of the possession of Canaan; and now that hope is on the point of fruition. The Christian hopes for freedom from sin, for holiness, for likeness to Christ, for the vision of God (1Jn. 3:2-3); and as he nears the bourne of his pilgrimage the realisation of these splendid hopes comes into clear and clearer view. Most brilliant and blessed are his prospects. (b)

II. Needs preparation for the new state into which he is about to enter.

In this encampment in the plains of Moab much preparatory work had to be done amongst the Israelites before they could advance to the possession of Canaan. This preparatory work is narrated in the last eleven chapters of this book, and in the book of Deuteronomy. Moses completed his work as legislator for them, gave them directions as to the conquest and division of the land, took great pains to guard them against apostasy, to confirm them in their covenant relation to God, and to strengthen their loyalty to Him. And as the Christian approaches the end of his pilgrimage, the progress of his preparation for heaven is often manifest to the spiritual observer. His increasing meetness for his inheritance may be seen in the beautiful ripening of his character, which grows rich and mellow. His life becomes luminous with fore-gleamings of the great glory to which he approaches. Gradually he is made meet to be a partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light. (c)

III. Is still subjected to trials and difficulties.

While encamped in the plains of Moab, and before entering the Promised Land, the Israelites experienced

1. Perilous temptations. In the twenty-fifth chapter we have an account of temptations arising from their association with idolatrous peoples and practices, to which great numbers of the Israelites yielded. The true child of God is sometimes sorely tempted and tried, even when he has the heavenly Canaan within his view.

2. Painful separations. Their great emancipator and leader, Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab. And the children of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days. And the aged pilgrim nearing the end of his course often experiences painful separations. The dear partner of his life is perhaps summoned home before him, leaving him to finish his journey alone in weariness and sorrow. The end of the pilgrimage always involves separations, and very often trying ones.

3. Formidable difficulties. Jordan had to be crossed before the Israelites entered into Canaan. And death is an experience which must be passed through by the Christian pilgrim before he gains the heavenly rest; and to some this is a source of great anxiety and trial. (d)

Ye aged pilgrims, and ye who by reason of sickness or weakness are nearing home, be of good cheer, for your heavenly inheritance is at hand. Be ye also diligent that when the summons to arise and depart is given to you, ye may be ready joyfully to obey it.

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) O weary sons and daughters of Adam! you will not have to drive the ploughshare into the unthankful soil in heaven; you will not need to rise to daily toil before the sun hath risen, and labour still when the sun hath long ago gone to his rest; but ye shall be still, ye shall be quiet, ye shall rest yourselves. Toil, trouble, travail, and labour are words that cannot be spelled in heaven; they have no such things there; for they always rest.C. H. Spurgeon.

(b) I do not know a more beautiful sight to be seen on earth than a man who has served the Lord for many years, and who, having grown grey in service, feels that in the order of nature he must soon be called home. He is rejoicing in the first-fruits of the Spirit which he has obtained, but he is panting after the full harvest of the Spirit which is guaranteed to him. I think I see him sitting on a jutting crag by the edge of Jordan, listening to the harpers on the other side, and waiting till the pitcher shall be broken at the fountain, and the wheel at the cistern, and the spirit shall depart to God that made it. A wife waiting for her husbands footsteps; a child waiting in the darkness of the night till its mother comes to give it the evening kiss, are portraits of our waiting. It is a pleasant and precious thing so to wait and so to hopeIbid.

During the last days of that eminent man of God, Dr. Payson, he once said, When I formerly read Bunyans description of the land of Beulah, where the sun shines and the birds sing day and night, I used to doubt whether there was such a place; but now my own experience has convinced me of it, and it infinitely transcends all my previous conceptions. The best possible commentary on the glowing descriptions in Bunyan is to be found in that very remarkable letter dictated by Dr. Payson to his sister a few weeks before his death. Were I to adopt the figurative language of Bunyan I might date this letter from the land Beulah, of which I have been for some weeks a happy inhabitant. The Celestial city is full in my view. Its glories have been upon me, its breezes fan me, its odours are wafted to me, its sounds strike upon my ears, and its spirit is breathed into my heart. Nothing separates me from it but the river of Death, which now appears but an insignificant rill, that may be crossed at a single step, whenever God shall give permission. The Sun of Righteousness has been gradually drawing nearer, appearing larger and brighter as He approached, and now He fills the whoe hemisphere, pouring forth a flood of glory, in which I seem to float like an insect in the beams of the sun, exulting, yet almost trembling, while I gaze on this blessed brightness, and wondering with unutterable wonder why God should deign thus to shine upon a sinful worm.George B. Cheever, D.D.

(c) Am I nearer heaven? then I will be doing more of the work which I shall do in heaven. I shall soon use the harp: let me be carefully tuning it: let me rehearse the hymns which I shall sing before the throne; for if the words in heaven shall be sweeter and more rich than any that poets can put together here, yet the essential song of heaven shall be the same as that which we present to Jehovah here below:

They praise the Lamb in hymns above,

And we in hymns below.

The essence of their praise is gratitude that He should bleed: it is the essence of our praise too. They bless Immanuels name for undeserved favours bestowed upon unworthy ones, and we do the same. My aged brethren, I congratulate you, for you are almost home: be yet more full of praise than ever. Quicken your footsteps as the glory land shines more brightly. You are close to the gate of pearl; sing on, dear brother, though infirmities increase, and let the song grow sweeter and louder until it melts into the infinite harmonies.C. H. Spurgeon.

(d) In itself, death is the self-same thing to the righteous as to the wicked. It is the same painful, convulsive separation between soul and body, sometimes attended with greater suffering, sometimes with less, but always constituting the supreme last strife of agony endurable in this mortal tenement.

Some wicked men have suffered much less in dying than some righteous men. One dieth in his full strength, being wholly at ease and quiet. Another dieth in the bitterness of his soul. They shall lie down alike in the dust, and the worms shall cover them. It would be interesting to draw a comparison between the deaths and the death-beds of a number of the most remarkable wicked men, with an equal number of the most remarkable righteous man. The circumstances of disease, of mere material evil, are much the same, except that as material evils, they are always aggravated by spiritual distress; the pangs of conscience giving sharpness to the pangs of dissolving nature. Compare even the death-beds of Hume, Voltaire, and Paine, with those of Edwards, Brainard, Henry Martyn and Payson, and you will find that there is not much to choose as to the physical pain of dying. Take the deaths of Herod and of Paul, the one eaten of worms, consumed inwardly, and the last in all probability crucified, and there was about as much physical suffering in the one death as in the other. Take the deaths of Nero and of John, the one is a suicide, the last dying quietly at a hundred years of age; the pangs of dissolution in both cases were probably very nearly equal. The death of the righteous is no more exempt from physical distress and suffering than that of the wicked.G. B. Cheever, D.D.

For another Illustration see the description of Christian and Hopeful passing through the river of Death in Bunyans Pilgrims Progress.

NEEDLESS ALARM

(Num. 22:2-4)

I. This alarm was great.

Moab was sore afraid of the people, and Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel. As the Israelites passed by the eastern border of the land of Moab, the Moabites did not venture to make any attack upon them; on the contrary, they supplied them with bread and water for money (Deu. 2:29). At that time they no doubt cherished the hope that Sihon, their own terrible conqueror, would be able with perfect ease either to annihilate this new foe, or to drive them back into the desert from which they had come. But when they saw this hope frustrated, and the Israelites had overthrown the two kings of the Amorites with victorious power, and had conquered their kingdoms, and pressed forward through what was formerly Moabitish territory, even to the banks of the Jordan, the close proximity of so powerful a foe filled Balak, their king, with terror and dismay, so that he began to think of the best means of destroying them. Keil and Del. To go out and fight against them, to attempt to oppose their progress by force, were projects which could not be entertained even for a moment by the Moabites. They shrank from before them in extreme alarm.

II. This alarm seemed to be justified.

The historian mentions three things as giving rise to the terror of the Moabites.

1. The number of the Israelites. Moab was sore afraid of the people, because they were many. The number of men, from twenty years old and upwards, able to go to war in Israel, was at this time about 601, 730 (Num. 26:51), not including the Levites.

2. The needs of the Israelites. And Moab said unto the elders of Midian, Now shall this company lick up all round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field. The idea seems to be that so great a multitude would have great needs, and with their great power would seize and entirely consume all the possessions of the Moabites and the Midianites. The Israelites seemed able to eat up the Moabites, to consume their towns, to possess their substance, and to take both their cities and substance into their own hands.

3. The deeds of the Israelites. Balak the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. They had conquered completely the former conqueror of the Moabites; how, then, could they expect to stand before them? It is probable that they had also heard of the supernatural might of the people of God, of the wonders which He had wrought for them, and this increased their terror by reason of them.

III. This alarm led to the formation of an alliance against Israel.

The Moabites induced their neighbours, the Midianites, to make common cause with them against the people who seemed such a dangerous foe to both of them. In this we have an illustration of many alliances which have been entered into against the cause and people of God. Notwithstanding the differences and divisions amongst the enemies of God and His truth, they can join hand in hand together to oppress the Church. We have illustrations of this in Jdg. 6:3; 2Ch. 20:1; Psa. 83:5-8; Mat. 22:15-16; Luk. 23:12; Act. 4:27; Act. 6:9; Act. 17:18.

IV. This alarm was needless.

There was no ground for such alarm, as the Israelites, in consequence of Divine instructions (Deu. 2:9), had offered no hostilities to the Moabites, but had conscientiously spared their territory and property; and even after the defeat of the Amorites, had not turned their arms against them, but had advanced to the Jordan to take possession of the land of Canaan. We may regard this as an illustration of

1. The groundless fears of the good. Thus David said in his heart, I shall now perish one day by the hand of Saul. And the disciples of Christ cried out for fear, when Jesus came to them walking on the sea. (a)

But the terror of the Moabites more appropriately illustrates

2. The groundless alarms of the wicked. The wicked fleeth when no man pursueth.

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind;
The thief doth fear each bush an officer.

Shakespeare.

The evil man feareth oftentimes where no fear is, trembling at the fall of a leaf, starting at his own thought, and shaking at his own shadow. Conscience before sin committed, is a bridle to keep us from it, but when it is committed, a most sharp scourge and whip. (b)

Lessons.

1. It is not always well to judge by appearances. In this respect the Moabites erred. (c)

2. No alliance can prevail against the cause of God.

3. The infallible antidote against alarm is firm faith in God (comp. Psa. 56:3; Psa. 56:11; Psa. 112:7).

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) I remember, when a boy, reading a story of a traveller, who arrived in the dusk of the evening at a place where two roads met, and was greatly alarmed by what appeared to him, at a distance, to be a frightful ghost, dressed in white, with arms extended, ready to seize him in his frightful embrace. Cautiously advancing, however, he soon discovered that what appeared to be a terrible monster, ready to clutch him, was only a guide-board to direct him on his journey. Such are the afflictions that often befall us in this life. Seen at a distance, in the feeble light of our dim faith, they are frightful apparitions that alarm and terrify us; but, in the event, they prove so many friendly guide-boards, that a wise and gracious Providence has placed by the wayside, to guide us on to glory.Anon.

It often happens that the coming of Christ to His disciples, for their relief, is that which frightens them most, because they do not know the extent of Gods wardrobe; for I think that as a king might never wear the same garment but once, in order to show his riches and magnificence, so God comes to us in all exigencies, but never twice alike. He sometimes puts on the garments of trouble; and when we are calling upon Him as though He were yet in heaven. He is walking by our side; and that from which we are praying God to deliver us is often but God Himself. Thus it is with us as with children who are terrified by their dreams in the night, and scream for their parents, until, fully waking, behold, they are in their parents arms.H. W. Beecher.

In regard to these temptations, Bunyan was sometimes just like a scared child that thinks it sees a ghost, or like a timid person in a wood by twilight, that sees in the stump of a tree a man crouched and lying in wait, and instead of daring to go boldly up to it to see what it is, stands shivering and almost dead with terror. Who has not realized this in his own experience, timid or brave? And just so Bunyan did not dare to go up to and examine and look in the face of the shocking blasphemies, accusations, and wrathful passages that Satan would be ever thrusting into his soul; but went cowering and shivering and bowed down as a man in chains under the weight of them. There was a time when all that Satan said to him he seemed morbidly inclined to take upon trust; and if it were a fiery passage of Gods Word, so much the worse; for instead of coming up to it as a child of God to see what it was, and whether it were really against him, he fled from it at once as from the fiery flaming sword in the gate of Eden. And nothing can be more curious, more graphic, more affecting in its interest, more childlike in its simplicity, than the manner in which Bunyan describes the commencement and progress of his recovery out of this state of condemnation and terror: how timidly and cautiously, and as it were by stealth, he began to look these dreadful passages in the face when they had ceased pursuing him, standing at first afar off, and gazing at them, and then, as a child that cannot get rid of its fear, slowly drawing near, and at length daring to touch them, and to walk around them, and to see their true position and meaning, but always conscious of their awful power.G. B. Cheever, D.D.

(b) However vauntingly men may bear themselves in the hour of prosperous villainy, proofs enough have existed of the fears of guilt, when the hour of calamity approaches. Why did our first parents hide themselves after their sin, when they heard the voice of the Lord in the garden? Why did Cain alarm himself at being pursued by the people of the earth? Why shrunk Belshazzar from the handwriting on the wall? Adam had before heard the voice of the Lord, and trembled not: Cam knew that no witness of the murder of his brother existed: Belshazzar understood not the meaning of the writing upon the wall:and yet they all, after the commission of their several deeds of sin, trembled at the voices that were heard, and the signs that were about. Whence, then, was this? It was because conscience told them, that there is an Eye to which all hearts are open, and whispered the important truth, which has since been proclaimed aloud to all the world, that doubtless there is a God that judgeth in the earth.Mathew.

What a state is guilt,

When everything alarms it! Like a sentinel
Who sleeps upon his watch, it wakes in dread
Een at a breath of wind.
When apprehension can form naught but fears,
And we distrust security itself.W. Havard.

(c) I remember well, one night, having been preaching the Word in a country village, I was walking home alone along a lonely foot-path. I do not know what it was that ailed me, but I was prepared to be alarmed, when of a surety I saw something standing in the hedge ghastly, giantlike, and with outstretched arms. Surely, I thought, for once I have come across the supernatural; here is some restless spirit performing its midnight march beneath the moon, or some demon of the pit. I deliberated with myself a moment, and having no faith in ghosts, I plucked up courage, and resolved to solve the mystery. The monster stood on the other side of a ditch, right in the hedge. I jumped the ditch, and found myself grasping an old tree, which some waggish body had taken pains to colour with a little whitewash, with a view to frighten simpletons. That old tree has served me a good turn full often.C. H. Spurgeon.

BALAKS FIRST APPLICATION TO BALAAM: MAN AND THE SUPERNATURAL

(Num. 22:5-14)

Here we have the beginning of the action arising from the alliance between Moab and Midian against Israel. Willing to wound, but yet afraid to strike, the Moabites felt that it would be in vain to contend with them while they so manifestly enjoyed the blessing and protection of a mighty God. But they did think that it might be possible to withdraw or neutralize the force of that advantage, by laying upon them the heavy ban of some powerful magician; and by having them thus rendered weak as other men, they might be assailed with every prospect of success. It must have been a great recommendation of the design to them, that the result would enable them to recover the territory that had once been theirs, but which the Israelites now held by right of conquest from the Amorites. Indeed, could the Israelites be exterminated, or driven back into the desert, the children of Lot might well calculate on not only recovering what they had lost, but on adding the rich lands of Argob and Bashan, which the Israelites had won from Og, to their former territories; and they would thus, with some allied tribes of Abrahamic origin, become the sole possessors of the whole country east of the Jordan.Kitto. With these views they sent to Balaam, a celebrated soothsayer, requesting him to come and curse Israel. In this portion of the history we have the following instructive themes for meditation

I. Men in difficulty seeking supernatural help.

Balak sent messengers unto Balaam the son of Beor, &c. (Num. 22:5-7). This action manifests the belief that Balaam wielded supernatural powers. It was supposed that prophets and sorcerers had a power to curse persons and places so as to confound all their designs, frustrate their counsels, enervate their strength, and fill them with fear, terror, and dismay. (a)

1. There is a measure of truth in this. It is true that men have had power granted them to curse others. We have examples of this in Gen. 9:25; Jos. 6:26; 2Ki. 2:24. It is probable that Balaam had this power. It is also true that when natural resources are unavailing, under certain circumstances and conditions man may obtain supernatural aid. The godly man may obtain such aid by means of prayer to God.

2. There is much error in the views under consideration. It was utterly erroneous to suppose that Balaam, or any one else, possessed this power independently, and could wield it arbitrarily. The curse causeless shall not come. No man can curse those whom God hath blessed. And the power to curse or bless does not depend upon sacrifices or incantations; it is rather a gift bestowed by God, and which can be exercised only by His permission.

II. Man conscious of supernatural powers and of his subjection to Divine authority in the use of them.

And he said unto them Lodge here this night, and I will bring you word again, as the Lord shall speak unto me. Balaam was certainly not altogether an impostor. In his career, says Dean Stanley, is seen that recognition of Divine inspiration outside the chosen people, which the narrowness of modern times has been so eager to deny, but which the scriptures are always ready to acknowledge, and, by acknowledging, admit within the pale of the teachers of the Universal Church the higher spirits of every age and of every nation. But notice

1. His consciousness of great powers. This is clearly implied in the history. He was endowed with a greater than ordinary knowledge of the one true God: he was possessed of high gifts of intellect and genius: he had the intuition of truth, and could see into the life of thingsin short, he was a poet and a prophet. (b)

2. His consciousness of subjection to God in the use of his powers. Repeatedly in the history he confesses that all his great powers were not his own, but derived from God, and could be used only by His permission. This is clearly implied in the portion of the history now under consideration (Num. 22:8; Num. 22:13). He seems also to have been aware of the relation of Israel to the true God; and to have doubted whether he would be allowed to curse them. Hence we see

3. His sin against God. Knowing what he did, he ought at once, and decidedly, to have refused the request of Balak. But he said to his messengers, Lodge here this night, &c. He coveted the rewards of divination; he loved the wages of unrighteousness. For unhallowed gain he would have prostituted his great gifts to wicked uses; and hoped to gain permission to go with the messengers of Balak. (c)

III. Man receiving a supernatural visitation.

And God came unto Balaam, and said, What men are these with thee? (Num. 22:9-12). This was an extraordinary visit. But here are three points of general application:

1. Gods access to mans mind. It was probably by means of a dream or vision that God came to Balaam that night, and made known to him His will. By many avenues God can enter into mans mind, and influence his consciousness. With or without the concurrence of mans will, or even against His will, God can enter his mind and speak to him.

2. Gods interest in mans life. This is seen in His question to Balaam, What men are these with thee? and in His prohibition, Thou shalt not go with them, &c. The Lord was concerned for Balaams welfare; He was solicitous that he should not succumb to the temptations presented to him. (d) In many ways God still manifests His solicitude for mans salvation, and His deep interest in every human life.

3. Gods authority over mans life. God said unto Balaam, thou shalt not go with them, &c. It is Gods to command; it is mans to obey. Mans well-being is in the practical recognition of Gods authority over him.

IV. Man dealing unfaithfully with a Divine communication.

And Balaam rose up in the morning, and said unto the princes of Balak, &c. (Num. 22:13). The most important part of Gods message to him, that which would effectually have ended the business, he withheld from the messengers of Balak. He spoke as if it were possible to curse them, and as if he were inclined to accede to the request of Balak. His avarice is still further manifest in this: he could not bear to lose for ever the rewards of divination which the messengers had brought with them. Balaams character is not so peculiar as it seems. Separated from the external accidents of time, of country, and position, we may go into the streets, and find a Balaam in every third man we meet. He belonged to that still numerous class who theoretically know God, and who actually do fear Him, but whose love and fear of God are not the regulating and governing principles of their minds. They are convinced, but not converted. They can prize, and strongly desire the privileges of Gods elect; they long to die the death of the righteous, but are unwilling to live their life. They would serve God, but they must serve mammon also; and in the strife between the two contending influences, their lives are made bitter, and their death is perilous.Kitto.

V. Men dealing unfaithfully as messengers.

And the princes of Moab rose up, and they went unto Balak, and said, Balaam refuseth to come with us. Observe Satans practice against Gods word, says Ainsworth, seeking to lessen the same, and that from hand to hand, till he bring it to naught. Balaam told the princes less than God told him, and they relate to Balak less than Balaam told them; so that when the answer came to the king of Moab, it was not the word of God but the word of man; it was simply, Balaam refuseth to come, without ever intimating that God had forbidden him.
Learn.

1. The Divine communications have never been limited to any one people, or country, or age. Amongst heathen peoples Divine voices have been heard, Divine visions have been seen.

2. Great goodness it not always associated with great gifts. The illumination of the mind is by no means necessarily associated with the conversion of the heart. Broad is the distinction between spiritual endowments and spiritual character.

3. Great gifts involve great responsibility and grave peril. The responsibility of using them in accordance with the will of the Giver, and the peril of misusing them.

4. The temptation to covetousness is of great subtlety and strength, and assails even the most gifted natures. Take heed and beware of covetousness; &c. (Luk. 12:15-21).

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) Their proceedure, in seeking to lay the armies of Israel under a curse, that their own arms might be successful against them, is a strange no ion to us. But it is not so in the East. Even at the present day, the pagan Orientals in their wars have always their magicians with them to curse their enemies, and to mutter incantations for their ruin. Sometimes they secretly convey a potent charm among the opposing troops, to ensure their destruction. In our own war with the Burmese, the generals of that nation had several magicians with them, who were much engaged in curing our troops; but as they did not succeed, a number of witches were brought for the same purpose. We may indeed trace it as a very ancient opinion among all people, that the maledictions, and the blessings, the charms, the incantations, and the devotements of men who were believed to be inspired by a superior spirit, good or evil, had the most marked effects, not only upon individuals, but upon regions and entire nations, and even upon cattle and upon the fruits of the field. Not seldom they sought by strong enchantments to evoke the tutelary divinities of their enemies cities, desiring thus to deprive them of what was regarded as their chief defence. Hence the proper name of many great cities was preserved as a state secret, that no enemy might be able to make use of it in their invocations. The names by which cities were ordinarily known,as, for instance, Troy, Carthage, Romewere not the true and secret names of these places. Rome was called Valentiaa name known as hers by very few persons; and Valerius Soranus was severely punished for having disclosed it. The heathens had, indeed, certain solemn invocations, by means of which they devoted their enemies to certain divinities, or rather to malignant and dangerous demons. The following is the formula of one of these imprecations, as preserved by Macrobius: Dis-Pater, or Jupiter, if it better please thee to be called by that nameor by whatever name thou mayest be invokedI conjure thee to pour upon this army (or this town) the spirit of terror and trepidation. Deprive of their sight all those who shall aim their strokes at us, our armies, or our troops. Spread darkness over our enemies, over their cities, their fields, their forces. Look upon them as accursed. Bring them under the must rigorous conditions to which any armies have ever been obliged to submit. Thus do I devote them; and I and those whom I represent, the nation and the army engaged in this war, stand for witnesses. If this doom be accomplished, I promise a sacrifice of three black sheep to thee, O Earth, mother of all things, and to thee, great Jupiter.John Kitto, D.D.

For additional illustrations on this point see Dr. Adam Clarke in loco.

(b) Was this knowledge a reality or a pretence? If we take the narrative in its plain meaningand that is the meaning in which we think that all historical Scripture should be takenthere can be no doubt that Balaam actually had this knowledge, that he not only held the truth, or much of truth, though he held it in unrighteousness, but that God did, in subservience to His own high purposes, actually communicate with him. Any other explanation, however ingenious, is but a continuous and painful distortion of the whole narrative, which revolts the understanding more than do even the strong facts which it tries to mitigate, in deference to the tastes and tendencies of the age. Besides this, the deep attention that Balaam had given (and was doubtless known to have given) to the affairs of the Hebrews, and his acquaintance with their early history, their existing condition, and their future hopes, are shown in the noble prophecy which he was eventually constrained to utter.

How he became possessed of the knowledge he heldand held with so little advantage to his own soulis a question that looks more difficult than it is. May he not have owed something to such remains of the patriarchal religion as still existed in Mesopotamia when Ja ob was there, and which his residence for twenty years in that quarter may have contributed to maintain? But the only supposition which accounts fully for the knowledge which Balaam possessed of Jehovah, whom he generally mentions by that high and peculiar name, is the one which adds to whatever knowledge he possessed from other sources, that which he owed to the Israelites themselves. The way in which this knowledge might be acquired is clear. There could not but be many reports concerning, the Israelites during their forty years wandering in the desert. With a mind awake to everything which concerned his profession, he would be naturally attracted by the reports of the deliverance effected by the Lord for this people who had come out of Egypt, and whose parentage could not be unknown to him. He had surely heard of the passage of the Red Sea, of the waters of Meribah, of the miracle of the brazen serpent; and, as in the case of Simon M gus, a new source of celebrity and of emolument seemed to open up before him, most enticing to his besetting sins. He then, we may conceive, adopted Jehovah as his God, and named himself Jehovahs prophet. Nor, it may be, was this wholly with views of worldly advantage. It is quite possible, as Hengsienberg supposes, that there was a mixture of a higher order of sentiments, a sense of the wants of his moral nature, which led him to seek Jehovah, and laid the foundation of his intercourse with Him. This is all the more probable, as we feel bound to understand that the Lord did, in the accomplishment of His own great purposes, vouchsafe unto him special manifestations of the Divine will.Ibid.

(c) Take heed of cares and covetousness, which is an immoderate desire of getting and enjoying the wealth of this world. For it stealeth away the heart of man from God and godliness, and maketh him bend the whole course of his life on earthly pleasures. This is the common sickness and disease of this age wherein we live. For give me one among many that is not overcome with the pleasures of sin, and the profits of the world. It stealeth on such as have sanctified affections, and have escaped out of the fil hiness of the world, through the acknowledging of the Lord, and seeketh to overcome them. It is so deceitful and dangerous a sin, that it hath greatly assaulted, and fearfully overcome them after their calling to the truth and profession of the glorious Gospel of Christ our Saviour, and after they have began to make some conscience of their life and conversation. Nay, such as before their calling and conversation felt no such desires and cares, now begin to be pressed, cumbered, and tempted with them. For as Satan by all means seeketh whom he may devour, and how he may hinder the repentance of sinners, so when he cannot any longer hold men in horrible sins of idolary, blasphemy, adultery and contempt of God then like a wily and subtle serpent, he creepeth in another way before we can espy him; then he suffereth us to hate evil company, surfeiting, drunkenness, riot, and excess, but he driveth to another extremity, and possesseth us with distrustful cares, and immoderate thoughts of this world, to desire greedily, to seek continually, to keep wretchedly, and to depart heavily from the vain and momentary things that perish with the use. And as this is a secret and subtle sin (albeit deeply rooted, yet hardly espied) so is it seldom cured and recovered, because men do not much consider of it and regard it, but please and flatter themselves in it. If we would attain to our former estate, and see the danger of this disease, consider the vanity and uncertainty of all worldly things; compare them with spiritual blessings, and they are as dung and dirt matched with gold and silver. Love not the world, &c. (1Jn. 2:15-17; 1Ti. 6:17-19).W. Attersoll.

(d) Balaam was blessed with Gods special favour. You will ask at once, How could so bad a man be in Gods favour? But I wish you to put aside reasonings, and contemplate facts. I say he was specially favoured by God. God has a store of favours in His treasure house, and of various kindssome for a time, some for ever; some implying His approbation, others not. He showers favours even on the bad. He makes His sun to rise on the unjust as well as on the just. He willeth not the death of a sinner. He is said to have loved the young ruler, whose heart, notwithstanding, was upon the world. His loving mercy exteeds over all His works. How He separates, in His own Divine thought, kindness from approbation, time from eternity; what He does from what He foresees we know not, and need not inquire. At present He is loving to all men, as if He did not foresee that some are to be saints, others representates to all eternity. He dispenses His favours variouslygifts, graces, rewards, faculties, circumstances, being indefinitely diversified nor admitting of discrimination or numbering on our part. Balaam, I say, was in His favour; not indeed for his holiness sake, not for ever; but in a certain sense, according to His inscrutable purpose who chooses whom He will choose, and exalts whom He will exalt, without destroying mans secret responsibilities, or His own governance, and the triumph of truth and holiness, and His own strict impartiality in the end. Balaam was favoured in an especial way above the mere heathen. Not only had he the grant of inspiration, and the knowledge of Gods will, an insight into the truths of morality, clear and enlarged, such as we Christians even cannot surpass, but he was even admitted to conscious intercourse with God, such as even Christians have not.J. H. Newman, D.D.

GODS INTEREST IN MANS COMPANIONSHIPS

(Num. 22:9)

Human companionships are

1. Observed by God. The guests we entertain, the persons who visit us, the associations we enter into, the friendships we form, are all known unto the Lord.

2. Challenged by God. What men are these with thee? This enquiry was made neither because the Lord needed information, nor yet simply to open the conversation on the mission of the messengers of Balak. It was designed, as Hengstenberg suggests, to awaken the slumbering conscience of Balaam, to lead him to reflect upon the proposal which the men had made, and to break the force of his sinful inclination. God addresses the same question to the young who are forming dangerous associations; to Christians who take pleasure in non-religious and worldly society, &c. He urges this solemn enquiry

(1) by the voice of conscience;
(2) by the preaching of His truth;
(3) by the exhortations and admonitions of His Word; and
(4) by the remonstrances of His Spirit.

This enquiry also indicates the Divine concern as to human companionships. We may regard this concern as

I. An indication of the Divine solicitude for the well-being of man.

Nothing whatever that is of importance to us is uninteresting to God. In every man, created in His image and redeemed by the precious blood of His Son, He has the deepest and tenderest concern.

II. An indication of the importance of our companionships.

Inasmuch as He is so concerned as to the character of our associates, it must be a matter of vital importance to us, and should receive our serious attention.

1. Our associates indicate our character. A man is known by the company which he keeps.

2. Our associates influence our character. He that walketh with wise men shall be wise; but a companion of fools shall be destroyed. (a) My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not; &c. (Pro. 1:10-15). Enter not into the path of the wicked, &c. (Pro. 4:14-19). Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, &c. (b)

III. An indication of our responsibility to God for our companionships.

For the associations we form and the alliances we contract we must every one give account to God. Soon or late we each must answer the interrogation, What men are these with thee?

IV. An indication of the danger of dallying with temptation.

Balaam should have sent the messengers back to Balak at once, with a firm refusal to comply with his request. His longing for the rewards of divination led him to keep them for the night; and by so doing he increased the perilousness of his position tenfold. To parley with temptation is to play with fire. In matters of right and wrong let us never hesitate; for hesitation in such matters is both sinful and dangerous. (c) To the invitations of the tempter let us respond with a prompt and decisive No. To the summons of Duty let us render speedy and hearty obedience.

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) The examples of our companions will exert a plastic influence in the formation of our own character, slow and silent, perhaps, but irresistible and successful: and this influence will be in proportion to the love and esteem we cherish for them. All nations and all ages have confessed the truth of this sentiment. The example of a beloved companion is omnipotent, more especially if he be a sinful one, because a bad model find in the depravity of our nature something that prepares it to receive the impression. One evil companion will undo in a month all that parents and teachers have been labouring for years to accomplish.J. A. James.

There is a certain magic or charm in company, for it will assimilate, and make you like to them by much conversation with them; if they he good company, it is a great means to make you good, or confirm you in goodness; but if they be bad, it is twenty to one but they will infect and corrupt you. Therefore be wary and shy in choosing, and entertaining, or frequenting any company or companions; be not too hasty in committing yourself to them; stand off awhile till you have inquired of some (that you know by experience to be faithful), what they are; observe what company they keep; be not too easy to gain acquaintance, but stand off and keep a distance yet awhile, till you have observed and earnt touching them. Men or women that are greedy of acquaintance, or hasty in it, are oftentimes snared in ill company before they are aware, and entangled so that they cannot easily get loose from it after when they would.Sir Matthew Hale.

(b) Flee unholy company, as baneful to the power of godliness. Be but as careful for thy soul as thou wouldst be for thy body. Durst thou drink in the same cup, or sit in the same chair with one that hath an infectious disease? And is not sin as catching a disease as the plague itself? Of all trades, it would not do well to have the collier and the fuller live together; what one cleanseth, the other will blacken and defile. Thou canst not be long among unholy ones, but thou wilt hazard the defiling of thy soul, which the Holy Spirit hath made pure.W. Gurnall.

Those who willingly associate with the sinful are like men strolling with some trivial object through a district infected with fever, heedless of the invisible arrows of disease spreading through the air: or they may be compared to the River Thames, which is a sweet and pretty river enough near its source; but in the great metropolis it has kept company with drains and sowers, under the belief that its current was too powerful and pure to be injured by them. It was meant that the river should purify the sewer; but, instead of that, the sewer has corrupted the river.Union Magazine.

(c) Suffer not Satans fiery darts to abide one moment with you; entertain no parley or dispute about them; reject them with indignation; and strengthen your rejection of them with some pertinent, testimony of Scripture, as our Saviour d d. If a man have a grenado or fire-ball cast into his clothes by the enemy, he does not consider whether it will burn or no, but immediately shakes it off from him. Deal no otherwise with these fiery darts, lest by their abode with you they inflame your imaginations unto greater disturbance.John Owen, D.D.

Young persons should, above all things, beware of beginnings, and by no means parley with temptations; their greates security is in flight, and in the study to avoid all occasions of evil; for the cockatrice, which may be easily crushed in the egg, if suffered to hatch and grow up, will prove a deadly serpent hard to be destroyed.Gleanings.

HISTORY OF BALAAM, AND HIS PROPHECIES.NO. I

(Num. 22:1-14)

This story of Balaam I believe to be an honest narrative of facts as they actually occurred (see Mic. 6:5; 2Pe. 2:15; Jud. 1:11; Rev. 2:14). These repeated references to the history of Balaam in the Old and New Testaments come in support of our belief in the reality of the history; and teach us that since Peter and Jude and John were anxious that the mans character and history should not be forgotten, and that the Church in their days should profit by the beacon-warning which the whole career of this half-bad, half-good man furnished; so, too, should we in our day gather up the details of his history and from them learn what is the lesson of the whole, how a man may struggle and fight against God; against Gods kindness and Gods voice, and Gods warnings, and against his own thoughts and convictions, and better aspirations, until he becomes a light quenched in darkness, a heart hopelessly hardened, a man whom it is impossible to renew unto repentance.

Look at the circumstances that brought Balaam into notice.
Let us notice three things, as illustrative of human character and of the general history of Divine Providence.

I. How the career and fortunes of the children of Israel were made known in those days.

Those were the days of mere oral communication. From mouth to mouth, and from father to son, events passed along and through society. There was no machinery for the spread of intelligence: it was circulated just in the natural order of things. By these means the knowledge of Israel and of Israels God appears to have been spread throughout all the countries surrounding the Sinaitic peninsula. This was in fact a revelation to these people; a mercy in making known to them, that amidst all their gods and vanities, there was yet a mightier and holier One, who would not give His name to idols, nor His praise to graven images.

II. But this fear of the Moabites was needless, from the express instructions given to the Israelites (see Deu. 2:9).

Of course the King of Moab, Balak, knew nothing of this; he and his elders might, however, have reflected upon the fact that the Israelites with anxious solicitude had avoided doing the least injury to the territory of the Moabites; they might have remembered that this powerful body of people had scrupulously paid for the bread and water that had been furnished them as they passed through their territory (Deu. 2:28-29). But the Moabites themselves were a lawless predatory tribe, in whom the will for conquest was manifested as far as their power went; and hence the needless fear of the King of Moab, expressed in that nervous language that at once reminds us of the old shepherd princes: Now shall this company lick up all that are round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field. What a fine illustration is this of human nature! How the wicked fleeth when no man pursueth: how suspicious unprincipled men generally are! how men have estimated others by their own standard of right and wrong!

III. Let us add a word or two about Balaam.

What was he? Was he a heathen soothsayer? (and in Jos. 13:22 he is called so): and if he was a heathen soothsayer, how did he come to utter such glorious and far-reaching predictors? Or was he a prophet of the true God, like Isaiah or Micah? And if so, how did he come to do such wicked things, and be so base and avaricious, and at last so gross and sensual a tempter of the people of Israel?

In reply to such questions, we remark, that previous to the constitution of the children of Israel into a separate religious nation, a nation selected for a religious purpose, with ultimate reference to the Messiah, there was a patriarchal Church extending among all the faithful that preserved uncorrupted the early traditions of the human family. This church, doubtless, received frequent oral communications from God Himself. The men composing this church were not of the seed of Abraham, but were in those far distant days a pledge and type of the enlargement of the Church of Christ among all nations. Such were Shem, Job, and Jethro.
Now, Balaam, I take it, was one of that ancient patriarchal church traditions, partly correct and partly corrupt, had been handed down generation after generation until they came to him; on these traditions, and on occasional visits from God, his soul lived. There was a religiousness and purity about the man that attracted attention among the wild and lawless Moabites; they were impressed and awe struck with the blameless simplicity of his life as compared with the licentious character of their sensual Baal worship; and so the man came to be regarded with reverence and fear by them, to be invested with a kind of supernatural and mysterious power by which whomsoever he blessed was blessed, and whomsoever he cursed was cursed, in the estimation of these wild Moabites.
Now you can hardly imagine a more difficult and perilous position for a man to be placed in. A man standing alone in his religious ideas; far in advance of all around him in real and essential truth; got to be regarded by others, until he comes to regard himself, as a very extraordinary character; looking down upon others quite as much as they look up to him; surrounded by wild nomadic tribes, who are filled with a vague but real, and all the more real because it was vague, dread of this superior being. What a school this, to learn lessons of the human heartto learn how it will shuffle, and cheat, and lie, to keep up this spiritual powerto learn how, under seeming religiousness, it will aim at personal aggrandizement and influence; to learn how, step by step, he who was at one time the most religious man among them, may become the darkest and the blackest sinner among them. To us in this history the Scripture says, Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.W. G. Barrett.

HISTORY OF BALAAM, AND HIS PROPHECIES.NO. II

(Num. 22:1-14)

There is nothing so dear to man as power; the acquisition of influence over the minds of others is a conquest full of hazard and responsibility. Balaam had this influence. He had the key of Balaks heart, and could turn its wards which way he pleased. To him, living a retired life in the desert, the messengers of the king come; their request is urgent, for it is from the king; their request is flattering, for it is a testimony from Balak that a prophets word is better than a kings sword; their request is apparently reasonable, for why should the Moabites be destroyed? and their request was accompanied by those rewards of divination without which the heathen never consulted their favourite oracles.

But their request was a sinful one; and I believe from the language of Num. 22:9, Balaam saw even then that it was a wicked request; but it had come before him so unexpectedlyhe was so honoured and flattered by it, that his moral sense, his religious convictions, got crushed and overpowered as this huge temptation came and stated itself before this weak man, and said to him, Yield to me, yield at once, for riches and honour are in my right hand: all these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.

Let us notice

I. The first false step Balaam took, as indicative and prophetic of all the other downward ones.

(Num. 22:8.) And he said unto them, Lodge here this night, &c.

This was not the way to meet this great peril. I believe he had quite enough knowledge on the subject to have shaped for himself a different course. I believe this was just a hypocritical pretence to gain time, and that the man, even now dazzled by the gifts of gold, the rewards of divination, was clutching them in his heart long before they came into his actual possession. This I think furnishes the key to the whole after-history of this greatly bad man. I do not think Balaam meant at all to consult God. The matter was too plainly before him to create any necessity for that; but it was a capital trick to play off upon these Moabitish courtiers to impress them with a deeper sense of his importance and influence.
Do not you think we may do the very same thing? We may talk of praying over such and such a matter, and seeking Divine direction, and asking for the leadings of Providence, when really Gods will is the last thing we are thinking about; when we have already decided and determined what to do. God sees our purpose and determination to have our own way, and man hears our words about Divine direction and guidance; and so, next to cheating God, the worst thing a man can do is to cheat himself; so Balaam did, and you know how it succeeded.

II. The warning Balaam had during the night of agitation that followed this visit.

My reason for thinking that Balaam did not intend to consult God at all is the language of the ninth verse, which reads to me very much like a reproof. It is not Balaam going to God and asking, Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do? but God coming to Balaam and saying to him, What are you doing? What men are these with thee? How is it they are with thee? How is it that you did not dismiss them at once?

Ah! that must have been a sore night of perplexity and agitation to Balaam. How often must he have resolved and re-resolved, and yet, spite of all his resolutions, in the absence of a holy will did he reconsider the thing, and make up his mind, if possible, to go with the messengers of Balak.
Then in the stillness of that night, came this warning to Balaam, What men are these with thee? How that warning might have saved him if he bad heeded it: but out of stammering lips and from an undecided heart he speaks the truth, and tells God their character and message to him.
All this was the beginning of the end of Balaam. Let us look here, and see the easy steps to hell. What does it profit a man, if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul? Learn how a man, in spite of his better nature and religious revivings, may quench the Spirit and die a desolate and forsaken outcast.

III. The positive refusal God gave to Balaam.

Thou shalt not go with them.
Here was mercy and severity! It was mercy not to abandon this man; not to give him up hopelessly and for ever to his own hearts lust, without another word of warning; mercy to follow him after his stammering, hesitating, halfhearted confession, to say, No, no, thou shalt not go! There is a way that seemeth right to thee, Balaam, but the end of it is death. And does God never follow us in that manner? Does he not come and cry unto us, Turn ye, turn ye at My reproof; why will ye die? Oh! if you have ever heard that voice, listen to it; it is thy life! To-day, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your heart.

Here was severity too. Do you think a man like Balaam ought to have required such a prohibition? Ought he not at once to have felt that the whole scheme was a wicked one, which he ought to hate, and to shun and to protest against?

Ill fares it with the health of life and soul when it must be put under the care of lock and key; when nothing but commands and prohibitions can keep it in order; when it must be surrounded by thou shalt, and thou shalt not, to keep it right. Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty; and the emancipated spirit has higher but happier constraints than the law of Sinai, in the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.Ibid.

BALAKS SECOND APPLICATION TO BALAAM: THE DECREASE OF RESISTANCE TO EVIL

(Num. 22:15-21)

In this section of the history we have four conspicuous steps.

I. The repetition with increased force of the request of Balak to Balaam.

And Balak sent yet again princes, &c. (Num. 22:15-17).

1. The embassage was more influential. The princes who were sent this second time were more numerous and more honourable than the former ones. Here was a powerful appeal to the vanity of the prophet.

2. The message was more urgent. Let nothing, I pray thee, hinder thee from coming unto me.

3. The inducements were stronger, For I will promote thee unto very great honour, and I will do whatsoever thou sayest unto me, &c. If Balaam wanted rank and dignities, he should have them; if he wanted wealth, he should have it also. If he will but comply with the request of the King of Moab, the most splendid honours and the most munificent treasures shall be freely given to him. Learn: that temptations which have been declined reluctantly or half-heartedly are presented again, and with greater force. The manner of Balaams dismissal of the former messengers prepared the way for a repetition of their mission.

II. The repetition under aggravating circumstances of guilty delay by Balaam.

And Balaam answered and said unto the servants of Balak, &c. (Num. 22:18-19). In entertaining the proposal at all, and in keeping the messengers during the night, the prophet sinned and that heinously; he ought to have sent them back to Balak with a firm and final refusal. And his guilt was the greater because

1. He had been challenged by God as to the presence of the former messengers. God came unto Balaam, and said, What men are these with thee?

2. He had already been prohibited from complying with the request of Balak. God said unto Balaam, Thou shalt not go with them, &c. (Num. 22:12). To a really good man this would have been a final settlement of the question. So it ought to have been to Balaam.

3. He himself felt and plainly declared that he was bound by the Word of the Lord in the matter. He said unto the servants of Balak, If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot transgress the command of Jehovah my God, to do little or great. An utterance worthy of a holy man and a true prophet. But in the light of this declaration, Dr. Kitto forcibly enquires: Then why not at once dismiss the messengers? He already knew the mind of God, and he ought to have known that God is not a man, that He should lie; nor the Son of Man, that He should repent. Instead of that, he says, Now therefore, I pray you, tarry ye also here this night, that I may know what the Lord will say unto me more. What more? Did Balaam fashion to himself a god after his own heart, and imagine that he also was to be moved from his declared purpose by the gifts and promises of Balak? Could he mean to insult God by his importunities? Did he hope to extort from Him, out of regard to his own worldliness, permission to bring a curse upon an entire nation which, as was well known, had been so long the object of His covenant care? Even such was what Peter calls the madness of the prophet. Such also was the great wickedness of the prophet. He was afraid to transgress the command of God; but he hoped to obtain from Him permission to accompany the messengers, and so to gratify his passion for worldly gain. (a) The temptation was stronger than before; but the reasons for resisting it were also more clear and cogent; and his guilt in not doing so was darker and heavier. A temptation once dallied with, it becomes more difficult to resist it hereafter.

Vice is a monster of so frightful mien,
As to be hated, needs but to be seen;
Yet, seen too oft, familiar with her face
We first endure, then pity, then embrace

Pope

III. The repetition of the Divine visit to Balaam.

And God came unto Balaam at night, and said, &c. (Num. 22:20). Here are two things which claim attention

1. The permission granted. God said unto Balaam, If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them. When man is determined to have his own way, a time comes when God ceases to oppose him in the matter. My people would not hearken to my voice, and Israel would none of me. So I gave them up unto the stubbornness of their heart; they walk in their own counsels. In giving permission to Balaam, God granted in anger what He denied in mercy (comp. Num. 11:18-20; Num. 11:31-33).

2. The condition enforced. But yet the word which I shall say unto thee, that shalt thou do. God allows Balaam to go, but He restrains him so that he shall not in any way injure His cause and people. The power of the wicked for injury is limited by the Lord.

IV. The setting out of Balaam on the journey.

And Balaam rose up in the morning, and saddled his ass, and went with the princes of Moab. (b) Mark his unbecoming and sinful haste: God said to him, If the men come to call thee, rise up and go with them; but he did not wait to be called: he rose up in the morning, &c. Because, says Dr. Adam Clark, he was more hasty than he ought to have been, and went to them instead of staying till they should come to him, it was said of him, not ki halach, that he went; but ki holech hu, i.e., he went of his own headwithout being called. He ran greedily for reward.

The chief lesson of our subject is, the importance of meeting the first temptation to evil with uncompromising resistance: to hesitate or to parley is to diminish our power of resistance, and to increase the power of the temptation, thus making successful resistance a task of almost insuperable difficulty. (c) Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, &c. (1Pe. 5:8-9).

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) You will observe he wished to go with Balaks messengers, only he felt he ought not to go; and the problem which he attempted to solve was, how to go and yet not offend God. He was quite resolved he would, any how, act religiously and conscientiously; he was too honourable a man to break any of his engagements; if he had given his word, it was sacred; if he had duties, they were imperative; he had a character to maintain, and an inward sense of propriety to satisfy; but he would have given the world to have got rid of his duties; and the question was, how to do so without violence; and he did not care about walking on the very brink of transgression, so that he could keep from falling over. Accordingly, he was not content with ascertaining Gods will, but he attempted to change it. He inquired of Him a second time, and this was to tempt Him. Hence while God bade him go, His anger was kindled against him because he went.

This surely is no uncommon character; rather, it is the common case even with the more respectable and praise worthy portion of the community. I say plainly, and without fear of contradiction, though it is a serious thing to say, that the aim of most men esteemed conscientious and religious, or who are what is called honourable, upright men, is, to all appearance, not how to please God; but how to please themselves without displeasing Him. This surely is so plain that it is scarcely necessary to enlarge upon it. Men do not take for the object towards which they act, Gods will, but certain maxims rules, or measuresright perhaps as far as they go, but defective because they admit of being subjected to certain other ultimate ends which are not religious. Men are just, honest, upright, trustworthy; but all this, not from the love and fear of God, but from a mere feeling of obligation to be so, and in subjection to certain worldly objects. And thus they are what is popularly called moral, without being religious. Such was Balaam. He was in a popular sense, a strictly moral, honourable, conscientious man; that he was not so in a heavenly and true sense is plain, if not from the considerations here insisted on, at least from his after history, which (we may presume) brought to light his secret defect, in whatever it consisted. His defect lay in this, that he had not a single eye towards Gods will but was ruled by other objects.J. H. Newman, D D.

(b) That Balaam saddled his ass, must not lead us to suppose that there were in those days any proper saddle. This is a far later invention, even for riding on horseback, and is not even now in the East generally used in riding on asses. On this subject we have the negative evidence of sculptures. In Egypt, indeed, there are no equestrian sculptures at all except those which represent riding in chariots. Classical sculpture has no saddles or saddle cloths. We used to think that the earliest suddles were to be seen in the sculptures of the Sassanian dynasty at Shahpur in Persia; but the following passage would take them back to the last age of the Assyrian empire: In the earliest sculptures (at Nineveh) the horses, except such as are led behind the kings chariot, are unprovided with cloths or saddles. The rider is seated on the nuked back of the animal. At a later period, however a kind of pad appears to have been introduced; and in a sculpture at Konyunjik was represented a high saddle, not unlike that now in use in the East (Layard).

The saddling of asses mentioned in Scripture probably consisted merely in placing upon their backs such thick cloths or mats as we see in some of the asses represented in the Egyptian paintings. Something of the same kind, or pieces of rug, felt, carpet, or cloth, are still in general use; although a kind of pad is now frequently to be seen upon asses in the large towns of Egypt, Syria, and Arabia, especially among these let out for hire. Such town asses have also bridles, and sometimes stirrups, none of which, any more than the pad, do we remember to have noticed on asses upon actual journeys; and we have known of asses being used continuously on journeys quite as long as that which Balaam now undertook; and that by persons whose position in life quite enabled them to ride a horse or mule had they so chosen. It would not be at all extraordinary, even now, that a person, expecting to be laden with riches and honours, should ride upon an ass, still less in an age and country where no other mode of conveyance, except that of riding upon camels, appears to have been known.J. Kitto, D.D.

(c) In worldly matters, think twice; but in duty, it has been well said, first thoughts are best; they are more fresh, more pure, have more of God in them. There is nothing has the first glance we get at duty, before there has been any special pleading of our affections or inclinations. Duty is never uncertain at first. It is only after we have got involved in the mazes and sophistries of wishing that things were otherwise than they are, that it seems indistinct. Considering a duty, is often explaining it away. Deliberation is often only dish mesty. Gods guidance is plain, when we are true.F. W. Robertson, M.A.

APOSTACY

And Balak sent princes more and more honourable (Num. 22:15).

Tarry ye also here this night (Num. 22:22).

Balaam also the son of Beor they slew with the sword (Num. 31:8).

We assume Balaam to have been a true prophet, though not of Israel. He appears to have been a singularly good man. And, taking the history as it rises, we may learn what his religion was.

It was very enlightened. His eyes were open (see Mic. 6:5; Mic. 6:8). These were Balaams views of religion.

Balaams religion was founded on principle,the all-comprehensive principle of godliness. All considerations are kept in abeyance, waiting on the will of God. Lodge ye here this night: I will bring you word as the Lord shall speak.

His religion was practically exemplified. Balaam acted on principle, and obeyed the word of the Lord. Thou shalt not go with them, &c. (Num. 22:12). Then Balaam said to the princes of Moab, Get you unto your land, &c. (Num. 22:13).

But Balaam fell, and the first of our texts brings us to the turning point of his lifedownwards.

I. Balaam apostatized through worldliness.

The temptation was strengthened. Balak sent princes more honourable. The overtures now comprehend all that kings can do. I will do whatsoever thou sayest unto me. Still the prophet resists; but after a hard contest principle relaxes under the influence of this sun of worldly glory. Balaam becomes a soft and pliant thing in the hands of these monarchsa total apostate from God. By means of the world the devil ever tempts man; tempting again and again by worldly pleasures, ambition, gain. Take heed and beware of covetousness. Of all mortal sins this is perhaps the most insidious and self-deceptive.

II. Balaam apostatized progressively.

Religion is neither got nor lost all at once. The progress of Balaams fail may be traced.

1. His heart went after covetousness. He loved the wages of unrighteousness.

2. He tampered with temptation. Why were these ambassadors kept a second night?

3. He struggled against his own conscience. Mountain after mountain is ascended, sacrifice after sacrifice offered, that by some means he may obtain sanction to do what God said he should not do.

4. He departs from the word of the Lord. If the men call thee thou mayest go with thema final check and test interposed. Now he is on the downhill course. The deepest, darkest sins follow. Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.

III. Balaam apostatized despite the greatest obstacles.

Conscience was a perpetual obstacle. The fear of death haunted him. From the high places of Baal, where he would have cursed, he saw the Israelites encamped below. How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, he utters in apostrophe; when at once his own death appals him, like a dark vision. Then he abruptly exclaims, Let me die the death of the righteous! There were extraordinary as well as ordinary obstacles. What is to do with that poor ass? Mercy, Balaam!. At last the angel reveals himself, sword in hand. I have come out to withstand thee, &c. If, said Balaam, it displease thee, I will get me back. IF. Alas! he is not turned back yet. The Lord is longsuffering, not willing that any should perish. Providence is mediatorial. The very difficulties and obstacles and adversities of life are incorporated with Gods saving plans; yea, are ordered, permitted, or overruled for our good.

IV. Balaams apostacy was not only sad but fatal.

Never did he obtain the wages of unrighteousness. His career was one of unmitigated disappointment, issuing in the sin unto death. Very briefly is the last tragic scene given. God will be avenged of the Midianites. In the war against them Balaam is found among the enemies of the Israelites. Balaam the son of Beor they slew with the sword. Thus the veil is drawn darkly; nor does the sacred historian ever name the fallen prophets name more; but the silences of the Bible are significant as its utterances. Nor did that man perish alone in his iniquity. Does the backslider ever?
From this subject many additional lessons may be gatheredthere is one of hope for apostates. The forbearance of God should lead to repentance. Balaams case shows that there is hope for the worst and hope to the last.A Military Chaplain, in The Homiletic Quarterly.

BALAAM AND HIS ASS; DIVINE CHECKS ON MANS DOWNWARD COURSE

(Num. 22:22-35)

We are met by a preliminary inquiry; why was God angry with Balaam because he went with the princes of Moab, when He had given consent to his going with them?

(1) It is important to observe that God had not given to Balaam an unconditional permission to go with them. He might go with them on condition that the men came to call him. If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them. This condition had not been fulfilled when Balaam rose up in the morning, &c. (Num. 22:21). And Gods anger was kindled because he went of himself.

(2) Even this conditional permission was given not because God approved of his going, but because Balaam was determined to obtain permission if it were possible.
(3) He went hoping to set aside the restriction which God had imposed upon him,that he was to do that which He commanded. Clearly Balaam both desired and hoped to be able to curse Israel, and thus obtain the wealth and honours upon which his heart was set. Hence, Gods anger was kindled because he went. (a) God mercifully places obstructions in his way to save him from further sin, and to warn him against attempting to curse Israel, or exceed or deviate from His word to him. This part of the history is a striking illustration of Divine checks on mans downward course.

I. These checks are sometimes in operation when unperceived by man.

The Angel of the Lord stood in the way for an adversary against him. And the ass saw the Angel of the Lord standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand. Thrice the ass saw the Angel, and presented indications of alarm; but Balaam saw Him not until God had opened the mouth of the ass to remonstrate with him. Balaam was blinded to such sights by the fierce lust of wealth and honours which possessed him. Many a dispensation of Gods providence is intended as a check upon mans downward course, which is not seen to be such by the person most concerned. As Balaam saw the troubled and troublesome ass, but not the forbidding Angel; so men see the afflictions, the losses, the difficulties of their course without perceiving the merciful design of God in them; they are irritated at the obstructions in their path, but do not see the Angel who is beyond the obstructions.

II. These checks are numerous.

Mark, says Babington, the manifold admonitions that Balaam had, and yet all in vain. The ass avoids the Angel once, twice, and thrice; she hurts his foot against the wall, she lied down under him, never used to do thus beforeyet all this could not smite his heart to think, Surely my journey pleaseth not God. Even thus in some sort doth God still deal with men, and yet all in vain; their sin will not be seentheir fault will not be amended. He giveth us a twitch within, either at some sermon, or otherwise, and yet that vanisheth away, and we forget it. Then He striketh our foot against the wall, that is, He crosseth us with sickness or loss, or some calamities, assaying whether that will bring us home; but still we beat the ass, and continue our course. When this will not serve, He throweth us down, ass and all, that is, when the lesser crosses profit not, He layeth on greater, greater, I say, and greater, till He makes us feel, even as a father smiteth more, till he humble the forward stomach of his child, yet many times in vain still.

III. These checks are of various kinds.

This is very clear in Balaams case, in which we see

1. Obstructions to his progress. The advance of his ass was thrice arrested by the Angel of the Lord. When our course is delayed, or difficulties crowd our path, or sickness removes us for a time from the active walks of life, we shall do well to enquire whether these things are checks to restrain us from sin, or warnings that we are on a dangerous road.

2. Appeals to his reason. God gave to the dumb ass a voice to summon the erring and angry prophet to the exercise of reason. The Lord opened the mouth of the ass, and she said unto Balaam, What have I done, &c. (Num. 22:28-30). And where, asks Dr. A. Clarke, is the wonder of all this? If the ass had opened her own mouth, and reproved the rash prophet, we might well be astonished; but when God opens the mouth, an ass can speak as well as a man (b)

And God by various means still addresses the reason of sinful man. Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord, &c. Why will ye die? Christianity is a sublime and mighty appeal, not only to the heart, but also to the understanding of man.

3. Rebukes for his conduct. The Angel of the Lord said unto him, Wherefore hast thou smitten thine ass these three times? &c. (Num. 22:32-33). (c) The Lord now rebukes men for their sins by the penalties of those sins, by the condemnations of His holy Book, and by the voice of conscience. And these rebukes are designed to deter from sin.

4. The awakening of his conscience. Balaam said unto the Angel of the Lord, I have sinned, &c. His whole line of conduct shows a mind ill at ease, a troubled, anxious mind. His irritation, petulance, and unreasonable anger with his ass, indicate clearly that he had no rest within. God in his great mercy was checking him by the voice of his conscience. Conscience will not allow the sinner to pursue his downward course without stirring remonstrances and stinging rebukes, (d) Lo, all these things worketh God oftentimes with man, to bring back his soul from the pit to be enlightened with the light of the living.

IV. These checks are graduated in force.

See this in the case of Balaam: first his ass turned aside out of the way; then she thrust herself unto the wall, and crushed Balaams foot against the wall; then she fell down under Balaam; and then there appears unto the angry man the Angel of the Lord standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand, who administers to him a stern rebuke. In this carriage of the Angel, says Mr. Ains-worth, the Lord shows us the proceedings of His judgments against sinners: First, He mildly shakes His rod at them, but lets them go untouched. Secondly, He comes nearer, and touches them with an easy correction, as it were wringing their foot against the wall. Thirdly, when all this is ineffectual, He brings them into such straits that they can neither turn to the right hand nor to the left, but must fall before His judgments, if they do not fully turn to Him.

V. These checks are limited in their effects.

1. By the perverseness of mans character. The earlier obstructions only irritated and enraged Balaam. His eager lust for wealth and honour blinded him that he did not even see the forbidding Angel. To a perverse and hardened heart mild restraints are utterly ineffectual. There are, alas! some men to whom even severe checks seem ineffectual.

2. By the irreversibleness of mans conduct. If it displease thee, said Balaam, I will get me back again. And the Angel of the Lord said, Go with the men; but only the word that I shall speak unto thee, that thou shalt speak. So Balaam went with the princes of Balak. He had advanced too far to turn back then. He must go on. Only in one respect will the Divine restraint be effectual now; and that God insists upon: Only the word that I shall speak unto thee, that thou shalt speak. Unutterably solemn is this irreversibleness of moral conduct. The career once entered upon, in many instances, must be continued. The deed once done, can never be undone; and many of its consequences will live onfor ever! (e)

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) Why did Almighty God give Balaam leave to go to Balak, and then was angry with him for going? I suppose for this reason, because his asking twice was tempting God. God is a jealous God. Sinners as we arenay, as natures of His handwe may not safely in rude upon Him, and make free with Him. We may not dare to do that which we should not dare to do with an earthly superior, which we should be punished, for instance, for attempting in the case of a king or noble of this world. To rush into His prefence, to address Him familiarly, to urge Him, to strive to make our duty lie in one direction when it lies in another, to handle rudely and practise upon His holy word, to trifle with truth, to treat conscience lightly, to take liberties (as it may he called) with anything that is Gods; all irreverence, profaneness, unscrupulousness, wantonness, is represented in Scripture, not only as a sin, but as felt, noticed, quickly returned on Gods part (if I may dare use such human words of the Almighty and All-holy God, without transgressing the rule I am myself laying downbut He vouchsafes in Scripture to represent Himself to us in that only way in which we can attain to the knowledge of Him)I say, all irreverence towards God is represented as being jealously, and instantly, and fearfully noticed and visited, as friend or Stranger among men might resent an insult shown to him. This should be carefully considered. We are apt to act towards God and the things of God as towards a mere system, a law, a name, a religion, a principle; not as against a Person, a living, watchful, present, prompt and powerful eye and arm. That all this is a great error, is plain to all who study Scripture; as is sufficiently shown by the death of 50,070 persons for looking into the Arkthe death or the prophet by the lion, who was sent to Jeroboam from Judah, and did not immediately obey his instructionsthe slaughter of the children at Bethel by the bears, for mocking Elishathe exclusion of Moses from the Promised Land for smiting the rock twiceand the judgment on Ananias and Sapphira.J. H. Newman, D.D.

(b) The true explanation lies between the notion that the whole occurrence was purely internal, and consisted exclusively in ecstasy brought by God upon Balaam, and the grossly realistic reduction of the whole affair into the sphere of the senses and the outward material world. The Angel who met the soothsayer in the road, as he was riding upon his ass, though He was not seen by Balaam till Jehovah had opened his eyes, did really appear upon the road, in the outward world of the senses. But the form in which He appeared was not a grossly sensuous or material form, like the bodily frame of an ordinary visible being; for in that case Balaam would inevitably have seen Him, when his beast became alarmed and restive again and again, and refused to go forward, since it is not stated anywhere that God had smitten him with blindness, like the men of Sodom (Gen. 19:11), or the people in 2Ki. 6:18. It rather resembled the appearance of a spirit, which cannot be seen by everyone who has healthy bodily eyes but only by those who have their senses awakened for visions from the spirit-world. Thus, for example, the men who went to Damascus with Paul, saw no one, when the Lord appeared to him in a miraculous light from heaven, and spoke to him, although they also heard the voice (Act. 9:7). Balaam wanted the spiritual sense to discern the Angel of the Lord, because the spirits eye was blinded by his thirst for wealth and honour. This blindness increased to such an extent, with the inward excitement caused by the repeated insubordination of the beast, that he lost all self-control. As the ass had never been so restive before, if he had only been calm and thoughtful himself, he would have looked about to discover the cause of this remarkable change, and would then, no doubt, have discovered the presence of the Angel. But as he lost all his thoughtfulness, God was obliged to open the mouth of the dumb and irrational animal, to show a seer by profession his own blindness. He might have reproved him by the words of the Angel; but because the rebuke would not have been sufficiently severe without some deep humiliation, He made the beast his teacher (Calvin). The asss speaking was produced by the omnipotence of God; but it is impossible to decide whether the modulation was miraculously communicated to the animals voice, so that it actually gave utterance to the human words which fell upon Balaams ears (Kurtz), or whether the cries of the animal were formed into rational discourse in Balaams soul, by the direct operation of God, so that he alone heard and understood the speech of the animal, whereas the servants who were present heard nothing more than unintelligible cries. In either case Balaam received a deeply humiliating admonition from the mouth of the irrational beast, and that not only to put him to shame, but also to call him to his senses, and render him capable of hearing the voice of God. The seer, who prided himself upon having eyes for Divine revelations, was so blind, that he could not discern the appearance of the Angel, which even the irrational beast had been able to see. By this he was taught that even a beast is more capable of discerning things from the higher world, than a man blinded by sinful desires. It was not till after this humiliation that God opened his eyes, so that he saw the Angel of the Lord with a drawn sword standing in his road, and fell upon his face before this fearful sight.Keil and Del.

(c) We shall find in the sequel the person styled the Angel of the Lord, as in other places, so here, assuming the character and exercising the prerogative of Deity: for He it is that afterwards says, The word that I shall speak unto thee, that thou shalt speak. We are to understand, therefore, by this designation, the mighty, the uncreated Angel, by whom God made the worlds, the eternal Word, which was in the beginning, which was with God, and which was God, and which in the fulness of time was made flesh and dwelt among men.Dr. H. Hunter.

The Angel of Jehovahs presence, which went before His people in the wilderness, not only to guide, but to guard and protect them; and who was an adversary to their adversaries, and at all times stood up for their help and assistance against all those that hated and opposed them.John Gill D.D.

(d) Balaam did only what men so entangled always do. The real fault is in themselves. They have committed themselves to a false position, and when obstacles stand in their way, they lay the blame on circumstances. They smite the dump, innocent occasion of their perplexity as if it were the cause. And the passionatenessthe madness of the act is but an indication that all is doing wrong within. There was a canker at the heart of Balaams life, and his equanimity was gone; his temper vented itself on brute things. Who has not seen the likea grown man, unreasoning as a child, furious beyond the occasion? If you knew the whale, you would see that was not the thing which had moved him so terribly; you would see that all was wrong inwardly.

It is a strange, sad picture this. The first man in the land, gifted beyond most others, conscious of great mental power, going on to splendid prospects, yet with hopelessness and misery working at his heart. Who would have envied Balaam if he could have seen allthe hell that was working at his heart?F. W. Robertson, M.A.

It is a mans own dishonesty, his crimes, his wickedness, and boldness, that take away from him soundness of mind; these are the furies, these the flames and firebrands of the wicked.M. T. Cicero.

(e) Here is a serious reflection, that when we have begun an evil course we cannot retrace our steps. Balaam was forced to go with the men; he offered to draw backhe was not allowedyet Gods wrath followed him. This is what comes of committing ourselves to an evil line of conduct; and we see daily instances of it in our experience of life. Men get entangled, and are bound hand and foot in dangerous courses. They make imprudent marriages or connections; they place themselves in dangerous situations; they engage in unprofitable or shameful undertakings. Too often, indeed, they do not discern their evil plight: but when they do they cannot draw back. God seems to say, Go with the men. They are in bondage, and they must make the best of it; being the slave of the creature, without ceasing to be the responsible servant of God; under His displeasure, yet bound to act as if they could please Him. All this is very fearful.J. H. Newman, D.D.

Consider the impossibility under such circumstances of going back. Balaam offers to go back. The Angel says, Go on. There was yet one hope for him, to be true, to utter Gods words, careless of the consequences; but he who had been false so long, how could he be true? It was too late. In the ardour of youth you have made perhaps a wrong choice, or chosen an unfit profession, or suffered yourself weakly and passively to be drifted into a false course of action, and now, in spite of yourself, you feel there is no going back. To many minds, such a lot comes as with the mysterious force of a destiny. They see themselves driven, and forget that they put themselves in the way of the stream that drives them. They excuse their own acts as if they were coerced. They struggle now and then faintly, as Balaam didtry to go backcannot, and at last sink passively in the mighty current that floats them on to wrong.F. W. Robertson, M.A.

BALAAM AND HIS ASS; OR, A LESSON ON OBSTRUCTIVE PROVIDENCES

(Num. 22:22-35)

Is this a literal narrative? Yes; for,

1. The style in which it is written is plain and unadorned.
2. The story is not essentially incredible.
3. It is referred to in other parts of Scripture as plain matter of fact.
4. The end to be gained was quite enough to warrant the miracle.
5. The speech of the ass is so simple and natural that it could not be either a delusion of Balaams excited imagination, or an invention of some later fabulist.

I. See the lessons it taught Balaam.

1. It convinced him of spiritual blindness. He was more stupid than his ass. She could see an angel, but Balaam could not, because he was engrossed and binded by his covetous greed.

2. It taught absolute submission to God. He made his ass, however reluctant, obey him; and he, too, however obstinate, must be taught to obey God. This was indispensable to prepare him to do Gods work among the Moabites.

II. The subject is full of lessons to us.

It shows us the worth of obstructive providences, and the wisdom of giving patient attention and heed to them.

1. We often go on wrong errands, or on right errands in a wrong spirit. Some go on wrong errands, seeking a change of place, from selfish ambitionpursuing a business necessarily sinfulprojecting a matrimonial union without regard to pietyresolution to leave home and country from recklessness and self-will. Some have wrong motives in a right way:e.g., mercenary ministers of religion, self-seeking teachers, &c.insincere rebukers of sin, who pander to the rich and make allowance for their vices, while they are very severe on the offending poor, &c.

2. God checks us in His providence, and in love to our souls. Illness; raising up of insuperable difficulties; falling off of friends; superior success to rivals, &c.

3. We are apt to fret and be angry at the instruments of our disappointment. We cast our spite and blame on second causes.

4. We should seek spiritual enlightenment, to see that it is Gods doing. Be not angry and resentful, but give yourselves to prayer; else, like Balaam, you will not see that it is God who opposes you (Num. 22:34).

5. We can only be permitted to go forward when we are brought to a state of perfect subjection to God. Two things are here included: a perfect purity of motive and freedom from worldly self-seeking; and an entire acquiescence in whatever God appoints, desires, or does. Thus, acknowledge God in all your ways, and He will direct your steps.T. G. Horton.

BALAAMS ASS

(Num. 22:28-30)

Observe

I. The historic character of the miracle here recorded.

In the history of Christ and in that of His apostles, incidents are recorded which are miraculous, side by side with those which are not miraculous. The one cannot be separated from the other; they are interwoven into one narrative, which must be accepted as a whole, or rejected altogether. So it is in the history of Balaam. It is well to note, concerning this incident, that it is spoken of by a New Testament writer as an undoubted fact (2Pe. 2:16).

II. The miracle itself.

The speech of the ass as the instrument of a higher intelligence, finds an analogy in another Scriptural record. In the first temptation of man, the speech of the serpent was used to convey the thought of a higher and more intelligent creature. If God permitted Satan to use a serpent to tempt man, why should He not Himself use an ass to reprove man? If the tongue of the serpent was used to convey intelligible sounds, why should not that of any other animal be used for the same purpose? In one case the miracle was wrought by Satan for an evil end, in the other by God for a good end. We have another somewhat analogous case in the speech of parrots and other birds, who utter intelligible sentences without understanding them, the difference being that the ass did at once, and therefore miraculously, what these creatures learn to do by imitation. It is evident that these birds possess a special God given faculty to imitate human words, and He who made them made the ass also.

III. The object of the miracle.

It was to bring Balaam to obey the Divine voice of his conscience, which was well nigh drowned in the clamour of his covetousness for the wages of unrighteousness.

1. It was calculated to humble him in relation to: gift of God upon which he probably prided himself. It is likely he was an eloquent man. He would now see that God could endow a brute with the gift of speech.
2. He would also see that an ass could discern a messenger from heaven, where he, blinded by his desire for gain, could see nothing but empty space.
3. He might also have learned that all speech was under Divine control, and that he would be able to utter only such words as God would permit.

Lessons.

i. That the means used by God to bring men to obedience are always adapted to that end, although they do not always attain it. Balaam needed to repent of his present course, and nothing could have been more likely to startle him into reflection upon it than a reproof from his own beast. He had a moments space for consideration before he stood face to face with the Angel of the Lord; but his half-hearted confession of his sin (Num. 22:34) shows

ii. That, when obedience to a certain command is withheld (Num. 22:12), miracles are powerless to change character. Those who were unwilling to take the yoke of Christ (Mat. 11:29), were not won by His miracles. See also Luk. 16:31. Miracles startle the soul, but obedience transforms the character.From Outlines of Sermons on the Miracles and Parables of the Old Testament.

THE MEETING OF BALAAM AND BALAK

(Num. 22:36-41)

In this portion of the history these are the principal points:

I. The king receives the prophet with marks of great honour.

And when Balak heard that Balaam was come, he went out to meet him &c. (Num. 22:36). And as a further token of his respect, the king sent unto Balaam and to the princes who were with him a feast from the sacrifices which he offered (Num. 22:40). The heathen were accustomed to pay great respect and reverence to their priests and prophets. We have evidence of this in Gen. 47:22; 1Ki. 18:19; Ezra 7 et al. Their conduct in this respect is

1. A rebuke to many Christians. Paul exhorted the Christians at Thessalonica toesteem their ministers very highly in love for their works sake: yet how many Christians fail lamentably in this respect!

2. An example to many Christians. In this respect we may profitably imitate them. Our Lord saith to His faithful ministers, He that heareth you, heareth Me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth Me; and he that despiseth Me, despiseth Him that sent Me (see also Mat. 10:40-41; Joh. 13:20). (a)

II. The king expresses his surprise at the delay of the prophet in coming to him.

And Balak said unto Balaam, Did I not earnestly send unto thee to call thee? &c. (Num. 22:37). Thus he gently rebukes him for not having come to him when he was first asked to do so. And he seems surprised that his power to reward the prophet had not secured his ready compliance with his request. Clearly he was of opinion that the blessing or curse of a prophet was purchasable if the would-be purchaser could only bid high enough for them; that Balaam had his price; and that he, Balak, was able to pay it (b) (comp. Act. 8:18-23). Balak seems to have had no idea of the sacredness of genius, or of the solemn responsibilities involved in the possession of great gifts, or that endowments from God must be used only in religious accordance with His holy will. A worldly-minded man, he can think of no higher motive than this, Am I not able indeed to promote thee to honour? (c)

But of what value are the highest honours and the richest rewards which kings can bestow, when they are obtained at the cost of righteous principles and a clear conscience? (d)

III. The prophet endeavours to moderate the expectations of the king.

And Balaam said unto Balak, Lo, I am come unto thee, &c. (Num. 22:38). Balaam felt himself under a restraint which he could not throw off; no, not even for all the wealth and honours which a king has power to bestow. (e)

The Lord was watching over the interests of Israel; and while He protected them neither could Balaam curse them, nor Balak conquer them. Behold, He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep, &c. (Psa. 121:4-8). (f)

IV. The king endeavours by sacrificial offerings to induce Jehovah to favour his design.

Balak offered oxen and sheep. Keil and Del.: The sacrifices were not so much thank-offerings for Balaams happy arrival, as supplicatory offerings for the success of the undertaking before them. This is evident, as Hengstenberg correctly observes, from the place and time of their presentation; for the place was not that where Balak first met with Balaam, and they were only presented on the eve of the great event. Moreover, they were offered unquestionably not to the Moabitish idols, from which Balak expected no help, but to Jehovah, whom Balak wished to draw away, in connection with Balaam, from His own people (Israel), that He might secure His favour to the Moabites.

How utterly mistaken in this view of the Divine Being! He changes not. No sacrifices can alter His will, or turn Him aside from His purposes. How unworthy of God and how dishonouring to Him is such a view of His character! No bribes, however costly, can induce Him to forsake His people, or to favour an unrighteous cause. And the sacrifices offered to Him with such a view are an abomination in His sight.

V. The king and prophet ascend a height and obtain a view of the camp of Israel.

And it came to pass on the morrow, that Balak took Balaam, and brought him up into the high places of Baal, that thence he might see the utmost part of the people. Balak thought that Balaam must see the Israelites in order that he might curse them effectually. And now the time had come for the prophet to make the awful attempt. Balak was in a state of eager anxiety. But who shall tell the state of Balaams mind at this time?

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) For illustrations on this point see p. 62.

(b) As a mere mutter of fact, known to us, by distressing observation, the saving of money is a fascination of the devil to many men; it absorbs their energies; it engrosses their time; it perverts their moral nature; it destroys natural affection; it sets them on fire of hell. Kept from the sight of gold, they may even bear a strong resemblance to pious men; they may be intelligent, genial, and entertaining, yet the moment their thoughts are turned to the accumulation of property, every trace of nobleness is destroyed. The victim of the world is entirely without self-control: every speck of dust is to him as a shackle of bondage; he would risk his eternity for a stone or a clod. At all times he would not know this, for in the moments of his release from the urgency of his tormentor he might discover traits of a better disposition; it is when he is brought again into contact with worldly concerns that he shows how utterly he is enslaved and unmanned. I may remind my young hearers of the tiger that was trained to be the playmate of a favourite child. Weeks and months and years elapsed, and the tiger was gentle and playful; it so happened, however, that in looking the childs hand it tasted blood, and instantly the natural appetite of the creature was excited, and the child fell a victim to its ferocity. It is so in the moral history of many a man: there are breaks in human life which are filled up by many excellencies, and which apparently give the lie to the charge of apostacy, and yet suddenly some besetting sin will set the whole nature on fire, and in the madness of an hour the fabric of a lifetime may be overthrown.Joseph Parker, D.D.

(c) But few men in any country touch the highest point of fame; thousands upon thousands in all generations come to honour and influence, yet in a few months after their death their names cease to have any interest but for the smallest circles. This reflection ought not to discourage virtue. Peace of heart is better than mere renown. To be known in heaven is the best fame. To have a place in the love of God is to enjoy the true exaltation.Ibid.

(d) With money you can bay the canvas and the oil, but not the artistic eye which interprets and appreciates the picture; you can buy the poem, but the living and inspiring poetry is not for sale; you can rent the garden, but cannot bribe the flowers to whisper their tender messages. After all, it is but a very little way that money can go; it can do nearly everything in the market-place or among the dust of cities, but what do the angels know of your currency, your bills of exchange, your promissory notes, and your intricate conveyancing of estates? Not one of the great redemptions of life can be wrought out with money; death takes no bribe; the grave will not sell its victories for gold; you may buy the Bible, but you cannot buy the Holy Ghost; you may pay for the masonry, but no money can put you in possession of the Spirit of the altar.Ibid.

(e) The kite broke away from its string, and instead of mounting to the stars it descended into the mire. The river grew weary of its restraining banks, and longed to burst them, that it might rush on in the wild joy of freedom; down went the embankments, the river became a flood, and carried destruction and desolation wherever it rushed. Unrein the coursers of the sun, and lo! the earth is burned; unbind the girdle of the elements, and chaos reigns! Let us never desire to be rid of those restraints which God has seen fit to lay upon us; they are more needful than we dream. Remember how the vine, when bound to the stake which upheld it, judged itself a martyr, and longed to be free; but when it saw the wild vine at its feet, rotting on the damps and pining amidst the heats, and producing no fruit, it felt how needful were its bonds if its clusters were ever to ripen.C. H. Spurgeon.

(f) According to the gloomy prophets, all England is going to the badnot England alone, but all countries are hastening on to a general and everlasting smash. Then one begins to fret about the Church of God; for according to the soothsayers of the age, Anti-Christ is yet to come, and new heresies are to spring up; the dogs of war are to be let loose, the Pope is to rule and burn us, and one hardly knows what else. Daniel, Ezekiel, and Revelation, have been made sometimes to minister poison to every bright hope, but here is our comfort with regard to the future:

He everywhere hath sway.

And all things serve His might:

His very act pure blessing is,

His path unsullied light.

Let the worst come to the worst, the best will come of it ere long. If the heavens were a bow, saith one, and the earth were the string, and God should fit the arrows of His vengeance thereon, and shoot at the sons of men, yet they could find shelter with the archer himself. Our refuge is in God; let the worst calamities occur to the world in years to come we are secure. It must be well: it cannot be ill. Jehovah, Jireh. Lift high the banner and hopefully advance to the battle, for the victory shall surely come unto the Arm eternal, the Will immutable.Ibid.

HISTORY OF BALAAM.NO. III[1]

[1] For Nos. I. and II. see pp. 429431.

(Num. 22:36Num. 24:25)

We approach the termination of this eventful history. The portion of Scripture that forms the basis of our remarks is Num. 22:36, to the end of chap. 24.

We left Balaam on his journey to Balak; we now commence with his arrival in the land of Moab. With what strangely mingled feelings must Balaam have pursued this journey! That dumb ass had not spoken for nothing: a good many twinges of conscience, no doubt, Balaam had on the way; perhaps, after all, God did not like his going with these messengers; perhaps he had better have been content with his humble mountain home; perhaps he will get into trouble, for he cannot forgetThe word that I shall speak, that shalt thou speak. However, Balaam goes on, just this once, and when this affair is over he will return home, eschew Balak and his messengers for ever; in fact, Balak had made him so many presents already, that he will be able in future to afford to keep a conscience, and to say No to temptation.
As the key to this history, recall what was said before of Balaams connection with the old patriarchal church: he was a monotheist amongst a multilade of polytheists; to that idea of God he was faithful. Moreover, Balaam knows God to be the God of Israel, that God has chosen Israel, and that God is with them. The history of their eight and thirty years weary pilgrimage in the peninsula of Sinai, was matter of notoriety among all the wild Ishmaelites of that part; and Balaam is seer, he can prognosticate out of existing facts; and in the opposition of the Amalekites, and Moabites, and Edomites to the Israelites, he sees the certainty of their final overthrow. And yet the King of Moab sends to him to curse the people of Gods choice; a people that Balaam knows are to be victorious; and he goes, although he knows it to be impossible to curse them; but he hopes to get his wages of iniquity.
And so Balaam and Balak meet. The first words of the interview are ominous. Balak chides Balaam, and Balaam admits that all he says is right; but adds, the word that God putteth in my mouth, that shall I speak.
When a man has come to that pass it is all over with him. How many do we meet every day, who would be wicked if they dared; who would go here, and would go there, only they are not at liberty; who dont mind the sin at all, only its exposure:they might be reproved; they might lose a situation, &c. There is nothing left, but another edition of Solomons picture in the Proverbs, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof, &c.
Endeavour to realize the scene. Balaam was alone; he went to a high place; there he stood by his burnt offering; below, on the plains, were Gods people Israel: from the top of the rocks he saw their encampment, the pillar of cloud still hovering over the assembled host: all was order, security, and strength amongst Israel. Far away is the uncrowned king and his nobles, waiting the return of Balaam: but meanwhile a very notable event occurs,And God met Balaam. Balaam shall yet be warned, shall yet have another word; and so God met him.
The lessons from the whole are
The formidable power of sin. Man can degrade himself below the level of a beast. The dumb ass was wiser than Balaam.W. G. Barrett.

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Part Four: On The Plains of Moab (Numbers 22; Numbers 23; Numbers 24; Numbers 25; Numbers 26; Numbers 27; Numbers 28; Numbers 29; Numbers 30; Numbers 31; Numbers 32; Numbers 33; Numbers 34; Numbers 35; Numbers 36)

I. THE STORY OF BALAAM (Numbers 22; Numbers 23; Numbers 24)

A. SUMMONS OF BALAK (Num. 22:1-6)

TEXT

Num. 22:1. And the children of Israel set forward, and pitched in the plains of Moab on this side Jordan by Jericho.

2. And Balak the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. 3. And Moab was sore afraid of the people, because they were many: and Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel. 4. And Moab said unto the elders of Midian. Now shall this company lick up all that are round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field. And Balak the son of Zippor was king of the Moabites at that time. 5. He sent messengers therefore unto Balaam the son of Beor to Pethor, which is by the river of the land of the children of his people, to call him, saying, Behold, there is a people come out from Egypt: behold, they cover the face of the earth, and they abide over against me: 6. Come now therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people; for they are too mighty for me: peradventure I shall prevail, that we may smite them, and that I may drive them out of the land; for I wot that he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou curest is cursed.

PARAPHRASE

Num. 22:1. Then the people of Israel set out, and they camped in the plains of Moab on the far side of the Jordan by Jericho.

2. And Balak, the son of Zippor, saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. 3. And Moab was very frightened by the people, because they were numerous; and Moab was overcome by fear because of the children of Israel. 4. And Moab said unto the elders of Midian, This horde will now lick up everything around us, just as the ox licks up the grass of the field. Balak, the son of Zippor was king of Moab at that time. 5. So he sent messengers to Balaam, son of Beor, at Pethor, which is near the River in the land of the children of his people, to call him, saying, Behold, there is a people come out of Egypt; they cover the face of the earth, and they are camping opposite me. 6. Come now and curse this people for me, for they are too strong for me. Perhaps I shall be able to defeat them and drive them from the land; for I know that he whom you bless is blessed, and he whom you curse is cursed.

COMMENTARY

When the Israelites bypassed Moab on their journey toward Canaan, it must have relieved the Moabites greatly. Now, after they have delivered stunning defeats to the Amorites of Sihon and Og, and have taken residence in the near vicinity of Moab, fear enters the heart of Balak the king. Gilead and Bashan have fallen, and Moab would be a logical next step. Since the Israelites are a threat to more than the Moabites alone, and since they are so numerous, Balak appeals to Midian for help. More closely related to the Israelites than were the Moabites or the Ammonites, the Midianites lived to the east of Moab. They derived their livelihood from their herds and from the caravan trade, (Gen. 36:35), and were nomadic in life style. Although the threat to Moab was more immediate than that to Midian, it was real enough to give substance to Balaks appeal.

When the account introduces Balaam into the history of Israel, we are brought face to face with one of the most mysterious and intriguing people in all the Word of God. A native of Pethor, on the bank of the Euphrates in Mesopotamia, he was quite evidently a widely known soothsayer whose counsel was sought now by Balak. He appears suddenly upon the scene in the history of Israel, playing a role of no little importance. Like Melchisedec and Cyrus, he is one of a select few whom God chose from outside the Israelite nation for His good purposes. Everything we know of him is developed in this one circumstance, and in the later notice of his death (Num. 31:8; Num. 31:16). His fame was evidently widespread, since his coming to Moab involved a trip of well over four hundred miles, if Pethor is properly identified as Pitru, near Carchemish.

Opinions regarding Balaam have generally divided into two camps. Some have considered him a wizard and false prophet, an idolator who was compelled to bless Israel against his personal will. Others have thought him a genuine prophet whose downfall was occasioned by greed and ambition. As a matter of fact, there may be some truth in both positions since he seems to undergo a shift of character as the account unfolds. His name suggests that he belonged to a family in which the magical arts was inherited; hence, he is properly thought of as a wizard. Furthermore, he is never spoken of by the common term for a prophet (nabbi). The term used for him in Jos. 13:22 is translated properly as soothsayer, a term never used of a prophet of God. On the other hand, Balaam has a specific knowledge of Jehovah, and his words, at least at the outset, are exactly what Jehovah called upon him to speak. In the presence of Balak and his messengers, he would call upon the Name (Num. 22:8 ff.). At some earlier time at least, he had used auguries in his work, (Num. 24:1), but when he speaks for Jehovah, these means are unnecessary. It is in his favor that he rejected the request of Balak consistently to condemn Israel; but his downfall came when he betrayed his own conscience. The consistent answer to the full character of this enigmatic man remains in large part a matter of conjecture.

Although it had been forty years since Israel departed from Egypt, Balak quite properly looks upon them as much more than a disorganized, nomadic people. He may remember the accounts of their miraculous delivery from the oppressing nation, as well as the record of divine provision of their needs in a bitter territory; more recently, the ease with which they have won victories over the northern neighbors has caused Balak to show due concern. Even though they had circumvented his land, they are now a greater threat, having cut off Moab from any assistance from the North: and Midian, to whom he makes his request, is a small, almost insignificant people. The king seems backed into a corner. His move to call Balaam is an act of desperation.
What people had Balaam cursed, and which had he blessed? We have no way of answering. Had he, indeed, by some prior power granted of the Lord been called upon to act in His behalf toward another nation? We can only guess. It may be that Balak is indulging in flattery as he expresses his confidence in Balaam, or that he relies upon his own superstitious nature by trusting in one who has come from a family noted for their auguries. Whatever the actual situation may be, the messengers are charged to bring him back with them to curse Israel.

QUESTIONS AND RESEARCH ITEMS

407.

If the Israelites had intended to attack Moab, why had they not done so before they marched around the land?

408.

Upon what basis does Balak appeal to Midian for help against the Israelites?

409.

How were the Midianites related to the Israelites, if at all? the Moabites?

410.

Using a good Bible encyclopedia or other sources, tell of the many possible methods Balaam might have used in his conjuring.

411.

How might Balaam have known anything about Jehovah?

412.

What later facts are known about Balaam?

413.

Why should Balak have sent so far away for a soothsayer?

414.

How did he know of Balaam?

415.

Discuss fully the varying opinions of Bible scholars about Balaam.

416.

Why are the Israelites now a much greater threat than when they marched around Moab?

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

XXII.

(1) In the plains of Moab.The Arboth Moab extended from Beth Jeshimoth (the house of wastes) to Abel Shittim (the meadow of acacias) (Num. 33:49), in the upper Arabah, the present Ghor. These plains had belonged to Moab, and, since the victory over the Amorites, were possessed by the Israelites.

On this side Jordan.Better, alongside of the Jordan. It cannot be determined, from the use of the word eher, or me-eber, to which side of the Jordan reference is made. (See Num. 32:19, where me-eber occurs twice, and is rendered in the Authorised Version on yonder side in the first case, and on this side in the second case. See Deu. 1:1, and Note, and Isa. 9:1, where Galilee is described by Isaiah as beyond Jordan.)

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

Balak and Balaam.

THE FIRST MESSAGE TO BALAAM 1-14.

While the main body of the people remained at Heshbon, they sent out a successful expedition against Jaazer and against Bashan. After the return of this expedition, or during its absence, the children of Israel left their quarters before Nebo and made the movement recorded in the first verse of this chapter. Hence this verse must not be connected directly with the last verse of chapter xxi, but with Num 22:31. This harmonizes Num 33:48. In this encampment by the Jordan, opposite to Jericho, the whole congregation was to be put to a severe test by the blandishments of a licentious polytheism, and Moses was to give a solemn recapitulation of the contents of the whole law as the completion of his mediatorial work before his death, being excluded from the Land of Promise by reason of his moral failure at the Waters of Strife. Num 20:12.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

1. The plains of Moab are a narrow strip of land, scarcely six miles in breadth, lying along the eastern bank of the Jordan, opposite to the plains of Jericho. Here occurred the wonderful story of Balaam, “the grandest of all the episodes introduced into the Mosaic narrative,” and the promulgation of Deuteronomy. The plains, though recently conquered by the Amorites, still retained the name of Moab, its former possessor. The Dead Sea is on the south, Mount Pisgah on the southeast, the Gilead mountains on the east, and on the north, losing its specific name, it continues as the Valley of the Jordan to the Sea of Tiberias.

This side Jordan The Hebrew is to be rendered on this side or on that side, according to the position of the speaker. The east side is meant throughout the Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua. See Jos 1:14, note.

Jericho This is the first mention of “the city of palm trees.” For its geography, see Jos 2:1, note. After its miraculous overthrow it drops out of sight for more than four hundred years, when David appointed it as the place of retirement for his messengers until their “beards be grown.” [Possibly a small hamlet had sprung up near the site of the former city, to which, as to a very quiet secluded place, the spies were permitted to retire for awhile.] After another century Hiel braved the curse of Joshua and attempted to rebuild the city, and, in some way, suffered great domestic bereavement and sorrow. 1Ki 16:34, note. It. is mentioned again in 2Ch 28:5-16, as the scene of one of the most touching and humane acts to be found in the entire records of ancient or modern warfare, reflecting the highest honour upon the Israelites of the northern kingdom. Jericho is also the place where the wretched Zedekiah was defeated and witnessed the slaying of his sons and had his own eyes put out. And here Jesus gave sight to the blind.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘And the children of Israel journeyed, and encamped in the plains of Moab beyond the Jordan at Jericho.’

Their warfare being in successful process of completion, the people of Israel encamped in the plains of Moab opposite Jericho in Beyond Jordan. The plains of Moab were a large relatively uninhabited region north of the Arnon, in former Amorite territory. Israel would remain there for some time and there Moses delivered his final exhortation and encouragement as revealed in Deuteronomy, prior to his death. Here they were on the verge of the territory known as ‘Beyond Jordan’ which extended on both sides of the Jordan. The Moabites in their land south of the Arnon could hardly be anything but worried. They did not like their seeming inactivity. The inevitable question on their minds was, who were these people going to attack next? So they decided to take the initiative in order to protect themselves.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Num 22:1-20 Balak Invites Balaam to Come Curse the Children of Israel In Num 22:1-20 Balak invites the prophet Balaam to come to Moab and curse the children of Israel.

Num 22:2  And Balak the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites.

Num 22:2 Comments – Balak and Balaam saw what God was doing in the midst of the children of Israel, and the Lord spoke to Balaam about it. However, these two men refused to serve the Lord. It is not those who hear God’s word are justified, but those who obey or do God’s word (Rom 2:13).

Rom 2:13, “(For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified.”

Num 22:5  He sent messengers therefore unto Balaam the son of Beor to Pethor, which is by the river of the land of the children of his people, to call him, saying, Behold, there is a people come out from Egypt: behold, they cover the face of the earth, and they abide over against me:

Num 22:5 “Pethor, which is by the river of the land of the children of his people” Comments – Pethor was located in Mesopotamia on the Euphrates River (Deu 23:4). T. G. Pinches says Pethor is believed to be the ancient city of Pedru(i), located on the west bank of the Euphrates River near the Sagura River. [30]

[30] T. G. Pinches “Pethor,” in International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, ed. James Orr (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., c1915, 1939), in The Sword Project, v. 1.5.11 [CD-ROM] (Temple, AZ: CrossWire Bible Society, 1990-2008).

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 hired against thee Balaam the son of Beor of Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse thee.”

Num 22:7  And the elders of Moab and the elders of Midian departed with the rewards of divination in their hand; and they came unto Balaam, and spake unto him the words of Balak.

Num 22:7 “the rewards of divination” Comments – Peter calls these rewards of divination the “wages of unrighteousness” (2Pe 2:15-16). God’s prophets took no wages or rewards for speaking God’s Words.

2Pe 2:15-16, “Which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness .”

Num 22:21-35 Balaam’s Journey to Moab In Num 22:21-35 Balaam response to Balak’s request by travelling to Moab. Along the way an angel of the Lord blocks the path. The angel appeared three times. Each time it was more difficult for the donkey to avoid the angel. Finally, after been beaten by the prophet, the donkey speaks to Balaam. Note other references to this story in the New Testament:

2Pe 2:15-16, “Which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness; But was rebuked for his iniquity: the dumb ass speaking with man’s voice forbad the madness of the prophet.”

Jud 1:11, “Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core.”

Rev 2:14, “But I have a few things against thee, because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balac to cast a stumblingblock before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed unto idols, and to commit fornication.”

Note other verses related to this story:

Pro 1:10, “My son, if sinners entice thee , consent thou not.”

Pro 1:15-16, “My son, walk not thou in the way with them; refrain thy foot from their path: For their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed blood.

Pro 1:19, “So are the ways of every one that is greedy of gain ; which taketh away the life of the owners thereof.”

Num 22:28 Comments – The Lord opened the mouth of the ass, which implies that its mouth had been closed. The Book of Jubilees tells us that on the day when Adam and Eve fell in the Garden of Eve that God closed the mouths of all beasts because they had all spoken with one tongue until that time. We know that the serpent spoke to the woman in the Garden in order to deceive her. So, his mouth was open before the Fall.

“And on that day was closed the mouth of all beasts, and of cattle, and of birds, and of whatever walks, and of whatever moves, so that they could no longer speak: for they had all spoken one with another with one lip and with one tongue.” ( The Book of Jubilees 3.28) [31]

[31] The Book of Jubilees, trans. R. H. Charles, in The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament in English With Introductions and Critical and Explanatory Notes to the Several Books, vol 2, ed. R. H. Charles, 1-82 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913), 17.

These are not the only two occurrences of animals speaking in the Scriptures. We see in Rev 5:13 that all of God’s creatures in heaven, on the earth and under the earth spoke and praised God.

Rev 5:13, “And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.”

The last verse in the book of Psalms tells every creature that has breath to praise the Lord.

Psa 150:6, “Let every thing that hath breath praise the LORD. Praise ye the LORD.”

Num 22:32  And the angel of the LORD said unto him, Wherefore hast thou smitten thine ass these three times? behold, I went out to withstand thee, because thy way is perverse before me:

Num 22:32 “thy way is perverse before me” Comments – The way became harder and harder in order to avoid the angel.

Num 22:33 And the ass saw me, and turned from me these three times: unless she had turned from me, surely now also I had slain thee, and saved her alive.

Num 22:32-33 Comments The Angel’s Concern for the Donkey – The angel of the Lord showed concern for the donkey.

Pro 12:10, “A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast: but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel.”

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

The First Invitation Refused

v. 1. And the children of Israel set forward and pitched in the Plains of Moab on this side Jordan, on the eastern side, by Jericho, for these rich bottom-lands had formerly been a part of Moabitis and were still called by the name of their former owners.

v. 2. And Balak, the son of Zippor, saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. The Moabites had not interfered with the children of Israel while the latter journeyed along their eastern border, but had even sold them bread and water, Deu 2:29. At the same time, they seem to have entertained the hope that the mighty nation of the Amorites would easily overcome the invaders. This expectation was now rudely shattered.

v. 3. And Moab was sore afraid of the people because they were many; and Moab was distressed, filled with a sickening terror even to the point of nausea, because of the children of Israel.

v. 4. And Moab said unto the elders of Midian, the two nations evidently being allies, Now shall this company lick up all that are round about us as the ox licketh up the grass of the field, for that is the impression which one receives, since cattle will sometimes crop off the grass to its very roots. The word carries with it the idea of complete destruction. And Balak, the son of Zippor, was king of the Moabites at that time, as Moses notes for the sake of historic accuracy and completeness.

v. 5. He sent messengers, therefore, as the sequel shows, at the suggestion of his Midianitish allies, who may have learned of Balaam’s reputation on their journeys, unto Balaam, the son of Beor, to Pethor, which is by the river of the land of the children of his people, probably near the Euphrates, in Mesopotamia, to call him, saying. Behold, there is a people come out from Egypt; behold, they cover the face of the earth, and they abide over against me (note the variation of the same thought for the sake of emphasis);

v. 6. come now, therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people, afflict them with an evil which will render them powerless; for they are too mighty for me; peradventure I shall prevail, that we may smite them, and that I may drive them out of the land; for I wot (know) that he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou cursest is cursed. This was the reputation which Balaam had in all the surrounding countries, and this fact is noted in the message, in order to make Balaam willing to grant the request.

v. 7. And the elders of Moab and the elders of Midian departed with the rewards of divination in their hand, for the rich presents were to induce Balaam to come all the more readily. And they came unto Balaam and spake unto him the words of Balak. Balaam was not a common wizard, indulging in cheap tricks and sleight-of-hand performances for the purpose of awing the multitude. He was, indeed, engaged in the business of divination, of soothsaying, but he knew also of the true God, for the tradition of the God of Abraham, of the true, living God, had been handed down in many branches of the family of Shem. That Balaam was well known among the Midianites of this section of Arabia (to be distinguished from the Midianites of the Sinaitic Peninsula) appears from the fact that he afterward gave the heathen the advice which plunged Israel into idolatry and immorality, and almost brought about their ruin, Num 31:16; Rev 2:14.

v. 8. And he said unto them, Lodge here this night, and I will bring you word again, as the Lord shall speak unto me, for he knew that the God of Israel was the true God and feared to do anything contrary to His will. And the princes of Moab abode with Balaam. The false prophet was merely trying to put off the time when he must refuse, since he knew that the Lord would never consent to a curse upon His people, but also since the reward in the hands of the messengers was a powerful argument to his avaricious soul.

v. 9. And God came unto Balaam, He manifested Himself to him in some form, probably in a dream during the night, and said, What men are these with thee? The purpose of the searching question was to make Balaam realize the peril of his position in dealing with the messengers at all.

v. 10. And Balaam said unto God, Balak, the son of Zippor, king of Moab, hath sent unto me, saying,

v. 11. Behold, there is a people come out of Egypt which covereth the face of the earth; come now, curse me them; peradventure I shall be able to overcome them, and drive them out. Balaam was careful to tell the Lord the whole truth, since he feared His almighty power.

v. 12. And God said unto Balaam, Thou shalt not go with them’; thou shalt not curse the people, for they are blessed, and therefore all statements which were intended for curses would have no effect.

v. 13. And Balaam rose up in the morning and said unto the princes of Balak, Get you into your land; for the Lord refuseth to give me leave to go with you. This was a cunning way of putting it, for it withheld that part of God’s message which might have broken off the negotiations definitely, and at the same time conveyed to the messengers of Balak the feeling of Balaam that personally he was not at all disinclined to come. The men undoubtedly understood the position and the inclination of Balaam, as the sequel shows.

v. 14. And the princes of Moab rose up; and they went unto Balak and said, Balaam refuseth to come with us, thus intimating that it was merely a greater reward which was needed to produce the desired effect. Note that the power of soothsaying and of its curses is not denied in this story, just as it is elsewhere recorded with gratitude that the Lord turned the curse into a blessing, Deu 23:5; Jos 24:10; Mic 6:5; Neh 13:2. With God’s permission the power of witchcraft is very great and should not be made a subject of foolish jesting. Satan is a powerful spirit, and his tools in this world often do great damage.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

EXPOSITION

THE COMING OF BALAAM (Num 22:2-40).

Num 22:2

Balak the son of Zippor. The name Balak is connected with a word “to make waste,” and “Zippor” is a small bird. Balak was, as is presently explained, the king of Moab at this time, but not the king from whom Sihon had wrested so much of his territory (Num 21:26). He seems to be mentioned by name on a papyrus in the British Museum (see Brugseh, Geogr. Inschr.,’ 2, page 32). The later Jews made him out to have been a Midianite, but this is nothing but the merest conjecture.

Num 22:3

Moab was sore afraid of the people. While the Israelites had moved along their eastern and north-eastern border, the Moabites supplied them with provisions (Deu 2:29), desiring, no doubt, to be rid of them, but not disdaining to make some profit by their presence. But after the sudden defeat and overthrow of their own Amorite conquerors, their terror and uneasiness forced them to take some action, although they dared not commence open hostilities.

Num 22:4

Moab said unto the elders of Midian. The Midianites were descended from Abraham and Keturah (Gen 25:2, Gen 25:4), and were thus more nearly of kin to Israel than to Moab. They lived a semi-nomadic life on the steppes to the east of Moab and Ammon (cf. Gen 36:35), supporting themselves partly by grazing, and partly by the caravan trade (Gen 37:28). Their institutions were no doubt patriarchal, like those of the modern Bedawin, and the “elders” were the sheiks of their tribes. As the ox licketh up the grass of the field. The strong, scythe-like sweep of the ox’s tongue was a simile admirable in itself, and most suitable to pastoral Moab and Midian.

Num 22:5

He sent messengers therefore. It appears from Num 22:7 that Balak acted for Midian as well as for Moab; as the Midianites were but a weak people, they may have placed themselves more or less under the protection of Balak. Unto Balaam the son of Beer. is derived either from , to destroy or devour, and , the people; or simply from , with the terminal syllable , “the destroyer.” The former derivation receives some support from Rev 2:14, Rev 2:15, where “Nicolaitans” are thought by many to be only a Greek form of” Balaamites” , from and ). Beor () has a similar signification, from , to burn, or consume. Both names have probable reference to the supposed effect of their maledictions, for successful cursing was an hereditary profession in many. lands, as it still is in some. Beer appears in 2Pe 2:15 as Bosor, which is called a Chaldeeism, but the origin of the change is really unknown. A “Bela son of Beer” is named in Gen 36:32 as reigning in Edom, but the coincidence is of no importance: kings and magicians have always loved to give themselves names of fear, and their vocabulary was not extensive. To Pother, which is by the river of the land of the children of his people. Rather, “which is on the river,” i.e; the great river Euphrates, “in the land of the children of his people,” i.e; in his native land. The situation of Pethor is unknown. Here is a people come out of Egypt. Forty years had passed since their fathers had left Egypt. Yet Balak’s words expressed a great truth, for this people was no wandering desert tribe, but for all intents the same great organized nation which had spoiled Egypt, and left Pharaoh’s host dead behind them. They abide over against me . Septuagint, . This would hardly have been said when Israel was encamped thirty miles north of Arnon, opposite to Jericho. The two embassies to Balaam must have occupied some time, and in the mean while Israel would have gone further on his way. We may naturally conclude that the first message was sent immediately after the defeat of Sihon, at a time when Israel was encamped very near the border of Moab.

Num 22:6

I wot that he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou cursest is cursed. This was the language of flattery intended to secure the prophet’s services. No doubt, however, Balak, like other heathens, had a profound though capricious belief in the real effect of curses and anathemas pronounced by men who had private intercourse and influence with the unseen powers. That error, like most superstitions, was the perversion of a truth; there are both benedictions and censures which, uttered by human lips, carry with them the sanction and enforcement of Heaven. The error of antiquity lay in ignorance or forgetfulness that, as water cannot rise higher than its source, so neither blessing nor cursing can possibly take any effect beyond the will and purpose of the Father of our souls. Balaam knew this, but it was perhaps his misfortune to have been trained from childhood to maintain his position and his wealth by trading upon the superstitions of his neighbours.

Num 22:7

With the rewards of divination. , “soothsayings.” Septuagint, . Here the soothsayer’s wages, which St. Peter aptly calls the wages of unrighteousness. The ease with which, among ignorant and superstitious people, a prophet might become a hired soothsayer is apparent even from the case of Samuel (1Sa 9:6-8). That it should be thought proper to resort to the man of God for information about some lost property, and much more that it should be thought necessary to pay him a fee for the exercise of his supernatural powers, shows, not indeed that Samuel was a soothsayer, for he was a man of rare integrity and independence, but, that Samuel was but little distinguished from a soothsayer in the popular estimation. If Samuel had learnt to care more for money than for righteousness, he might very easily have become just what Balaam became.

Num 22:8

Lodge here this night. It was therefore in the night, in a dream or in a vision (cf. Gen 20:3; Num 12:6; Job 4:15, Job 4:16), that Balaam expected to receive some communication from God. If he had received none he would no doubt have felt himself free to go.

Num 22:15

More, and more honourable than they. Balak rightly judged that Balaam was not really unwilling to come, and that it was only needful to ply him with more flattery and larger promises. The heathens united a firm belief in the powers of the seer with a very shrewd appreciation of the motives and character of the seer. Compare the saying of Sophocles, .

Num 22:18

I cannot go beyond the word of the Lord my God. Balaam’s faith was paramount within its own sphere of operation. It did not control his wishes; it did not secure the heart obedience which God loves; but it did secure, and that absolutely, outward obedience to every positive command of God, however irksome; and Balaam never made any secret of this.

Num 22:22

And God’s anger was kindled because he went, or, “that he was going.” . Septuagint, . There can be no question that the ordinary translation is fight, and that God was angry with Balaam for going at all on such an errand. It is true that God had given him permission to go, but that very permission was a judicial act whereby God punished the covetous and disobedient longings of Balaam in allowing him to have his own way. God’s anger is kindled by sin, and it was not less truly sin which prompted Balaam to go because he had succeeded in obtaining formal leave to go. The angel of the Lord stood in the way. The same angel of the covenant apparently of whom Moses had spoken to the Edomites (see on Num 20:16).

For an adversary against him. . Septuagint, , Not so much because Balaam was rushing upon his own destruction as because he was going to fight with curses, if possible, against the Israel of God (cf. 2Ki 6:17; Psa 34:7).

Num 22:23

And the ass saw the angel of the Lord. This was clearly part of the miracle, the which was to exhibit in such a striking manner the stupidity and blindness of the most brilliant and gifted intellect when clouded by greed and selfishness. It is nothing to the point that the lower animals have a quicker perception of some natural phenomena than men, for this was not a natural phenomenon; it is nothing to the point that the lower animals are credited by some with possessing “the second sight,” for all that belongs to the fantastic and legendary. If the ass saw the angel, it was because the Lord opened her eyes then, as he did her mouth afterwards.

Num 22:25

She thrust herself unto the wall. Apparently in order to pass the angel beyond the reach of his sword; when this was clearly impossible she fell down.

Num 22:28

And the Lord opened the mouth of the ass. On the face of it this expression would seem decisive that an audible human voice proceeded from the ass’s mouth, as St. Peter beyond doubt believed: . It is truly said, however, that a passing illusion of this kind, while it testifies that the Apostle understood the words, like all his contemporaries, in their most natural and simple sense, does not oblige us to hold the same view; if he was mistaken in this matter, it does not at all affect the inspired truth of his teaching. Two theories, therefore, have been proposed in order to avoid the difficulties of the ordinary belief, while vindicating the reality of the occurrence. It has been held by some that the whole affair took place in a trance, and resembled St. Peter’s vision of the sheet let down from heaven (Act 10:10), which we rightly conceive to have been purely subjective. This is open to the obvious and apparently fatal objection that no hint is given of any state of trance or ecstasy, and that, on the contrary, the wording of the narrative as given to us is inconsistent with such a thing. In Num 22:31 Balaam’s eyes are said to have been opened so that he saw the angel; but to have the eyes open so that the (ordinarily) invisible became visible, and the (otherwise) inaudible became audible, was precisely the condition of which Balaam speaks (Num 24:3, Num 24:4) as that of trance. According to the narrative, therefore, Balaam was in an ecstasy, if at all, after the speaking of the ass, and not before. By others it has been put forward, somewhat confusedly, that although Balaam was in his ordinary senses, he did not really hear a human voice, but that the “cries” of the ass became intelligible to his mind; and it is noted that as an augur he had been accustomed to assign meanings to the cries of animals. If instead of “cries” we read “brayings,” for the ass is endowed by nature with no other capacity of voice, being indeed one of the dumbest of “dumb” animals, we have the matter more fairly before us. To most people it would appear more incredible that the brayings of an ass should convey these rational questions to the mind of its rider than that the beast should have spoken outright with a man’s voice. It would indeed seem much more satisfactory to regard the story, if we cannot accept it as literally true, as a parable which Balaam wrote against himself, and which Moses simply incorporated in the narrative; we should at least preserve in this way the immense moral and spiritual value of the story, without the necessity of placing non-natural constructions upon its simple statements. Supposing the miracle to have really occurred, it must always be observed that the words put into the ass’s mouth do nothing more than express such feeling’s as a docile and intelligent animal of her kind would have actually felt. That domestic animals, and especially such as have been long in the service of man, feel surprise, indignation, and grief in the presence of injustice and ill-treatment is abundantly certain. In many well-authenticated eases they have done things in order to express these feelings which seemed as much beyond their “irrational” nature as if they had spoken. We constantly say of a dog or a horse that he can do everything but speak, and why should it seem incredible that God, who has given the dumb beast so close an approximation to human feeling and reason, should for once have given it human voice? With respect to Balaam’s companions, their presence need not cause any difficulty. The princes of Midian and Moab had probably gone on to announce the coming of Beldam; his servants would naturally follow him at some little distance, unless he summoned them to his side. It is very likely too that Balaam was wont to carry on conversations with himself, or with imaginary beings, as he rode along, and this circumstance would account for any sound of voices which reached the ears of others.

Num 22:29

And Balaam said unto the ass. That Beldam should answer the ass without expressing any astonishment is certainly more marvelous than that the ass should speak to him. It must, however, in fairness be considered

1. That Balaam was a prophet. He was accustomed to hear Divine voices speaking to him when no man was near. He had a large and unquestioning faith, and a peculiar familiarity with the unseen.

2. Balaam was a sorcerer. It was part of his profession to show signs and wonders such as even now in those countries confound the most experienced and skeptical beholders. It is likely that he had often made dumb animals speak in order to bewilder others. He must indeed have been conscious to some extent of imposture, but he would not draw any sharp line in his own mind between the marvels which really happened to him and the marvels he displayed to others. Both as prophet and as sorcerer, he must have lived, more than any other even of that age, in an atmosphere of the supernatural. If, therefore, this portent was really given, it was certainly given to the very man of all that ever lived to whom it was most suitable. Just as one cannot imagine the miracle of the stater (Mat 17:27) happening to any one of less simple and childlike faith than St. Peter, so one could not think of the ass as speaking to any one in the Bible but the wizard prophet, for whomboth on his good and on his bad sidethe boundary lines between the natural and supernatural were almost obliterated.

3. Balaam was at this moment intensely angry; and nothing blunts the edge of natural surprise so much as rage. Things which afterwards, when calmly recollected, cause the utmost astonishment, notoriously produce no effect at the moment upon a mind which is thoroughly exasperated.

Num 22:31

The Lord opened the eyes of Balaam, and he saw the angel. As on other occasions, the angel was not perceptible to ordinary sight, but only to eyes in some way quickened and purged by the Divine operation. This explains the fact that Balaam’s companions would appear to have seen nothing (cf. Act 9:7).

Num 22:32

Because thy way is perverse. , an uncommon word, which seems to mean “leading headlong,” 1.e. to destruction.

Num 22:33

Unless surely. . It is somewhat doubtful whether this phrase can be translated as in the Septuagint ( )and in all the versions; but even if the construction of the sentence be broken, this is no doubt the meaning of it. And saved her alive. Compare the case of the ass of the disobedient prophet in 1Ki 13:24. It is plainly a righteous thing with God that obedience and faithfulness should be respected, and in some sense rewarded, even in an ass.

Num 22:35

Go with the men. It may be asked to what purpose the angel appeared, if Balaam was to proceed just the same. The answer is that the angel was not a warning, but a destroying, angel, a visible embodiment of the anger of God which burnt against Beldam for his perversity. The angel would have slain Balaam, as the lion slew the disobedient prophet, but that God in his mercy permitted the fidelity and wisdom of the ass to save her master from the immediate consequences of his folly. If Balaam had had a mind capable of instruction, he would indeed have gone on as he was bidden, but in a very different spirit and with very different designs.

Num 22:36

Unto a city of Moab, or, “unto Ir-Moab” ( ), probably the same as the Ar mentioned in Num 21:15 as the boundary town of Moab at that time.

Num 22:39

Kirjath-huzoth. “City of streets.” Identified by some with the ruins of Shian, not far from the supposed site of Ai.

Num 22:40

Balak offered oxen and sheep. Probably these sacrifices were offered not to Chemosh, but to the Lord, in whose name Balaam always spoke. Indeed the known fact that Beldam was a prophet of the Lord was no doubt one of Balak’s chief reasons for wishing to obtain his services. Balak shared the common opinion of antiquity, that the various national deities were enabled by circumstances past human understanding to do sometimes more, sometimes less, for their special votaries. He perceived that the God of Israel was likely, as things stood, to carry all before him; but he thought that he might by judicious management be won over, at least to some extent, to desert the cause of Israel and to favour that of Moab. To this end he “retained” at great cost the services of Balaam, the prophet of the Lord, and to this end he was willing to offer any number of sacrifices. Even the resolute and self-reliant Romans believed in the wisdom of such a policy. Thus Pliny quotes ancient authors as affirming “in oppugnationibus ante omnia solitum a Romanis sacrdotibus evocari Deum, cujus in tutela id oppidum esset, promittique illi eundem aut ampliorem apud Romanos cultum,” and he adds, “durat in Pontificum disciplina id sacrum, constatque ideo occultatum, in cujus Dei tutela Roma esset, ne qui hostium simili modo agerent.” And sent, i.e; portions of the sacrificial meats.

HOMILETICS

Num 22:2-40

THE WAY OF BALAAM

In this section we have some of the profoundest and most subtle, as well as some of the most practical, moral and religious teachings of the Old Testament. In order to draw them out fully we may consider

I. The character and position of Balaam with regard to God and man;

II. The policy of Balak in sending for Balaam;

III. The conduct of Balaam when asked and urged to come to Balak;

IV. The incidents, natural and supernatural, of Balaam’s coming.

I. THE CHARACTER OF BALAAM, AND HIS POSITION WITH REGARD TO GOD AND MAN. Consider under this head

1. That Balaam had a true knowledge of the most high Cod. He was not in any sense a heathen as far as his intellectual perception of Divine things went. And it was not merely Elohim, the God of nature and creation, whom he knew and revered, but distinctly Jehovah, the God of Israel and of grace. Speculatively he knew as much of God as Abraham or Job.

2. That Balaam had an unquestioning faith in the one true God. Whatever difficulties it may create, it is obviously true that Balaam walked very much by faith, and not by sight. The invisible God, the will of God, the power of God, the direct concern of God with his doings, were all realities to Balaam, strong realities. God was not a name to him, nor a theological expression, but the daily companion of his daily life.

3. That Balaam had an undoubted prophetic gift from God. He was not an ordinary servant of the true God; he held as it were a very high official position in the service of God. He enjoyed frequent and direct intercourse with him; he expected to receive supernatural intimations of the Divine will; he professed to speak, and be did speak, words of inspired prophecy far beyond his own origination.

4. That at the same time Balaam’s heart was given not to God, but to covetousness. He loved the wages of unrighteousness. Not perhaps in the lowest sense. He may have valued influence, power, consideration even more than mere money; but money was necessary to all these.

5. That Balaam was a soothsayer. He practiced magical arts and sought for auguries. He traded on the superstitions of the heathen, and even sought to prostitute his prophetic powers to excite astonishment, obtain power, and make money. He hired himself out to curse the enemies of those who employed him. And note that Balaam’s fall in this respect was accountable enough; for we may naturally conclude

(1) that Balaam had an hereditary position as seer which it was his interest to keep up at any cost;

(2) that the ignorant people put strong pressure upon him to play the soothsayer. How easily Samuel might have become the same if he had been covetous! How constant is the temptation to abuse spiritual powers in order at once to gratify others and to exalt oneself! (cf. 1Sa 9:6-8; Jer 5:31)

II. THE POLICY OF BALAK, AND HIS ERROR. Consider under this head

1. That Balak was afraid of Israel, because he was mighty, and had overthrown the Amorites. Yet he had no cause to fear, for Israel had not touched him, and did not mean to. Men are afraid of the Church of God because it is a great power in the world, albeit it is a power for good, and not for evil.

2. That Balak was afraid of the God of Israel. He rightly judged that Israel’s success was due to his God; but he wrongly thought that the Lord was but a national deity who was victorious at present, but might be turned aside or bought off.

3. That Balak put his trust in Balaam because he was a prophet of the Lord, and might be expected to use his influence to change the purposes of the Lord; perhaps even to counterwork those purposes. How often do people seek the aid of religion against God! How often do they seek for religious support and solace in doing what they must know is contrary to the moral law of God!

4. That Balak professed, and no doubt felt, a profound belief in the efficacy of Balaam’s benedictions and maledictions, even as against the people of Balaam’s God. Here was the very essence of superstition, to suppose that anything whatsoever can have any spiritual efficacy contrary to, or apart from, the will of God; most of all, that the word of God, as officially employed by his ministers, can be made to work counter to the declared mind of God. As though Peter could ban whom Christ hath blessed. Yet note that Balak’s superstition was the depraving of a great truth. Balaam had no doubt authority to censure or to bless in the name of God; and his censures or blessings would have had validity if pronounced with a single eye to the glory of God and the good of souls, and in clear dependence upon the higher knowledge and necessary ratification of Heaven.

5. That Balak sought to obtain supernatural aid from Balaam by means of flatteries, gifts, and promises; and thought, no doubt, to buy over the powers of the world to come. He rightly gauged the character of the man; he was utterly deceived as to the worth of his alliance. How often do shrewd and worldly men make the same mistake! Because they see through the selfishness and worldliness of the human ministers of religion, they fancy they can command the services, and employ in their own behalf the powers, of religion itself.

III. THE COMING OF BALAAM. Consider under this head

1. That Balaam was solicited to come for a purpose which he must have felt sure was wrong. To curse any people was an awful thing, and only to be done with sorrow if commanded by God. To curse Israel, of whose history Balaam was not ignorant, was on the face of it treason towards God. When men are invited to lend their aid in opposing or destroying others, how careful should they be to make sure that such hostile action is a matter of duty; for we are called unto blessing (1Pe 3:9).

2. That Balaam was tempted through his love of money and of good things. A true-hearted prophet would have been ashamed to receive gifts and promises for the use of his spiritual powers, and he would have vehemently suspected such as offered them, even with flattery and deference. If anything appeals to our cupidity and promises advantage in this world, we ought all the more to turn against it, unless it is irresistibly proved to be right. With what just scorn does the world regard the universal propensity of religious people to exercise their gifts and throw their influence where and as it pays the best!

3. That Balaam was forbidden to go, for the plain and unalterable reason that he could not possibly do what he was wanted to do without flying in the face of God. If he went, he must either act dishonourably towards Balak by taking his money for nought, or he must act treasonably towards God by cursing his people. And this was perfectly clear to Balaam. The moral law of God is plain enough in its broad outlines, and if men loved righteousness more than gain they would have little practical difficulty.

4. That Balaam’s outward conduct was consistently conscientious. He would not go without leave; he refused to go when forbidden; when allowed to go, he repeatedly protested that he could and would say nothing but what God told him to say. And no doubt his protestations were sincere. He had no intention of rebelling against God; it was a fixed principle with him that God must be obeyed.

5. That Balaam’s inward desire was to go if possible, because it promised honour and gain to himself. He obeyed God, but he obeyed grudgingly; he obeyed God, but he gave him clearly to understand that he wished it might be otherwise; he respected the definite command not to go, but he paid no heed to the reason givenbecause Israel was not to be cursed. The only obedience which God really cares for is obedience from the heart (Rom 6:17; Eph 6:6). How many are strict in not violating the moral law (as they understand it), but not in order to please God, not because they love the will of God! To how many are the commandments of God formal barriers which they do not overleap only because they dare not! But for such these barriers are sooner or later done away, that they may have their own way.

6. That Balaam did not get credit for the conscientiousness he did possess. He said that God refused to give him leave, which was true, although not expressed in a proper spirit, whereas the messengers reported that he refused to come; and Balak believed that he only wanted more pressing. So it is with men who do what is right, yet not from the true motive; they do not get credit even for the good that is in them; they are always tempted afresh, because they are felt to be open to temptation; the world sees that their heart is with it, and puts their hesitation down to mere self-interest. There is no safety for the man whose heart is not on the side of God.

7. That Balaam, when he referred the matter again to God (as if it were still open), was allowed to go. This is the very essence of tempting Godto cast about for ways and means to follow our own will and compass our own ends without open disobedience. How many treat the rule of God as a disagreeable restraint which must indeed be respected, but may be thankfully avoided if possible! Such men find themselves able to go with a clear conscience into circumstances of temptation which are presently fatal to them. If thou hast once had a clear intimation of what is right, cleave to it with all thy heart, else shalt thou be led into a snare.

8. That Balaam’s going, though permitted, was controlled; and this not in his own interest (for he should not have gone),but in the interest of Israel. When men will go into evil they are judicially permitted to go, and the law of God ceases so far to constrain their conscience; but the consequences of their inward disobedience are overruled that they may not be disastrous to God’s own people.

IV. THE JOURNEY OF BALAAM. Consider under this head

1. That God was angry with Balaam for going, although he had given him leave to go. For it was sin which made Balaam wish to go if possible; and it was his wish to go on an evil errand for gain which obtained him leave to go. Even so if men are inwardly desirous to do what is wrong, God will suffer them to persuade themselves that it is not actually wrong, and they will go on with a clear conscience; but God will be angry with them all the same. How many very religious people find it permissible to walk in very crooked ways for the sake of gain, and are yet resolute not to do a wrong thing! But God is angry with them, and they have forfeited his grace already.

2. That the destroying angel stood in the way as an adversary to him. Even so destruction awaits us in every way wherein greed leads us contrary to the will of God. God himself is an adversary to us (Mat 5:25), and is ready at any moment to fall upon us and cut us asunder. It is useless to say that we have done nothing wrong; if our motives be corrupt, the sword of Divine justice is drawn against us.

3. That Balaam saw not the angel, but the ass did; and this although Balaam was a “seer,” and prided himself on “having his eyes open,” and on being familiar with the unseen things of God. Even so the “religious” and “spiritual” man, who has great “experiences,” and yet is secretly led by greed and self-interest, is often much blinder than the most carnal and unenlightened to perceive that he is rushing upon destruction; the most stupid person has often a clearer perception of moral facts and situations than the most gifted, if this be blinded by sin.

4. That the ass by her fidelity and instinct of self-preservation saved her master. Even so are men, wise in their own eyes often indebted to the most despised and neglected agencies for preservation from the consequences of their blind folly.

5. That Balaam was enraged with the ass, and ill-treated her. Even so foolish men are often very angry with the very circumstances or persons which are really saving them from destruction.

6. That the ass was Divinely permitted to rebuke her master, and to teach him a lesson if he would learn it; for she had been faithful, and docile, and had never played him false ever since she had been his; while he had been and was unfaithful, obstinate, and disloyal to his Master in heaven. Even so do the very beasts teach us many a lesson by their conduct; and those whom we account in some sense worse than the beaststhe heathen, and men who have no religion at allwill often put us to shame by the strong virtues which they display where we perhaps fail.

7. That then Balaam saw and knew his danger. Even so do men complacently walk in the road which leads to destruction, and have not the least idea of it, but are angry with any that thwart them, until some sudden influence opens their eyes to their awful danger.

8. That he offered there to go back, if necessary, and acknowledged that he had done wrong (perhaps sincerely), but was not permitted to go back. Even so when men have, as it were, insisted upon taking a line which is unwise, dangerous, and wrong, it is often impossible for them to turn back. They are committed to it, and God’s providence compels them to go on with it, even though it brings awful peril to their souls; for God is a jealous God, and the judicial consequences of our own (albeit inward and disguised) disobedience cannot be got rid of in a moment.

9. That he was met by Balak with honour and ceremony and religious rites; and no doubt all that happened by the way faded like a dream from his mind. Even so when men walk after their own covetousness they may receive the most solemn and (at the time) impressive warnings, but amidst the converse of the world, and the honour received of men, and the outward ceremonies even of religion, these warnings have no lasting effect, and are as though they had never happened.

Consider again, as to the broad lessons to be drawn from Balaam’s character and history

1. That there may be in a man high spiritual gifts without real goodness. Balaam was a veritable prophet, and had in a remarkable degree the faculty both of understanding’ the hidden things of God and of announcing them to men. Yet, as in the case of Saul (1Sa 10:11; 1Sa 19:24) and Caiaphas (Joh 11:51), his prophetic gifts were not accompanied by sanctification of life. Even so many in all ages and lands have great spiritual gifts of understanding, of interpretation, of eloquence, &c; whereby others are greatly advantaged, but they remain evil themselves.

2. That a man may have a true and strong religious faith, and yet that faith shall not save him, because it does not affect his heart. That Balaam had a strong faith in the Lord God is evident; on the intellectual side it was as strong as Abraham’s; he walked with God as truly as any in the sense of being constantly conscious and mindful of God’s presence and concern with him. No definition of religious faith could be framed with honesty which should exclude Balaam and include Abraham. Yet he was not saved, because his faith, although it largely mingled with his thoughts and greatly influenced his actions, did not govern his affections. Even so it is useless, however usual and convenient, to deny that many men have strong religious convictions and persuasionsin a word, have religious faithwho are not saved by it, but fall into deadly sins and become castaway. This is not a matter of theology so much as of facts; the combination of strong religious feelings, and of power to realize the unseen, with deep moral alienation from God, is by no means uncommon.

3. That a man may do much and sacrifice much in order to obey God without receiving any reward. Balaam repeatedly crossed his own inclinations, and forewent much honour and emolument from Balak, from a conscientious motive; and yet he was all the time on the verge of destruction, and was miserably slain at last. Even so many men do much they do not like, and give up much they do like, because they feel they ought to; and yet they have no reward for it either here or hereafter, because their self-restraint is grounded on some lower motive than love of God and the desire to please him.

4. That a man’s conduct may be to all appearance irreproachable, and yet be displeasing to God. No one could have found distinct fault with any one step in Balaam s proceedings; each could be singly justified as permissible; yet the whole provoked the Lord to anger, because it was secretly swayed by greed. Even so many men are careful, and to ordinary eyes irreproachable, in their doings, because no act is by itself without justification; yet their whole life is hateful because its governing motive is selfishness, not love. It is not enough to be able to justify each step as we take it, neither will a mere resolve to keep straight with God insure his favour.

5. That a man may have profound religious insight, and yet be very blind to his own state. Balaam justly prided himself upon his intelligent and spiritual religion as compared with the follies and mummeries of the heathen around, yet he was more blind than his own beast to the palpable destruction on which he was running. Even so many of those who are most enlightened, and most removed from ignorance and superstition, are most blind to their own entire moral failure, and to the terrible danger they are m. They, e.g; who most denounce idolatry are often utterly blind to the fact that their whole lives are dominated by covetousness, which is idolatry.

Consider again, with respect to the miracle of the dumb beast speaking with human voice

1. That the lower animals, of which we reck so little, save as a matter of gain, have often great virtues by which they teach us many a lesson. How much more faithful are they to us than we to our Master! It is their pride and study to observe and follow, almost to anticipate, the least indication of our will. How inferior are we in that respect!

2. That God is not insensible to their virtues, as we very generally are, but at times at least gives them a certain recompense of reward (see on verse 33). Since they seem to have no future state, it is a duty laid upon us to remember and reward their fidelity in this world.

3. That to be enraged with dumb animals when their conduct vexes us is sin and folly. Sin, because we have no right to be angry except with sin (Jon 4:4); folly, because they are less in the wrong with us than we are with God; sin and folly, because such anger surely blinds the mind and leaves us a prey to temptation.

4. That God delights to choose “the foolish things of the world to confound the wise,” and “things which are despised” and “things which are not” (as the intelligible voice of an ass) “to bring to nought things that are. Even so are we often rebuked and reproved in our madness by things most contemned and familiar, by those whom we regard as brutish and senseless, and standing upon a lower level than ourselves.

HOMILIES BY E.S. PROUT

Num 22:5, Num 22:6

BALAAM’S GREATNESS AND FALL

Balaam’s character and history have supplied materials for many theological and ethical studies. His character and conduct, though somewhat perplexing, are not more so than those of many around us, and are full of instruction and warning. At present we confine ourselves to two points:

I. BALAAM‘S LOFTY POSITION AND PRIVILEGES.

II. THE SECRET OF BALAAM‘S HUMILIATING FALL.

I. (1) He had a knowledge of the true God. Among the heathens of Mesopotamia he retains a knowledge of the God revealed “from the creation of the world.” He was like the evening star, showing in which direction the sun of truth had set (Rom 1:21), and reflecting some of its light. His knowledge may be illustrated by his lofty utterances respecting God and his people; e.g; Num 23:10, Num 23:19; and according to some interpreters, Num 6:8.

(2) He enjoyed the gift of inspiration by God. Though there were no Scriptures, God was not left without witnesses, and among them was Balaam “the prophet” (2Pe 2:16). He expected Divine communications, and was not disappointed. No wonder then that

(3) he enjoyed wide-spread fame. It extended hundreds of miles away, to Moab and Midian, whence more than once an embassy crossed the desert with such flattering words as those in Num 6:6. Yet we know that Balaam was a bad man who came to a bad end. Thus we have lessons of warning for ourselves, who have a fuller knowledge of God than Balaam, and may enjoy gifts, if not as brilliant, yet more useful than his. All of these may avail nothing for our salvation, but may be perverted to the worst ends. Illustrations:Hymenoeus and Alexander, the companions of St. Paul (1Ti 1:19, 1Ti 1:20); Judas, the apostle of Jesus Christ (cf. Mat 7:21-23; Mat 11:23; 1Co 13:1, 1Co 13:2).

II. Balaam’s name mentioned in the New Testament only three times, and each time it is covered with reproach (2Pe 2:15; Jud 2Pe 1:11; Rev 2:14). His root sin was the ancient, inveterate vice of human nature, selfishness. He knew God, but did not love him, for “he loved the wages of unrighteousness.” He did not follow the Divine voice, but “followed after” reward. God taught him sublime truths; he “taught Balak” base arts of seduction. His selfishness was shown in

(1) Ambition. There was nothing of the self-forgetfulness of such prophets as Elijah, Elisha, Jeremiah, or Balaam’s contemporary, Moses. He is esteemed as a great man, and he takes good care he shall be so esteemed. He knows divination has no power with God, but to magnify himself among the heathens of Moab, he resorts to it. He constantly aspires to the “very great honour” to which Balak offers to promote him (cf. Psa 131:1-3; Jer 45:5).

(2) Covetousness. He would be rich, and therefore fell into temptation, &c. (1Ti 6:9; 2Pe 2:15). His words were fair (verse 18), yet suspicious, like those of a venal voter boasting his incorruptibility. Balaam coveted the offered honour and wealth. How could be gain them while God was keeping him back? Two ways were possible. He might get God to change his mind. He wanted to get permission from God to do what was at present a sin. He might have known from the first, as he says (Num 23:19). But he struggles to conquer God, as though the fact was not that God cannot change, but that God will not change. Hence his repeated changes of place and new sacrifices. At length it was clear that this way was closed against him. He is constrained to bless Israel again and again. At the close of the narrative (Num 24:10-24) he seems to be taking his place boldly as an ally of the people of God. But it was only a temporary impulse, not a true conversion. Greedy for the wages of unrighteousness, he allies himself with hell. (“Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo.”) What a contrast between his fair promises (verse 18) and this wicked deed l The reason is that in trying to “bend” God he was miserably perverting himself (like a weak tool used to move a great weight), while seeking permission to sin he was growing less sensitive to sin (see next Homily). Learn then from the fall of this great and gifted prophet to what a depth of infamy selfishness, that mother of sins, and its offspring, ambition and covetousness, may lead us. Warned by the selfishness of Balaam, may we copy the unselfishness of Christ (Rom 15:3; Php 2:3-8).P.

Num 22:13

BALAAM, AN ILLUSTRATION OF SYSTEMATIC RESISTANCE OF CONSCIENCE

The final fall of Balaam was not sudden. A process of deterioration had been going on, the first clear sign of which is in the text. In trying to change God’s will he had been changing himself for the worse (see Homily on Num 22:5, Num 22:6). We can trace his resistance of conscience step by step.

1. When the first embassy came, his knowledge of God and of Israel’s history should probably have led to a decisive refusal. But if we assume that he needed direction, it is clear that the rewards of divination made him anxious to go. Not that he had a desire to curse Israel; he would just as soon have blessed them for reward. Yet he had no intention then to disobey. If a prophet could have shown him that evening his future career, he might have shrunk in loathing from the self that was to be. The will of God is declared (Num 22:12), and the struggle between conscience and covetousness begins. At first conscience prevails, but the form of refusal (Num 22:13) indicates double-mindedness. In contrast to Joseph (Gen 39:9), Balaam lays himself open to fresh temptations. If we give Satan a hesitating “No,” instead of a “Get thee behind me,” he will understand that we would like to sin, but dare not, and will try us with more honourable embassies and costlier gifts.

2. The ambassadors leave, but lingering regrets keep the fire of covetousness smouldering in Balaam’s heart. It flames up afresh on the arrival of the second embassy (Num 22:16, Num 22:17). Fair professions (Num 22:18) reveal his weakness, for what “more” (Num 22:19) could he want God to say unless it was to give him permission to sin? God gives him leave not to sin, but to go. (Illustrate this act by similar Divine proceedings: e.g; allowing the Israelites, under protest, to elect a king; a wild youth receiving reluctantly permission to carry out his determination to go to sea.)

3. Balaam went, and God is angry, not because he went, but because he went with a wicked purpose. When he found the ways of transgressors hard, and offers to return (Num 22:34), God knows that he would only carry his body back to Pethor, and leave his heart hankering after the rewards of Balak. May we not suppose that if he had shown real repentance in the future, and heartily entered into the Divine purposes: though he lost Balak s rewards, he would have received God’s blessing? But he ran greedily after reward, and found, as sinners still find, under God’s providence, that it is hard to retrace false steps. Therefore, “enter not,” &c. (Pro 4:15).

4. Balaam meets with a flattering reception, yet renews his good professions (Num 22:38). He means them, for he still hopes to gain God’s consent to his purpose. His use of enchantments to impose on the heathen is one sign of unconscientiousness. His first attempt to curse is a failure (Num 23:7-10), but the struggle with conscience and God is not abandoned. (“No sun or star so bright,” &c; Keble’s Christian Year,’ Second Sunday after Easter.) Three times he persists in this “madness,” trying to change or circumvent the will of God. At length he seems to give up the struggle, but is probably only “making a virtue of a necessity;” at the best it is but a passing impulse, followed by a relapse, and by the infamous act by which he clutched his wages and brought God’s curse on Israel (Num 25:1-18). He thus shows that he has renounced God, has entered thoroughly into Balak’s schemes, and even outstripped him in wickedness. His perverted conscience does not keep him even from such unutterable baseness. His triumph is brief, and his “end is destruction” (Num 31:8; Psa 34:21). Learn from this the guilt and danger of resisting and thus corrupting conscience. (Explain process of this corruption, and note natural analogies to a conscience dulled by persistence in sin.) To try and bribe conscience is like seeking permission to sin. (Illustrate by story of Glaucus inquiring at the oracle of Delphi whether he might keep stolen moneyHerodotus, 6:86.) Conscience, like a railway signal-lamp, is intended to warn against danger or direct in the path of safety. If through negligence the lamp is put out or shows a wrong light, the consequences may be fatal (Isa 5:20; Mat 6:23). A healthy conscience accuses of sin and warns of danger only that it may be a minister to lead us to Christ.P.

Num 22:15-17

THE IMPORTUNITY AND IMPUDENCE OF THE TEMPTER

Such appeals as Balak sent to Balaam are constantly addressed to us, in word or substance, by human tempters, and through them by the infernal tempter. The honour offered is represented as “very great,” and as essential, and the promises are as vast as we can desire (“whatsoever,” &c; Num 22:17; Luk 4:6, Luk 4:7). Though at first the tempter may be resisted, and may depart “for a season” (cf. Num 22:14), yet his solicitations may be renewed in a more alluring form than at first, with this appeal, “Let nothing,” &c. (Num 22:16). Neither

(1) conscience. Away with childish scruples in a man of the world who has to see to his own interests. Nor

(2) considerations of mercy to others. Balaam was required to curse and, if possible, ruin a nation that had done him no harm. Selfishness is bidden to make any sacrifice at its shrine. E.g; ambitious rulers, dishonest traders or trustees, heartless seducers. Nor

(3) the will of God; for who can be sure whether God has really revealed his will, or will enforce it (Gen 3:1-5). Nor

(4) the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ in dying that he might save from the ruin of sin; for though you sin, grace will abound. Nor

(5) the fear of judgment; for after all the threats of judgment may be old wives’ fables, or you may make all right before you die. Thus speaks the tempter, bidding us make riches and honour “the prize of our calling,” and overleap or break down every barrier that God has set up to hinder us from ruining ourselves and others. (Illustrate from the case of Judas, and the barriers he broke through at the call of Satan, and contrast the impregnability of Jesus Christ when offered the wealth and honour of the world.) Christ himself, the motives supplied by his cross when applied by his Spirit, are the greatest hindrances to keep us from yielding to the tempter.P.

Num 22:32

ON CRUELTY TO ANIMALS

In Num 22:28 we are reminded of the silent protest of the brute creation against the cruelty of men. From Num 22:32 (“Wherefore hast thou smitten thine ass these three times?”) we may learn that this protest is heeded and supported by God. Cruelty of all kinds is one of the foulest of the works of the flesh, opposed to the character of God and to the instincts of humanity. Cruelty to animals is especially hateful, because of

I. THE WRONG DONE TO THE CREATURES

II. THE EFFECTS ON OURSELVES.

I. 1. They are our inferiors, therefore magnanimity and sympathy should protect them.

2. They are often helpless to defend themselves; cruelty is then unutterably mean.

3. Some of these animals are part of our property, and of great value to us, though absolutely within our power.

4. If they are not “wont to do so” when they provoke us, some good reason may exist which we should seek to discover. Therefore

5. When tempted to harshness, short of cruelty, it is our duty to consider whether they need it, and in this sense deserve it. For

6. Past misconduct of ourselves or of others may have occasioned their present obstinacy, through timidity or some other cause.

7. Animals suffer too much already, directly or indirectly, through men’s sins (war, famines, &c.) without the addition of gratuitous cruelties.

8. No future life for them is revealed, so that we have the more reason for not making them miserable in this life.

II. 1. It fosters a despotic habit of mind, as though might and right were identical.

2. It hardens the heart and tends to nurture cruelty to men as well as brutes. E.g; the child Nero delighting in killing flies.

3. It still further alienates us from the mind of Christ, the character of “the Father of mercies.”

4. It is a sign of unrighteousness (Pro 12:10), against which God’s wrath is revealed, and from which we need to be saved by Christ (Rom 1:18; 1Jn 1:9).P.

HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG

Num 22:2-4

MOAB TAKES ALARM

I. AN INTERESTED OBSERVER OF AN IMPORTANT ACTION. “Balak saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites.” The thing was worth observing in itself, that this great host of people, coming with but little notice, having no land of its own, no visible basis of operations, no military renown, should yet have crushed into ruin such powerful kings as Sihon and Og. It was not merely the conquest of one army by another; there was something decisive and very significant about the conquest. Just as in profane history some battles, such as Marathon and Salamis, Waterloo and Trafalgar, stand out like towering mountains because of the great issues connected with them, so these victories of Israel over Sihon and Og are for all generations of God’s people to consider. Balak of course was interested as a neighbour, but we, living thousands of miles from the scene of these events, and thousands of years after them, should be not less interested. They concern us just as much as they concerned Balak. Distant as they are from us in time, they have to do very practically with our interests and the yet unaccomplished purposes of the ever-living God. We are too observant of trifles, the gossip of the passing day, the mere froth on the waves of time. The thing also pressed for notice. The Amorites were Moab’s neighbours, and Moab had been conquered by them. If Israel then had conquered the conqueror, there was need for prompt action. So long as Israel was far away, wandering in the wilderness, with no aim in its course that could be ascertained,that course aimless rather, so far as others could make out,there was no feeling of alarm. But now, with Israel in its very borders, Moab feels it must do something. Yet the pressure was not of the right sort. Moab was driven to consider its position not because of dangers within, not because of idolatry and unrighteousness (Num 25:1-18), nor that it might become a pure and noble-minded nation, but because of the selfish fear that another people close to its territory might prove hostile and destructive. Thus we allow considerations to press on us which should not have the slightest force. Where our minds should be well-nigh indifferent they are yielding and sensitive; and where they should be yielding and sensitive, indifference too often possesses them, When Jesus fed the multitude, the action pressed for notice not because the multitude appreciated the spiritual significance of the action, but they eat of the loaves and were filled. Balak did well when he noticed the victories of Israel, but very ill when he noticed them simply as bearing on the safety of his kingdom.

II. THE CONSEQUENT DISQUIETUDE OF MOAB. The Amorites had conquered Moab, but Israel had conquered the Amorites. The presumption then was that Israel, having the power, would as a matter of course advance to treat Moab in the same fashion; just as an Alexander or Napoleon goes from one conquered territory to conquer the next; just as a fire spreads from one burning house to its neighbour. It was therefore excusable for Moab to be sore afraid; but though excusable, it was not reasonable. The alarm came from knowledge of some things, mixed with ignorance of things more important. The alarm then was groundless. General as that alarm was, Moab had really nothing to fear. Its way of reasoning was utterly erroneous. If Moab had known the internal history of Israel half as well as it knew the present external appearance and recent triumphs, it would not have been alarmed because of the children of Israel, and because they were many. The children of Israel had been commanded to cherish other purposes than those of conquering Moab, and the mind of their leader was occupied with things far nobler than military success. Besides, as God had remembered the kinship of Israel and Edom, so he remembered that of Israel and Moab (Deu 2:9). Moab was afraid of the people because they were many. What a revelation of their craven and abject spirit in the past he would have had if he had seen them threatening to stone Caleb and Joshua (Jos 14:1-15). And though they were many, he would have seen that all their numbers availed nothing for success when God was not with them (Num 14:40-45).

III. MOAB‘S CONCLUSION WITH REGARD TO HIS OWN RESOURCES. He could no more resist Israel than the grass of the field resist the mouth of the ox. This expresses his complete distrust of his own resources, and was a prudent conclusion, even if humiliating, as far as it went, and always supposing that Israel wished to play the part of the ox. The fall of Sihon had taught nothing to Og, the self-confident giant, but the fall of Sihon, and next the fall of Og, had taught Moab this at least, that in the battlefield he could do nothing against Israel. If a man refuses to go in the right path, it is not, therefore, a matter of little consequence which of the wrong paths he chooses. One may take him swiftly in the dark to the precipice; another, also downward, may afford more time and occasions for retrieval. It was a wrong, blind, useless course to send for Balaam, but at all events it was not so immediately destructive, as to rush recklessly into the field of battle against Israel.Y.

Num 22:5, Num 22:6

BALAK’S MESSAGE TO BALAAM

War being useless, what shall Balak do? In his mind there were only two alternatives, either to fight or to send for Balaam. And yet there was a better course, had he thought of it, viz; to approach Israel peacefully. But prejudice, a fixed persuasion that Israel was his enemy, dominated his mind. We do very foolish things through allowing traditional conceptions to rule us. That Israel was the enemy of Moab was an assumption with not the smallest basis of experience. Many of the oppositions and difficulties of life arise from assuming that those who have the opportunity to injure are likely to use the opportunity. He who will show himself friendly may find friends and allies where he least expects them. We must do our best in dubious positions to make sure that we have exhausted the possibilities of action. Balak then sends a message to Balaam. Notice

I. A TESTIMONY TO THE POWER OF RELIGION. Balak cannot find sufficient resources in nature, therefore he seeks above nature. When men, who in their selfishness and unspirituality are furthest from God, find themselves in extremity, it is then precisely that they are seen turning to a power higher than their own (1Sa 28:1-25). Man has a clinging nature, and if he cannot lay hold of the truth as it is in Jesus, he must find some substitute. Balak did not know God as Moses knew him; he knew nothing of his spiritual perfections and holy purposes. But still he recognized the God of Israel as really existent, as a mighty potentate; he felt that Balaam had some power with him; and thus even in his ignorance he believes. It is a long, long way to pure atheism, and surely it must be a dreary and difficult one. May not the question be fairly raised whether there are any consistent atheists, those whose practice agrees even approximately with their theory? There are men without God in the world, i.e; lacking conscious and happy connection with the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; but even so they may bear testimony unthinkingly to their need of him. The witnesses to the power of religion are not only many, but of all sorts, giving testimony often when they least suspect it.

II. A TESTIMONY TO THE EMPTINESS OF IDOLATRY. Balak had a god of his own, probably more than one, and doubtless he would have felt very uncomfortable in omitting the worship of them; but he did not trust in his gods. He may have sacrificed to them on this very occasion with great profusion and scrupulosity, but he did not trust them. Though they were near at hand, he felt more hope from Balaam far away; and yet if there was any good in his gods, this was the very time to prove it and receive it. There is a Nemesis for all idolatry. The idols of Moab were put to shame before the God of Israel, and that by the very man who was bound to be their champion. It does not need always for a Dagon to fall in the presence of the ark. There are other ways of dishonouring idols than casting them to the moles and the bats. They may have shame written across their brows, even while they stand on the pedestal of honour. Thus we see also an exposure of formalism. Balak’s great need strips the mask off his religion, and underneath we see, not living organs, but dead machinery. And bear in mind, formalism in serving the true God is just as certain to come to shame as formalism in serving an idol. The principle is the same, Whatever deity be formally acknowledged.

III. AFTER ALL, THE RESORT TO BALAAM WAS A VERY PRECARIOUS ONE, even supposing Balaam had all the power with which Balak credited him. For Pethor was a long way off, and the dreaded, victorious Israelites were close at hand. Balaam did not live in the next street. While you are sending from Land’s End for the celebrated London physician, the patient’s life is steadily ebbing away. That is no sufficient help in our supreme necessities which has to be brought over land and sea. “Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from above:) or, Who shall descend into the deep? (that is, to bring up Christ again from the dead). The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart” (Rom 10:6-8). Go into thy closet; retreat into the seclusion and security of thine own heart, and meet the mighty Guide and Helper there. The God of Israel went about with his people. Jesus did not say, “Wheresoever I am, there my people are to gather together,” but, “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”

“God attributes to place
No sanctity, if none be thither brought
By men who there frequent, or therein dwell.”

IV. A MAN MAY BE IGNORANT OF THINGS LYING NEAREST HIM AND UNSPEAKABLY IMPORTANT, while he abounds in useless knowledge of things far away. Balak knew not the needs of his own heart, the real power of Israel, the disposition of Israel’s God to him, the possibilities of friendship which lay within those tents on which he looked with so much apprehension. But somehow he had got to know concerning Balaam in far-away Pethor. How much useless, deceiving, pretentious knowledge we may accumulate with infinite labour, and at the time feeling great certainty, of its value. “Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.” It is of great moment in a world where so much is to be known, and yet so little can he acquired, not to miss acquiring the right things. Said Dr. Arnold, “If one might wish for impossibilities, I might then wish that my children might be well versed in physical science, hut in due subordination to the fullness and freshness of their knowledge on moral subjects. This, however, I believe cannot be; and physical science, if studied at all, seems too great to be studied , Wherefore, rather than have it the principal thing in my son’s mind, I would gladly have him think that the sun went round the earth, and that the stars were so many spangles set in the bright blue firmament.” Thus also the great discoverer Faraday in his old age”My worldly faculties are slipping away, day by day. Happy is it for all of us that the true good lies not in them. As they ebb, may they leave us as little children, trusting in the Father of mercies and accepting his unspeakable gift!”

V. THE MESSAGE WAS VERY FLATTERING TO BALAAM. Kings have much to do with courtiers, and all the delicate preparations of flattery must be well known to them. Balak made Balaam to understand that it was not for a trifle he had summoned him, for a service that could be rendered by a second-rate soothsayer. The people he so dreaded had come out from Egypt, that home of strength in those days, that populous and wealthy land, and by no means lacking in reputed wise men, sorcerers and magicians. They had come in great numbers: “behold, they cover the face of the earth;” and they were in close proximity and apparently settled condition: “they abide over against me.” There is the willing confession by Balak of his own inability, and his evident faith in Balaam’s power to cast a fatal paralysis over all the energy of Israel. Now all this must have been very pleasant for Balaam to hear, sweeter maybe than the jingle of the rewards of divination. Thus did the temptation to Balaam, already only too open to temptation, begin. His carnal mind was appealed to in many ways. The rewards of divination were only a part of the expected wages of unrighteousness. “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall (Pro 16:18).

VI. BALAK HAD MORE FAITH IN FALSEHOOD THAN ISRAEL FOR A LONG TIME HAD shows TOWARDS TRUTH. The conduct of Balak in sending so far, in casting the fortunes of his kingdom with such simplicity on what was utterly false, should put us to shame, who have the opportunity of resorting at all times to well ascertained and established truth. Balak had only a Balaam to seek, such an ignoble and double- minded man as appears in the sequel; not a Moses, who could have told him truly, not only how the blessing and the curse really come, but how to secure the one and escape the other.Y.

Num 22:7-14

THE FIRST VISIT TO BALAAM

I. BALAK‘S NOTION OF WHAT WOULD BE MOST ACCEPTABLE TO BALAAM. It is all a matter of money, Balak thinks. “Every man has his price,” and the poor man who cannot pay it must go to the wall. Not that we are to suppose Balaam a specially greedy man, but it has been the mark of false religions and all corruptions of the true service of God that priests and prophets have been greedy after money. They promise spiritual things and make large demands for carnal things; the more they get the more they promise, and the more they get the more they want. “The priests teach for hire, and the prophets divine for money” (Mic 3:11). Simon Magus must have known well the greed of his tribe when he offered money to Simon Peter. It is the mark of a true bishop that he is not greedy of filthy lucre (1Ti 3:3). Jesus sent forth his disciples to make a free gift in healing the sick, cleansing the lepers, raising the dead, and casting out devils. “Freely ye have received, freely give.” “He, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price” (Isa 55:1).

II. BALAAM‘S RECEPTION OF THE MESSENGERS. He cannot give a prompt answer. We are certainly very much in the dark concerning Balaam’s past life and present position. If he knew anything of Israel’s true character and God’s purpose concerning Israel, then, of course, there was not the smallest excuse for delay. But even supposing him ignorant in this respect, was there any excuse for delay to an upright man? Did not Balak’s wish at once suggest the answer an upright man would have given? Blessing and cursing are great realities, not mere priestly fictions (Deu 27:1-26, Deu 28:1-68), but they can never become mere matters of money. “The curse causeless shall not come.” tie who deserves blessing cannot be cursed, nor he who deserves cursing, blessed. God’s sovereignty, mysterious enough in its operations, is never arbitrary. An upright man would have felt it was no use pretending to consult God with a bribe in his hand. The bribe vitiated the spirit of his prayer, and prevented a proper reception of the answer. There are certain propositions which upright men do not need to sleep or deliberate over. The answer should follow the request like the instantaneous rebound of a ball. Balak did not send asking advice in general terms, or that Balaam should do the best he could, but he pointed out a certain, well-defined road which no upright man could possibly take. If we acquit the prophet of dishonesty and evasion in this plea of delay, we can only do it by convicting hint of great darkness in his own spirit and great ignorance of God.

III. THE INTERPOSITION OF GOD. God does not seem to have waited for any request from Balaam. While the prophet is considering all the honour and emolument that may come to him out of this affair, God comes to him with the prompt and sobering question, “What men are these with thee?” All the depths of this question we cannot penetrate, but at all events it was enough to prepare the prophet, one would think, for an unfavourable answer. And may we not also assume that it was expressive of a desire to extricate him when he had only taken one or two steps into temptation? As to Balak’s request, God settles everything with a brief, a very brief, but sufficient utterance: “The people are blessed.” And blessed beyond all doubt they had been of late, not in word only, but in deed. Note that God does not send any message of reassurance to Balak. There is guidance for Balaam, security for Israel, but for Balak only blank denial. If Balak had come in the right spirit to Balaam, and Balaam in the right spirit to God, then the messengers might have gone back cheerful, and welcome to their expectant master. But what begins badly ends worse. He who sets himself in opposition to God’s people cannot expect to hear comfortable words from God. If we are to hear such words, we must approach him in the right spirit. We must not seek good for ourselves by a selfish infringement on the good of others. It was one thing for Israel, under the leadership of God, to attack the wicked Amorites; quite another for Moab, on a mere peradventure, to attack Israel.

IV. BALAAM‘S ANSWER TO THE MESSENGERS. He does not repeat what the Lord said; thus advancing further in the revelation of his corrupt heart. Why not have told them plainly these words: “Thou shalt not curse the people, for they are blessed”? Simply because it was not pleasant to say such words with the flattering message of Balak still tickling his ears. It was not true then that whom he blessed was blessed, and whom he cursed was cursed; but to have told Moab so would have been to publish his humiliation far and wide, and hurt his repute as a great soothsayer. Yet how much better it would have been for Balaam as a man, and a man who had been brought in some respects so near to God, if he had told the whole truth. It would perhaps have saved a second embassy to him. Men are looking to the main chance even when among the solemn things of God, and fresh from hearing his voice. Balaam first of all, in speaking to God, omits from the message of Balak, saying nothing of his own reputation in the eyes of the Moabitish king, suspecting very shrewdly that this would be offensive to God. Then he omits again in his answer to the messengers, and, to make all complete, they omit still more in their report to Balak. There is nothing in their word to show that God had said anything in the matter. This is what is called diplomacy; not telling a lie, but only leaving out something of the truth, as being’ of no practical importance. It is a great blessing that there are Scriptures for us all to read. Philosophers and preachers may leave out part of the truth, or colour and distort it to suit their own prejudices, but they cannot get over the written word. Out of their own mouths they may be contradicted when they read one thing out of the Scriptures and say another as the fruit of their own lips.Y.

Num 22:15-21

THE SECOND VISIT

I. THE RESULT OF MUTILATED ANSWERS.

1. As concerns Balak. Balaam does not tell the first messengers all that God had spoken to him; they do not tell Balak all that Balaam had spoken to them. The consequence is that he comes to a wrong conclusion, and really he had no information by which to come to a right one. His thoughts on the subject may be supposed to have run thus:”All the difficulty lies with Balaam. He took the night to think the matter over, and concluded it was not worth his while on such poor considerations to undertake so serious a journey. My messengers and rewards have not sufficiently impressed him with the rank of Moab.” In Balak’s mind it is all a question of degree, and so he sends more princes, and more honourable than before. And possibly, if these had been unsuccessful, as a last resort he would have gone himself. Thus poor Balak, in the quagmire of misunderstanding already, was led still deeper into it. The great end was to get Balaam’s curse into operation, and there was nothing to shake his faith in the possibility of this end being gained. Between God and Balak there were interposed a self-seeking Balaam, and, to say the least, messengers who were careless, if nothing more. Ours is a more secure position. We come to God through a Christ, not through a Balaam; enlightened by a Spirit who teaches us the proper needs of sinful men, and shows us our real danger.

2. As concerns Balaam. Whether he thought that by his first answer he had finally disposed of the request, or wanted time to consider if it should be preferred again, we cannot make sure. His first answer had to be given very much on the spur of the moment. If it had been a truthful answer, one not only with the lips, but with the whole countenance, and the whole man speaking all God had said, he would not have been troubled again. But now he has to deal with more princes, and more honourable than before. He sees precisely why they have been sent, and as he listens to their urgent and obsequious words and comprehensive promises, he understands exactly what is expected of him. His proper answer even now was to say that he could not go on any consideration. But there was no spirit and courage of repentance in him. His reply, with all its seeming emphasis, is very evasive and ambiguous. It looks strong to say, “If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold,” and to speak of God as “the Lord my God,” but after all he leaves the messengers in the dark as to what the word of the Lord was, though he knew it well. He pretends that it is needful to wait another night for what the Lord might say. This time it is a mere pretence, beyond any doubt. Perhaps he reckons that he will have nothing to do but wait till the morning, and then repeat to the second messengers what he had said to the first. How startled then he must have been, not only to get another revelation of God, but a totally different direction! And yet, when we consider, we see that he could not get the same answer as before. Balaam does not stand where he did at the time of the previous answer. He is a worse man; he has yielded to temptation from which God would have preserved him, and now, with open and greedy heart, he is in the midst of greater temptation still. He had daringly neglected God’s previous word, and would assuredly neglect it again if he got the opportunity. Why then should God repeat the word? Balaam will still suppress the fact that he cannot curse Israel, seeing they are blessed. What was the needful word yesterday may become useless today. The possible of one hour becomes the impossible of the next. Jesus says, “Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation;” but that does not prevent him saying very soon afterwards, “Sleep on now and take your rest. Rise, let us be going.” The father has not changed because the child whom he commands in one way today he commands in another tomorrow. Different actions outwardly may reveal the same character and advance the same purpose. The appearance of contradiction in God’s dealing arises from our hasty thinking, not because there is any reality corresponding to the appearance. God was speaking, as we more and more clearly see, both for the real good of Balaam and the safety and blessedness of his own people.

II. THE WORLD‘S CONFIDENCE IN THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF ITS REWARDS. The world never has any doubt but what it can make its possessions fascinating to every man, and appeal successfully to his affections and sympathies. Weak as the world is, it never loses its self-confidence. Though Balak’s throne is in peril, he brags of the honours he can confer on Balaam; and when he sends the second message, he does not change the considerations, but simply increases them to the utmost. So, to take the other side, the world is equally confident in the terrifying power of its penalties. Nebuchadnezzar, sorely troubled about his forgotten dream, does not for all that forget to play the despot. He menaces the astrologers, threatening them with a dreadful death, in right royal style. It must be acknowledged also that the result only too often shows that the confidence is justified. We cannot guard too carefully against the world, alike in its attractions and its threats; and he does this best who is filled with a purer love and a worthier fear than anything in the world can inspire.

III. BALAK‘S ALARM SAD NOT BEEN LOST NOR LESSENED BY THE LAPSE OF TIME. “These Israelites are not going to steal away my suspicions by their quietude. The less they look my way, the more sure I am they mean ultimate mischief.” And yet what was Israel doing all this time of going to Balaam and returning and going again? Why, while Balak is in all this fret and stir, Israel is steadily preparing for the promised land. Whatever God’s enemies may do in plot and counsel, let it not hinder our advance. Enemies outside cannot hinder, if only we, whom God has called and guided, lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us.Y.

Num 22:22-35

THE ANGEL, THE PROPHET, AND THE ASS

I. WE MUST LOOK NOT ONLY AT THE LETTER OF GOD‘S COMMANDS, BUT THE SPIRIT OF THEM. a If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them” (Num 22:20). “God’s anger was kindled because he went” (Num 22:22). It has been said indeed that God was angry not because he went, but with something that happened on the journey; and to support this view grammatical considerations are urged, from the participle being used instead of the finite verb (Keil and Delitzsch on the Pentateuch,’ 3:168. Clark’s Translations). It is further urged, as a consequence of this construction, that the encounter with the angel took place not at the outset of the journey, but rather towards its close. All this may be true, but there is no distinct affirmation of it in the narrative and it is not necessary to assume it for reconciling purposes. There is no difficulty in admitting that God was displeased with Balaam because he went at all. We must not go by words simply. There is something, even in communications between men, which cannot be put into words. And just as the Spirit makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered, so there are communications of the answering God which can be put in no human tongue. The obedient heart will distinguish between the permissive and the imperative, between the concession to human Weakness and the call to holy duty. Those who want to be right with God, to attend to his will rather than their own desires, will never lift a permission into a command Our interpretations of God’s words are a searching test of our spiritual state. How many jump at them to excuse self-indulgence, but conveniently ignore equally prominent words that call for self-denial. The word telling Balaam that he might go to Balak was not like the call to Abram to get out of his country and away from his kindred to a land which the Lord would show him; nor like the sending of Moses to Pharaoh, and Jonah to Nineveh,

II. BALAAM WAS GOING ON THIS EXPEDITION EVIDENTLY FULL OF THE DESIRES OF HIS OWN HEART. All, so far as he could see, was pointing in the way he wanted. He could plead God’s permission, which was a very comfortable, not to say a necessary, beginning to one who was a prophet. As he rode along, his heart filled with expectation of the futureriches, honours, fame, poweran ample share in the kingdoms of this world and the glory of them. God’s permission may have seemed to the infatuated man a clear indication of further favours. If he allowed Balaam to have his own way in one thing, why not in others? Thus he had in view the possibility of exercising an extraordinary power, one that would make him famed and dreaded far and wide. It is something to make a man’s heart swell when he can wield the immense forces of nature, say in the strength of a disciplined army, or of some huge steam-engine. But Balaam had in view the possibility of wielding forces above nature, cursing Israel so that its strength might utterly melt away. What wonder God was angry with him, seeing he had desires in his heart which could only be satisfied by accomplishing the ruin of the chosen race! Not that he deliberately desired their destruction; but selfishness in its blind absorption destroys with little scruple all that comes in its way. There is some parallel between Balaam and Paul, all the more striking because it extends only a little way. Paul set out for Damascus, like Balaam for Moab, his fanatical heart brimful of darling projects. Hence in both instances we see special, extraordinary, and unfailing methods adopted to check the men and bring them to consideration. Men who are m the ordinary paths of sin may be dealt with by ordinary methods, peculiar indeed to each individual, yet never rising above the ordinary experiences of humanity. But Balaam and Paul, being extraordinary transgressors, were dealt with by extraordinary methods. We do not expect sinners to be met by angels now, or to hear human speech from brute beasts. Still we may have this much in common with Balaam and Paul, that we may be so absorbed in our own things, so utterly careless of God, Christ, salvation, and eternity, as to require sharp, sudden, accumulated agencies to stir up our attention. It takes a great deal to bring some men to themselves.

III. THE PROCESS ADOPTED TO MAKE BALAAM FULLY CONSCIOUS OF THE WRATH OF GOD.

1. The presence of an angel in front. Why an angel? Why not communicate with Balaam as before? The answer is that Balaam did not appreciate such communications. He heard them indeed, but they did not lay hold of his conscience, they did not secure his obedience, they did not even make him think seriously of his danger. Hence the appearance of a visible sign in the angelone who should equally speak the word of God and be seen as he spoke. We know that persons were greatly terrified and impressed by the visits of angels (Jdg 13:1-25). Men can go about the world delighting in sin, unconscious that all the time they are in the presence of God himself, but let them see what seems an apparition from another world, and they tremble like the aspen. The disciples in their earlier, carnal-hearted days were not much affected by the holiness and spiritual beauty of their Master’s life; but what an impression he made when they saw him walking on the sea! They thought it was an apparition. So soon as Balaam perceived the presence of the angel it brought him up at once. “He bowed down his head, and fell fiat on his face.” God makes use of visible agents to prepare results in the sphere of the invisible. And not only did an angel appear, but he was right in front, signifying that he was there to meet with Balaam. He had also his sword drawn. There was significance in meeting a messenger bearing a sword, but the drawing of the sword, even without a single word spoken, was the clearest possible intimation of opposition. The way of transgressors may be hard in more senses than one. How many persevere in the ways of sin in spite of urgent, repeated warnings and entreaties, everything short of physical force, from those who love and pity them! Such at all events cannot say that no one has cared for their souls.

2. The extraordinary means by which God made Balaam to notice the angel. Balaam would not attend to the warnings of an invisible God presented to the eye within, therefore a visible angel was sent to appeal through the eye without to the eye within. But though the angel was in front with the drawn sword, Balaam did not see him. How then shall he be made to see him? God, as his custom is, takes the weak ,things of the world to confound the mighty. He opens the mouth of the prophet s ass. Ridiculous I say the men who will have no miracles, no admission of the supernatural; and ludicrous as well as ridiculous, seeing that it is an ass, of all animals, which is chosen to speak. But that is only because we associate Balaam with the despised and buffeted animal which the word “ass” recalls to us. We may be sure that a man of Balaam’s dignity would have a beast to carry him such as became his dignity. And as to the absurdity of an animal uttering human speech, it is no harder to believe that God should here have opened the mouth of the ass, than that he should afterwards have opened the mouth of Balaam, being such a man as he was, to utter glorious predictions concerning the people whom it was in his heart to curse. If we were allowed to think of things as being either easy or difficult to God, we might say that it was more difficult for him to control the mouth of a carnal-minded man like Balaam than the mouth of a brute beast. It is not pretended that he changed the intellect and gave the ass human thoughts along with human speech. The words were the words of a man, but the thoughts were the thoughts of an ass. Balaam himself was not astonished to hear it speak. He was too much exasperated with the strange stubbornness of an animal hitherto so docile and serviceable, to notice the still stranger power with which it had been so suddenly endowed. Observe, again, how naturally all leads up to the speaking of the ass. The ass is not brought specially on the scene, as the angel was. Balaam saddles the ass, and takes the road on it in his customary way. At first there is nothing miraculous. The ass sees the angel, and turns aside into the field; there is nothing strange in that. Coming to the path of the vineyards, and still seeing the angel, it crushes Balaam’s foot against the wall; there is nothing strange in that. Still advancing into the narrow place, and still seeing the angel, it sinks to the ground; there is nothing strange in that. The ass was in a strait before and behind, on the right side and on the left. Thus its speaking is prepared for as a climax. Accept the statement that the ass spoke, and all the previous narrative leads beautifully up to it. Deny the statement, and the chief virtue of the narrative is lost.

3. Let us not fail to notice this instance of the lower creation recognizing God’s messenger. The question of course suggests itself, Who was this angel? one of the unnamed host, or the Son of God himself in his old covenant guise? If the latter, then he who while in human flesh signified his will to the stormy sea might well signify his warning presence to the ass. Not that the ass knew the angel as a human being could; but even as the lower creation is sensible in its own way of the presence of man, so the ass might be sensible in its own way of the presence of the angel. We argue concerning the lower animals far more from ignorance and carelessly-accepted tradition than from real and discerning knowledge. We know positively nothing as to what sort of consciousness underlies the phenomena of their existence. We know wherein they are not like us, but what they are in themselves we cannot know.

4. Every Balaam has his ass, i.e; every man who has the spirit and conduct of Balaam in him may expect to be pulled up at last in like manner. What God made the ass to his master, that God makes their consciences to many. For a long time the ass had only been of ordinary and commonly accepted use. Balaam had ridden on it ever since it was his, a long time we may conclude, and doubtless rejoiced in having so convenient and trustworthy a servant. And thus many find their consciences as little troublesome, as constantly agreeable, as the ass was to Balaam. Some sort of conscience they must have, but it amounts to nothing more than taking care to keep a reputation for honesty and respectability. They find such a conscience useful in its way, just as Balaam found his ass when out on soothsaying business. But even as the ass sees the angel, so conscience begins to waken to nobler uses. One gets out of the little world of mere give and take, business customs and local habits. Something suggests that we are in the wrong road, pulls us up for a moment, tries to turn us aside. In reality God is beginning to close with us for our own good. At first there is latitude, opportunity of evasion. We go a little further, and God comes closer. Onward still! and at last the soul cannot escape. Blessed is that man, blessed in his opportunity at all events, whose conscience, once the humble instrument of his baser self, is thoroughly roused so that it will not allow him further with its consent in his chosen and accustomed way. The crisis comes, and the question is, “Will you from the heart obey the Divine command, come in subjection to the angel of God, or go on greedily in the way of unrighteousness, which you have been so clearly shown is also the way of destruction?”

IV. THE EXTENT TO WHICH THE PROCESS IS SUCCESSFUL.

1. Balaam is enlightened at last, but after all only partially enlightened. At last, and only when forced to it, does he become aware of the angel’s presence. And now he is quick enough and humble enough to recognize that presence, but not with the quickness and humility of a full repentance. The Lord opened the eyes of Balaam, even as he opened the eyes of the ass, but the opening left his disposition and wishes unchanged, even as it left the ass-nature unchanged. He saw the angel, the drawn sword, his danger at the moment, and the danger he had been in before; but his folly, his duplicity, his covetousness, his spiritual danger he did not see. Then when his eyes were opened, and at the same time his ears unstopped, the angel goes on to speak to him such words as might bring him to a right state of mind. Nothing was left undone that could be done. The angel shows him plainly in what danger he had been from the first swerving of the ass, and how the ass was perhaps more aware of the master’s danger and solicitous for his safety than was the master himself. Nothing but the sagacity and fidelity of the ass had saved his life. The ass was more faithful to its master than the master had been to God.

2. Hence, the enlightenment being partial, the confession is inadequate, indeed worthless. “I have sinned.” There are no more complaints against the ass; there is no extenuation with the lip; so far all is satisfactory. What is said is all right so far as it goes. The mischief is in what is left unsaid, because unthought. Balaam should have asked himself, “How is it that though my ass saw the angel, I did not?” His confession was lacking in that he did not say, “I have sinned because my heart has not been right. I have sinned in going on an expedition to glorify and enrich myself. I will turn back at once.” The only thing of real use and worth in God’s sight is a voluntary turning from the ways of sin. When the younger son came to himself, he did not say, “I will go back to my father if he wishes me to go, if he will not let me stop where I am,” but definitely, “I will arise and go,” &c. Therefore, in spite of the angel’s presence, the drawn sword, the thrice intimation through the ass, in spite of all the words to make all plain, Balaam goes on. He may indeed plead God’s permission, but this plea will avail him nothing. For himself it matters little now, seeing he is not one whit changed in heart, whether he goes forward or backward; any path that he takes is downward. If he returns to Pethor, it will not be to a life of true repentance. He is the same low-minded man wherever he is, and it matters little to himself whether he is destroyed in Pethor or in Moab. Let him then go forward into Moab, so that in his further descent and ultimate destruction he may at the same time be used for the glory of God. Even if he refuses a willing obedience, God may get gain out of him by an unwilling one.Y.

Num 22:36-38

BALAAM AND BALAK MEET AT LAST

I. BALAK‘S SOLICITUDE TO CONCILIATE BALAAM AND SHOW HIM HONOUR. Balak does not yet know what unhealed wounds may be in the prophet’s pride, or whether that pride has been sufficiently pleased by the dignity of the second deputation and the extent of the promises it has made. He does all he can, therefore, to minister to Balaam’s vanity. The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light. They will leave nothing undone to gain their ends; they will creep to reach them, if they cannot reach them standing erect. Balak goes to meet the prophet at the utmost border of his land. It is a dangerous thing to offend the powerful ones of this world; they must be kept in good humour. How different from the spirit in which God would have us approach him or any one whom he may send! If he sends to bless us, it is because of our need; he is not a man, that he should be kept in a favourable disposition by our flatteries and fawnings. We need to remember this. Cornelius had a sincere desire to serve God, but very mistaken apprehensions in some respects of what God required, seeing how he fell before Peter’s feet and worshipped him. Let us take heed lest in our anxiety to offer God what we think he wants we are found utterly insensible as to what he really wants. We cannot be too solicitous to please God, if only we are doing it according to his will; we cannot be too solicitous to conciliate men, if only we are doing it for their good. There is nothing degrading or unmanly, nothing that compels cringing or obsequiousness, in the service of God. When we bow before the grandees and plutocrats of the world and watch their wishes as a dog the eyes of its master, then we are reptiles, not men. We must be all things to all men only when it will save them, not simply to advantage ourselves.

II. BALAAM AND BALAK MEET, IN SPITE OF ALL THE HINDRANCES PUT IN THE WAY. Balak of course has his own notion of these hindrances; he thinks they lay in Balaam’s waiting for a sufficient inducement; and very likely he congratulates himself on his insight, his knowledge of the world, his pertinacity, his choice of agents, and of the right sort of bait to attract Balaam. Yet after all Balak had not the slightest idea of what great hindrances he had overcome. If he had known of God’s interferences, he might have been prouder than ever; that is, if the knowledge of these interferences had not changed his pride to alarm. Balak’s earnest sending had been more potent and fascinating than, in his greeting to Balaam, he unwittingly supposed. It had outweighed the direct commands of God, the mission of the angel, the influence of a very peculiar miracle and a very narrow escape from death. How much there must have been in Balaam’s greedy heart to draw him on when even mighty and unusual obstacles like these could only stay him for a moment! Balak drew him because in his heart there was something to be drawn; and they came together as streams that, rising miles apart, and winding much through intervening lands, yet meet at last because each pursues its natural course. All the obstacles put in our way to perdition will not save us if we are bent on the carnal attractions to be found in that way. Drawing is a mutual thing. There was nothing in Balaam’s heart to be drawn towards God. The hugest magnet will do no more than the least to attract another body to it unless in that body there is something to be attracted.

III. THE MEETING, AFTER ALL, DOES NOT SEEM A SATISFACTORY ONE. One would have thought that, after overcoming so many hindrances, these two kindred spirits would have met each other with cordial congratulations. But instead of this being so, Balak must show himself a little hurt with what he thinks Balaam’s want of confidence in his word and prerogative as king. And though Balaam’s difficulty has not lain in these things, he cannot explain the misunderstanding; he has to hear that word “wherefore” as if he heard it not. “Lo, I am come unto thee.” that must be sufficient. And as to Balak’s expectations, he can only fall back upon the old misleading generalities; he cannot meet the king with the open, eager, joyous countenance of one who sees success within his grasp. Balak, he sees, has more confidence in him than he can possibly have in himself, considering the strange things he has experienced since he set out on his journey. It is not even the proverbial slip between the cup and the lip that he has to prepare for. It is not the probability of success with the possibility of failure, but the strong probability of failure with just the possibility of success. “Have I now any power at all to say anything? the word that God putteth in my mouth, that shall I speak.” Not that we are to suppose Balak was unduly taken aback by such a want of ardour and sympathy in Balaam. Very likely he thought it was nothing more than a proper professional deference to Jehovah, and that in the event all would be right; just as men say “God willing” and “please God” when they are in the midst of schemes where God’s will and pleasure are never thought of at all.Y.

HOMILIES BY J. WAITE

Num 22:13, Num 22:14

BALAAM-THE SUMMONS

The story of Balaam is full of contrarieties. The pure faith and worship of Jehovah is seen coming into strange contact with the superstitions of heathenism; and as regards the personal character of Balaam, utterly discordant moral elements are seen struggling together in the same breast. The chief interest of the story centers in the moral phenomenon presented by the man himself” that strange mixture of a man,” as Bishop Newton well calls him. He was a heathen soothsayer, and yet had some real knowledge of God. He was under the influence of sordid passions, and yet was in personal converse with the Spirit of truth, and received from him, at least for the time, a real prophetic gift. He had no part or lot with the chosen people, but rather with their worst enemies, and yet his “eyes were opened,” and he had very lofty conceptions of Israel’s dignity and blessedness. His history has its clearly-marked stages. In this first stage we have the summons that came to him from Balak, and the answer he was constrained to send back to it. Note here

I. HEATHEN FAITH IN THE UNSEEN. Balak in the extremity of his fear sends beyond the limits of his own people, into distant Mesopotamia, to secure the help of one supposed to be endowed with supernatural gifts, in special relation to the invisible powers, able to “curse and to bless” (Num 22:6). A striking illustration of that blind instinct of human nature by virtue of which it believes ever in the interposition of Deity in the world’s affairs. All idolatrous rites, oracles, divinations, incantations, sacerdotal benedictions and maledictions, rest ultimately on this basis. It is this makes the sway of the priest and the supposed “prophet of the Invisible” so mighty in every land and age. Christianity teaches us to lay hold on the substantial truth that underlies these distorted forms of superstition. It enlightens this blind instinct; reveals the righteous “God that judgeth in the earth;” leads humanity to Him who is at once its “Prophet, Priest, and King.”

II. THE WITNESS FOR GOD THAT MAY BE FOUND IN THE SOUL OF A DEPRAVED MAN, even of one whose inward dispositions and whole habit of life are most opposed to his will. Balaam practiced an art that was “an abomination unto the Lord” (Deu 18:12), and his way was altogether “perverse” (Num 22:32), and yet God was near to him. God spoke to him, and put the spirit of prophecy into his heart, and a word into his mouth. He “heard the words and saw the vision of the Almighty.” Whether his knowledge of God was the result of dim traditions of a purer faith handed down from his forefathers, or of influences that had spread in his own time into the land of his birth, we at least see how scattered rays of Divine light then penetrated the deep darkness of heathendom. So now God is often nearer to men than we or they themselves suppose. He does not leave himself without a witness, even in the most ignorant and vile. The light in them is never totally extinguished. They have their gleams of higher thought, their touches of nobler, purer feeling. Conscience rebukes their practical perversity, and the Spirit strives with them to lead them into a better way. When God is absolutely silent in a man’s soul, all hope of guiding him by outward persuasions into the path of righteousness is gone.

III. THE PROSTITUTION OF NOBLE POWERS TO BASE USES. Here is a man whose widespread fame was the result, probably, to a great extent of real genius. His native capacitymental insight, influence over men, poetic giftwas the secret of this fame. Like Simon Magus, he “bewitched the people,” so that they all “gave heed to him, from the least unto the greatest, saying, This man is the great power of God.” But these extraordinary powers are perverted to the furtherance of an unhallowed cause; he makes them the servants of his own base ambition and desire for gain. “He loved the wages of unrighteousness.” It was in his heart to obey the behest of Balak and secure the offered prize. There is a tone of disappointment in the words, “The Lord refuseth to give me leave to go with you.” He lets “I dare not” wait upon “I would.” And notwithstanding all his poetic inspiration and his passing raptures of devout and pious feeling,

“Yet in the prophet’s soul the dreams of avarice stay.”

How full is all human history of examples of the waste of noble faculties, the prostitution to evil uses of God-given powers! The darkest deeds have ever been done and the deepest miseries inflicted on the world by those who were most fitted by nature to yield effective service to the cause of truth and righteousness, and to confer blessings on mankind. And it is generally some one base affectionthe lust of the flesh, self-love, avarice, an imperious will, &c.that turns the rich tide of their life in a false direction. As the spreading sails of a ship only hasten its destruction when the helm fails, so is it with the noblest faculties of a man when he has lost the guidance of a righteous purpose.

IV. THE DIVINE RESTRAINT OF MAN‘S LIBERTY TO DO EVIL. “And God said, Thou shalt not go with them,” &c. The spell of a higher Power is over him. In a sense contrary to that of Paul the Apostle, he “cannot do the thing that he would.” So are wicked men often made to feel that there is after all a will stronger than their will; that, free as they seem to be, some invisible hand is holding them in check, limiting their range of action, thwarting their purposes, compelling them to do the very thing they would fain avoid, turning their curses into blessings, so that in the end they serve the cause they meant to destroy. The hope of the world lies in the absolute mastery of the Will that is “holy, and just, and good” over all conceivable opposing forms of human and Satanic power.W.

Num 22:31-35

BALAAM-THE ARREST

The secret willingness of Balaam to yield to the solicitations of Balak, seen at first in the tone of his answer, “The Lord refuseth,” &c; was still more manifest in his parleying with the second appeal. Though he felt the resistless force of the Divine restraint, yet he delayed the return of the messengers for the night in hope of getting a reversal of the sentence (Num 22:18, Num 22:19). No wonder God’s anger was kindled against him, and that, though permission was at last given him to go, he was made in this startling way to feel that he was in the hands of a Power that would not be mocked. Whatever view we take of the strange incidents of this narrative, whether as objective realities, or as the visions of a trance, the moral lessons remain substantially the same. Three features of Balaam’s conduct are specially prominent.

I. His CRUEL ANGER. His rough treatment of the dumb ass is marked with reprobation. It was both itself evil and the symptom of a hidden evil.

1. We may believe that the secret unrest of his conscience had a great deal to do with this outburst of anger. Note the subtle connection that often exists between certain unusual phases of conduct and the hidden workings of the heart. Jonah’s anger at the withering of the gourd was but one of the signs of his general want of sympathy with the Divine procedure. Balaam, perhaps, was not a cruel man, but the sense of wrong within and the feeling that he was doing wrong betrayed itself even in this form of behaviour. Conscience made him a coward, and cowardice is always cruel. If it had not been for the “madness” of his passion, he might have judged, as a diviner, that the unwillingness of the beast to pursue her journey counseled him to return; but when a man’s heart is not right with God, resentment is often roused against that which is meant to turn him into a better way. “Am I become your enemy because I tell you the truth?” (Gal 4:16).

2. It illustrates the sad subjection of the inferior creatures to the curse of moral evil. “The creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly.” “The whole creation groaneth,” &c. We think it strange that the dumb ass should “speak with man’s voice and rebuke the prophet’s madness,” but, to the ear that can hear it, such a voice is continually going forth from all the innocent creatures that suffer the cruel consequences of man’s abuse. Well may St. Paul represent them as “waiting with earnest expectation for the manifestation of the sons of God” (Rom 8:19, Rom 8:22).

II. HIS BLIND INFATUATION. It is deeply significant that he should not have seen the angel. Even the poor dumb creature that he rode saw more than he did. It was his moral perversity, the frenzy of his carnal ambition, that was the true cause of the dullness of his spiritual vision. Note

1. Sin blinds men to the things that it is most needful for them to apprehend and know. Mental blindness often, not always, has a moral cause. “This people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing,” &c. (Mat 13:15). The highest spiritual truths, realities of the spirit world, tokens of the Divine presence and working, eternal moral laws, sacred responsibilities of life, &c.all these are darkly hidden from him whose heart is “thoroughly set in him to do evil.”

2. Even animal instinct is a safer guide than the moral sense of a bad man. It effectually warns of danger, and prompts to the pursuit of the good nature requires. It is to the animal a sufficient law. But when the “spirit in man, the inspiration of the Almighty that giveth him understanding,” the sovereignty of reason and conscience, is overborne by base fleshly lust, man sinks lower than the brutes that perish. Their obedience to the law of their being puts him to shame. Though they “speak not with man’s voice,” their silent wisdom “rebukes him for his iniquity.” “If the light that is in thee be darkness,” &c. (Mat 6:23).

III. HIS HELPLESSNESS. This is seen

1. In his abject submission. “He bowed down his head, and fell fiat on his face,” saying, “I have sinned;” “now, therefore, if it displease thee, I will get me back again.” He must have known from the beginning that his obstinate self-will was displeasing to God, but now that the consequences of it stare him in the face he is filled with alarm. There are those who grieve over their sin only when it is found out. It is not the evil itself they dread, but only its discovery and punishment. Fear often makes men repent and reform when there is no genuine abhorrence of wrong-doing.

2. In the Divine compulsion under which he is placed to pursue his journey. “Go with the men,” &c. He would fain draw back, but it is too late now; he must do the work and bear the testimony that God has determined for him. When men are bent upon that which is evil, God often allows them to become entangled in circumstances of danger from which there is no escape, that “they may eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices” (Pro 1:31).W.

Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary

Num 22:1. And the children of Israel set forward After the entire conquest of the kingdom of Bashan, the Israelites marched back to the southward, and then bent their course toward the land of Canaan. They pitched in the plains of Moab: plains which had formerly belonged to Moab, but were now in the possession of the Amorites. On this side Jordan, i.e. on the east side of Jordan from Beth-Jesimoth, unto Abel-Shittim, as we read, chap. Num 33:49. Here they staid, till, under the conduct of Joshua, they came to Jordan, and passed over it, Jos 3:1. By Jericho: in the original it is, at Jericho, the ford of Jordan, that ford it seems, being called Jericho, from the neighbouring city of that name which stood on the other side of the river. This event is supposed to have happened in the seventh month of the fortieth year after their departure from Egypt; and when they had left the mountains of Abarim. Compare chap. Num 21:20 with Num 33:48. Houbigant joins this verse to the last chapter, and begins the present chapter with the second verse.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

A.BALAKS RESORT TO BALAAM

Num 22:2-8

2And Balak the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. 3And Moab was sore afraid of the people, because they were many: and Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel. 4And Moab said unto the elders of Midian, Now shall this company lick up all that are round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field. And Balak the son of Zippor was king of the Moabites at that time. 5He sent messengers therefore unto Balaam the son of Beor to Pethor, which is by the river of the land of the children of his people, to call him, saying, Behold, there is a people come out from Egypt: behold, they cover the face 1 of the earth, and they abide over against me: 6Come now therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people; for they are too mighty for me: peradventure I shall prevail, that we may smite them, and that I may drive them out of the land: for I wot that he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou cursest is cursed. 7And the elders of Moab and the elders of Midian departed with the rewards of divination in their hand; and they came unto Balaam, and spake unto him the words of Balak. 8And he said unto them, Lodge here this night, and I will bring you word again, as the Lord shall speak unto me: and the princes of Moab abode with Balaam.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

[Num 22:4. Assembly, this congregation, , not a multitude, but an organized whole.A. G.].

[Num 22:5. River is emphatic; by the river, to the land.A. G.]

[Num 22:6. Wot, know.]

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

General preliminary remarks. We shall only reach a full view of the history of Balaam when we consider the section upon his prophecies in connection with the record of his end (chap. 31). Balaam the prophet, the utterer of blessings upon the people of God, the so-to-speak dogmatic Balaam, stands in striking contrast to the Balaam, the wily worldly politician, or the moral tempter of the same chosen people. The hidden, hardly discovered reconciliation of the two apparently contradictory representations of his character has led Knobel and others to suppose that there was a real contradiction in the history; while, on the other hand, Hengstenberg and others have clearly detected the features of the second Balaam in the character of the first, and have recognized also the first in the later counsels of the second, in his wily suggestions as to the celebrations of the religious feasts. We have here the living, vivid image of a remarkable character, thoroughly unstable, vacillating in obedience to predominant motives, two-sided; but a character whose two-sidedness does not show itself in distinct, stereotyped qualities, ever ready for action, but is wrought out in the progress of a spiritual conflict, in which avarice and ambition gradually work his ruin. Below the summit of sacred zeal or inspiration which Balaam seemed to have reached begins the hidden process of his ruin. If it is asked how the Jews came to possess this information, we may hazard the conjecture, that Balaams fall began with double-dealing; that he had first made disclosures and offers to the Israelites, by whose camp he must pass on his way home, and then because he did not meet with the expected favorable reception, returned secretly and by the aid of a Midianitish nomad chief, who was probably camping on the skirts of the Moabite territory, to Balak, in order still to secure from him the reward of iniquity, seeking all the time to hide from himself the baseness of his conduct under the pretence of a desire to lay upon the broadest basis a sure alliance between Moab and Israel. If he thought of the real approaching downfall of Moab and the glory of Israel, he may have cherished the idea of such an intermediation, as even Judas seems to have been impelled for some time by a similar motive. His fear of the power of Israel may have determined him to greater secresy in the pursuit of his crafty aim. Thus Balaam in this second form in which his character appears stands, in the New Testament, as the prototype of a subtle tempter and destroyer of Gods people, through his teaching a false religious freedom. The remarkable portraiture of Balaams character makes the deeper impression of historical truthfulness, since we find the contradictions appearing here, reflected in a thousand instances in the history of religion, in ecclesiastical and profane history, as features of an unstable double-hearted nature.

We note first the contradiction between an ostentatious and vaunted faith in Jehovah, and the ever re-appearing and strong lusting after the rewards of unrighteousness, after the glory and the gold which ultimately leads him to ruin. The seeming piety, aliquid nimis, at once excites suspicion; the frequent use of the name Jehovah, the constant parade of his dependence upon Jehovahs directions, the multiplication of the offerings in which he compels Balak to take part, the greatness of the sacrifices, as if he might thereby control Jehovah (take providence by storm, as modern hypocrites phrase it) are all suspicious. How much the orthodox and pietistic extravagances of to-day remind us of the methods of Balaam! Then again, as to the form of his faith, we must notice the broad contrast between his fervent language of rapturous inspiration, his soul borne away as it were in inspired vision, and his ordinary states of consciousness, his efforts to tempt God, to carry out his evil selfish plans by means of superstitious practices, and his aiding the heathen king and his subjects in their destructive hostility to the people of God. Even the formal, oratorical exaggeration is a characteristic feature of the superficial nature of his feelings. How often religious, poetical, sthetic emotion proves itself more or less Balaam-like through its contrast with the real state of the feelings!

The psychological problem of the prophetic enthusiast becomes more difficult through the psychological sympathy of his ass. This contrast and the change in the parts of the performance between the rider and the animal on which he rides, is much greater than the contrast between Don Quixote and his Sancho-Panza.
Still another contrast, and one which we must not overlook, appears in the great flourish and display with which Balaam takes his leave of Balak, and the secrecy in his later operations, after which he is first found among the slain in Midian, and recognized as the instigator of the great calamity.
More conspicuous is the distinction in Balaam, as he speaks, proclaims, sings the blessing, and as he plots the curse. Still while be changes his blessing into a curse, Jehovah transforms the curse into a blessing.
This very remarkable episode in the Mosaic history could not fail to occasion many dissertations. For the literature see Keil, p. 158, note (consult especially Baur, History of the Old Testament Prophecy, p. 329), Knobel, p. 127; also articles in Winer, Worterbuch, Hebzogs Encyclopdia, Hengstenbergs Geschichte des Bileams, Baumgarten, Commentar.; This Commen., Introduction to Genesis. [Also Kurtz, Gesh., Vol. II., p. 451 et seq., Bible Com., Smiths Bible Dic., Wordsworth, Holy Bible with notes, Stanley, History of the Jewish Church, Vol. I., p. 209218.A. G.]

From the very earliest time opinions have been divided as to the character of Balaam. Some (e.g. Philo, Ambrose. Augustine) have regarded him as a wizard and false prophet devoted to the worship of idols, who was destitute of any susceptibility for the true religion, and was compelled by God, against his will, to give utterance to blessings upon Israel instead of curses. Others (e.g. Tertullian, Jerome) have supposed him to be a genuine and true prophet, who simply fell through covetousness and ambition. But these views are both of them untenable in this exclusive form. Witsius (Miscell. Song of Solomon 1, lib. 1, c. 16, 33), Hengstenberg, Kurtz. Keil. The declaration of Hengstenberg, however, that Balaam was not entirely without the fear of God, nor yet a really pious man and true prophet of God, leaves us without any very definite idea. It is most important here to bear in mind that we are not considering a fixed character, but one passing through a change, and engaged in a serious conflict. The record speaks clearly of a communication between Balaam and God, although not of an intimate and confidential relation with Him. He is at least a monotheist; he clings as a Mesopotamian, perhaps as a descendant of Abraham, to the name of Jehovah in its more general significance, which it had before acquiring its specific meaning, Exo 3:4 : and hence the writer uses in connection with him the name Elohim, not recognizing him as strictly a worshipper of Jehovah. He thus lies within the primitive, monotheistic traditions, the religious twilight which Melchizedek also represents (see Gen 14:18). But he had derived from his father Beor, i.e. consumer, destroyer, as it appears from his own name Balaam, subverter, devourer of the people, a stronger inclination to curse than to bless. Hengstenberg lays great, stress upon the fact that he is never called nabi, prophet, but kosem, soothsayer. But we may well suppose that the obscure word kosem originally bore a better sense than that which was attached to it later. It may be true that this word, and those who bore it, as with the worship of high-places, which was originally patriarchal, but afterwards degenerated into idolatry. We distinguish between the primeval religion which runs from Melchizedek down through the Old Testament history, and was never entirely extinguished, and the religion of the Abrahamic promise or covenant, by the inverted order of signs or symbols, and the word. In the primitive religion God is known through the signs, and these are rendered into the word by the interpreting mind, in the covenant religion the word precedes and is afterward confirmed and enforced by sacramental signs. Thus Joseph wears the aspect of a descendant of the primitive religion, and might even appear as a Kosem when he claims that he prophesied out of his cup. Thus Balaam also proceeds to seek for signs, Num 23:3; Num 23:15. But then there is an evident approach to the Abrahamic form of religion, when he no longer seeks for signs, whose interpretation Jehovah puts into his mouth, but by virtue of the free direct inspiration, as he looks upon Israel, utters his prophetic words, (Num 24:1). After this we can no longer class the Kosem Balaam with the later degenerated soothsayers. But surely he does approach that lowered type, when he suffers himself, avowedly at least, to recognize the superstitious notion, that by arbitrary curses he could magically produce calamitous results, even upon a whole people, even against the blessing of Jehovah; and because he was eager and prepared to receive the reward of such enchantments. It may be that it was from the pay which he took, that the prophet, originally, came to wear the altered and less honored name of Kosem. But the possibility of such a designed intermingling of the holy with the unholy, lies in the great divergency between emotional capacity when excited, in highly gifted natures, and the normal condition of the mind. Universally there is a contrast between the man in the ordinary state of his mind, or his habitual tendency, and the same man in his quickened state, in his strivings after ideal heights; between the man in his everyday and in his Sunday life. In the lives of noble men, this divergency sometimes ripens into opposition, as with Peter, Matthew 16; and indeed in the very best men there is always the blossom of impulse before the fruit of a new soul-life. But if a fissure opens between these two spiritual states of the soul, which widens at last into a broad chasm, a permanent contradiction, then the Balaam nature is complete, and in the end the evil tendency and nature triumphs over the ideal. Thus it happens that false prophets have been formed out of gifted prophetic natures, in ancient and modern times.

We pass now naturally to the consideration of another erroneous contrast, which supposes that Balaam intended to curse at the very moment of his speaking, but that the Spirit of God compelled him to utter blessings. Hengstenberg says of this view: Ambrose held a crude notion of the effect of the divine power upon Balaam, as if God put the words in his mouth, quasi cymbalum tinniens sonum reddo. Calvin held nearly the same view. [Hengstenberg says of Calvin that in general he clearly recognized and sharply expressed the dependence of prophecy upon the subjective condition of the prophet, while he regards Balaam as an exception to this rule.A. G.]. But one could scarcely call this power which thus constrains the soul, inspiration, not even infusion. Here again we must bear in mind that the divine irresistible influence is moral, and is carefully to be distinguished from any physical or magical compulsion, from which it is free. It is a strange coincidence that this assumption has been applied not only to Balaam, but even to the ass on which he rode, although it lacked entirely the organic capacity for human speech. In this respect Hengstenberg has admirably presented the distinction between the ideas of externality and reality; asserting the reality of inward occurrences, as well as the distinction between real visions and bare imaginations, although the two things are held to be one and the same by many thinkers who assume great superiority. But no one can make any great progress in the Holy Scripture, without a sense or capacity for perceiving the reality of genuine visions. But we shall return to this theme in the sequel.

This narrative, moreover, is very important with respect to the doctrines of the divine permission. God forbids Balaam to go. He then permits him to go under certain conditions, while He appears to be offended because he went. To a superficial view the passage seems full of inconsistencies, whereas in truth the apparent change in the divine decisions is determined by the changes in Balaam, is adapted to them, and is thus the result and fruit of the strictest and most sacred consistency.
As some have held that the words of the third and last prophecy point clearly to a later origin, is, according to the fiction of the critics, a vaticinia post eventum, it is necessary that we should examine the passage more closely. In this third prophecy Balaam stands at the very highest point in his inspired intuition. It is no longer (as in Num 22:5; Num 22:16): Jehovah put a word into his mouth, but: The Spirit of God came upon him. Before he spake under restraint of fear, now freed from any such limitations, and in the full freedom of revelation (Num 24:4-9). The anger of the king at his third utterance of words of blessing seems to have unfettered his own indignation (Num 22:12-24).

The passage in which we have the beautiful prediction of the Star out of Jacob, does not belong to the line of clear, direct, conscious Messianic prophecy, although Rabbi Akiba held that it did, but refers to the Bar-Cochab: Son of the Star. [There was a pretender who bore this name, with express reference to the prophecy of Balaam: and led the Jews into rebellion against the Roman power in the reign of Hadrian, A. D., 136.A. G.]. The exclusive references of the Star to the Messiah, have been numerous in Christian authors from Calvin to Baumgarten, see Knobel, p. 146. But since the conception of an ideal, personal Messiah had not reached its full development even at the time of David, 2 Samuel 7, it would have been a strange anomaly if it had found expression so much earlier by the heathen Balaam. For other interpretations, as e.g. that which refers the prophecy to David, to David and the Messiah, to the Jewish kingdom and the Messiah, see Knobel, p. 146 [and notes in loc.A. G.]. As to the appearance of new stars in connection with the birth of great kings, see Keil, p. 192 [who, however, refers to Hengstenberg, who cites Justini, Hist. 37:2; Plinii, H. N. 2:23; Sueton., Jul. Cs. 100:78; and Dio Cass. xlv., p. 273.A. G.]. We must bear in mind here first of all, that we are not dealing with an Old Testament prophet. Balaam and his prophecies appear throughout under an historical point of view. But what he meant by a star was a sceptre, a royal ruler, who should arise in Israel, and crush all its enemies. We do not need to be familiar with Jewish history to understand what follows, although Balaam, in a typical, but not in a verbal sense, uttered far more than he was conscious of, even with respect to the star out of Jacob. What could be of greater moment than the crushing of the power of the Moabite princes, since they were even now plotting the destruction of Israel? The Edomites, in a spirit of enmity, bad just before restrained the onward march of the people of God. The Amalekites were old traditional foes of Israel. When now he proceeds further and predicts the victory over the Assyrians, his own countrymen, over the Kenites (in the north), and then the conquest of Assyria and Mesopotamia (Eber) by some western power, he passes from the particular into the universal. At length his prophetic vision reaches its utmost bounds. Chittim shall be overthrown at last. His talent for cursing now comes into full play, and the proud seer in wrath takes leave of the angry king who had thought only that by some superstitious magic spell, he would be able to win back his lost domain, or at least to protect that which was Still left him; takes leave ostensibly never to see him again, but only ostensibly. A Midianitish nomad tribe, coming perhaps from his own home in Mesopotamia, roamed at this time along the extended kingdom. Here among these Midianites Balaam seems to have rested (after having sought in vain a market for his talents among the Israelites) in order to renew his relation with Balak. For various conjectures as to who Balaam was, see Knobel. It was formerly conjectured that he was Elihu or Laban, or one of the magicians of Egypt. Modern guesses are that he was the Arabic sage Lokman. Thus Knobel. For conjecture as to Pethor, see Knobel, 128. [Knobel identifies Pethor with (Zosian Num 3:14) and with the of Ptolemy v. 18, 6. He regards both these names as corruptions of Pethor, and thinks the place is found in the present Anah. Keil regards this as very uncertain, while Bible Com. is inclined to favor it. Very little is certainly known.A. G.] For the faith of antiquity in the efficacy of curses, see Knobel, p. 129. [Also Kurtz, Geschichte des Allen Bundes, and Baumgarten, Com., who holds that the efficacy attributed to them was not merely a superstition or imagination, but had a real ground, and that the narrative here can only be correctly understood on the supposition that it recognizes the actual power of Balaam to bless and to curse. He finds the turning point in the whole narrative, the thought around which it clusters, in the words Deu 23:6. The Lord thy God would not hearken unto Balaam; but the Lord thy God turned the curse into a blessing unto thee. Kurtz adopts substantially the same view. For the opposite view see Hengstenberg, History of Balaam.A. G.]

[The question as to the moral character of Balaam is distinct from that as to the nature of his prophetic gift and position. They are not entirely disconnected questions; but the one is much more easily settled than the other. He could not of course be a good man and a false prophet; but he may have been a bad man and a true prophet. Such in fact he was. Morally Balaam comes before us as a man of keen insight and of wide culture, having broad glimpses of the truth, which seem to have grown clearer with his investigations, a heart susceptible to noble impulses, a conscience awakened, but not authoritative, with strong convictions of right and duty, which are yet sacrificed to the cravings of avarice and ambition; ever practically selling all his better impulses, his convictions and his conscience, for the sake of gain, and yet never doing it without a conscious and serious struggle. As to his prophetic position, he is not to be viewed, as Hengstenberg has fully shown, as a false prophet, a mere heathen seer, who was constrained by God against his own will to bless and not to curse Israel, nor, on the other hand, as a true and genuine prophet, who was only swept away by his avarice and ambition. There are elements of truth in both views; but neither of them is tenable in its exclusive form. The truth lies, to use the words of Kurtz, in the midst. Balaam was in his present position both a heathen magician and a Jehovistic seer. He stood upon the border line between regions, which indeed lie contiguous, but in their nature and character are radically opposed to each other, and exclusive of each other. With one foot still upon the ground of heathen magic and soothsaying, he planted the other within the limits of the Jehovistic religion and prophecy. The name he bears, , a soothsayer, which is never used to designate a true prophet of God; his parleying with the messengers, his seeking permission to go the second time; the eager pursuit of his covetous hopes, and especially his use of signs as the fit-ting and customary means to ascertain the will of God, which were never resorted to by the true prophet, are proofs that he still stood upon the old and lower ground; while his avowed claim to act as a prophet of Jehovah, his delay in going at Balaks request, his answer to the second and more attractive embassy, and his reply to Balaks indignant remonstrance because he had not cursed, but blessed Israel, Num 23:12, show that be had indeed in part crossed the border and stood within the region of the true prophets of Jehovah. The tidings of the great things which God had done for His people in Egypt, at the Red Sea, in the wilderness, which had been borne to him as the report spread through the nations, had doubtless led him to take a more decided stand. He probably hoped too to make greater gains if he appeared as a prophet of Jehovah.

Why he remained in this position; why he did not advance still more decidedly and completely into the new region which opened before him; or rather why attempting to stand upon the border-line, to unite and hold fast in himself that which differed so widely and irreconcilably, he ultimately went back to his old service, sank completely down to the lower level upon which he stood before, and into all the deeper darkness because he had turned away from the light, the progress of the history makes perfectly clear. It is just here that his moral character bears upon his prophetic position. He was not willing to part with his lusts. He loved the wages of unrighteousness. He could not bring himself to serve God with an undivided heart. It was no intellectual defect, nor any want of fitness for a higher calling, for the position of a true and genuine prophet, but his clinging to his lusts, his attempt to carry them over with him into the service of Jehovah, which restrained his progress. Through the call of Balak he was brought into a position at which he must decide whether, as Kurtz says, the old heathen, or the new Jehovistic principle of life should rule within him, whether he should go on to the full, genuine, prophetic condition, or fall back upon the old stand-point, and in so doing fall of course into a more decided hostility towards Jehovah, towards the theocracy and the people of His choice. This development of circumstances, which serves for the glorifying of Jehovah, for the encouragement of Israel, for the discouragement of the enemies of Israel, has also for Balaam most momentous, indeed decisive importance. He fell. Covetousness and ambition were stronger in him than the desire for salvation.A. G.]

Sec. A. Num 22:1-8.

The Moabites, like the Edomites, had sold the Israelites bread and water while they were passing along their eastern border. But now when they saw them settling down in the dominion of Sihon, upon their northern border, the wounds of which were not yet healed, terror seized upon them. They excited the Midianites by appealing to their fears, lest the Israelites should lay waste all their green meadow-lands, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field. They could not hope to conquer those who were victorious over the Amorites, against whom they had been unable to stand. Then Balak (whose name seems to be without significance) in consultation with the elders of Midian, strikes upon the diabolical thought, that he might perhaps secure the destruction of this mighty people through fanatical curses, through magical incantations; a thought suggested perhaps by Midianitish traders, to whom the reputation of Balaam, as a great magician and imprecatory prophet, was familiar. However confused may have been the prevalent conceptions in these regions as to supernatural agencies, so much is clear, that the reputation was in accordance with them. His father called Beor (from ) on account of the destructive power attributed to his curses. The son of this fanatical destroyer (for the form Bosor, 2Pe 2:15, see Keil, who holds that it probably arose from the peculiar mode of pronouncing the guttural ) is called Balaam, ensnarer or destroyer of the people. [Hengstenberg: He bore the name as a dreaded wizard and conjurer, whether he received it at his birth as a member of a family in which this occupation was hereditary, or whether the name was given to him at a later period, when the fact indicated by the name had actually made its appearance.A. G.] Balaam understood well how to destroy the people not only with burning curses, but by the wily use of worldly and fleshly allurements. It must have been already known, too, that his powers and gifts were in the market, and could be purchased for gold or renown. Moses indeed may have despised the superstition of heathen antiquity that curses could actually work injurious resultsa superstition which in some of its forms, reaches even to the present time, and therefore may have regarded the curses of Balaam as having no importance in themselves; but still as mere fanatical delusions they might produce injurious results, as they might inflame the Moabites, and dishearten and weaken the Israelites. [Balak who was king of the Moabites at that time. The words seem to intimate that he was not the hereditary king of Moab. If, as Bible Com. regards as probable, the Midianitish chieftains had taken advantage of the weakness of the Moabites after the Amoritish victories to establish themselves as princes in the land, as the Hyksos had done in Egypt, we see at once why Balak should have turned for counsel to the elders of Midian, and why he should have had such confidence in the power of BalaamA. G.] Accordingly he sends messengers to Balaam with the rewards of soothsaying (Kosem the soothsayer), to Pethor, an unknown city, probably, according to Keil, a seat of Babylonian sages, if it was not rather the seat of monotheistic hermits, among whom the Semitico Abrahamic tradition was still preserved. Balak did not think that the curses of Balaam in themselves could destroy the Israelites; but he firmly believed that with the aid of this superstitious delusion he could so work upon the temper of both peoples, so animate his own people and the Midianites, and so discourage the people of God, as to secure the victory. [It is far more probable that Balak shared the belief, which, strange as it may seem to us, was common among the heathen, that persons like Balaam could by their sacrifices work upon the gods they served, and so determine and control their purposes and power. As Balaam was avowedly now the servant of Jehovah, the God of Israel, Balak doubtless hoped that if he could secure his influence, he would work upon Jehovah, and so change the current of events.A. G.] Come curse me this people, for they are too mighty for me: peradventure I shall smite them and drive them out of the land.As thou art the great curser, the highest adept in that great art, so thou canst with thy curses infuriate the Moabites and dispirit and confound the Israelites; then I can smite them. This people is come out of Egypt, he said, as if he knew nothing more of them. They cover the eye of the earth is his scornful expression. They abide over against me, as if he did not know that they did not wish any conflict with him. He will have revenge because the Israelites have conquered the Amorites his own enemies. Knobel, speaking of the belief in incantations, loses sight of the distinction between prophetic announcement of curses, and the mere incantation of common superstition and witchcraft. [Keil: The fact that the Lord did not hearken to Balaam, but turned the curse into a blessing, is celebrated as a great favor to Israel. Deu 23:5; Jos 24:10; Mic 6:3, assumes that Balaam had power to bless and to curse. This power is not traced, it is true, to the might of heathen deities, but to the might of Jehovah, whose name Balaam confessed; but yet the possibility is assumed of his curse doing actual, and not merely imaginary harm to the Israelites.A. G.].

Balaam receives the messengers of Balak. As he acknowledges the name of Jehovah, he must have known at once that he could not curse the people of Jehovah. He invites them, however, to remain over night, assuring them that he will in the night receive instructions from Jehovah. He thus intimates that he expects his instructions in the form of nocturnal dream-visions, although this is not the only thing, upon which he relied as an interpreter of signs. He regards or presents as in doubt what he should have known at once. He tempts Jehovah; and thus he enters the path of perdition.

Footnotes:

[1]Heb. eye.

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

SECOND SECTION
From Mount Hor to the Plains of Moab

Num 21:4 to Num 22:1

A.THE DEPARTURE FROM MOUNT HOR AND THE FIERY SERPENTS

Num 21:4-9

4And they journeyed from mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea, to compass the land of Edom: and the soul of the people was much discouraged1 because of the way. 5And the people spake against God, and against Moses, Wherefore have ye brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? for there is no bread, 6neither is there any water; and our soul loatheth this light bread. And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died.

7Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord, and against thee; pray unto the Lord, that he take 8away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. 9And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole; and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

[Num 21:5. Light; Luther, De Wette, mean; Bunsen, wretched; light, not as opposed to solid, but as that which nauseates, disgustsvile.A. G.]

[Num 21:6. Lange: venomous. The , literally burning, denotes with and sometimes without (Num 21:8, below) a kind of serpent whose bite produces burning heat and thirst. Our word fiery is a good rendering, but is ambiguous. De Wette and others retain the Hebrew word Seraphim.A. G

[Num 21:7. And the people.]

[Num 21:8. omit Serpent.]

[Num 21:8. , standard. See Exo 17:15 : Jehovah-nissi.A.G.]

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Keil gives as the heading to the contents of this section: The march of Israel through the Arabah. He starts with the assumption that mount Hor stands near Petra. Leaving mount Hor, Israel must take the way to the Red Sea, in order to compass the land of Edom, since Edom refused permission to cross its territory, and thus descend the Arabah to the head of the Ailanitic gulf. But if it is settled that the Arabah forms a part of Edom, and if it is further settled that by the command of Jehovah, Israel must pass around Edom, it is impossible that they should have marched through the Arabah on their way to the Red Sea, for leaving out of view the difficulty of their finding sustenance in this narrow rocky valley (see Shubert, Travels, II. 396), Ritter, Erdkunde XIV., p. 1013 [see however, on the other hand, Robinson, Res. II. 594 seq., and Stanley, Sinai and Palestine, pp. 84, 85.A. G.], they would be in constant danger of attack by the Edomites and of perishing by the sword with their wives and children. As they came up from Sinai to Kadesh through the desert plateau Et Tih. (Paran), so they must have returned through the same desert, although farther to the east, from Kadesh to the Red Sea. The Israelites, it is true, at the end of their march to the Red Sea, must have crossed the limits of the Edomitish territory, as this comes out clearly in Deu 2:1. They compassed mount Seir many days, and they were commanded to turn northward, not of course back upon the way they had come, but in a north-easterly direction, which shows that they had reached the extreme limits of the Edomite kingdom, and must how penetrate it, passing over below their brethren the sons of Esau, and below the Arabah (comp. the notes in this Commentary, Deu 2:12).

The desert plateau Et Tih was, according to the testimony of modern travellers, far better fitted for the returning path of the Israelites than the Arabah. See extracts in Ritters Erdkunde, part 14, Book 3, p. 830, The Central and Northern Routes across the Desert Et Tih to the Promised Land, from Seetzen, Russegers and others. The description of Seetzen, who went from the north to the south, from Beersheba to Sinai, merits special attention. Here we met several Wadys with broad pasture-lands, our path at times crossing rolling flowery meadows, across heaths blooming with white-flowering heather, now and then by springs or fountains, but also through rocky fields, strewn with flint-stones, while at times also we found the ground full of holes the homes of serpents, lizards, etc. The fiery serpents cannot therefore be urged with force in favor of the Arabah. [Stanley, Sinai and Palestine, p. 84, agrees with Keil, and uses this strong language of the Israelites and the Arabah: It is indeed doubtful whether they passed up it on their way to Canaan; but no one can doubt that they passed down it when the valleys of Edom were closed against them. This was clearly the natural route for them to take; and the very argument which Lange uses against itthe want of sustenanceseems strongly to favor it. The scarcity of food made them more sensible of their dependence upon the manna, and they wearied with the sameness; our soul loatheth this vile bread.Geographical considerations, the well-ascertained fact that the Arabah abounds in poisonous serpents, and the tenses of the narration all favor the Arabah. The incidents of the later narrative and the easy egress from the Arabah to the plains east of Edom through the Wady Ithm confirm this view.A. G.]

Num 21:4-9. And the soul of the people was much discouraged because of the way.The young and vigorous generation found the long return journey wearisome, partly because it seemed like a discomfiture, because they so carefully avoided the Edomites, with whom they had recently tried their strength in the region of Arad, and from whom they may have captured large herds, which proved a source of supply in the march. At all events they were greatly depressed. They sighed for a fruitful land, and the manna from a miraculous food, became to them as a light (contemptible ) bread, while the usual bread and water were wanting. They spake against God (Elohim) and against Moses.It is observable that they did not rebel against Jehovah, but murmured against the divine guidance and the leading of Moses. [There seems to be little ground for the distinction drawn between Elohim and Jehovah as the object of their querulous complaints.A. G.] Their unbelief grew out of the delusion which the previous generation expressed, that they also, as their fathers, must die in the desert. The punishment laid upon them is commensurate with their less turbulent and violent disobedience. Then sent Jehovah (not Elohim) fiery serpents among the people.Here again the judicial providence of God uses the noxious product of the land for punishment, converting the serpents of the desert into a divine punitive visitation. Fiery, literally burning serpents; so called from the inflammatory nature of their bite, which infuses a burning, deadly poison; as the Greeks also name certain serpents, especially the , because its poison wrought like burning fire, and (Dioscorides VII. 13; Aelian, Natura Anim. VI. 51), and not because they had fiery, red spots upon their skins, which are frequently found in the Arabah, and are extremely poisonous. Keil. But why should they not have been named from the fiery red color of the serpents, which finds its reflection later in the fiery glow of the brazen serpent? The one quality, however, does not necessarily exclude the other. This is clear from a citation from V. Shuberts Travels: At midday a very mottled snake, marked with fiery red spots and wavy stripes, which belonged to the most poisonous species, as the construction of its teeth clearly showed. According to the Bedouins, these snakes, which they greatly dreaded, were very common in that neighborhood. [For similar occurrences see Strabo XV. 723; XVI. 759, referred to in Bible Com. I. 725.A. G] And much people of Israel died. Although the swarm of serpents was extraordinarily large, we may suppose that the excitement among the people, the confusion, and their conscience awakened to a sense of their guilt, greatly increased their terror. The voluntary repentance of the people, which was wanting in the earlier generation, shows how greatly the present generation was in advance of its predecessor. They confess that they have sinned against Jehovah their covenant-God, and against Moses, and implored him to intercede in their behalf.

The divine answer is adapted to the situation, shows a marvellous and profound psychological insight, and at the same time is of great Christological and soteriological significance. Make thee a fiery serpent (an image of one), and set it upon a pole (standard), and it shall come to pass that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live (shall not die). Moses understood the command correctly, and made a brazen serpent. This goes to show that the assumption that the serpents were named from their red color is correct. The miraculous result corresponds fully with the promise.

This obscure and mysterious narration rises into great importance in its soteriological aspect, through the application which Christ Himself makes of it to His own life, which He also makes in mysterious words. Many theologians therefore have been earnestly engaged in the explanation of this passage. For the literature see in Keil, p. 179, note Eng. Trans., Kurtz, Hist. of Old Cov., Vol. II., p. 428 [see also Lange, Com. on John, Num 3:14; Cowles, The Pentateuch, has a brief and satisfactory note.A. G.] Among the explanations of the brazen serpent, the passage in Wis 16:6-7. It is a symbol of salvation to remind them of the commandment of thy law. We have a clearer interpretation of the symbol here than we find in some modern theologians. The profoundest, but also the most obscure application of the passage is the word of our Lord, Joh 3:14. Keil gives Luthers explanation: In the first place the serpent which Moses was to make at Gods command was to be of brass or copper, i.e. of a reddish color, and in every way (though without poison) like those, who from the bite of the fiery serpents were red and burning with heat. In the second place, the brazen serpent must be set upon a pole for a sign. And in the third place, those who were bitten of the fiery serpents and would live must look to the brazen serpent so lifted up; otherwise they could not recover or live.

But this is rather a description of the event than an explanation of the symbol. Hengstenbergs explanation reminds us of Menken: Christ is the antitype of the serpent in so far as He took sin, the most pernicious of all pernicious potencies, upon Himself, and made a vicarious atonement for it. The great mistake in this explanation lies in the thought that the serpents here typify sin, whereas they were sent as a punishment and an antidote for sin. Men fall into the mistake through the operation of a dead mechanical principle of hermeneutics, according to which the same image, e.g., the leaven, must always represent the same thing.

But the serpents here have, on the one hand, just as little to do with the serpent in Eden, or with the devil, the old serpent, as, on the other hand, they have with the serpent of sculapius, the symbol of healing power or virtue. Keil rejects, with good reason, the interpretation of Winer, Knobel and others, that the view common to the religion of antiquity, that the serpent was a beneficent and health-bringing power, lies at the basis of this narrative. On this supposition the direct, immediate view of the fiery (brazen) serpent must have been much more effective. In sharp antagonism to this interpretation stands the view of the dogmatic realists as wrought out by Menken in his Treatise on the Brazen Serpent (Works, Vol. VI., p. 351, Bremen, 1858). In this view the serpent signifies in the first place the devil, then sin, then further (in entire consistency with that system) inherited original sin, as it clave even to the nature of Christ, but as the sin of humanity, was extirpated through His sufferings upon the cross. To reach the full import of this thought, Menken supposes that the standard upon which the serpent was placed was the principal standard of Israel, the banner of the tribe of Levi, and this most probably was in the form of a cross, so that the sins of humanity appeared here symbolically upon the cross, i.e., overcome and destroyed. As if the poor bitten Jew himself must have thought of all this, or could even have suspected it. Others hold, Sack, e.g., that the symbolism is not in the figure, but in the lifting up (the lifting up of the serpent, the lifting up of Christ). Ewald places it in the symbolic destruction of the serpents which to the believing one who looked was an assurance of the redeeming power of Jehovah.

If we make this our starting point, which clearly results from the narrative, that the fiery serpents indicate not the sins of Israel, but the counteracting agency of the sins, the punishment, thus also the evil, then the mystery, in its great features, soon comes into the light. The view of evil in the confidence that it is Jehovahs remedy against sin, this is the main thing. Heathenism proclaims its delusion in two words: sin is merely an ill, an endurable fate, but the ill itself is the real peculiar harm, far worse than the sin. Christendom, on the contrary, in its truth proclaims: sin is the intolerable injury, but the ill result, its consequence, is also its remedy. Thus in the cross, or even in death, in the communion in death with Christ, is salvation. In that case therefore the look to the serpent image taught that the true, peculiar, pernicious, fiery serpents were their murmuring disposition and complaints against Jehovah, while the fiery serpents were sent by God for a little season for a terror and warning. Thus also, according to the epistle to the Hebrews, Christians have become free from the bondage of sin and Satan, since with the look to the cross of Christ they have recognized death as the salvation of the world. When this confidence in the healing power of all pure, divinely destined ill is established, then the heart is fixed. In the restful assurance which the Jew found in his look to the brazen serpent, as it symbolized to him the saving virtue and agency of Jehovah, he lost all dread of the fiery serpents, and could assume towards them the attitude of a conqueror. We know not how in any other way the great pestilential scourges which have descended from heathendom, have lost to such an extent, their fearful terrifying sympathetic power, within the sphere of Christendom. A more definite relation between the serpent upon the standard and the Saviour upon the cross, lies firstly in its elevation; it was a raised sign visible to all. The cross of Christ is a sign for the whole world. Then Christ appeared upon the cross, under the assumption by the blinded world, that He was the betrayer and corrupter of men, the serpent in the bosom of the people of God, while in truth He was absolutely the contrary, so that believing humanity must recognize its saving Friend in the form and image of its hereditary foe. Thus He was the antitype of that brazen serpent which had the form of the fiery serpents which filled Israel with dismay, while it was made only as a means of rescue and healing, but at the same time was a symbol of the truth that the external visible fiery serpents did not constitute the real calamity of Israel, but the serpents of cowardice and discontent, comp. Comm. on Joh 3:14.

The great impression made upon the Israelites by the brazen serpent, appears from the fact that they took it with them into Canaan, where it was at first regarded as a sacred relic, but at last was destroyed in the time of Hezekiah, as it had become an object of idolatrous reverence (2Ki 18:4).

[Knobel: In a similar way Alexander lost many men as he marched through Gedrosia, the serpents springing upon the men from the brushwood upon the sand-hills. The Sinaitic peninsula is dangerous to travellers from the number of serpents who have their homes here.A. G.].

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. [The heathen view of the serpent as a blessing or healing power, is not only foreign to the Old Testament, but is irreconcilably opposed to the Biblical view of the serpent as the representative of evil which was founded upon Gen 3:15. To this we may add that the thought which lies at the foundation of this explanation, viz., that poison is to be cured by poison, has no support in the Scriptures. God, it is true, punishes sin by sin, but He neither cures sin by sin, nor death by death. On the contrary, to conquer sin it was necessary that the Redeemer should be without sin, and to take away the power from death, it was requisite that Christ, the Prince of life, who had life in Himself, should rise again from death and the grave (Joh 5:26; Joh 11:25; Act 3:15; 2Ti 1:10).A. G.].

2. [The looking of the bitten Israelite and the looking in obedience to the divine direction, and upon the promise, was a part of the typical transaction; as much so as the lifting up. There is scarcely anything which can better represent the simple act of faith than the looking.A. G.].

HOMILETICAL HINTS

[The brazen serpent one of the most significant types of the Old Testament. A proof also of the peculiar and profound attention with which Christ read the Scriptures, and discovered its meaning, when all others had failed. Bible Comm.: The look to the brazen serpent denoted acknowledgment of their sin, longing for deliverance from its penalty, and faith in the means appointed by God for healing. Henry: They that are disposed to quarrel will find fault when there is no fault to find. Justly are those made to feel Gods judgments, that are not thankful for His mercies. They that cry without cause have justly cause given them to cry out their repentance; they confess their guilt; they are particular in their confession; they seek the prayers of Moses for their deliverance. The provision which God made for their relief, was wonderful, and yet was suited to their case. Observe the resemblance, 1. Between their disease and ours; 2. Between their remedy and ours; 3. Between the application of their remedy and ours. The brazen serpent being lifted up would not cure if it was not looked upon. They looked and lived, and we, if we believe, shall not perish. It is by faith that we look unto Jesus, Heb 12:2.A. G.].

B.STATIONS OF THE MARCH TO MOUNT PISGAH

Num 21:10-20.

10, And the children of Israel set forward, and pitched in Oboth. 11And they journeyed from Oboth, and pitched at 2Ije-abarim, in the wilderness which is before Moab, toward the sunrising.

12, 13From thence they removed, and pitched in the valley of Zared. From thence they removed, and pitched on the other side of Arnon, which is in the wilderness that cometh out of the coasts of the Amorites: for Arnon is the border of Moab, between Moab and the Amorites. 14Wherefore it is said in the book of the wars of the Lord,

What he did3 in the Red sea,

And in the brooks of Arnon,

15And at the stream of the brooks

That goeth down to the dwelling of Ar,
And lieth 4upon the border of Moab.

16And from thence they went to Beer: that is the well whereof the Lord spake unto Moses, Gather the people together, and I will give them water.

17Then Israel sang this song:

5Spring up, O well; 6sing ye unto it:

18The princes digged the well,

The nobles of the people digged it,
By the direction of the lawgiver with their staves.

And from the wilderness they went to Mattanah: 19And from Mattanah to Nahaliel: and from Nahaliel to Bamoth: 20And from Bamoth in the valley, that is in the 7country of Moab, to the 8top of Pisgah, which looketh toward 9Jeshimon.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

Num 21:14. [ which our version after the older Jewish commentators renders gave, or did, is now regarded as a proper name. not the sea, nor any proper name, but as in Nah 1:3; Job 21:18, to destroy or overthrow as by a whirlwind.A. G.].

Num 21:14. [Brooks, better valleys. Hirsch., the brooks or wadys forming the Arnon.A. G.].

Num 21:18. Digged or delved with the sceptre or rulers staff, Gen 49:10. Our version gives the sense accurately.A. G.].

Num 21:20. The margin rendering, wilderness or waste, is preferable.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

The different and apparently conflicting representations as to this march, leave us in great uncertainty. It is necessary therefore to come to the defective, but established historical data of the Bible. It is clear from Deu 2:4-8 that the Israelites merely crossed from Ezion Geber the land of the Edomites, on the further side of the Arabah, but did not pass through its length; that they avoided, with the greatest care, the Moabitish territory also, so far as it was inhabited, and in like manner the country of the Ammonites. They thus sought, going out from Ezion Geber, to reach the east side of the kingdoms of Edom and Moab, and marched northwards, keeping along the line between their borders and the Arabian desert, till they touched the region of Ammon. The first station which they reached after leaving the undefined place of the fiery serpents was, according to the narrative here, Oboth, and from Oboth to Ije-Abarim, in the desert eastward of Moab. We may conjecture that Oboth lay on the eastern border of Edom as Ije-Abarim was upon the frontiers of Moab. In the list of stations, chap. 33, they went from Hor to Zalmonah, from there to Punon, and then to Oboth. One of these stations may well have been the undetermined place of the fiery serpents. The record here is so closely connected with the list of stations in chap. 33. that they must be considered together, and we defer the full investigation until that point in the narrative is reached. We confine ourselves here to that which comes in direct connection with the text. [Lange holds the identity of Hor and Hor-hagidgad; of Oboth and Ezion Geber; of Jotbath and Zalmonah, both suggesting the idea of a shaded, well-watered oasis; that Ebronah designates, with tolerable certainty, a crossing place, in which sense it corresponds with Punon (derived from to turn); and that near Ezion-Geber or Oboth they left the plain Et Tih and crossed the Arabah. His theory is constructed on the supposition that they did not march down the Arabah from Hor or Moserah. Keil thinks that Punon is doubtless the same with Phinon, a tribe seat of the Edomitish Phylarch, a village between Zoar and Petra, from which, according to Jerome, copper was dug by condemned criminals. He is compelled however to place Punon to the east of the lines from Petra to Zoar. The localities cannot be certainly identified at present. We may hope for that in the future progress of geographical discoveries. But the general direction is now well-nigh beyond question. They descended the Arabah to the month of the Wady El Ithm, which opens a few hours north of the Akaba or Ezion Geber, and gives easy access to the eastern plain. They then skirted the elevated plateau of Idumea, and began to turn to the north, following essentially the same route taken by the caravans of the present day. The character of the country prevented the Edomites from contesting their passage in this direction. Bible Com. regards the name Oboth as identical with the present pilgrim halting-place, El Ahsa. The name Oboth, denoting holes dug in the ground, being the plural of . The term hasy, of which Ahsa is the plural, has the same meaning, and thus the modern station corresponds to the ancient both in name and place. All that seems certain, however, is that the place must be sought in the desert on the eastern skirts of Edom or Idumea.A. G.]. From Oboth they came to Ije-abarim, in the wilderness which is before, east of Moab. Keil translates ruins of the crossings, and thinks the place must be sought for north of the Wady El Ahsy, which divides Idumea from Moab. Ges., while he renders ruins, translates the phrase, tops of the mountain-chain Abarim. We must take a view of this eastern country or we shall fail to have any clear notion amid the confusion of conjectures. The land of Canaan itself is a region of alternate lowlands and highlands. The low-lying coast region is succeeded by the highland of the western mountain plateau; the valley of the Jordan by the Perean highlands. This type appears of a more decided character as we approach Arabia. The Jordan valley is prolonged in the Ghor and the Arabah, the Perean highlands in the mountain range of Abarim, which extends through the land of the Amorites, of Moab and of Edom. This mountain region terminates on the west in abrupt lofty masses, while on the east it slopes off into the first desert table land. This again is bordered by a loftier mountain chain, standing out as high mountains on the west, but falling off eastward into the wide desert plateau towards inner Arabia. This range belongs to the great encircling wall which girts around the larger part of Arabia. The highland of Abarim, however, like the lower regions toward the Ghor, is crossed from east to west by great wadys, which at last break down into mountain gorges. The name Abarim may be regarded as signifying that the heights of these mountains stretch away from and beyond all these ravines and torrent gorges. The Israelites appear to have encamped often by the fords of these streams, as they passed along the eastern edge of the inhabited mountain region, to avoid, as far as possible, the peopled regions of Moab and Edom. Thus they first encamped at Ije-Abarim, i.e., probably the ruins of the mountains rent by the Wady El Ahsy (in its lower stretches called El Kereky) over against the city Ar in Moab. They then pitched in the valley of Zared.We much prefer to leave the Wady Zared undetermined, than to regard it as Wady Kerek in the midst of the land of Moab, or even the Wady Kerek in the upper part of its course. [It is to be identified with the Wady Franjy, the main upper branch of Wady Kerek. The word Zared signifies osier; and, remarkably enough, the Wady Safsaf, Willow Brook, still clings to the tributary which unites with Wady Franjy below Kerek. Bible Com.A. G.]

Farther on they came to the Arnon, which divides the land of the Amorites from that of Moab, and encamped beyond the wady. Since the Arnon is formed by several smaller streams, and in its lower course passes through deep gorges, which would not admit of the passage of an armed host, it has been justly inferred that the passage was effected in the upper part of its course, and where the affluents still flowed apart. [Ritter quoted by Keil: It is utterly inconceivable that a whole people, travelling with all their possessions, as well as with their flocks, should have been exposed without necessity to the dangers and enormous difficulties that would attend the crossing of so dreadfully wild and so deep a valley, and that merely with the purpose of forcing an entrance into an enemys country.A. G.] We come now to a very obscure passage, Num 21:14-15. The Sept. renders the passage singularly, but yet with a correct apprehension of the fundamental thought: , , . The Vulgate, in doubt as to the of the Septuagint, translates: Sicut fecit in mari rubro, sic faciet in torrentibus Arnon. Scopuli torrentium inclinati sunt ut requiescerent in Ar, et recumberent in finibus Moabitarum.

Since it is plainly the passage of the Arnon which is celebrated, it is difficult to see why Luther with others should cut the knot as he does and render Vaheb in Supha and the brooks of Arnon. And it is still harder to understand why Knobel also should read Vaheb in Supha, and add a senseless supplement. [Knobel supposes the verb to be supplied, and refers to the Amorites, viz.: they possessed Vaheb in Supha as their southern limit.A. G.] Keil explains the passage by referring to the capture of the region by storm, although there has been thus far no allusion to a warlike attack. [So also Bible Com., Kurtz, Hengstenberg.A. G.]

We offer the following translation:
And onward unto the Red Sea ( or ) and (unto) the brooks of Arnon, and unto the upper current of the brook which reaches unto the dwelling of Ar, and leaneth upon the border of Moab. The passage will then stand connected with the crossing of the Arnon. It compares the passage of the separated streams of the upper Arnon with the passage of the Red Sea. It sees in both events something alike, a heroic deed, corresponding to the divine summons or call. The , come on, appears here in or and – of direction as the suffix of the noun . What motive could there be for the celebration in a heroic song of a mere geographical notice in and for itself? The Sept. may mean He glorified, made to shine the Red Sea and the brooks of Arnon, viz., through His leading and power. The Vulg. gives us a peculiar idea of the passage: as He did in the Red Sea, so He will do in the brooks of Arnon. The rocks of the torrents were carried down, so that they first rested in Ar, then lay on the borders of Moab. For the distinction between the Arnon referred to and the modern Ar in Moab, see Keil [also HengstenbergsGesch. Bileams, Bible Com., Keil. The Ar here referred to is the city of Moab on the border of Arnon, which is at the end of the Moabitish territory (Num 22:36). It was called Areopolis by the Greeks, and probably stood at the confluence of the Lejum and Mojeb in the fine green pasture land in the midst of which there is a hill with some ruins. This Ar is not to be identified with the modern Areopolis in Rabbah, which stood six hours south of the Lejum.A. G.] The book of the wars of the Lord.Some have regarded it as an Amoritish book of the conflicts of Baal; others attribute to it a late origin in the time of Jehoshaphat; but it clearly belongs to the Israelitish epic, and from its marks of extreme simplicity may be regarded as the first new awakening of inspired song in the rejuvenated Israel. The book is named only here, but the new poesy bloomed in other productionsespecially in the song of the well. [The reference to this book has been seized upon by the negative critics as a grave objection to the Mosaic authorship of Numbers. They have thought it incredible that such a work should have been extant at the time of Moses. But there is nothing more natural, or which occurs more constantly in the progress of humanity under like circumstances, than a body of song bursting out irrepressibly with the new fresh life of a people and commemorating the great events in its early history. As Baumgarten well observes that such a book should arise in the days of Moses, is so far from being a surprising fact, that we can scarcely imagine a more suitable time for the commencement of such a work. To the cavil that the wars of the Lord had scarcely begun when Moses died, and hence they could not have been referred to in any work written by him, Hengstenberg replies: When Moses wrote the Amalekites, the king of Arad, the king of Sihon, and Og king of Bashan, were all conquered. But the idea of the wars of the Lord in the usage of the Pentateuch is much wider than this (comp. Exo 12:41; Exo 12:51; Exo 14:14; Exo 14:25; Exo 15:3; Num 33:1). All the signs and wonders in Egypt were regarded as a contest of Jehovah against Egypt and its gods; the march through the desert is the march of an armed host of whom Jehovah is the leader, so that there was the richest material for a book. And the very object of the book is to glorify the leading of Jehovah as He brings His people on their way. So also Stanley, History of the Jewish Church, vol. I., p. 207.A. G.].

And from thence they went to Beerwell or place of wells. The encampment is marked by a longed-for well in which the promise of Jehovah is accomplished through human effort. This well was dug by the princes with their sceptres, i.e., under their leading, greeted by the festal hymn of the people and embalmed in a song. The fountain thus praised lies still in the open desert somewhere. The place cannot be definitely determined, probably is the same with Beer-Elim in the north-east of Moab. And from the desert they went to Mattanah.They pushed their way into the inhabited territory or the Amorites to the west or northwest. It was not their purpose to enter the land of the Amorite in a hostile manner, for the goal of their journey lay across the Jordan. The reference in Deuteronomy: Then sent I messengers out of the wilderness of Kedemoth (the east) unto Sihon king of Heshbon with words of peace, Deu 2:26, is to this time and place. But when Sihon refused them a peaceable transit, the conquest of his land took place by divine command, (Deu 2:31, see also Keil, p. 150). The encampments after that at the well or Beer, must have preceded the later-mentioned war with Sihon, since the advance of the great mass of the people must have been protected by a victorious warlike expedition, which must have been sent out between the stations Beer and Mattanah. The engagement took place at Jahaz [Keil Jahza] on the border of the Amoritish territory toward the desert. The desire of the writer to complete the list of stations led him to anticipate the record of the last encampments, and this the more that he might connect the subjugation of Og in Bashan with the victory over Sihon; as indeed it was only after the destruction of Og from the land of the Amorites, that the peaceful settlement of the people in the plains of Moab, took place (comp. Num 21:31 with Num 22:1). For the comparison of the stations in this section with the general register, chap. 33., see that chapter and notes. [Aside from any successful identification of the places mentioned, two principles, as Kurtz. Gesch. d. Alt. Bund., Vol. II., 453 well argues remove all difficulty. In the first place we are to bear in mind that the encampment of such a vast body, especially when they reached a cultivated and thickly settled region, must have included a number of places, some of which may appear in one record, and others in another, while both are strictly accurate. But it is more important to observe the diversity in the character of the different records. Chapter 33. is purely statistical. The author there enumerates only those stations, i.e., regular encampments, where Israel made a considerable stay, and hence not only constructed an organized camp, but set up the tabernacle. Here his interest is not statistical, but historical, and only those places which were of historical importance are mentioned. Hence the names of the stations between mount Hor and Ije-abarim, are omitted in this record, for they were of no historical moment, while we have a larger number between Ije-abarim and the plains of Moab because they were historically memorable, although they may not have been regular encampments.A. G.]. We content ourselves here with a mere outline of their march through the eastern desert. Going up Wady El Ithm, and crossing the border of Edom, they were free to wander through the worthless common domain of the desert until they reached Beerprobably Beer-Elimthe well which the princes dug with their staves, i.e., presumably acquired as military leaders. Then they moved to Mattanah, i.e., gift, because it was the first camping place in the dominion of the Amorite king Sihon. They must now have passed the field of conflict with Sihon, for (Num 21:23) Sihon went out against Israel into the wilderness. The Israelites moreover could not have settled peaceably in the Amoritish country without some victory like this. And from Mattanah to Nahaliel, Rivers of God. The name corresponds to the description: Abarim before Nebo. We are ever coming back to the mountain chain Abarim. Nebo, without being definitely determined, may be regarded as forming one of the peaks of Pisgah lying over against Jericho. In this region where several wadys empty into the Jordan, and where the long-wished for Jordan valley first appeared in sight, they may well have said Nahaliel, rivers of God. Knobel. [Keil, Kurtz, Bible Com.], identify this place with Encheileh, which now lay far behind the Israelites. [Keil: Encheileh is the name given to the Lejum until its junction with the Saide. The Israelites then went from Beer north westerly to Mattanah or Tedun, and thence westerly to the northern bank of Encheileh.A. G.]. And from Nahaliel to Bamoth. We can scarcely regard Bamoth (heights), with Keil and others, as identical with Bamoth-Baal, since Israel had before this encamped at Nebo, and certainly had passed the place where Balaam was first solicited to curse Israel. The people were at first busy in taking possession of Heshbon, at the same time capturing Jaazer on the extreme eastern border toward the land of the Ammonites. Then their course lay northwards towards Bashan, and Og, king of Bashan, came out to meet them at Edrei. But as Edrei is found far to the north in Bashan, it is not to be supposed that the armed host should have left the people behind them defenceless in the plains of Moab, where Balak might easily have destroyed them. We therefore accept fully the conclusion that Bamoth, which is here mentioned, was the basis of their warlike operations against Bashan in upper Gilead. Places bearing this name heights are common all over the world. After the conquest of Bashan they returned nearly to their former position in the plains of Moab. [The top of Pisgah which looketh toward Jeshimon: across the desert. Keil: The field of Moab was a portion of the tableland which stretches from Rabbath Amnion, to the Arnon, and which extends to the desert of Arabia towards the east, and slopes off to the Jordan and the Dead Sea towards the west. The valley in this table land was upon the height of Pisgah, i.e., the northern part of the mountains of Abarim, and looked across the desert Jeshimon. Jeshimon, the desert, is the plain of Ghor El Belka, i.e., the valley of desolation on the north-eastern border of the Dead Sea. The valley in which the Israelites were encamped is to be sought for to the west of Heshbon, on the mountain range of Abarim, which slopes off into the Ghor El Belka. Kurtz holds the same view and identifies this position with the field of Zophim, Num 23:14. Bible Com.: Pisgah was a ridge of the Abarim mountain westward from Heshbon, and Nebo a town on or near that ridge, and apparently lying on its western slope. See also Groves Art. Moab, Smiths Bib. Dict., Palmer, The Desert and the Exodus, Vol. II., p. 472 et seq.A. G.].

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. [God ever leads His people by a way which they know not, but leads them safely and well. They pass through the wilderness, but come out upon the top of Pisgah and then across the Jordan. All along the fountains spring upnot without human agency, and yet flowing with the fulness of divine blessing.A. G.].
2. [The doctrine of Gods providence, and the duty of an implicit trust in it; of a hearty and cheerful compliance with it; and the safety and welfare of those who so yield to it are clearly seen in this narrative.A. G.].

HOMILETICAL HINTS

The march as it overcomes all obstacles. The passage over the river of Arnon, a reminiscence of the passage through the Red Sea, and a pledge of the passage over the Jordan. [Henry, Num 21:10. It were well if we would thus do in our way to heaven, Num 21:14-15, what God has wrought for us, what He did at such a time, and in such a place ought to be distinctly remembered, Num 21:18. God promised to give them water, but they must open the ground to receive it. Gods favors are to be expected in the use of such means as lie within our power. The wellsfountainsalong the way. Wordsworth refers upon the wells of the Bible to Gen 21:19; Gen 21:31; Gen 24:13; Gen 26:15; Gen 29:10; Exo 2:15; Exo 3:1; Joh 4:6. Moses gathers the people, God gives the water. This is a work which God is ever doing in His church. He gives the waters in His holy word, in His blessed Son of whom Moses wrote, and in the living waters of the Holy Spirit whom Christ sent.A. G.].

C.SIHON KING OF THE AMORITES, AND OG KING OF BASHAN

Num 21:21 to Num 22:1. Deu 2:26 to Deu 3:22.

21And Israel sent messengers unto Sihon king of the Amorites, saying, 22Let me pass through thy land: we will not turn into the fields, or into the vineyards; we will not drink of the waters of the well: but we will go along by the kings high way, until we be past thy borders. 23And Sihon would not suffer Israel to pass through his border: but Sihon gathered all his people together, and went out against Israel into the wilderness: and he came to Jahaz, and fought against Israel. 24And Israel smote him with the edge of the sword, and possessed his land from Arnon unto Jabbok, even unto the children of Ammon: for the border of the children of Ammon was strong. 25And Israel took all these cities: and Israel dwelt in all the cities of the Amorites, in Heshbon, and in all the 10villages thereof. 26For Heshbon was the city of Sihon the king of the Amorites, who had fought against the former king of Moab, and taken all his land out of his hand, even unto Arnon. 27Wherefore they that speak in proverbs say,

Come unto Heshbon,
Let the city of Sihon be built and prepared:

28For there is a fire gone out of Heshbon,

A flame from the city of Sihon;
It hath consumed Ar of Moab,

And the lords of the high places of Arnon.

29Woe to thee, Moab!

Thou art undone, O people of Chemosh:
He hath given his sons that escaped,
And his daughters, into captivity
Unto Sihon king of the Amorites.

30We have shot at them;

Heshbon is perished, even unto Dibon,
And we have laid them waste even unto Nophah,
Which reacheth unto Medeba.

31Thus Israel dwelt in the land of the Amorites. 32And Moses sent to spy out Jaazer, and they took the villages thereof, and drove out the Amorites that were there.

33And they turned and went up by the way of Bashan: and Og the king of Bashan 34went out against them, he, and all his people, to the battle at Edrei. And the Lord said unto Moses, Fear him not: for I have delivered him into thy hand, and all his people, and his land; and thou shalt do to him as thou didst unto Sihon king of the Amorites, which dwelt at Heshbon. 35So they smote him, and his sons, and all his people, until there was none left him alive: and they possessed his land.

Num 22:1 And the children of Israel set forward, and pitched in the plains of Moab on this side Jordan by Jericho.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

Num 21:27. Bunsen, De Wette: the poets; Zunz, Hirsch: the proverb speakers. [The Heb. to make like, very aptly designates Heb. poems in which one was made like, parallel, to another.A. G.].

[Num 21:30. Lange, we came upon them. Bunsen, Fuerst, Ewald, we have burned. Zunz, we have thrown them down. Hirsch, we came and overthrew them. formerly regarded as a noun, is now accepted as the first person plu. Imp. Kal. from with the suffix of the 3d person. Hirsch makes a fut. Kal., and refers for suffix to Ex. 20:30.A.G.]

Num 21:30. Keri , and hence is rendered by De Wette and others, a fire, burns to Medeba.

Chap. 22. Num 22:1. Plains. Keil, Steppes of Moab. Lange, fields.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

The message of Israel to Sihon king of Heshbon, is like that sent to the king of Edom. We learn from Jdg 11:17, that a similar message was sent to Moab; and we may infer, therefore, that besides a direct passage through Edom, they entertained a hope that they might press rapidly on between the end of the Dead Sea and the Edomitish territory, without seriously irritating the Edomites; as indeed they had later to cross the southern extremity of the land of Edom. Israel had originally only the promise of Canaan west of the Jordan. Even Pera was not included in the promise. This limitation was carefully regarded in the message to Sihon. But since the Amorites at Heshbon, were included in the condemnation of the Canaanites, so the Israelites were not only at liberty to force their way through their land, but were under obligation to do so by the injunction of Jehovah. How Og. king of Bashan, in the northern part of Gilead, became involved in the conflict, is not explained; a sufficient explanation may be found in the fact that the successful assertion of a religious and moral dominion over Heshbon or lower Gilead, was not possible without the conquest of Bashan. Then we must bear in mind also that in Deu 3:8, the two kings stand in close connection as kings of the Amorites. Knobel strives in a strange way to prove from Deu 3:10, that there were two Edreis [Adraa; see for its location and description, Porter: Damascus, Vol. II., p. 271, and Giant Cities of Bashan, p. 94 sqq., and Smiths Bib. Dict., art. Edrei.A. G.]. A southern to be distinguished from the northern. He gives as the reason that Og surely did not allow the Israelites to reach the northern boundary of his kingdom before he went out to meet them. [So also Keil, Bible Com.A. G.]. The conjecture however is obvious that the terror which the victory over Sihon spread far and wide, may have led the people of Bashan to retreat, until they found it necessary to make a stand at Edrei, their second capital, and not far from their chief city Ashtaroth. [Porter says, The situation is most remarkable, and in selecting the site, everything seems to have been sacrificed to security and strength. There was an all-sufficient reason therefore why they should make their final stand here.A. G.].

It is recorded here that the king of the Amorites had fought against the former king of Moab, and taken all his land out of his hand, even unto Arnon; not, however, that they had reached the Ghor to the west. They had thrust themselves by force between Moab to the right and the desert and the land of the Ammonites to the left. Moab must at this time have exercised dominion in the border-land to the Ghor, for otherwise the plains of Moab would not have been spoken of here. If the dominion of the plains of Moab had been now in the hands of the Amorites, Balak, the king of Moab, would only have rejoiced at their overthrow, and would have sought alliance with Israel. On the other side the Amorites had not been able to conquer the children of Ammon in their mountain-fastnesses, Num 21:24. The Israelites were prevented by an express direction of Jehovah not to attempt an assault against these strong borders (Deu 2:37).

Sihon had as yet no suspicion of the strength of the rejuvenated Israel, and went out against him beyond his own bounds, as far as Jahaz. But Israel smote him with the edge of the sword, i.e. utterly destroyed him. He then took possession of his land, described as reaching from Arnon unto Jabbok. The military occupation is spoken of here; its political incorporation in the land of Israel followed afterward (see Num 32:33). They dwelt in Heshbon and all her daughters, i.e. Heshbon, the capital city, and its surrounding and dependent villages or cities. Wherefore they that speak proverbs. Why the proverbs? Why not wherefore says the song? The enigmatical form is probably chosen by design, so as to express the thought: now is Heshbon laid waste, as it just before had laid waste the Moabite capital Ar; and thus the land falls to the Israelites, who could not have held it as a Moabitish territory. Therefore come unto Heshbon; build it up anew. The purpose and burden of the song is that Israel should restore the ruins, rebuild the city. We cannot agree with Meyer and Ewald [Keil, Kurtz, Bible Com. in part also.A. G.] that the appeal is to the Amorites and ironical. At first the fact is emphasized that this land has been wrested from Moab by right of war. The Amorites had taken it from Moab. Then the thought uttered is that the Israelites have wrested it in turn from the Amorites. [Ewalds interpretation makes the song lifelike, beautiful and striking: Come, come home to Heshbonthe city which no longer affords you a home or roof; rebuild, if you can, the city which now lies forever in ruins. Thus the victors cry to the vanquished. But in order to explain the guilt of the conquered, a second voice verifies the earlier history. Is this the Heshbon from whose gates went the conquering hosts against Moab, poor Moab, over whose fall and the weakness of his god Chemosh the saddest complaints fill the airthat god who had left all his sons and daughters, i.e. all his worshippers, to be driven out and carried captive by Sihon? But then, while that victorious host, sweeping Moab with fire and sword, rests in fancied security, then the loud voice of the victor comes back to the beginning of his song: Then burned we it, and wasted it, from Heshbon, the central royal city, to the utmost limits of his land, and thus Israel avenged Moab.A. G.]

For there is a fire gone out of Heshbon. The occupation of Heshbon is anticipated. The city is viewed as a point of departure for a conquest which should be completed by the torch of war. Ar of Moab. The earlier capital of Moab lay then in this part of its territory. Moab was not stricken without cause or as guiltless. It was the people of Chemosh, subduer, vanquisher. [Fuerst derives it from a root which leads to the signification fire-god; others, sun-god. The inscription on the Moabite stone shows that the worship of Chemosh was associated with that of the Phnician Astarte. Ginsburg, The Moabite Stone.A. G.] As the god of war, human victims were offered to him, as to Milcom and Moloch. He is not therefore to be regarded as identical with Baal Peor (Keil); for that idol as the god of lust and pleasure was Baal, as the god of misfortune, despair and of human sacrifices, he was Moloch. [It seems probable, however, that these heathen idols were worshipped under different forms according to the special attribute which was in view, or which called forth the special worship. He might thus be the god of war, and at another time, regarding prominently another attribute, the god of lust. See Bible Com. notein loc.A. G.] Moab perished as the people of Chemosh. The distinction, that the sons took to flight back across the Arnon, while the daughters fell captives to Sihon, is entirely true to nature. Then follows the record of Israels victory and conquest. We shot at them, overthrew them. See textual note. Heshbon is perished, even unto Dibon, and we have laid them waste even unto Nophah. The textual difficulties in the last clause seem to be best solved by following the Sept., which some MSS. favor, and read fire upon, or to Medeba. [Keil, Bible Com., Wordsworth, Samaritan text.A. G.] The confounding of Nophah and Nobach increases the confusion. We suggest, however, this reading: to the ridge of hills which reaches unto Medeba. We rend in Isa 15:2 : He is gone up to Bajith and Dibon, the high places, to weep; and in the same connection: Moab shall howl over Nebo and over Medeba. Even now it is said that Medeba lies on a rocky hill about four miles southeast of Heshbon. It seems to be a sketch of the new possession, and reveals in its very terms the tender conscience of Moses which prevented him from pushing his conquests into Moab.

Num 21:32. Jaazer. The special allusion to Jaazer between the narrative of the conquests of Heshbon and Bashan seems to imply that it was an independent province lying between the two small kingdoms. The city with her villages, daughters, was taken and laid waste. Jaazer lay in the direction of Rabbath-Ammon (Philadelphia), ten miles to the west, and is to be found probably in the ruins Es Szir at the source of the Nahr Szir, in the neighborhood of which Seetzen found pools, which are probably the remains of the sea of Jaazer alluded to Jer 48:32. Keil. Thence the army moved eastwards. To human view the Israelites may have seemed rash, in approaching so nearly the powerful Ammonites. And they turned, for Ammon could not be attacked. Hence the march tends northward towards Og, king of Bashan. It is needless to ask from what point Israel undertook the expedition against Bashan. The kingdom of Og included the northern half of Gilead, i.e. the region between the Jabbok and the Mandhur (Deu 3:13; Jos 12:5), the modern Jebel Ajlun, and all Bashan, or all the region of Argob (Deu 3:4; Deu 3:14), the modern plain of Jaulan and Hauran. Keil. Keil follows Knobel, and recognizes a double Edrei in Bashan; but for the true Edrei at which the kingdom was overthrown by the Israelites, comp. Von Raumers Geog., p. 247. It has been inferred from Deu 3:10 that a second Edrei existed on the northwest border of Bashan, which is supposed to have been discovered in the ruins Zorah or Edrah. Von Raumer designates this place, however, as Esra or El Ira, and describes the ruins of both places. [The weight of authority at present is decidedly in favor of two Edreis.The significant name might easily have been attached to different places, in a country naturally strong in fastnesses.A. G.]

[The plains of Moab. After the conquest of the two Amorite kingdoms, the Israelites came down from the heights of Pisgah, and pitched in the Arboth Moab. These plains in the northern Arabah stretched from Beth-Jeshimoth, houses of mortar, to Abel Shittim, the acacia meadow. Here they remained till the death of Moses. The camp was beyond the Jordan, in the plain, as Lange supposes, still in the possession of Moab.A. G.]

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

The song of triumph on the Arnon reminds us in its mysterious words of the song at the passage through the Red Sea. The revival of the spirit of song in the people is also an awakening of the heroic spirit which won the victories over Sihon and Bashan. They are inseparably connected in all ages.

HOMILETICAL HINTS

The two great victories east of Jordan foreshadow the conquest of the promised land. New life, new songs. [Henry: God gave Israel these successes while Moses was yet with them, both for his comfort, that he might see the beginning of that glorious work, which he must not live to see the finishing of, and for their encouragement in the war of Canaan under Joshua. It was the earnest of great things.A. G.]

Footnotes:

[1]grieved, Heb. shortened.

[2]Marg. heaps of Abarim.

[3]Marg. Vaheb in Suphah.

[4]Marg. leaneth.

[5]Marg. ascend.

[6]Marg. answer.

[7]Marg. field.

[8]Marg. or the hill.

[9]Marg. or the wilderness.

[10]Heb. daughters.

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

FIFTH DIVISION
ISRAELS FINAL PREPARATION DURING ITS RESIDENCE IN THE PLAINS (STEPPES) OF MOAB

Numbers 22-36

FIRST SECTION
Balak and Balaam, or the Curse as a Weapon against Israel Frustrated

Num 22:2 to Num 24:25

Survey: a. Balaks resort to Balaam, Num 22:2-7. b. Balaams formal, but heartless opposition, Num 22:8-14. c. Balakss second attempt, Balaams irresolution, and the beginning of Gods judgment upon him in the permission of the journey, Num 22:15-21. d. Balaams journey and his speaking ass, Num 22:22-40. e. The first blessing by Balaam, Num 22:41 to Num 23:10. f. The second blessing by Balaam, Num 23:11-26. g. Balaams apparent victory over temptation. His third and greater blessing. And as an appendix his angry announcement of judgment upon Moab and other enemies of Israel, at last upon all heathen, Num 23:26 to Num 24:25.

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

CONTENTS

This is a very remarkable chapter, and merits particular attention. It commenceth the wonderful history of Balaam and his ass. There is much to be discovered in it of the LORD’S gracious dealings with his people. The contents of it are the fright and the consequent wicked and foolish attempts of Balak, king of the Moabites, to prevent Israel from invading his borders. The impious endeavours of the king to gain over to his interest, a noted sorcerer of Mesopotamia: the impious attempts of this sorcerer, who knew better, yet for the sake of gain hired himself out to curse a people whom he knew the LORD had blessed: the history of these characters, and their conduct upon this occasion, together with the miraculous interposition of GOD, in causing a dumb ass to speak with man’s voice, to forbid the madness of the prophet, are related in this chapter.

Num 22:1

It is precious to the believer, when drawing near the borders of death and the grave, like Israel in the place where they are now arrived, they are on the brink of Jordan, and have Canaan in full prospect. Reader! what are your thoughts of this? Heb 11:6 .

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Num 22

‘Carlyle,’ says Mr. Herbert Paul in his Life of Froude (pp. 312-313), ‘was in truth one of the noblest men that ever lived. His faults were all on the surface. His virtues were those that lie at the foundation of our being. For the common objects of vulgar ambition he had a scorn too deep for words. He never sought, and he did not greatly value, the praise of men. He had a message to deliver, in which he profoundly believed, and he could no more go beyond it, or fall short of it, than Balaam when he was tempted by Balak…. Popularity was not his aim. His aim was to tell people what was for their good, whether they would bear or whether they would forbear.’

Balaam

Num 22:18

Let us point out two chief lessons that there are for ourselves in Balaam’s history.

I. Beware of tampering with conscience. In all questions of doubt and difficulty use yourselves to consult the living oracle, the Tabernacle of witness which God has set within you, however enticing the bait may be by which Satan, or Satan’s agents, the world, and the flesh would seduce you seek to lead you astray. However great the promises that Balak may make of earthly honour and reward, put it back with a resolute hand and steadfast denial; ‘If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the word of the Lord my God, to do less or more’.

II. Row vain are good wishes when separated from good actions.

Balaam’s famous wish, ‘Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his,’ is a wish that finds an echo in every heart. It is but right that we should so pray and wish, but we must do more than wish and pray, or else the wish in itself will profit us nothing profit us no more than it profited Balaam, for in spite of his good and pious wish, he died a miserable and untimely death. To have our wish fulfilled, we must first live (God helping us) the life of His servant, live as those who have been redeemed of the Lord; live soberly, live righteously, live godly; walk in all His statutes and ordinances, live in His faith and fear.

III. Trust not to mere good wishes, or to utterance of warm, excited feelings, to secure to yourselves a truly happy, a truly blessed death. ‘Awake to righteousness and sin not,’ ‘the sting of death is sin,’ sin never forsaken, never repented of, persisted in to the end. Till that sting be done away, there can be no peace, no good ground of hope for the dying man. You know how alone that sting can be removed, you say with me ‘thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ’.

R. D. B. Rawnsley, Village Sermons (3rd Series), p. 109.

The Story of Balaam

Num 22:18-19

Balaam is one of those extraordinary characters that we meet with in Holy Writ, who flash across the page of Scriptural history and we know no more about them. He is referred to both in the Old and the New Testament, but nothing certain is stated regarding his past history, nor have we any of those details which we should be so glad to know regarding this most interesting person. He was a prophet of the Lord, and as we read his history, so graphic, so clear, we feel absolutely sure that it is a true account, a true history of a true person, because it reveals to us one of those mysteries of human life so hard to explain, and yet not so very remote from our own experience.

I. Balaam’s Temptation. We see, in spite of the privileged position which he held, that he had a very strong temptation. He was susceptible to one temptation above others the temptation of covetousness, and, yielding to that temptation, he betrayed away all the privilege which he had enjoyed as the chosen servant of God, and ended his life fighting against the people of God. Balak sent to Balaam. What does Balaam do? He asks the will of God Is it my duty to go with these men? And the answer comes clear: ‘Thou shalt not go with them’. And Balaam told the messengers: ‘No, I cannot go’. But the temptation came a second time, for Balak sent messengers more honourable. He repeated the invitation and offered larger rewards than those which had been offered by the first messengers. Balaam knows perfectly well what he has to do. He knows what the answer of God has been. He says, ‘If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the word of the Lord’. Whatever temptation Balak could hold out, nothing should tempt him to move to the right or to the left beyond the will of God.

II. Balaam’s Fall. But he does not stop there. He is very anxious to go and he begins to trifle with his conscience, to see whether, after all, he cannot reconcile what he wants to do with the will of God. He bids the messengers ‘tarry… this night’. Yet he had received his answer, and was convinced of the will of God; but he said, I will have another try, it will bring me such a great advantage. Is there not another way by which I can do what I want to do without disobeying the command of God? The messengers stay another night, and God allows him to go, but, nevertheless, He says: ‘The word which I shall say unto thee, that thou shalt speak’. He is delighted with the result of his second inquiry, in the face of what God had told him in the first instance; and what is the result? The angel of God appears to him to turn him back. He receives the awful warning. And the angel of the Lord said unto him in effect, ‘If thou hadst not turned back, I would have smitten thee to the earth’. Now he sees his mistake, but he does not tear the desire from his heart. ‘If it displease thee, I turn’ but why not in the first instance? He had gone to God and got his answer. He is given permission to go and he goes, but he is only able to speak the words which God puts into his mouth. Having trifled with his conscience, in the end he does not hesitate to risk the souls of a whole nation in order that he may get what he wants. And so he falls, fighting on the side of God’s enemies.

III. Balaam a Warning to Us. What a sad history it is! Balaam’s aspiration, ‘Let me die the death of the righteous,’ is that of every one of us; but, like him, we forget that if we are to die the death of the righteous we must live the life of the righteous.

References. XXII. 18,19. A. G. Mortimer, The Church’s Lessons for the Christian Year, part ii. p. 372. XXII. 20. M. G. Glazebrook, Prospice, p. 48. XXII. 20-22. A. Jessopp, Norwich School Sermons, p. 149.

Balaam’s ‘I Have Sinned’

Num 22:34

Balaam’s ‘I have sinned’ was of a very different character from Pharaoh’s. Pharaoh’s was the confession, under terror, of a very hard heart: Balaam’s heart at least at this point was anything but a hard one. See the exact position of Balaam. On his lips, ‘I have sinned’; probably in his heart a condemning sense that he was wrong; a conviction that he had made a great mistake; but his passions high-wrought; a resolute will and purpose in direct antagonism to the known will of God; one sin, all the while, tightly grasped; and a worldly, covetous affection in the ascendant! This was Balaam, as he went out at Pethor that early morning, through the vineyards of the city. Reduce the picture to the scale of ordinary life, and it is the life of many.

I. An Emotional Repentance. There is an acknowledgment of sin, under sorrow, which often clothes itself in very strong expressions, even to tears, and which is little else than a passion. It is not altogether an hypocrisy. At the moment, it is sincere, very earnest. But it is an emotion only an emotion. It goes with many other emotions, some good and some bad. It is one of the developments of an ecstatic temperament. The person who has it is very affectionate; capable of great and loving deeds. And the repentance, in the moment of compunction, takes the shape of the mould of the man’s natural disposition. It is rapid inflated short!

II. But Without Love. Need I say, there is no real love to God in it? There is no true sense of sin. There is no relation to Christ. It does not go on to action. It ranges, with other feelings, in the mind, which are just as strongly wrong. It is only the necessary vent of the heat of an ardent spirit, when anything happens to awaken it to a brief solemnity, or to send the toss of its thoughts to death, to eternity, to God; a natural sentiment, clothing itself in a religious dress.

III. One Sin held Back. I have known a person, whose wonder and regret was that his penitence never seemed to deepen or increase; yet he said, and said often, and said truly, ‘I have sinned’. The reason was, he never put the ‘I have sinned,’ upon the right thing. He said it about his sins generally, or he said it about some particular sin; but, all the while, there was another sin behind, about which he did not say it. That sin he willingly forgot he connived at it he allowed it! All the rest he was willing to give up, but not that And that was his sin. And that sin, reserved and in the background, poisoned and deadened the repentance of all other sins! The ‘I have sinned’ fell to the ground impotent like a withered blossom. That was Balaam and that may be you!

References. XXII. 34. J. Vaughan, Sermons Preached in Christ Church, Brighton (7th Series), p. 78. F. W. Farrar, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xlvii. 1895, pp. 312, 321. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. iii. No. 113.

The Preacher and His Message

Num 22:38

Whether the extraordinary and scarcely explicable character who thus expressed himself used this language with intelligence, sincerity, and resolution, or vaguely and insincerely, may be questioned; but it cannot be questioned that in themselves these words utter a high, sacred, and noble purpose. It was a prophet’s profession, and the proof of Balaam’s prophetical office is this, that his solemn utterances corresponded with the profession he herein made.

I. It is God’s to Give the Word.

( a ) This is obviously true with reference to inspiration, to the ‘living oracles’ of God. The great lawgiver Moses, the inspired chroniclers, the majestic prophets of the Hebrews all received the word from heaven. Their formula was this, ‘Thus saith the Lord’.

( b ) It is true of every reverent and faithful teacher of religion. Such a teacher does not ask, ‘Is this doctrine acceptable to human nature?’ but, ‘Is it of the Lord?’ To put human fancies and speculations in the place of teaching divinely authorized is not the part of the Lord’s servant and prophet Such a one looks up; asks for a communication, a message; honours the God of truth and wisdom by seeking light and the vision from Heaven.

II. It is Man’s to Speak the Word. High is the honour, precious the privilege, the Creator bestows upon human nature in making man the vehicle to convey Divine truth to his fellow-man. The prophet, the teacher sent from God, echoes the voice which has reached him from above, reflects the sacred light which has shone upon his soul. This vocation he is bound to fulfil with scrupulous care and unremitting diligence. No consideration of his own selfish interests, no regard for the prejudices, no desire for the favour of those who receive his message, should induce him to deviate from his path, to betray his trust. The word ‘put into his mouth’ he is bound to utter fearlessly and yet with sympathy and affection, with authority and yet with persuasiveness.

III. Application.

( a ) The preacher learns from his language the dignity and responsibility of his vocation.

( b ) The hearer of the Divine Word learns that he is not at liberty to neglect or to refuse a message which is not from man, but from God Himself.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

Balaam

Num 22

Balaam comes into the narrative most suddenly; but he will never go out of it again. Other men have come into the Bible story quite as suddenly; but they have only remained for a time. Balaam will never disappear: we shall read of him when we come to the Book of the Revelation of John the Divine. There are some historical presences you can never get rid of. It is useless to quibble and question. The same mystery occurs in our own life. Some persons, having been once seen, they are seen for ever. You cannot get away from the image or the influence, or forget the magical touch of hand or mind or ear; they turn up in the last chapter of your life Bible. You cannot tell whence they come: their origin is as great a mystery as is the origin of Melchisedek; they come into your life-lines as quickly and abruptly as came Elijah the Tishbite; and they take up their residence with you, subtly colouring every thought, and secretly and mightily turning speech into new accents and unsuspected expressions, full of significance, and revealing that significance in ever-surprising ways and tones. Why sit down and look at the story of Balaam as though it were something that occurred once for all? It occurs every day. God teaches by surprise. He sets the stranger in our life, and while we are wondering, he turns our wonder into some sublimer mystery. Who would have a life foursquare, in the sense of limitation, visible boundary, tangible beginning and ending? Who would not rather be in the world as if he had been in some other world, and as if he were moving on to some larger world? We lose power when we lose mystery. Let us not chaffer about words. If the spirit of mystery is in a man, the spirit of worship is in him; and if the spirit of worship is in him, it may detail itself into beliefs, and actions, and services, which are accounted right, and whose rightness will be proved by their beneficence. Balaam comes as suddenly as Melchisedek, as unexpectedly as Elijah; but we shall find him at the very last an instructive historical character. He is called Balaam the son of Beor, and he is located at Pethor on the river Euphrates. At that time the king of Moab was called Balak, and when Balak saw how Israel had destroyed the Amorites, he said, Fighting is out of the question; if we have to come to battle, we may as well surrender before we begin; the numbers are overwhelming. “Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel” ( Num 22:3 ). Balak said, “Now shall this company lick up all that are round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field” ( Num 22:4 ). You can hear the lick and the crunch, and be present at the destruction. It was a day of fear and much sorrow in Moab. What, then, was to be done? Herein came the wisdom of Balak. He also lives to the end of life’s chapter, for to the end of that chapter we shall find the touch of superstition in the human mind. Balak would have recourse to supernatural help. He had heard of Balaam the soothsayer of Pethor a man of divination, a person who had power to bless and to curse the Simon Magus of his day; so he took advantage of his superstition, and thought to sow the air with curses which would work where his little sword could not reach. That is not a mean thought. Call it perversion, or superstition, you do not touch the inner and vital mystery of the case. The great agonies of life are not to be explained by calling them perversions, or labelling them superstitions, or denouncing them as nightmares or dreams: they are there. Man must obey voices which are not always articulate and reportable as to words and tones. It may be more superstitious to deny the supernatural than to affirm it Never forget the cant that is talked against cant. Do not believe that they are the heavenly, pure, brilliant souls who have no Church, no religion, no altar, who live under the dome of their own hats and walk on the marble of their own boots. Whose prophets, pray, are they? They must be accounted for, as well as the Melchisedeks, the Balaams, and Elijahs of old time. What is their history? Where have they made their mark? What marvels of beneficence have they performed? Or do they only live in the very doubtful region of sneering at other people’s piety? Balak’s was a great thought. We do not adopt its form, but we should perhaps do unwisely to reject its spirit and intent. Balak said, Numbers are against us; if it is to be a mere contention of army against army, Moab will be destroyed at once; the thing to be done if it can be done is to enlist the service and action of the supernatural. Quite right. We say so now. If that can be done, any other thing that can be done is contemptible in comparison. All the little inventions and tricks and arts of man, in arranging and rearranging and adjusting and adapting, are beneath contempt compared with the discovery of the spring of life, the spring of thought. If one could read the heart of man and understand his thought afar off, that if possible would throw all other acquisitions into the shade, and reduce them to puerility and nothingness. If it cannot be done, still the audacious imagination that it might be done is a force that might play a very beneficent part in human thinking and human service: it might ennoble the mind, it might create a holy impatience with all little and transitory things, it might enlarge the soul’s whole outlook, and constrain all life into an attitude of prayer and expectation. That, indeed, is prayer. The words are not the prayer. Herein we make the continual blunder of supposing that the sentences are the prayer. As well say the body is the man; as well say the house is the tenant. The prayer is in the sentences wrapped up in them; a spirit impatient with the sentences, frowning upon them because so empty, so short, so inadequate. Prayer is the very mystery of breathing. Balak’s thought, therefore, let us say again and again was an anticipation of the greatest of all thoughts, namely, that the spiritual is mightier than the material. The man who lays down that proposition commits no crime against reason. Suppose it to have entered into some man’s mind altogether apart from what is known in Christian countries as revelation that a thought is mightier than an arm. It is a sublime conception, whoever conceived it in his own imagination. The man seems to be going upon the right line; he is not a man to be jeered at. He suggests that “knowledge is power.” Take down the sentence; write it in a book; on hearing it, we feel as if we might be ready to die for its exposition and vindication. Some bold man has said let us suppose, Could we get at the Ruling Spirit of the universe and enlist that Spirit upon any given side of a controversy, that would be the winning side. Now you say so, we feel the possible wisdom of the reasoning; nay, more, of course it must be so. Your argument is, that were it possible about which we do not dogmatise were it possible to get hold of the Force, whatever it be, that made all things, that holds all things, that rules all things that would be getting hold of omnipotence and securing the soul within the walls of a sanctuary that cannot be violated. Yes, we admit it, if . But that if does not destroy the reasoning; that if does not turn the reasoner into a mere dreamer, or sentimentalist, or fanatic; he stands behind his if as a great man. To have driven up to that if is some progress in human thinking. Better die behind that if, with great tears of disappointment in your eyes, than live the narrow, superficial, selfish life. It would seem to be a mile nearer home. It would seem as if any spirit that may be behind things must answer the reverent audacity that says to the universe, This is not all: I fling it from me, and hope. “Such a thought,” the heart says, “cannot be turned to disappointment; it must evoke any fire of Deity that may be burning behind the visible stars.” The idea has occurred to Balak that if he can enlist the services of a man who is a spell-binder a man who can curse or bless, if he can enlist the supernatural on his side, then Israel may be ten times as many as Israel is, yet they shall be but a multitude of grasshoppers. Balak in his superstition is not a man to be smiled upon as if he had committed some act of harmless lunacy.

So Balak sent for Balaam, who made answer that he would not go. By-and-by, Balak sent other princes more honourable still, with offers of promotion and honour and abundant wages. Balaam said he would ask God. He asked God, and angered him by so doing. Some second prayers are worse than superstitions. So God said, “If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them” take thine own way; no secondary use shall be made of me, but go “yet the word which I shall say unto thee, that shalt thou do” ( Num 22:20 ). “God’s anger was kindled” against Balaam. “And God’s anger was kindled because he went: and the angel of the Lord stood in the way for an adversary against him. Now he was riding upon his ass, and his two servants were with him. And the ass saw the angel of the Lord standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand: and the ass turned aside out of the way, and went into the field: and Balaam smote the ass, to turn her into the way. But the angel of the Lord stood in a path of the vineyards, a wall being on this side, and a wall on that side” ( Num 22:22-24 ).

When Balak heard of Balaam’s arrival he was glad. Gold went for nothing, now the soothsayer had come. Riches were as water poured forth. In those days the supernatural went for something in the marketplace. It is the cheapest of all things now. Ideas are without value; religious thoughts are mere breath. But Balaam remembered that he was only to speak what God told him; so he began to play the priest. He would have altars put up. “He took up his parable, and said, Balak the king of Moab hath brought me from Aram, out of the mountains of the east, saying, Come, curse me Jacob, and come, defy Israel” ( Num 23:7 ); and he would have altars put up and sacrifices rendered; and the answer was, No, Israel cannot be cursed. So Balak took him to another point of view, where, perhaps, the multitude looked greater or did not look so great. “And he took up his parable, and said, Rise up, Balak, and hear; hearken unto me, thou son of Zippor” ( Num 23:18 ); and again the people were to rise like a lion, and lift up themselves as a young lion; and the people were not to lie down until they had eaten of the prey and drunk of the blood of the slain. Well, then, Balak said if that be the case, this thou must do for me, neutralise thyself: be nothing: act as if thou hadst not come at all “Neither curse them at all, nor bless them at all” ( Num 23:25 ). But Balaam said, No; you cannot treat God’s messengers in that way; as a matter of fact, they are here: you have to account for them being here, and to reckon with them whilst they are here. We cannot quiet things by ignoring them. By simply writing UNKNOWABLE across the heavens, we really do not exclude supernatural or immeasurable forces. The ribbon is too narrow to shut out the whole heaven; it is but a little strip; it looks contemptible against the infinite arch. We do not exclude God by denying him, nor by saying that we do not know him, or that he cannot be known. We cannot neutralise God, so as to make him neither the one thing nor the other. So Balaam was the greatest mystery Balak had to deal with. It is the same with the Bible God’s supernatural Book. It will not lie where we want it to lie: it has a way of getting up through the dust that gathers upon it and shaking itself, and making its pages felt. It will open at the wrong place; would it open at some catalogue of names, it might be tolerated, but it opens at hot places, where white thrones are and severe judgments, and where scales are tried and measuring wands are tested. It will speak to the soul about the wrong-doing that never came to anything, and the wicked thought that would have burned the heavens and scattered dishonour upon the throne of God.

“Would to Heaven” Balak said, in effect “I could get rid of this man!” He took Balaam to another point of view, and Balaam “set his face toward the wilderness, and took up his parable,” and sang a sweet and noble song: “How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel! As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the river’s side, as the trees of lign aloes which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar trees beside the waters. He shall pour the water out of his buckets, and his seed shall be in many waters, and his king shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom shall be exalted. God brought him forth out of Egypt; he hath as it were the strength of an unicorn: he shall eat up the nations his enemies, and shall break their bones, and pierce them through with his arrows. He couched, he lay down as a lion, and as a great lion: who shall stir him up? Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee.” Balak made a bad bargain that day. He had added to his troubles instead of diminishing them. If we invite Christ into the house merely to do our bidding, he will burn the house and he will burn the host that invited him to break bread. We cannot trifle with these mysteries. The Gospel is a savour of life unto life, or of death unto death; the truth is a stone to be fallen upon, or it is a stone which will fall upon those who invoke it. We cannot get rid of these spiritual presences and influences. We seem to do so for a time I admit it. We are so broad in physical dimensions, so healthy in physical functions, so radiant in physical life, so successful, too, in the marketplace; we walk over the course, and bring back the prize; we smile with gracious contempt upon unsuccessful persons, who are labouring all day and bringing back nothing but a handful of wind; we name them by sneering names; we use them as typical instances whereby to excite our own laughter and the laughter of other men. Why, we could not do with a God under those conditions. But all human life is not enclosed within such limited boundaries. Not in any one mood can we determine these great questions. Life, in its sum-total, with all its variations, rapid changes, and increasing responsibilities, must be taken into account.

Balak would gladly have parted with Balaam, but he could not get rid of him; and Balak was wroth. It became a king to become angry. “And Balak’s anger was kindled against Balaam, and he smote his hands together: and Balak said unto Balaam, I called thee to curse mine enemies, and, behold, thou hast altogether blessed them these three times. Therefore now flee thou to thy place: I thought to promote thee unto great honour; but, lo, the Lord hath kept thee back from honour” ( Num 24:10-11 ). And Balaam spake a great speech to Balak: he said, Is this not precisely what I said to the king’s messengers? Did I not say, “If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the commandment of the Lord, to do either good or bad of mine own mind; but what the Lord saith, that will I speak”? ( Num 24:13 ) now I will tell that which I see. And then came the parable of the man whose eyes are open: “And he took up his parable, and said, Balaam the son of Beor hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said: He hath said, which heard the words of God, and knew the knowledge of the most High, which saw the vision of the Almighty, falling into a trance, but having his eyes open: I shall see him, but not now: I shall behold him, but not nigh: there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel, and shall smite the corners of Moab, and destroy all the children of Sheth. And Edom shall be a possession, Seir also shall be a possession for his enemies; and Israel shall do valiantly. Out of Jacob shall come he that shall have dominion, and shall destroy him that remaineth of the city” ( Num 24:15-19 ). Then the parable is continued, Balaam looking Balak full in the face; and last of all “Balaam rose up, and went and returned to his place, and Balak also went his way” ( Num 24:25 ). You cannot carve your God into any shape that will please your fancy. You cannot send for any true faith and bribe it to speak your blessings or your cursings.

Balaam was a man of noble sentiments. Look at some of his words, “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his!” ( Num 23:10 ). And again: “God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent” ( Num 23:19 ). And again: “I shall see him, but not now: I shall behold him, but not nigh” ( Num 24:17 ). Then take the grand word he spake to Balak as reported in the prophecies of Micah. Say, did ever man preach a nobler sermon than this: “He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God”? ( Mic 6:8 ). Who can amend that speech? Who can refine that gold? Who dares touch that lily with his mean paint? Who taught Balaam that great speech? We sometimes say we find scattered up and down in ancient literature morals as beautiful as any we find in the Bible. Possibly so. Who wrote them? Whence did they come? Is God the God of one corner of the creation? Is God a parochial Deity? Is there not a spirit in man universal man and doth not the Spirit of the Most High give him understanding? Wherever there is a line of beauty, God wrote it; wherever there is a sentiment which is charged with the spirit of beneficence, that may be claimed as a good gift of God. The Apostle Paul never uttered a nobler sentiment than is uttered by Balaam, as reported in the prophecies of Micah. This is the Sermon upon the Mount in anticipation. That is the vicious Church, built on the wrong foundation, aiming at the wrong heaven, which does not recognise in every literature and in every nation all that is good, noble, wise, prophetic.

Balaam’s convictions and wishes disagreed sometimes. Therein he was most human. He knew he ought not to go, yet he wished to go. He would ask the second time; he would doubt his own convictions, or he would adjust them according to the shape and temper of circumstances. Wherever he came from, he claims herein to be quite a near neighbour of ours. Doubts may exist as to the exact relation of Pethor to the river upon which it was built, but there can be no doubt whatever of the blood relationship between Balaam and our own age. Speaking impulsively from the centre of his convictions, he said, No! nothing shall tempt me to go; you speak of gold and silver if Balak were to give me his house full of gold and silver, I would not go; I am the Lord’s servant, and the Lord’s work alone will I do. Then the thought occurred to him a second message coming, borne by more honourable princes, Perhaps I might go and obtain this wealth and honour, and still do my duty. He is on the downward road now. A man who thinks to do forbidden things and spend the bounty for the advantage of the Church is lost; there is no power in him that can overcome the gravitation that sucks him downward. He says, I will bring back all Balak’s gold and silver and add a transept to the church or another course of marble to the altar. He will never return. God will not have his house so patched and bungled; nor does he want Balak’s gold for the finishing of his sanctuary. A nobler spirit was Abram, who said to the King of Sodom, No, “lest thou shouldest say, I have made Abram rich.” Thus do we poison our consciences, pervert our judgment, hold a veil before our eyes; thus do we attempt to look up to heaven and clutch the advantages of earth. This cannot be done; the whole spiritual gravitation is against it; the law of the Lord is against it. This miracle of evil he never permits his creatures to perform.

Note

Dr. Cunningham Geikie says: “The whole story is intensely Oriental and primeval. The first deputation is dismissed in obedience to a divine warning: but, so far as we know, “the wages of unrighteousness” which Balaam “loved,” are carefully retained. A second embassy of nobler messengers, carrying richer gifts, succeeds. He does not at once dismiss them, as God had required, but presses for permission to go with them, which at last is granted. He would fain earn the wealth and honour apparently in his grasp, yet knows that when the prophetic afflatus comes on him he can only utter what it prompts. With a feigned religiousness, he protests that if Balak were to give him his house full of silver and gold, he could not go beyond the word of Jehovah his God, to do less or more, but he also bids them wait overnight to see if he may not, after all, be allowed to go with them. If his ignoble wish to be allowed to curse an unoffending nation be gratified, he has the wealth he craves: if it be refused, he can appeal to his words as proof of his being only the mouthpiece of God. That he should have been allowed to go with Balak’s messenger, was only the permission given every man to act as a free agent, and in no way altered the divine command, that he should bless and not curse. Yet he goes, as if, perchance, at liberty to do either, and lets Balak deceive himself by false hopes, when the will of God has been already decisively made known.”

Dr. Samuel Cox says: “One of the sins brought home to Balaam with extraordinary force and bitterness in the New Testament Scriptures is his venality. And it is impossible to study his career, and to note his ardent love and admiration of righteousness, yet not be struck with surprise and shame at discovering that he loved the wages of unrighteousness, and was capable of prostituting his rare and eminent gifts for hire. Still, do we not find this same strange and pitiful combination of piety and covetousness in Jacob, who was surnamed Israel, ‘the Prince with God,’ and from whom the whole seed of Abraham have derived their name, and perhaps something more than their name? No candid student of his history can deny that, even from the first, Jacob showed a singular appreciation of spiritual things, a singular ambition for spiritual primacy and honour. Nor can any man who accepts the Bible record of him doubt that dreams and visions of the most ravishing beauty, pregnant with the most profound spiritual intention and promise, were vouchsafed him; or that, at least when he blessed his sons from his dying bed, his eyes were opened to behold things that were to befall them and their children years and centuries after he himself had been gathered to his fathers. Even the oracles of Balaam do not surpass the long series of dooms and benedictions which Jacob was then moved to utter. Yet what was his whole life but, on the one side, a constant endeavour to enrich or secure himself at the cost of others, by superior craft or superior force; and, on the other side, a divine discipline by which that worldly and grasping spirit was chastened out of him, in order that his genius for religion might have free play?

“And, again, who can deny that this love of money, this covetousness which is idolatry, this selfish and grasping spirit, is of all sins that which always has been, and is, most common and prevalent in the Church, and even among sincerely religious men? It clothes itself with respectability as with a garment, and walks often unrebuked, often flattered even and admired, in almost every assembly of the saints. How many of us are there who, if we love righteousness, also hanker after the wages of unrighteousness, after the opulence, the gratifications, the success which can only come to us through a selfish and worldly, i.e., a sinful life! No transgression is more common than this among spiritual men, though none is more fatal to the spiritual life, since none renders a man more impervious to the rebukes of conscience or the warnings of the Word and Spirit of God.

“Or take that other and grosser crime which we have seen brought home to Balaam, the sensuality that made the foul device by which the early innocence of Israel was debauched, familiar, or at best not impossible to him. Is it difficult to find a parallel to that? It would not be fair, though many would think it fair, to cite the example of David’s well-known sin; for no sin was ever more deeply repented than his, as few have been more terribly avenged. But think of Solomon; think of the beauty and promise of his youth. Recall his choice of a wise and understanding heart above all the luxuries of wealth and all the flatteries of power. Read his wonderful prayer when he dedicated himself and all the resources of his kingdom to the service of Jehovah, and invoked a blessing on all who at any time and from any place should turn to the Temple and call on the name of the Lord. And then remember that this most religious king, this great prophet who ‘spake three thousand proverbs and whose psalms were a thousand and five,’ to whose heart God gave a largeness like that of the sea, sank into the very sin of sensual idolatry with which Balaam betrayed Israel, suffering his wives and concubines to turn away his heart from the Lord his God, till at last he fell from his harem into his grave, an unloved tyrant, a jaded voluptuary, and probably a believer whose faith was shot through and through with a pessimistic scepticism.”

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

Balaam’s Man Uvres

Numbers 22-24

Balaam’s was a manoeuvring life: very truthful, and yet very false; very godly, and yet very worldly; a most composite and self-contradictory life; still a most human life. Balaam never breaks away from the brotherhood of the race in any of his inconsistencies. When he is very good, there are men living to-day who are just as good as Balaam was; when he is very bad, it would not be difficult to confront him with men who are quite his equals in wrong-doing; when he is both good and bad almost at the same moment, he does not separate himself from the common experience of the race. He was always arranging, adjusting, endeavouring to meet one thing by another, and to set off one thing over against another. It was a kind of gamester-life full of subtle calculation, touched with a sort of wonder which becomes almost religious, and steeped in a superstition which reduces many of the actions of life to a state of moral mystery wholly beyond ordinary human comprehension.

In the first instance, he poses as a very pious man. So we read: “And Balaam said unto Balak, Lo, I am come unto thee: have I now any power at all to say any thing? the word that God putteth in my mouth, that shall I speak” ( Num 22:38 ). We may take these words as equivalent to saying, I am a very pious man; nothing in myself, wholly destitute of intellectual vigour and brightness, and laying no pretension to any conspicuous altitude of a personal kind; I am simply an instrument: I am a mere machine; thou hast sent for me, but in sending for me thou hast but brought to thy side a trumpet through which God must deliver his own message. There was self-consciousness about his piety: he knew that he was a most religious man. We may be too well acquainted with our own religiousness; it may form quite a large object on which our vision is fixed in a kind of trance and adoration. Were we more pious, we should be less conscious of our piety. When we really pray, with all the fulness of divine inspiration, keeping strictly to our necessity, and yet allowing the soul full play as to spiritual communion with God, when the exercise is closed we cannot tell what we have said in mere words: our speech will run to this effect, Whether in the body or out of the body, I cannot tell; I saw things without shape, I heard voices without articulation, I felt upon me the ministry of light; and as to all the influence exerted upon my soul, that must report itself in the nobleness and beneficence of my life. Self-conscious piety is often impious. We should know more about Christ and less about ourselves. Yet in any endeavour to avoid self-consciousness, we certainly fall into it. Self-consciousness is not to be escaped by effort, as directed against itself: it is only to be absolutely escaped by growing in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by such enlargement of faith and multiplication of religious resources as shall cause us to be more occupied with divine things than with our own immediate and measurable relation to them. When we are filled with God, we shall be emptied of ourselves. But let no man judge his brother herein. Some are too keen in finding in others self-regard, self-conceit, and self-consciousness; and refinement vulgarises itself when it fixes upon the vulgarity of other people.

Then Balaam represented, consistently with this first view of his character, a most ostentatious religion. Having come to the field of action, he begins demonstratively. He would have everything done upon an ample scale. The Oriental mind itself shall be satisfied with the gorgeousness of the theatre within which the little magic is to be wrought. So, in the opening of Num 23 , we read, “And Balaam said unto Balak, Build me here seven altars, and prepare me here seven oxen and seven rams.” Balak did as Balaam had spoken; Balak and Balaam offered on every altar a bullock and a ram. In the same chapter we read, “And he brought him into the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, and built seven altars, and offered a bullock and a ram on every altar” ( Num 23:14 ). Again, we read: “And Balaam said unto Balak, Build me here seven altars, and prepare me here seven bullocks and seven rams” ( Num 23:29 ). There was to be no mistake about the preparation. The scaffolding was to portend a magnificent erection. All this lay at an immeasurable distance from the divine purpose and the divine simplicity. This was conjuring: these were the little tricks of a well-paid priest; these were accommodations to the Pagan mind. When we leave simplicity, we leave power. When we build after the fashion of earthly architecture, we forget that the true Builder is God, who builds invisibly but builds for eternity. The prophecy which we are called upon to represent to the age is not a prophecy of demonstration, or show, or spectacle. Balaam wandered from the first principles with which God had charged his soul. Nothing was said in the original instructions about building altars and slaying bullocks and rams. Word was given to Balaam, but instead of thundering that word at the very first and never changing it and repeating it until it deafened the very men who heard it, because of its resonance and majesty, Balaam betook himself to altar-building and to the keeping of perfect numbers to the insistance of seven, so that everything might be complete in an outward and mechanical way. Balaam should have made shorter work of it. He had a message to deliver, and the message seemed to be kept back until all the pomp and demonstration had played Its little part before the astonished gaze of the king and princes of Moab. That very same thing may be done now. It is possible now to put the Gospel last, and to leave it but small space for its expression. We may elbow out the message by doing things which are but introductory at best, and some of which were never prescribed by directing Heaven. What we want is the message, the great speech, the mighty judgment, the holy revelation. What does God say? What does the Lord require of us? To that inquiry there should be instantaneous, emphatic, and persuasive reply.

Still, consistently with the first and second positions thus discovered in his character, we find upon further inquiry that Balaam displays a highly poetical and sentimental religion. Six times we read the words, “And he took up his parable.” He spake like an oracle. The parables are marked by nobleness of thought, grandeur and massiveness of expression. There is genuine poetry in the utterances of Balaam; but, so far, the religion which Balaam represents is of a poetic and sentimental and histrionic character. The age needs more than parable. We may be so poetical as to convey a wrong impression as to the message we have to deliver. Poetry has its place. Parable was an instrument well-worked by the divine hand of Jesus Christ himself; but the moral purpose of the parable was never hidden: the meaning of the message was vividly written upon its whole face. The age wants direct speech. There is a kind of poetry that is harmless: it is delightful to the ear, it flows through the organ of hearing and leaves no impress behind; those who hear it say How lovely! how beautiful! how exceedingly pathetic! but the whole impression is only for a moment, and never goes in the direction of rousing men to action, to sacrifice, to complete and costly obedience. Balak did not want all these altars and all these parables, why does Balaam resort to them? Because he did not accept and realise the policy of God. A clear policy would have rendered all altars and parables unnecessary. We should have fewer apologies for our Christian service if we had a distincter conviction of its divine inspiration and absolute human necessity. Why try to decorate our message of judgment? Why these vain endeavours to paint the commandments of God? If we begin to decorate and adorn and garnish and parabolise, so as to miss the point, let us take care lest all this persiflage be so much reckoned against us in the final judgment. The altars were many, the parables were grand, the courtesy, as between prophet and king, was a courtesy perfect in dignity and in grace; but where is the message? It may be right to fold the sword in velvet, but let us beware lest we so. enclose the sword in velvet, as practically to deprive it of edge. Beauty we will never exclude, parable we must always welcome as highly illustrative of the truth: we can never forget that parable has been used for the representation of the kingdom of God; but let us, at the same time, beware lest the beauty of the parable should conceal the righteousness of the kingdom, and the splendour and exquisiteness of the decoration should hide in fatal darkness the tremendous Cross of Christ. Balaam was not sent forth to make poems for the Moabites: he was sent forth with one clear errand, and that he ought to have delivered instantly, and not have resorted to conjuring tricks, and to the small devices of a calculating magician.

Balaam represents but too vividly those who build many altars but build no character. How possible it is to be always near the Church without being really in it! How possible it is to preach about the Gospel without preaching it! This is the infinite danger of all spiritual service. We may be so wearied by things external and visible as to suppose we have rendered the sacrifice, when we have only kindled the coals. The altar is not built for coal-burning but for man-burning. The fire of coals is merely an instrument part of a process, but the leaping flame is an impious irony, if it be left to burn itself out without consuming the human will and the human self-idolatry. It would be easy to say, watching Balaam in all his course, How particular he is to build altars! he will insist upon the perfect number; truly, he is a most exact and religious man in all his appointments; even the number must be right, and the beasts must be fit for sacrifice. It is easy to be mechanically right. There is no drain upon a man’s life in getting out programmes of service and outlines of effort. It is easy to build the altar and to run away from it; it is not difficult to build an altar and burn a beast upon it. The difficulty is to go to God’s altar an altar built by God’s hands, burning with God’s fire, and to lie down upon it with the grace of absolute self-surrender.

Is Balaam far from any one of us in the peculiarity of his character which displayed itself in keeping up an open correspondence with heathen persons? He never quite closed the correspondence: even when he refused to go he would have the way open for renewed communications. He might have sent a message to which Balak dare not have replied; but he did not. He would rather seem to have said, Who knows what may come of this? we had better not foreclose all communication; in the meantime, I must stand upon my dignity as a wizard or prophet: I must send a message indicating that my services are not to be cheaply or easily engaged; I will say clearly that God will not permit me to go, but I can so say it as to suggest the idea that perhaps even God’s commandment may be trimmed and modified; we never can tell what may occur: I will, therefore, give such an answer as will not shut up the correspondence. Is that ancient history? Are not men in precisely that position to-day, in relation to many old associations or tempting opportunities or half-abandoned habits? They know the right, but they cannot speak it with a final emphasis. They are not untruthful, nor are they unfaithful in a degree which involves final apostasy or which ought to be visited by minor excommunication on the part of the Church; still they are in a mood which, being expressed in words, signifies that even yet something may come from the Moabite quarter that may be turned to account, it will be better, therefore, not to repel with too severe an answer; let the appeal be renewed, or come under some modified form, and then we will see what can be done. Such action is what we have termed a manuvre a work of the hand, a clever manipulation; it is not righteous in its soul; the fire may have singed the outside and given a kind of sacrificial colouring to the man, but it has not burned the inner core and wrought in the soul the miracle of burning out the evil spirit. It is possible to be on the right side hesitantly. It is easy to be so far committed to the Church as to be able on occasions to shake off the connection and “deny the soft impeachment.” We are prone to say, when the answer will suit the company, We often attend the church; we are pleased to be there; attendance upon the service is a season of refreshment and edification. And when it will suit the company we can modify that assertion: we can represent ourselves as being occasionally there, and as having had our wonder partially excited concerning the service; and we can talk truth and tell lies; we can stand back in a manner which, though not chargeable with visible apostasy, means, in the soul of it, treachery towards God. We have nothing to do with Moab; Christ has no companionship with Belial; light never enters into partnership with darkness. “Ye cannot serve God and Mammon.”

Balaam is as one of us when we regard him as not clearly perceiving the motive by which he is actually impelled. Our motives are not always clear to our own minds; or we can so trifle with the motive as to vary its expression and modify its claim and suppress its inspiration. We lose sight of the motive in the operation of secondary causes, and these secondary causes we endeavour so to manipulate as to represent the real purpose of life. There are a thousand ways of lying; even falsehood may be turned into a fine art. Balaam did not perhaps fully know his own mind in this matter; and sometimes we have to be revealed to ourselves by others; and the apostolic pen was inspired to write the real motive which urged Balaam forward in his remarkable career. In one suggestive sentence we have the explanation. Balaam is described in the New Testament as a man who “loved the wages of unrighteousness.” He did not know it. It does not become us to charge him with this perfidy in any broad and vulgar sense. Balaam was not a bad man through and through; he was marked by many noble features; there comes out again and again in his whole speech a distinct and valiant courage; but he “loved the wages of unrighteousness.” He did not altogether long for them, yet he did not resist the bribe; he wanted to be good, but he heard the chink of Balak’s gold; he loved preaching, he was a born preacher but a spark, and his soul flamed into poetry and noble rhetoric but he heard of promotion and honour and dignity, and what amounted almost to the kingship of Moab: for Balak said, All that thou biddest me do, I will do. It was a fierce temptation; it was a terrific agony. To stand beside a king, to move the springs of the royal mind, to dictate imperial policies, to curse invaders and repel encroachments, to have gold as the dust of the ground and honours like showers of rain, and to stand there firm, impeccable, resistant to every appeal to be in a far of! country without a friend, and yet to be as good as we might now be in our own blessed homes who could expect it? When we condemn Balaam, we condemn human nature; when we praise any feature in his character, we praise the grace that wrought that mystery in his soul.

Prayer

Almighty God, thy Church thou hast redeemed with blood. Thou wilt keep thy Church in eternal security. The foundation of the Lord standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. We can hide nothing from thee. The smallest of thy children is still thine. They shall be mine in that day when I number up my jewels, saith the Lord. Thou dost not lose any jewel. God cannot lose anything. Hold thou us up, and we shall be safe. Show us that we may lose ourselves: that if we are sons of perdition we are sons of waste, and even Christ’s wounded hand cannot save us from ruin. Establish us in the confidence of thy Fatherhood; and may we not live in it as in a doctrine only, but exhibit it in daily trust, in noble spiritual sacrifice, in continual and beneficent industry. Thus shall the Lord’s seal be confirmed by our loyalty, and no man shall curse what God the Lord hath blessed. We stand in thy blessing: thy benediction is our heaven, thy smile our perpetual light. This is our joy; and this holy confidence brings amongst us the shout of a king, so that all thy princes are greater than Agag, and the smallest of thy children is more than the kings of the earth. Fill us with holy delight; drive away all temptation and evil importunity, and extinguish every baleful fire; let our bodies be the temples of the Holy Ghost; may our souls be inspired, and our whole hearts know the mystery and the joy of sacrifice. Thou regardest us according to our need. Thou art twice Father to some. Thou art the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to us who are in Christ thou art Father; but to those who have no father on earth and are yet children redeemed thou art Father upon Father: thy Fatherliness rises into the passion and mystery of love. This is our confidence and our delight and our sure hope. The Lord regard those who are in peculiar circumstances of loneliness, or pain, or fear, or weakness; spread the table of poverty, and make the one loaf into many; draw water for those who are thirsty, and may it be unto them as the wine of heaven; make the bed of affliction, soften the pillow of pain; send into the hearts of the people a spirit of love and generosity and beneficence; and may we know that life is only noble as it gives, and lives in others, and delights in spreading sunshine and joy. Let the Book of the Lord be a flame of fire in the night-time and a pillar of cloud in the day season; in our right hand may there be a rod, in our left hand a staff. Thy rod and thy staff shall comfort us, and the valley of the shadow of death shall have in it no evil or darkness because of the Lord’s presence. Help us to sing again loudly, sweetly, lovingly; and whilst we tarry in God’s house, may we feel the nearness of the Lord’s hand. Amen.

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

Balaam’s Vision of the Church

Numbers 22-24

Let Israel, as gathered within sight of Moab, be regarded as representing the Church of the living God: let Balak, king of Moab, be regarded as representing all the forces which encounter the Church of the living God with suspicion or hostility: let Balaam be regarded as the prophet of the Lord standing between the Church and the kingdoms of heathenism, and declaring the divine purpose, and dwelling in sacred and rapturous eloquence upon the condition, the forces, and the destiny, of the Church of Christ. Such are the conditions which are now before us: Israel the Church, Balak heathenism and every manner of hostility, Balaam the voice of Heaven, the prophet of God. Such being the picture, what are the doctrines which underlie it and breathe through it and appeal to our confidence and imagination? First of all, the Church is represented as being “blessed.” We read, “And God said unto Balaam, Thou shalt not go with them; thou shalt not curse the people: for they are blessed” ( Num 22:12 ). To repeat that word is best to explain it. Some words refuse to pass into other terms, for they are themselves their best expositors; blessed is one of those words. We are not taught that Israel was in a state of momentary enjoyment passing through some transient experience of gladness; but Israel is represented as sealed with a divine benediction: Israel is blessed not merely to be blessed, or reserved for blessing; but through eternity is blessed set in sureness in the divine covenant, created and made a people by the divine knowledge and purpose and love. Here is no small contention as between momentary complacency and momentary hostility: we are in the eternal region, we are standing amid the august certainties of divine purpose, recognition and determination. The Church is, therefore, blessed sealed, gathered around the Lord, set in his sight, an inheritance, a possession, a sanctuary. That the Church does not rise to the glory of its election according to the divine purpose has no bearing whatever upon the argument. All things are in process; nothing is yet finished. Is it a temple? the walls are being put up. Is it a tree? the tree is yet in process of growing, and we Know nothing yet of its magnitude or its fruitfulness. Is it a character? time is required, and we must read destiny not in immediate appearances, but in the divine decree and in the inspired revelation. A man is not in reality what he appears to be at any given moment: man is as to possibility what he is in the divine thought. Until we have seen that thought in clearest realisation, it little becomes us to sneer at the meanest specimen of human nature, or to mock the handiwork of God. Let this stand: that there is a family, a Church, an institution describe it by any name which is “blessed”; in other words, there is a spot on the earth on which the divine complacency rests like a Sabbath-light; we may well consider our relation to that place; it would not be unbecoming even the dignity of reason to ask what its own relation is to that sacred and ever-blessed position.

This being the case, the negative seems to become the positive when we read that the Church of the living God is beyond the power of human cursing. Said Balaam, “How shall I curse, whom God hath not cursed?” That is a great principle. Balaam might use the words of cursing, but there would be no anathema in his impotent speech. The curse of man cannot get within the sanctuary of God. The Church is hidden within the pavilion of the Most High: the Church is beyond “the strife of tongues”: the curses are all outside noises like the wings of night-birds beating against the eternal granite. “No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper”; the weapon shall be formed, the weapon shall be lifted up, the weapon shall apparently come down; but it shall miss thee, and cut nothing but the vacant air. Unless we have some such confidence as this, we shall be the sport of every rumour, exposed to every wild alarm, without peace: in the whole week there will be no Sabbath day, after the day’s tumult there will be no time of repose: the house will be open to the encroachment of every evil. We must, therefore, stand in great principles, and take refuge in the sanctuary of divine and revealed appointments. You cannot injure the really good man: you may throw many stones at him, but you will never strike him; much speech may be levelled against him, but the speech will be without point. A good man is the Lord’s jewel; a soul in harmony with the Christian purpose is a soul hidden in the security of God’s almightiness. That we do not realise this is to our shame and not to the discredit of the inspired testimony. When a Christian is in alarm, he is doing more injury to the Christian cause than can be done by any outside assailants; when the good man interrupts his prayer by some expression of fear or doubt, he is doing more to invalidate every argument for the sufficiency of prayer than can be done by the most penetrating intellectual criticism or by the most audacious unbelief. Our religion is nothing if it does not make us feel our security and turn that security into a temple of living and daily praise. It still lies, therefore, with the believer to injure his cause, to bring discredit upon God’s temple, and to expose the Eternal Father to human suspicion. Let us beware of this, lest the enemies of God should be found in his own household.

Is there not something in the condition of the Church that might excite shall we call it? the envy the religious envy of the world? Read chapter Num 23:10 “Who can count the dust of Jacob, and the number of the fourth part of Israel?” The Church grows upon the attentive vision; at first it does not seem to be what it really is, but as the prophet looks the little one becomes a thousand and the small nation becomes a great empire, and those who were of little account from a physical point of view rise into immeasurable proportions of force and possibilities of service. The Church is let us repeat what God sees it to be: God sees it to be the power of the world, the light to illuminate it, the salt to preserve it, the city to be as a beacon in relation to it. The Lord has said that the Church shall overcome all opposition. The time in which it is about to do this is, by our reckoning, very long so long, that our poor patience almost expires and our faith sharpens itself into an almost doubtful inquiry, saying, O Lord! how long? the wicked are robust, evil-minded men are many in number, and virtue seems to be cast out upon the street and to be exposed to a very precarious fortune O Lord! how long? It is a natural question, full of reasonableness from a merely human point of view, and it never can be suppressed except by that increase cf faith which makes our life superior to the death-principle that is in us that fills us with a sense of already-realised immortality. Balaam saw Israel to be an innumerable host. Numbers played a great part in the imagination of the Eastern mind, and the Lord, touching the imagination of Balak along the only accessible lines, makes Balaam speak about the great host. Why, the dust of it could not be counted; no reckoning could sum up the fourth part of Israel; and as the numbers increased and came down in threatening countless multitudes upon the imagination of Balak, he was staggered by the vision of the majesty of Israel. That is the view we must take of the case. Let God number his Church. He teaches us by all these allusions that numbering is impossible on our part. We do but vex ourselves by taking the statistics of the Church: only God can take them, and he so represents them as to dazzle the imagination to throw our power of reckoning into absolute despair. From the beginning, he spoke thus about numbers: he would never entrust us with the exact numerical secret; when he told one man how many children he should have, he said, More than the stars, more than the sands upon the sea-shore, innumerable. God’s arithmetic is not a pronounceable quantity; it touches the imagination and excites the wonder, until imagination and wonder consent in their intellectual impotence to fall down like white-robed worshippers and say, Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, thou Father in heaven!

According to Balaam, the Church is named in an unchangeable decree: “God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?” ( Num 23:19 ). This is not a God that can be changed by temptation or whose decrees can be varied by circumstances. We do not surprise him by our sin. He does not alter the will because the younger son has gone away contrary to his expectation: when he made the will he foresaw the apostasy. There is nothing omitted from the divine reckoning. He saw the sin before he called me his child; he knew every time the arm of rebellion would be lifted and every time the voice of unbelief would challenge the integrity of his promises. The will overrides all these things: the Testator foresaw them, and the covenant was made in view of them. Herein is comfort, but not licence; herein is a great security, but no permission to tempt the living God. The view which the divine eye took of the whole situation was a complete view; reckoning up all sides, all forces, all possibilities and issues, the decree went forth, that out of this human nature, come whence it may straight from God’s hands, in one form or the other, it must have come this human nature shall be the temple of the living God, and out of those human eyes shall gleam the fire of divinity. If we believed anything short of this, our testimony would not be worth delivering at best, it would be but a happy conjecture, or a fanciful possibility, wanting in lines of solidity, and in characteristics of certainty wanting in the absoluteness which alone can give a steadiness of position to the human will and the destiny of the human career. Were all these covenants, arrangements and promises open to mere criticism of a verbal kind, we should have no inheritance we should be but beggars to the last, living upon appearances and exhausting the unsubstantial fortune of illusory hopes; but our Christian position is, God is unchangeable, the covenant is unalterable, the good man is the accepted of God, and the almightiness of God is pledged to see the good man through river, sea, wilderness, and the battle, being God’s, can only end in one way.

According to Balaam’s vision of the Church, Israel is guiltless and royal. This is proved by chapter Num 23:21 “He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel: the Lord his God is with him, and the shout of a king is among them.”

Herein is the mystery of love. Already we begin to see the meaning of the marvellous expression “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.” “He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel” whilst, from the human point of view, he has never seen anything else. The whole history up to this point has been on the part of Israel or Jacob a disclosure of meanness, selfishness, complaining, perfidy, and perverseness. Both the statements are perfectly true. They may not be open to the cheap reconciliation of mere verbal adjustment, but they are strictly in harmony with the great central line which unites and consolidates the universe. God does not judge in great and final senses by the detailed slips, losses, mistakes, misadventures, follies, and sins of his people; what a life would be God’s eternity could it be vexed by these details! We are lacking in the divine charity which sees the “man” within the “sinner” which sees behind the iniquity the divine seed. We are lacking in the divine benevolence which distinguishes between the action of the hand which sometimes does not express the motion of the will and the inward and set purpose of the sanctified soul. We count ourselves clever if we can trip one another up in discrepancies of speech, in small or great shortcomings, if we can but record a heavy score against some brother, as to a lapse here and a mistake there, and some evil deed yonder. God does not measure the man or Church according to that standard and method: he sees the purpose, he reads the soul, and he sees that nowhere is there a redder blush of shame for anything evil which the hand has done than in the soul of the man who has been convicted as the trespasser. So there are two views to be taken of the Church the small view, the magisterial criticism, the estimate which is formed by the ingenuity that is most successful in fault-finding; or the view which is taken by God’s purpose, by divine charity, by eternal election and decree. God’s purpose is to have the uttermost parts of the earth for an inheritance and a possession; and already the earth may be called his: “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof” not looked at here and now and within given lines so looked at it is the devil’s earth, it is ripped and seamed by ten thousand times ten thousand graves; little children’s bones are rotting in it, bad men are building their thrones and palaces upon it. The devil’s hunting-ground is this earth within a narrow or limited point of view; but in the divine purpose, in the great outcome of things, this earth is verdant as the upper paradise, pure as spotless snow, a sanctuary of the Lord; all lands and languages, all seas, all thrones, all powers, are baptized in the Triune Name, and the whole earth is a worthy annexe of God’s own heaven. Take any other view, and you become at once unsettled, unsteady, depleted of all enrichment arising from confidence and hope and promise. This is the true view, for it is the view given in the Scriptures of God.

Balaam recognises the operation of a miracle in all this. He describes Israel as a supreme miracle of God. He says, “… according to this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, What hath God wrought!” ( Num 23:23 ). Thus the Church becomes the uppermost miracle. From the first it did not seem such workmanship was possible: the material was rough, the conditions were impracticable, everything seemed to be as different as possible from the grace and purpose of Heaven; but years passed on, and the generations and the ages, and still the mighty Worker continued with patient love to carry forward his purpose, and already chaos seems to be taking shape, already some notes harmonious are heard through all the harsh discord, already there is the outlining of a horizon radiant with the silver of rising day, already God seems to be subduing, overruling, controlling, and establishing things; and looking further on the prophet says, “According to this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, What hath God wrought!” how wondrous the transformation; how sublime the moral majesty; how gracious the complete deliverance! That, again, is our standing ground. “Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord.” It is not within our little ability to establish the divine kingdom upon the earth; but God will bring in an everlasting kingdom: he “will overturn, overturn, overturn,… until he come whose right it is.” So we wait on in patience patience often sorely troubled, patience that is vexed by many a question from the hostile side: men say, “Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation” not seeing the invisible Hand, not having that sharp vision which perceives the rectification of lines so fibrous and so delicate, not knowing that God’s transformation is being worked from the interior; that it is not a case of external painting but a case of spiritual regeneration, and according to the majesty of the subject within whose life this mystery is to be accomplished is the time which even God requires for the outworking and consummation of his miracle.

Then Balaam paints a picture such a picture as would appeal to the Eastern imagination. He compares Jacob and Israel to the most beautiful of all spectacles; he says, “How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel! As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the river’s side, as the trees of lign aloes which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar trees beside the waters. He shall pour the water out of his buckets, and his seed shall be in many waters, and his king shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom shall be exalted” ( Num 24:5-7 ). Why speak so much about streams and rivers and waters? because nothing appealed so vividly to the Oriental imagination. To have plenty of water was to be rich in the days of Balaam and in the country of Balak. So Balaam, taught by the Lord to speak the music of truth and of heaven, speaks of Jacob and Israel as being “valleys” where the water rolled, “as gardens by the river’s side, as the trees of lign aloes… and as cedar trees beside the waters.” In other parts of the Old Testament those same cedar trees are spoken of with the rapture of poetry: they put out their dark roots towards the river, they suck up the streams, and they report the success of the root in the far-spreading branches which seem to have lifted themselves up to the very clouds of heaven. Every country has its own standards of success, its own signs of prosperity, its own symbols which most vividly appeal to the imagination of the inhabitants; and water constituted the great object of admiration and of thankfulness in the Eastern mind. And then the King that was coming was to be “higher than Agag” ( Num 22:7 ). The word “Agag” means “high”; the word “Agag” is the name of the Amalekite kings, as “Pharaoh” was the name of the kings of Egypt, and “Abimelech” the name of the kings of the Philistines; so Agag is not any one personal king but the you or I of the Amalekite nation; and when Balak and his hosts looked upon their mighty Agag, Balaam said, He is a child compared with the coming King a mere infant of days compared with the crowned One of Jacob; when He comes whose right it is to reign, all other kings and princes will acknowledge his right, and fall down before him, and pay their crowns as tribute to his majesty.

This, then, is the position of the Church of Christ. We believe a great future is in store for the Church. Were we to look at the Church within given lines, we should say, Great is its poverty, very questionable its intellectual standpoint; a very troubled community is the Church vexing itself by divers theologies and conceptions and theories and speculations. But we must not look at the question in that way. Call for the Lord’s prophet: let “the man whose eyes are open” be called to stand on the hills of Moab, and his speech will be:

Prayer

Almighty God, the way to thee is a broad way. We may come boldly to a throne of grace. The access which thy Son has wrought out for us is a great access. We will approach thee by the way which he has marked out. So we advance without fear, and can even venture to lift up our eyes unto heaven. At the very moment when we smite upon our breast, we have confidence in God, through our Lord Jesus Christ. We think we could now bear to look upon the shaded glory of the Lord of hosts. We have been with Jesus, and have learned of him. At first we were afraid of the great fire, saying, Behold, it burns like an oven, and is hot as the wrath of justice. But now we know thee. God is love. Thou dost wait to be gracious, thou dost live for thy creation. We feel as if thou thyself wert praying for us in the very act of answering our petition. Thou dost make our prayer for us; it is the inditing of thy Holy Spirit in the heart. It is a speech we never invented, but which we receive and adopt as the good gift of God, relieving our heart as it does of the pressure of its pain and expressing happily all the desire of its necessity. Thou dost teach us how to pray. Thou wouldest have us praying always and never faint. Help us, then, to pray without ceasing, as we live without ceasing. We live whilst we sleep, we live in our unconsciousness; the life still keeps beating on ready for the morning of expectation and service and sacrifice. So may we pray in our very unconsciousness yea, when we do not know we are praying in form and in set petition. May our life so acquire the sacred habit of the upward look and the heavenly expectation that without a word we may mightily cry unto the Father-Heart. We bless thee that we have experience of this kind. We are ashamed of our words: they are wings that cannot fly far; our souls must of themselves, in all the speechlessness of enraptured love, seek thee, find thee, and hold long and sweet communion with thee. We would live and move and have our being in God. This prayer thou dost never deny. Thou dost keep wealth from us, and prosperity, and renown, and riches, and honour, and ease; these things thou dost drive away with a sharp wind; but never didst thou say No to the soul that longed to be purer, to the heart that desired to be cleansed. May we find great answers to our petitions. They are addressed to thee in the appointed way, they are sealed with the name of Christ; every syllable is sprinkled with the blood of reconciliation; we say nothing out of our own name, or because of our own invention; we speak the Lord’s prayer in the Lord’s name, and we are sure of the Lord’s answer. We cannot tell thee what thou dost not know; yet thou dost love to hear us talk; thou delightest in the speech of man; there is something in it which we ourselves cannot hear; thou art carried back to thine own eternity. Even in our poor attempts to speak thou hearest a music which no other ear can detect in the utterances of man. What is that music? Is it a cry of pain? Is it the note of a voice of one who is lost in a wild night and cannot tell the east from the west, or where the sweet home lies warm with hospitable welcomes? Thou knowest there is divinity in it a strange pulsing of the eternal music. When we speak thus to thee, in the name of Jesus, our music becomes a mighty prayer, and thine answer encompasses the heavens like a cloud too rich with blessing for the very heavens to contain. Lead us on. We do not know where the grave is, nor do we care. It may be one foot off, or many a mile away, hidden among the years that are yet to be numbered by tens and twenties. Whether it is already dug, or is not to be dug for many a day, what care we? Being in Christ we cannot die; rooted in the Life Eternal, death can but touch the outer frame. We ourselves are already in heaven. Amen.

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

VII

FROM KADESH-BARNEA TO MOAB

Numbers 20-22, Num 33:37-49 ; Deu 2:1-3:11

Historically Numbers 21-22 of this book will carry you to the end of the book, describing the journey from Kadesh to the Jordan. But it leaves out the great incident about Balaam which occupies several chapters. In connection with Numbers 20-22, study the following scriptures: Num 33:37-49 the itinerary chapter commencing at Num 33:37-49 , Deu 2:1-3:11 . In many respects those two chapters give a more intelligent statement than this section in Numbers.

The great incidents of this section are the assembling at Kadesh in the fortieth year, the death of Miriam, the sin of Moses that excluded him from the Promised Land, the fight waged on them by Arad the Canaanite, the death of Aaron at Mount Hor, the sin of the people where they were punished by fiery serpents and saved by the brazen serpent, the digging of a well at another station by the princes of Israel using their sticks, and a most beautiful spring bubbling up, a song on that water as it bubbled up recorded in the old book of the Wars of Jehovah which is referred to, and the war with Sihon and Og.

It is the fortieth year and the first month of that year that they are reassembled by divine command at Kadesh-barnea. Before I proceed with this discussion, I want us to take a backward glance at that thirty-eight years of silence. I told you that in that thirty-eight years they did not keep up the ordinance of circumcision. In the book of Joshua, as soon as they passed the river Jordan, the covenant was renewed and Joshua circumcised all of those who had not been circumcised in the wilderness. From Amo 5 and Act 7 , we learn that all that thirty-eight years they had made no sacrifices. We learn that in that time they worshiped idols. They were under the curse of God, and he did not count the time; there was total suspension of the covenant. But during that time the Levites stayed around the ark of the covenant and kept up worship. The places mentioned in Num 33 constitute a record of the stopping places of the ark as they moved it.

The command goes out that since the penalty is nearly paid and we will find Just where it stops they must reassemble at the place where they broke the covenant. Miriam, who had lived through that period of thirty-eight years dies just when she gets back to the place where she had committed her sin. She is buried and that is the end of Miriam. Those people come back there sore, although it is a new generation, and the first thing they did was to commit another sin. The water at Kadesh-barnea was not sufficient for three millions of people, and striking it at a dry time, they began to make their old complaints. Moses takes the case to God and God commands him to gather them together in a great congregation, and in their sight, with staff in hand, the staff with which he had wrought all the miracles of the past years, to speak to the rock and the water would flow out and God would begin again to supply the people. Moses was very mad. He had been a meek and patient man. He had had charge of that people and had their burden on his shoulders for thirty-nine years. The description of the sin that he committed is expressed in the following scriptures: Num 20:10-11 ; Num 27:14 ; Deu 1:37 ; Deu 3:26-27 ; Psa 106:33 .

One of the questions on Numbers will be for you to analyze the sin of Moses, and as I am not going to give you that analysis, it is very important that you remember those passages of Scripture. Now, God told Moses to speak to the rock, but, instead of speaking, Moses struck the rock. The other time God had commanded him to strike the rock, which refers, first, to the fact that Christ must be smitten to supply the needs of his people. But the next time he must not be smitten. You must speak, and by petition draw the supplies of a Christian. But Moses struck twice. He was very mad and seemed to attribute the power to himself. He did not sanctify God in this matter, but sanctified himself. The psalmist says that the sin of the people brought ill to Moses and caused him to speak unadvisedly with his lips. Just before his death, recorded in Deuteronomy, Moses says, “For your sake I was led into this sin which kept me from entering the Holy Land which you are to enter.”

The next question in order of time is to turn to Num 21 and read three verses which tell us about the Canaanite king, Arad. This king thought that they were going to repeat their old experiment of trying to enter the Promised Land on the south, and he came out and fought them at the very place where they had been defeated before, but this time he got an awful thrashing. He was outlawed and that ban of outlawry was fulfilled in the days of Joshua.

While at Kadesh, Moses sent messengers to two nations. He wanted to get around on the Jordan River side without having to make a long circuit. There were only two ways, one through the Amorite country and the other by going through the Edom country. Moses sent a very respectful communication to the king of Edom, calling him Brother Edom, or Esau, and saying, “Your brother Jacob desires to pass through your country to get to his own land, and we will promise you to stick to the highways and not scatter about, and we will take nothing without paying your own price for it.” We learn from Deuteronomy that Moses sent a similar message to Moab, the descendants of Lot, as he would have to go through the Mount Seir country first and Moab next. And he said to the Moabites, “The descendants of Abraham would say to the descendants of Lot, Let your cousins pass through your country.” But as far as Edom was concerned, they assembled an army to block the way.

What follows next? Kadesh-barnea is Just south of Hebron. The children of Israel are at Kadesh and they want to get around on the Jordan side through Edom and Moab, their kinsfolk. If Moab and Edom refuse, they have to make a long circuit around. Moab and Edom did refuse and God would not permit them to force their way through by war, because they are kinspeople. So they have to move south through the Arabah, that great valley through which the Jordan doubtless used to flow. When they stopped at Mount Hor in the edge of the country, Aaron dies. The account is very piteous. In the main, he has been a remarkably good man. He has committed some sins. He joined Moses in the sin which excluded him from the Promised Land. God commands Moses to take Aaron up on that bare mountain and to take his sons with him. They strip off the priestly robes and put them on Eleazar, who is to become high priest. And there Aaron dies. I have often thought about that lonely grave. There is a tradition about that mountain now. Almost any guide will volunteer to take you to Aaron’s grave when you go there now.

Then they left Mount Hor and made a day’s march or two to a place called Zaimona, going right down that dry Arabah. The people complained again, and God’s punishment was to send fiery serpents among them. Once a little boy asked me to tell him a story about snakes. And I said, “Once upon a time there was a great camp of three million people in their tents in a dry valley, and they sinned against God, and in the night from every direction over the desert came snakes, great snakes with red splotches on them and much more deadly than rattlesnakes. And in the night whoever moved was bitten by the snakes. The children were crying out all night that they had been bitten by snakes, and the people died and kept dying, and the snakes kept biting, until finally God told the leader of that camp that if he would put brass into a furnace and mold a big snake and put it on a pole, that everybody who looked at it would be healed, and as the sun shone on that brazen serpent, it made it so very conspicuous that it could be seen all over that camp. A mother would hear about that brazen serpent and would say to her dying boy, all twisted with agony and pain, ‘O son, I will turn you over so you can see. Now just look yonder at that brazen serpent,’ and he would shut his eyes and say, ‘I will not look,’ and then die. They would come to where a man was bitten, and find him cursing and swearing. They would all gather around him and his wife would say to him, ‘O husband, here are your brothers and sisters and your friends and one of your children. They have all been bitten and they looked and lived. Will you not look and live too?’ But he shuts his eyes and dies. ‘But it came to pass whosoever looked was healed.’ ” And the little fellow was so well pleased with the story that he asked where I had read it and I told him in the Bible, the very last place he expected to find a good story.

Now, there was a converted Jew, Joseph Frey, who became a great expounder of the Old Testament types of Christ. He took this text in John, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life.” Preachers should all get Joseph Frey’s Old Testament Types. Fairbairn has a book on “Typology” but not so good a book as Frey’s.

I am going to call your attention to a thought that you will find nowhere else in the world. You remember that scapegoat on the great day of atonement that was to be given to Azazel and to pass under the power of the evil spirit. So Jesus on the cross passed under the power of the evil spirit. Now, that type is here. This serpent represents Jesus lifted up on the cross and though the serpent bit him, he crushed the serpent’s head.

When they get to Amah, Num 21:13 , here you find the reference to that old book. “The Wars of Jehovah.” “From thence they Journeyed to Beer.” That is a very dry place. When God told Moses to supply the people with water, the princes digged in the ground with their staves and a fresh spring bubbled out. They come up now even with the mouth of the Jordan. Moses stands on the top of Mount Nebo and looks over the Promised Land.

Moses sent a messenger to the Amorites and they despised the messenger and prepared for war. But they are conquered and their country taken. Then they come to Bashan. Deuteronomy tells us how big Og, the king of the country, was. Counting a cubit as a foot and a half, his iron bedstead was thirteen and a half feet long, and I could easily lie down upon it full-length crosswise.

That finishes this section. What is left of the book is to pick up some incidents that occurred, particularly the incident of Balaam.

QUESTIONS

1. The period of wandering How long, their relation to the covenant, their worship, the Levites, God’s mercies to them during this period and why?

2. When did they assemble back at Kadesh-barnea?

3. What noted person dies here?

4. What sin was committed here by the new generation and God’s provision for their need?

5. Collate the scriptures on the sin of Moses and give the character of his sin.

6. Give account of the attack on Israel by the Canaanites; their doom

7. What effort did Moses make to go a direct route to the Jordan?

8. Trace their journey from Kadesh-barnea to Mount Hor. What noted person dies here, and who takes his place?

9. What is Israel’s next sin? The punishment? What New Testament reference to the Brazen Serpent? In what particular is the Brazen Serpent a type of Christ?

10. What books commended on Old Testament types?

11. What lost book is here quoted from?

12. Recite the incident of the Well and the Song.

13. Give an account of the fall of Sihon and another song.

14. Give an account of the fall of Bashan.

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

VIII

BALAAM: HIS IMPORTANT PROPHECIES, HIS CHARACTER, AND HIS BIBLE HISTORY

Numbers 22-24; Num 31:8 ; 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 ; Rev 2:14

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

Num 22:1 And the children of Israel set forward, and pitched in the plains of Moab on this side Jordan [by] Jericho.

Ver. 1. In the plains of Moab. ] Once of Moab, then of the Amorites, now of the Israelites. Lands and lordships often change masters; Adeo nihil certi est in rebus humanis, &c. In the greatness of the Turkish empire is at this day swallowed up the name and empire of the Saracens, the most glorious empire of the Greeks, the renowned kingdoms of Macedonia, Peloponnesus, Epirus, Bulgaria, Servia, Bosnia, Armenia, Cyprus, Syria, Egypt, Judea, Tunis, Algiers, Media, Mesopotamia, with a great part of Hungary, as also of the Persian kingdom, and, besides all those famous Churches spoken of in Scripture, so much in Christendom, as far exceedeth that which is thereof at this day left; yet, no doubt, time shall triumph over this so great a monarchy, when it shall but then live by fame as others now do. a It laboureth with nothing more already than with the weightiness of itself.

a Turk. Hist., Preface.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

children = sons.

plains of Moab: i.e. which had belonged to Moab.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Chapter 22

AND so the children of Israel sat forward, and pitched in the plains of Moab ( Num 22:1 )

Moving now south from this position.

on this side of the Jordan River [on the eastern side of the Jordan River] by the city of Jericho. And Balak the son of Zippor saw that Israel all that he had done to the Amorites. And Moab was very afraid of the people, because they were many: and Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel. And Moab said to the elders of Midian, Now shall this company lick up all that are round about us, as the ox licks up the grass of the field. And Balak the son of Zippor was the king of the Moabites at that time. And so he sent messengers unto Balaam the son of Beor to Pethor, which is by the river of the land of the children of his people, to call him, saying, Behold, there is a people that is come out from Egypt: behold, they cover the face of the earth, they abide over against me: Come now therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people; for they are too mighty for me: peradventure I shall prevail, that we may smite them, and that we may drive them out of the land: for I know that whom you bless is blessed, and whom you curse is cursed. And so the elders of Moab with the elders of Midian departed with the rewards of divination in their hands; and they came to Balaam, and spake to him the words of Balak. And he said unto them, Stay here tonight, and I will bring you word again, and the LORD shall speak unto me: and the princes of Moab stayed with Balaam. And God came to Balaam, and said, Who are these men that are with you? And Balaam said unto God, Balak the son of Zippor, the king of Moab, has sent them unto me, saying, Behold, there is a people who has come out of Egypt, which covers the face of the earth: come and curse me then; that I might be able to overcome them, and drive them out. And God said unto Balaam, [Listen] Thou shalt not go with them; thou shalt not curse the people: for they are blessed ( Num 22:1-12 ).

So that’s God’s direct command.

Now, this guy Balaam, interesting character. It would definitely appear that he was a prophet of God though he was not from Israel, that God did indeed speak to him. In fact, some of the most remarkable prophecies of the Old Testament came out of the mouth of Balaam. What was his background? How is it that he knew God and was able to relate to God in such a special way? I don’t know. It would seem that he was used to creating enchantments or curses, and that’s actually what the king wanted him to do is to create some kind of a curse against these people. Now he had a reputation for power and putting curses on people.

And so the king sent the rewards of divination. In other words, when you go to a prophet to seek advice from God, you’d always take some kind of a gift for the prophet. That was the custom of the day. Even in Israel that was the custom; going to the prophet you’d take a gift for the prophet and ask him to seek the Lord for you, but it was always customary to take a gift for the prophet. And so the king sent these messengers with a gift with the command that he would put a curse on these people that had come out of Egypt and were now bordering his land. “For I know whomever you curse is cursed, whoever you bless is blessed.”

So Balaam sought the Lord and the Lord said to him, “Don’t go to the king and don’t curse these people”. God’s direct command to Balaam.

And so Balaam rose up in the morning, and he said to the princes of Balak, You better go home: for the LORD refuses to give me permission to come with you. So the princes of Moab, they went back to Balak, and they said, he won’t come. He said the LORD won’t let him come. And so Balak the king sent back more honourable princes ( Num 22:13-15 ),

Men of greater stature as far as the government was concerned. And the king said,

Don’t let anything keep you from coming: For I will promote you to great honour, and I’ll give you whatever you want: so come, and curse these people ( Num 22:16-17 ).

So, now more important princes, offers of, you know, you write the check or you name the price. I’ll do wonderful things for you. I’ll promote you to great honor and I’ll do anything you ask, but don’t let anything keep you from coming.

So Balaam answered the servants of Balak [and said], If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the word of God, to do any less or to do any more. So he said, Wait tonight, and I’ll find out what the LORD will say unto me ( Num 22:18-19 ).

Now I can imagine that this night, Balaam was really laying it upon the Lord, “Lord please” because he was thinking about these great rewards that had been offered to him by the king, all this loot. Man, he was really drooling. “Lord, you know, I’ll be good I promise. But let me go, Lord. Just let me go, Lord, please Lord let me go.” I assume that this was the case because the Lord gave him permission to go but yet when he went it wasn’t God’s will for him to go.

And I do believe that it is possible for us to enter into a gray area of what is termed the permissive will of God. Yes, God will permit you to do it but he doesn’t want you to do it. And I believe that a person can zero in right in the heart of God and the direct will of God for his life. You can be right on dead center with God’s will for your life. And I think that there is a gray area that you can get over into which God will permit you to do it. But it isn’t really His direct will. He isn’t really pleased with it.

“But He is”, but you’ve insisted, you’re pressuring, you’re forcing, you’re whining, you’re crying; “Ah, go on then.” you know. Oftentimes your kids, you know, they’ve laid it on you like that and you think “Okay, go ahead and go.” but you really don’t want them to. You’re so tired of hearing them griping, whining and complaining; “Get out of here. Go ahead; go on, tired of hearing your complaining. ” And so I assume that this was the case because God said, “All right go”.

And God said to Balaam at night, If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them; but the word which I shall unto thee, that shalt thou do. So Balaam rose up early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and went with the princes of Moab. And God’s anger was kindled because he went ( Num 22:20-22 ):

God was angry with him for going.

Now, God expressed His direct will in the beginning, “Don’t go with them. Don’t curse these people”. That was God’s direct will for his life but he was going off into an area. God permitted him to go but God was angry with him for going. Leaving the place of the center of God’s will; I think that it is possible for a person to do that.

But out of the center of God’s will you can run into all kinds of problems, all kinds of adversities. And before he had gone very long, very far down the road an angel of the LORD stood in the path with a drawn sword ready to take off his head. But fortunately his donkey saw the angel, though he didn’t. And so the donkey turned off the path and Balaam took his stick and hit the donkey and got it back on the path.

And they were going through a vineyard and in those vineyards they have rock walls along the pathway to keep people from going over and picking grapes. And so he’s going between these rock walls, past these vineyards, and the angel of the Lord stood in the path again. Balaam didn’t see him but the donkey did and the donkey sort of tried to edge over against the wall and got Balaam’s leg pinned up against the rock. And he beat that poor, little donkey again.

And so again he got him going down the road and the third time stood in the path, but this time there was nowhere for the donkey to go. So he just sat down. And Balaam began to beat him again.

And God opened the mouth of the donkey ( Num 22:28 ),

Now to me it is an interesting thing, the great pride that some people have because God has spoken through them. God spoke through me. You know, like you’re something super special because God spoke through you. It is true, God still speaks through donkeys today and that should deflate anybody who thinks they’re something special and something really glorious. You know, people ought to bow to them because God speaks through them.

God opened the mouth of the donkey, and the donkey turned to Balaam and said, Hey man do you think it’s right beating me these three times? ( Num 22:28 )

“Look, have I ever done anything to you like this before? Haven’t I been a good little donkey?” And Balaam said, “You bet your life I’m doing right. If I had a club I’d kill you, you rotten beast”. Boy, talk about being mad. That’s really being mad when a donkey talks to you and you talk back to him instead of just being dumbfounded. You know, if a donkey talked to me I’d just, you know, uh. He was mad. He wished he could kill that donkey at this point.

It’s amazing at how out of tune and out of sorts we get when we’re out of God’s will. You know, we’re wanting to do our own thing and God puts a block in our way and boy, we become angry. We become upset because God is blocking this, which I’ve got in my mind to do. You get out of the will of God you can really get out of sorts in every area of your life; your whole life just gets out of sorts completely.

And so, at this point God opened the eyes of this prophet and he saw the angel of God standing there with a sword. And the angel spoke to Balaam and said, “You better be thankful for that dumb little donkey you got because had he not turned aside I would have taken off your head”. Balaam said, “Oh, I’ll go right home. I’ll turn around and go right back home”. And the angel said, “No, you’ve come this far. You know it’s in your heart to go. You go ahead and go but you just make sure that you don’t say any more than what God tells you to say”. And so Balaam went on to the king.

And so the king brought Balak up into a high mountain where he might overlook all of Israel, camped down there in the valley. They came to Kirjathhuzoth, the city of the streets, literally. And so Balaam said to the king, “Build me seven altars here, and offer sacrifices unto God”. So they built seven altars and he offered seven oxen and seven rams. And Balaam said to the king, “Now you stand here and I’m going to go up and maybe God’ll speak to me and whatever God shows me I will tell you”.

And so he went to a high place

“

Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary

We now come to the story of BaIaarn. It is evident that he was a remarkable personality. He appears in the story as a man of integrity, who attempted a literal obedience to the will of God. We are arrested by the fact that he was fist forbidden, and afterwards consented, to go in response to the invitation of Balak. The only explanation that is satisfactory is that while desiring to maintain a literal and external obedience, his heart was lusting after the riches promised him by Balak. To this the word of Peter bears witness, “Balaam the son of Beor, who loved the hire of wrong-doing” (2Pe 2:15).

As he went on his journey, a startling and supernatural intervention occurred.

Had his heart been set upon doing right for its own sake, he would surely have turned back at that point.

His hesitation was revealed in the words, “If it displease Thee, I will get me back again.” Therefore permission to proceed was again granted to him, but a limit was set on his speech.

In this story we have again a remarkable illustration of the working of an abiding principle. Man is compelled to work out what is deepest within him, while all the way God works toward changing that internal condition. Circumstances are overruled for the development in outward manifestation of the inward truth.

Balaarn loved the hire of wrong-doing and so long as that love remained within him, he was driven forward, even though the sin of his action was revealed by the divine interventions.

He returned to Balak and in doing so manifested an external obedience to the will of God in declaring to him that he could speak only the word that God put into his mouth. Underneath there still lurked the love of hire. He attempted to compromise between obedience and this love.

Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible

Balaam Sent for, to Curse Israel

Num 22:1-20

These chapters present a surprising contrast between the covetous prophet and his sublime prophecies. It is clearly possible to be the mouthpiece of truth and yet have neither part nor lot in it.

Balak, as had been predicted, was sore afraid. Compare Num 22:3 with Exo 15:15. The elders of Midian were his friends and allies. It was very important for them to stand together. The journey across the desert to Mesopotamia, where Balaam lived, was long and tedious, but he was a famous magician, who could marshal unseen forces into the battle by his incantations. He knew the only true God, but loved the wages of unrighteousness and erred for reward. See 2Pe 2:14-16; Jud 1:11.

He made up his mind to win Balaks promised gifts, and sought to persuade God to become his accomplice, first, by letting him go, and, secondly, by letting him say what Balak wished said. But God demands our loyalty and unison with Him, and will not swerve from the path of truth and righteousness by a hairs-breadth to help our desires and ambitions.

Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary

Num 22:18

This was a brave answer, but it was spoilt by what Balaam added: “Tarry ye here this night, that I may know what the Lord will say unto me more.” As if God were likely to change His mind! The word “tarry” was a clear tampering with the voice of God. Balaam met his death at the hands of the people whom he had betrayed into sin. We may learn the following lessons from his life:-

I. The first is to beware of tampering with conscience. When we are tempted, conscience stands in the way as an adversary, flashes before us some great word of God, forbidding us to do what we were bent on doing. Well for us if we do not struggle with that angel adversary, if, at the sight of his glittering sword, we bow down and say, “I have sinned”!

II. We learn from the life of Balaam how vain are good wishes when separated from good actions. We must live the life of the righteous if we would die the death of the righteous.

“Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord.” But such a death must be preceded by a life “in the Lord.”

R. D. B. Rawnsley, Village Sermons, 3rd series, p. 109.

Reference: S. Baring-Gould, One Hundred Sermon Sketches, p. 178.

Num 22:20-22

In the story of Balaam we have a seeming contradiction. God said, “If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them,” and yet “God’s anger was kindled because he went.” How can these things be?

I. When God sent this message to Balaam, it was not the first time that Balaam had sought an answer from God on this very subject of whether he should go or not. Something had made him fear to go and speak the bitter curse till he had learned the pleasure of God. His wishes may well be supposed to have been all in one direction; his conscience alone restrained him. In the night came a message from God: “Thou shalt not go.” But Balaam persuaded himself that what was wrong yesterday might be right to-day, and that what was God’s will at one time might not be God’s will at another. God answered the fool according to his folly, and as the wretched man had dared to think of tampering with God, God rewarded him (if we may use the word) by tampering with him. God suffered him to “believe a lie.” The lie was but the reflection of the wishes that were lording it in the heart of Balaam, and to these wishes God for a time gave him over.

II. Men are doing precisely as Balaam did every day. Temptation to self-aggrandisement of various kinds comes before us; the only condition is a course of action about the lawfulness of which we, are in doubt. We look to see if for some little swerving from the rigorous path of virtue some excuse may not be found. We ask for guidance, perchance with a divided heart, and then, if God speaks to us at all, it is a voice which speaks to a conscience that has become confused and a judgment that has suffered itself to be dispirited, and though the voice may seem to be the voice of God, it is indeed only a lie.

A. Jessopp, Norwich School Sermons, p. 149.

References: Num 22:20-22.-T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. vi., p. 39. Num 22:22-35.-Parker, vol. iii., p. 315. Num 22:22-36.-Expositor, 2nd series. vol. v., p. 120 Num 22:23.-A. Watson, Christ’s Authority, and Other Sermons, p. 284. Num 22:26.-C. J. Vaughan, My Son, Give Me thine Heart, p. 61; Sermons/or Boys and Girls, 1880, p. 376. Num 22:27.-S. Baring-Gould, The Preacher’s Pocket, p. 167. Num 22:28-30.-Expositor, 1st series, vol. i., p. 366; vol. viii., p. 397; Parker, Christian Chronicle, April 2nd and 9th, 1885; S. Greg, A Layman’s Legacy, p. 244. Num 22:34.-Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. iii., p. 113. Num 22:34, Num 22:35.-F. W. Robertson, Sermons, 4th series, p. 34; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. v., p. 316. Num 22:37.-Parker, vol. iv., p. 59.

Num 22:38

The first and most general account of Balaam would be this: that he was a very eminent person in his age and country, that he was courted and gained by the enemies of Israel, that he promoted a wicked cause in a very wicked way, that he counselled the Moabites to employ their women as a means of seducing the chosen people into idolatry, and that he fell in battle in the war which ensued. Yet when we look into Balaam’s history closely, we shall find points of character which may well interest those who do not consider his beginning and his end.

I. He was blessed with God’s especial favour. Not only had he the grant of inspiration and the knowledge of God’s will, an insight into the truths of morality clear and enlarged, such as we Christians cannot surpass, but he was even admitted to conscious intercourse with God, such as we Christians have not.

II. Balaam was, in the ordinary sense of the word, a very conscientious man. He prayed before taking a new step. He strictly obeyed the commands of God. He said and he did; he acted according to his professions. He showed no inconsistency in word or deed.

III. The strange thing is that while he so spoke and acted, he seemed as in one sense to be in God’s favour, so in another and higher to be under His displeasure. Balaam obeyed God from a sense of its being right to do so, but not from a desire to please Him, not from fear and love. His endeavour was, not to please God, but to please self without displeasing God, to pursue his own ends as far as was consistent with his duty. Hence he was not content with ascertaining God’s will; he attempted to change it. His asking twice was tempting God. As a punishment God gave him leave to ally himself with His enemies and take part against His people.

IV. The following reflections are suggested by the history of Balaam: (1) We see how little we can depend in judging of right and wrong on the apparent excellence and high character of individuals. (2) We sin without being aware of it, yet wrath is abroad and in our paths. (3) When we have begun an evil course, we cannot retrace our steps. (4) God gives us warnings now and then, but does not repeat them. Balaam’s sin consisted in not acting on what was told him once for all.

J. H. Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons, vol. iv., p. 18; also Selection from the same, p. 319.

References: Num 22-Parker, vol. iii., p. 303. Num 22-24.-Preacher’s Monthly, vol. i., p. 353; Parker, vol. iii., pp. 322, 331. Num 22-25.-W. M. Taylor, Moses the Lawgiver, p. 388; J. Monro Gibson, The Mosaic Era, p. 295. Num 23:1-26.-Expositor, 2nd series, vol. v., p. 199.

Fuente: The Sermon Bible

III. EVENTS IN THE PLAIN OF MOAB FACING THE LAND

1. Balak and Balaam and Balaams Parables

CHAPTER 22

1. Balaks message to Balaam (Num 22:1-20)

2. The journey of Balaam (Num 22:21-35)

3. Balaam with Balak (Num 22:36-41)

The last section of the wilderness book begins with the story of Balak and Balaam. An enemy, the Gentile Balaam, has to speak the words of prophecy, predicting wonderful blessing and glory for the hosts of Israel. The advancing Israelites inspired terror and Balak (waster), the king of Moab, not willing to meet Israel in open battle, sent for Balaam (devourer of the people) to put his powerful magic spell upon Israel and curse them.

Balaam, originally a heathen magician of an ordinary class, was, very probably (like Jethro, Exodus 18) and Rahab (Joshua 2) conducted to the acknowledgement of Jehovah by the overpowering influence of the wonderful deeds of God in Egypt and in the wilderness, which made a deep impression on all of the surrounding nations (Exo 15:14; Jos 5:1). He resolved to serve Jehovah and to perform his enchantments henceforth in the name of Jehovah. Analogous instances in the New Testament occur in Mat 12:27; Act 19:13; and, particularly, in Acts, ch. 8, which relates the case of Simon the sorcerer, the Balaam of the New Testament. Such a combination of heathenish magic with the service of Jehovah, could not be permanent, and the experience of Balaam would necessarily soon compel him to abandon the one or the other. When the message of Balak reached him, the period of decision arrived–the test was applied, and Balaam was found wanting.

Balak send gifts to Balaam, but he declined the invitation as the result of divine instructions. He could not resist the second deputation, which was more imposing than the first. God gave him permission on the condition that he was to say nothing but what God would tell him. How Gods anger (not Jehovah, the covenant name) was kindled against him and the ass saw the angel of Jehovah, how the Lord opened the mouth of the ass and all the other details the reader will find in the text, so that a repetition here is not needed. Infidelity and higher criticism scoff at the incident of the speaking ass. One of their arguments is that the story of the speaking ass is disproven by the fact that Balaam carried on a conversation with the beast without expressing any astonishment at all at the occurrence. This is admirably answered by Augustinus: Balaam was so carried away by his cupidity that he was not terrified by this miracle, and replied just as if he had been speaking to a man, when God, although He did not change the nature of the ass into that of a rational being, made it give utterance to whatever He pleased for the purpose of restraining his madness. That the ass saw the angel of the Lord first, before Balaam saw him, does not present any difficulty at all.

Naturalists tell us that irrational animals have a much keener instinctive presentiment of many natural phenomena, such as earthquakes and storms, than man. The horses, for instance, sometimes will see dangers when the rider is entirely ignorant of what is ahead.

Jehovah opened the mouth of the ass. An omnipotent God can do this; why then should it be thought impossible? It is unbelief which makes objection to a miracle of this kind. If the occurrence did not happen, and must be classed as they Claim, with legends, what becomes of the inspiration of the New Testament? The Holy Spirit through Peter confirms the miracle (2Pe 2:15-16).

Balaam is used in the Epistle of Jude and in the corresponding testimony in the second Epistle of Peter (chapter 2) as well as in the message to Pergamos, as a type of the apostates in Christendom. They ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward (Jud 1:2). Following the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness (2Pe 2:15). They make merchandise of the things of God. They deny the Master, who bought them, and exercise a religious office for filthy lucres sake. We shall find additional information on this matter in the twenty-fifth chapter.

Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)

the children: Num 21:20, Num 33:48-50, Num 36:13, Deu 34:1, Deu 34:8

on this side: Num 32:19, Num 34:15, Deu 1:5, Deu 3:8, Jos 3:16

Reciprocal: Gen 19:37 – Moabites Num 26:3 – General Num 31:12 – the plains of Moab Num 35:1 – General Amo 2:1 – For three Mic 6:5 – Balak

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

The Woes of the Wicked Balaam

Selections from Num 22:1-41

INTRODUCTORY WORDS

One of the things which sadden the soul is the way that not only professing Christians, but real believing Christians sin against the Lord.

One moment Peter was saying, “Thou are the Christ, the Son of the Living God”; and, the next moment he was saying, “Be it far from Thee, Lord.” First, Christ could say to Peter, “Blessed art thou, Simon”; shortly after He could only say, “Get thee behind Me, Satan.”

It is a shame that Balaam, a Prophet, should have sold himself out to Balak for gold! It is a greater shame that Balaam should, afterward, have given counsel to Balak against Israel, advising him of how he might ensnare God’s people.

Sadder yet is the fact that the Holy Spirit was led to reach back to Balaam as an example of many more, who, in a more enlightened day, follow in the way of Balaam, holding his doctrine, and running after his error.

Thus, as we study the career of Balaam, a Prophet of old; and, as we behold his perfidy and folly, let us not fail to examine ourselves to see if any of his evil ways are settling upon us.

1. There is the danger of serving for reward. It was Balak’s gold, and Balak’s proffer of honor that enticed Balaam. To the minister of today God has said, “Feed the flock of God * * not for filthy lucre.”

Is the common fling against the preacher no more than a joke? The story is told of the pastor who received a call, at a greatly enlarged salary. The pastor’s little girl said, in response to a query,-“Dad’s praying for light; but ma’s packing.”

Are there preachers who demand gold, on the threat of deserting their post? Are there evangelists who talk money so much that it is altogether too plain that their main objective is gold?

Again, do some preach, or do Christian work to obtain human honor and glory? Do they seek the plaudits of men? Do they delight in standing on the street corners, where they may be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi?

2. There is the danger of encouraging world-mixing. Balaam taught Israel how to sin. He did it subtly. He prophesied good concerning Israel, and then sought their undoing by instructing Balak to entangle Israel into God-forbidden matrimonial alliances between the sons and daughters of Israel and of Moab.

Alas, alas, that there are many today who have turned the church building over to a place of play and frolic! Some young people are being led into sinful alliances by supposedly Christian leaders. World-mixing is not only condoned by the pulpit, it is even encouraged.

The message on “separation,” and scriptural “sanctification,”, is side-stepped. The world has become the paramour of the church, instead of its hater and persecutor.

Let us face the issues of this study with prayerful thought. Shall we love the world? Shall we walk with the world? Shall we mix and mingle with the world? Or, shall we come out from among them and be separate?

I. THE FEAR OF MOAB (Num 22:1-3)

The Children of Israel had entered Canaan. Jericho’s walls had fallen down flat. Now the people of God were encamped in the plains of Moab. Balak, king of the Moabites, had seen all that Israel had done to the Amorites.

We need not marvel that Balak’s heart was filled with fear. Balak even said, “Now shall this company lick up all that are round about us.”

1. When God’s children fight the good fight of faith, the sons of the wicked one become afraid. Some one has said, “The devil fears when he sees, the weakness saint upon his knees.”

The devil knows that one shall chase a thousand, and two shall put ten thousand to flight. This is a reality when that one, or those two, are empowered of the Spirit.

Think you that, in the days following the resurrection, the Scribes and Pharisees did not tremble before the prayers and testimonies of the Spirit-filled and Spirit-taught disciples?

Think you that Satan’s hordes did not quail before the onward march of Paul, a man full of the Holy Ghost and of power?

Satan may laugh at the church, when the church has succumbed to his strategy, and been weakened by world-affiliations; but Satan still fears a spiritual saint, with a true gospel message. He knows that the weapons of our warfare are “mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds.”

2. When God’s children fight the good fight of faith, the enemy will take counsel together against them. Satan may fear, but he does not run. He sees impending danger, and he knows the power of God, and the power of Spirit-led saints; but, Satan is not quick to give up the fight.

If he dare not meet us in the open, he will carry on a hit-and-run warfare. He will fight from ambush; he will resort to strategy; he will employ treachery. Satan will even raise a white flag in all seeming sincerity, while he studies out some new method of despoiling saints.

The devil is a strategist. He does not hesitate to put on sheep’s clothing, while he seeks, by subtility, to subdue.

II. MOAB’S APPEAL TO BALAAM (Num 22:5-6)

Here is something passing strange: Moab sends to one of God’s Prophets to secure aid against God’s people. Moab sought help against Israel from one of Israel’s spiritual allies. He sent for Balaam. What have we here?

1. Satan seeks to divide God’s forces. In unity there is always power. In division there is always the basis of failure. What have we today? Christianity is composed of groups of believers, all loving and worshiping the same Lord, and yet weakened by a multiplication of schisms.

What is the devil doing? He is turning Heaven and earth upside down to break through the prayer of Christ,-“That they may be one.” He is turning the tide of the battle away from himself, by setting the guns of the saints against one another.

Satan has even enrolled himself as a teacher of theology, with the sole purpose of muddling the minds of saints with false conceptions of truth. Under the guise of a defender of the faith, he seeks to disrupt the faith.

2. Satan even dares to enlist professed saints in his army of rebellion. The devil is not satisfied to divide the camps of saints into battalions warring, one against the other; he goes farther. He seeks to place unbelievers in the camp of believers. He seeks to garb men who deny every vestige of the faith, with garments of the faith.

Of old it may have sufficed Satan’s strategy, to have secured one of God’s servants, in the person of Balaam, as an ally. Now, Satan goes further. He not merely entices the true servant by means of proffered money, and honor, to join his forces; but he places into the citadel of saints, under the guise of evangelical garbs, men who deny Christ altogether.

How solemn are God’s words of warning: “There are certain men crept in unawares, * * ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ”!

Men such as these are hidden rocks, spots in our feasts, who run greedily after the error of Balaam for reward.

III. LODGING FOES OF THE FAITH (Num 22:7-8)

1. The faith group of Balak’s envoys. The envoys which Balak sent to entice Balaam came to him with flattery, and with rewards of divination. Balaam knew their objective, for they said, “Come * * curse me this people.” Balaam knew who the people were. He knew how God had led them through the wilderness, and how they had taken Jericho. He knew that they were people of the God whom he served as a Prophet.

He knew, and yet he entertained their enemies. He said to Balak’s envoys: “Lodge here this night, and I will bring you word again, as the Lord shall speak unto me.”

This sounds very well. However, that night the Lord said unto Balaam, “What men are these with thee?” Balaam responded truly. Then God said, “Thou shalt not curse Israel, for they are blessed.

It seems refreshing that Balaam told Balak’s envoys that God refused to give him leave to go. We fear, however, that the men detected in Balaam’s voice a sense of sorrow and disappointment that he could not go.

2. The second group of Balak’s envoys. Balak was not to be refused. He evidently felt that Balaam had closed the matter, for he sent again princes, more, and more honorable. Balak also enlarged his gifts, and his promises of honor. He said, “I will promote thee to every great honour, and I will do whatsoever thou sayest unto me.”

The second time Balaam said, “Tarry ye also here this night.” Beloved, we believe there is a vital truth here for us. Why should Balaam again house Balak’s men? Why should he again seek to know God’s mind? God is not a man to change His command, and to repent Himself of what He has said.

We need today young people who will not entertain evil. We need men and women of decisiveness of purpose. Why should we be moved by every wind that blows? Why should we so much as give ear to those who are seeking to malign God’s children?

IV. GOD’S PERMISSIVE WILL (Num 22:20)

1. God gave permission to Balaam to go with Balak’s envoys. God said, “If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them.”

We do not take it that God wanted Balaam to go. We are sure that He did not want him to go. Why then did He say, “Rise up, and go”?

Do you remember why God gave Saul to Israel as king? He even told Samuel to anoint Saul king over Israel. However, Saul was not God’s choice. God yielded to Israel’s cry, in order to show her the folly of her own way.

God does not force obedience; He commands it. Men sin when they are drawn away of their own lust, and enticed.

Balaam, in going to Balak to curse Israel, sought his own honor and riches, he saw no further than that. God saw far beyond that-He saw Balaam lying dead on Balak’s battlefield, where, with Balak’s soldiers, he had been fighting Israel.

2. God showed Balaam that His words would be circumscribed. He said, “But yet the word which I shall say unto thee, that shalt thou do.” Balaam, why go to curse Israel, if Israel cannot be cursed? Why think to fight against God?

There can be but one reason why Balaam went to Balak, he was lured by Balak’s gold and glory.

He went for “reward.” He sold out for filthy lucre. He sought to enrich himself, even if need be, by the destruction of God’s people.

“The love of money is the root of all evil.” Balaam coveted gold, and Balaam pierced himself through with many sorrows.

The world is strewn with the wreckage of many who have fallen into this snare of the devil; and yet, many press their way on in the same path. Many still look for their own gain, from their own quarter. They have become servants of men. They seek great things for themselves. They seek the honor which men proffer.

Young people, let us pay the price of isolation; and, if need be, of mortification and of death.

V. THE ANGEL IN THE WAY (Num 22:22)

We now come to that part of our lesson which will show Balaam’s true character. We also will see God’s method of dealing with a gain- and gold-loving Prophet.

1. Balaam’s true character discovered. We read that in the morning Balaam saddled his ass, and went with the princes of Moab. We also read that God’s anger was kindled because he went.

You say, “But did not God tell him to go?” Yes, but only after He had first told him not to go. Permission was given, because God saw that Balaam was intent on going. Balaam’s character is revealed as that of a selfish and self-centered man.

2. God’s adversary against Balaam. God sent an Angel to withstand Balaam in the way. The ass saw the Angel with the drawn sword, but Balaam saw him not. The ass turned aside into a field, and Balaam smote the ass.

Again the Angel of the Lord stood in a path between two walls; and, the ass, seeing the Angel, thrust herself unto the wall and crushed. Balaam’s foot against the wall.

Again the Angel of the Lord went and stood in a narrow place, and when the ass saw the Angel of the Lord, he fell down under Balaam. Then was Balaam wroth, and he smote the ass. “And the Lord opened the mouth of the ass,” and she spoke. Then the Lord opened Balaam’s eyes, and he saw the Angel of the Lord standing in the way. The Angel of the Lord told Balaam, “Thy way is perverse before Me,” and, “I went out to withstand thee.”

How good is God to His erring saints! How faithful in His warnings! God was giving Balaam one more opportunity to retrieve his footsteps. God would not allow Balaam to go on his way, unwarned.

Was not this the case with Jonah, the run-a-way Prophet? God withstood Balaam with an Angel and his drawn sword, God withstood Jonah with the storm-at-sea. Was not this the case with Peter? Satan had desired to have Peter, but Christ prayed for Peter, and Christ turned and looked at Peter.

VI. SORRY, BUT GOING ON IN THE SAME WAY (Num 22:34-35)

Balaam did not hesitate to acknowledge unto the Angel of the Lord that he had sinned by accompanying Balak’s envoys, and yet Balaam desired liberty to proceed in the same way that he was going. He said, “If it displease Thee, I will get me back again.”

We wonder if Balaam did not understand the words of the Angel, “Thy way is perverse before Me”? We wonder why the Angel stood with his sword drawn, if the Lord did not wish to stay Balaam against his journey?

One thing we know, when Balaam said, “Now therefore, if it displease Thee, I will get me back again,” that the Angel of the Lord said unto Balaam, “Go with the men.”

There is a verse of Scripture which says, “The sorrow of the world worketh death.” Balaam seemed sorry, but his sorrow was not sufficient to turn him from his evil way; therefore his sorrow was unto death. Later on, Balaam was found dead in the enemy’s camp.

God has said that he who “being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.”

How many there are who will go to the altar and confess their sins, and yet they live on in the same old way. They are ready to confess, but not to forsake their sins. The Bible very positively says, “He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso * * forsaketh them shall have mercy.”

God has said, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God for He will abundantly pardon.”

Are there not some, who are with us today, who have seen God’s Angel in the way? Let us be quick to heed the warning, and let us turn ourselves from every evil way.

VII. THE WAGES OF SIN (Num 31:8; Num 31:16)

We are passing by many marvelous chapters. These chapters contain among other things Balaam’s prophecies concerning Israel. We believe it would be profitable to give a special lesson on those prophecies. Just now, however, we want to consider Balaam’s sad ending.

As we look into this matter, let us remember that Balaam was the one who said, “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his”! It is easy to use high-sounding phraseology; however, he who would die the death of the righteous, must live the life of the righteous.

1. Let us examine Balaam’s final sin. Verse sixteen tells us that Balaam, through his counsel, caused Israel to commit trespass against the Lord in the matter of Peor.

When Balaam discovered that he could not curse Israel, he privately instructed Balak to marry and intermarry his sons and daughters with the Children of Israel. The result was that Israel soon sacrificed unto the Moabitish gods, and the anger of the Lord was kindled against her.

2. Let us examine Balaam’s final end. After the Lord had punished Israel for her sin, and after sacrifice of purging had been made by Israel; then the Lord spake unto Moses saying, “Avenge the Children of Israel of the Midianites.”

Thus, Israel was sent to war, as the Lord commanded Moses. Let us now read verse eight. “And they slew the Icings of Midian, beside the rest of them that were slain; * * Balaam also the son of Beor they slew with the sword.”

It must have been a gruesome sight to see a Prophet of God lying with the dead among those upon whom the Lord had avenged Himself.

As we see his corpse, let us remember that the Lord had plainly given command to him not to go to Balak. He had also sent the Angel of the Lord to warn him. He who follows with Satan, must suffer in Satan’s overthrow. We know Balaam died a physical death as the result of his sin. We know that, in his death he lost all of the honor and the reward, which Balak had given him.

AN ILLUSTRATION

Balaam said; “Let me die the death of the righteous,” but he died with the sinners of Balak’s army, fighting against God.

We may learn a lesson from the following parable: A farmer, being short of horses, hitched a mule and an ox together to help with the hauling. After a little while the ox stopped, lay down, and refused to move. The farmer said nothing, but quietly unhitched the animal, returned it to the stable, and made the mule pull the wagon the rest of the journey. At night the ox spoke confidentially to the male. “What did the master say today?” He asked. “Nothing that I heard,” replied the mule The next day exactly the same thing happened. “What did the master say this time?” asked the ox that night, “I didn’t hear him say anything,” replied the mule; “but he’s leaning over the fence out there talking to a butcher”!-C. E. World.

Fuente: Neighbour’s Wells of Living Water

BALAAM AND HIS PROPHECIES

THE HISTORICAL SETTING (Numbers 22)

In what neighborhood are the Israelites now camped (Num 22:1)? Where is this located? Who was the king of this people (Num 22:4)? What effect on him was wrought by Israels victories over his neighbors (Num 22:2-4)? What plan of defense other than war does he adopt (Num 22:5-6)?

Balaams History and Character

Balaam is a mystery. He comes from Mesopotamia where the knowledge of the true God lingered after it had been lost in the other parts of the known world. He is one of the group containing Melchisedec and Job, who testified that although Jehovah was now revealing Himself peculiarly to the Hebrews, yet He had not left Himself without witnesses in the other nations.

Not only Balaams history but His character is a mystery, some thinking him a saint, and others a charlatan. Probably he was between the two, worshipping God ostensibly and yet serving himself where the temptation was strong, as it seems to have been in this case.

Examine Num 22:13 as an illustration where his answer conceals the reason for the divine prohibition while it shows a willingness to go if only he could get permission.

When that permission is obtained (Num 22:20), it is an instance where God gave up a man to his own lust without approving it (Num 22:22), while he proposed to overrule the wrong desire for the furtherance of His own will. It is one thing to serve God and another to willingly serve Him. For the ultimate fate of Balaam, compare Num 31:8, and for inspired comments on his character, 2Pe 2:16 and Jud 1:11.

The Dumb Donkey Speaks

Some say that verses 22-35 represent merely a version and not an actual occurrence, but this seems inadmissible in the middle of a plain history. That the ass may have been uttering sounds like a parrot, without understanding them is probable, but the tenor of Peters language strengthens the conviction that we are dealing with an external act.

But why does not the prophet show astonishment at the phenomenon? He may have done so, without record of it being made, or the lack of it may be explained by the engrossment of his mind with the prospect of gain, for Peter speaks of the madness of the prophet.

THE DISAPPOINTED KING (Numbers 23)

Balak prepared these altars and offered these sacrifices (Num 23:1-3) in honor of Baal, the god of his country, but in whose honor did Balaam intend them (Num 23:4)? And yet how is his superstition mingled with the true worship? Compare 2Ki 18:22; Isa 17:8; Jer 11:13; Hos 8:11.

How does the prophet express the truth that no charms or demoniacal power can avail against Gods purposes (Num 23:8)? How does Num 23:9, last part, harmonize with what we have learned about Israel previously? (Compare Exo 19:5; Lev 20:24 and Deu 33:28.) How does the prophecy show not only Israels separateness but greatness (Num 23:10)? Recall Gen 13:16; Gen 38:14.

When Balaam says, Let me die the death of the righteous, he is still referring to Israel. The Hebrew word for righteous is jeshurun, another name for the Israelites. And the prophets meaning is that as they were blessed above others, not only in life but in death, because of their knowledge of the true God, he desired to have a part with them. But his desire was not very strong. He represents a large class in the world who wish for the salvation of Christ, and yet never accept it by receiving and confessing Him.

Gods Unchangeable Grace

In the second prophecy (Num 23:18-24), how is the unchangeable purpose of Gods grace expressed (Num 23:19)? Compare how this principle in Israels case still maintains, and applies to believers on Jesus Christ in this dispensation. The following will aid: 1Sa 15:29; Mal 3:6; Rom 11:29; Tit 1:2; Heb 13:8; Jam 1:17.

How does verse 21 show that this divine purpose toward Israel is one of grace? Does it say that there was no iniquity in Israel, or simply that God

took no cognizance of it? But does His non-cognizance of it mean that He never chastised Israel for it? On the contrary, we have seen Him chastising Israel continually as she has provoked it. What then do these words mean?

They mean that God neither has seen, nor shall see any iniquity in Israel that shall cause Him to change His original promise to Abraham and discard them as a nation from the place of privilege He has intended for them. This promise to Abraham is based on His original promise of the redemption of man in Gen 3:15. This promise is unalterable, and depends not on mans goodness, but on Gods truth and honor and grace. That is not to say that it has no effect on human character, and that mankind never will become good as the result of it, but only that its source is heavenly love and not earthly conduct (Joh 6:37-40; Rom 4:4-8; Rom 8:28-39; Eph 2:1-10; 1Pe 1:3-9; 1Jn 5:9-13).

THE GREAT PROPHECY (Numbers 24)

At what conviction has the prophet now arrived, and with what effect on his conduct (Num 24:1)? What was the feeling in his heart, do you suppose? Look at Deu 23:5 for an answer. One wonders why God should use such a man as a prophet of good for His people, but before He ordained a regular line of prophets, He was pleased to reveal His will instrumentally through various persons.

Christians are sometimes solicitous to be anointed for service, as though that were the highest or only fruit of the new life. But while not disparaging the aim but encouraging it in its proper place, let us be humbled by the thought that God can get service out of bad as well as good men when He pleases. There is a higher aim for the Christian, and that is to walk worthily of the Lord unto all pleasing (Col 1:10). When one is doing that he is not likely to come short in service.

The prophecy of Balaam is arranged as poetry in the Revised Version. The redundant imagery of Num 24:5-7 depicts the humble origin, rapid progress and great prosperity of Israel.

With what king and kingdom is Israel compared (Num 24:7)? The Amalekites are meant, the most powerful of the desert tribes, a common title for whose kings was Agag, like Pharaoh or Caesar.

What does Balaam say of the future of Israel (Num 24:8)? With what effect on Balak (Num 24:10-11)? How does the next prophecy particularize (Num 24:14)? Who do you suppose is the ultimate fulfillment of the word him in Num 24:17? It may mean the nation of Israel, but doubtless it is identical with the star and the sceptre of the same verse, whose application is Christ. That is not to say that the prophet knew this, but only that the event proves it. He only saw some great one coming out of Israel, not knowing whom, but we know whom in the light of the New Testament. (Compare to Gen 49:10; Psalms 110; Mat 2:2.) Of course, David was an approximate fulfillment of the words, and did the things referred to in verses 17 and 18, but in the com-pletest sense the reference is to Christ, and especially at His second coming (Isa 59:20; Rom 11:25-29).

What other national fate is predicted as well as Amalek (Num 24:21)? What great nation would ultimately deport the Kenites (Num 24:22)? What ultimately would be its history (Num 24:24)? Chittim or Kittim is an earlier name for Greece and some of the other western lands bordering on the Mediterranean, particularly Italy. What finally would become of the conqueror of Assyria (Num 24:24)? For some of the fulfillments of these prophecies, compare Exo 17:14; 1Sa 15:1; Jdg 1:16; Jdg 4:11; Jdg 4:16-17; 2Ki 15:29; and Dan 2:36-45; Dan 5:7-8. The Assyrians were overthrown by the Greeks under Alexander and his successors, and afterwards by the Romans who conquered the Greeks. The Romans, however, are yet to be overthrown with the son of perdition at their head, by the second coming of Christ to set up His kingdom on the earth through restored Israel. Some of these things we shall learn more about later on, but in the meantime what a sweep there is in this vision of Balaam! Little did he know the meaning of it all!

QUESTIONS

1. With what group of men may Balaam be classed and why?

2. What is your impression of his character?

3. What two ways are there of serving God?

4. What shows the unusual incident of the ass historical?

5. What is the explanation of Num 23:21?

6. What is a higher aim for a saint than merely service?

7. Give the common title of the kings of Amalek.

8. Apply the words of Num 24:17 and tell why.

9. What territory is defined by Chittim?

10. What is the sweep of Balaams prophecy?

Fuente: James Gray’s Concise Bible Commentary

Num 22:1. The plains of Moab Which still retained their ancient title, though they had been taken from the Moabites by Sihon, and from him by the Israelites. By Jericho That is, over against Jericho.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Num 22:5. To Pethor, which is by the river. A Pethor was in Mesopotamia; the river is thought to be the Euphrates, or one of its branches, distant at least 500 miles from Moab. Deu 23:4.

Num 22:6. Curse me this people. See note on Gen 9:25.

Num 22:12. Thou shalt not go with them. This indicates that Balaam had once been a good man; though now he ultimately disobeyed the Lord, being allured by the sin of covetousness, which in this awful journey proved to him a sin unto death. The fall of ministers has mostly proceeded from covetousness, liquor, or women.

Num 22:29. Now would I kill thee. A fallen man is apt to be violent in passion, and furious like a hariolus, a diviner or prophet of the heathen. Let us not forget the proverb, Ira est furor; anger is madness.

Num 22:34. I have sinned. Yea, when death is at the door the wicked confess.

REFLECTIONS.

Security and hardness of heart are naturally consequent on a long course of crimes; but when danger is at the door, alarms and fears have sevenfold force. The Amorites and the inhabitants of Bashan had fallen in battle before the arms of Israel. It was time for Moab and Midian to take the alarm. The hauspices of home were embarrassed and silent; and Balaam, the far famed prophet, or diviner of Mesopotamia, seemed the only character worthy of confidence in so great a crisis of danger; for this man had not been wanting to court fame, and to combine his ministry with his interest. His house was often crowded with embassied fools, who sought their help in man, instead of God. But for once he saw an embassy of Moabian princes, encumbered with presents, enter his house. He courteously invited them to repose for the night, that he might have time to teaze and importune heaven for revelations; for God seldom employs an unsanctified prophet, unless he willingly offers himself. And the Lord at once said, Thou shalt not go; thou shalt not curse the people, for they are blessed. The prophet obeyed, and declared that all the treasures of Moab would not induce him to violate the divine command. This disinterestedness imposed by divine fear, perfected the celebrity of his character. It was resolved to send again, and to double the embassy and the presents. The wavering prophet now began in his heart to importune the Lord for permission to go; and the Lord in anger permitted him to follow his inclination, provided he would speak his words. On the road he farther enforced obedience by an angel, whose brandishing sword menaced the prophet with death. What instruction does this character convey to certain ministers of religion, who seek popularity and gain from their profession, and whose reverence for God is extorted by fear. And what idea must Moab have formed of Balaams God, when a double present could make him change his mind!

Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Numbers 22 – 24

These three chapters form a distinct section of our book – a truly marvellous section, abounding in rich and varied instruction. In it we have presented to us, first, the covetous prophet; and, secondly, His sublime prophecies. There is something peculiarly awful in the case of Balaam. He evidently loved money – no uncommon love, alas! in our own day. Balak’s gold and silver proved a very tempting bait to the wretched man – a bait too tempting to be resisted. Satan knew his man, and the price at which he could be purchased.

If Balaam’s heart had been right with God, he would have made very short work with Balak’s message; indeed it would not have cost him a moment’s consideration to send a reply. But Balaam’s heart was all wrong, and we see him, in chapter 22 in the melancholy condition of one acted upon by conflicting feelings. His heart was bent upon going, because it was bent upon the silver and gold; But, at the same time, there was a sort of reference to God – an appearance of religiousness put on as a cloak to cover his covetous practices. He longed for the money; but he would fain lay hold of it after a religious fashion. Miserable man! most miserable! His name stands on the page of inspiration as the expression of one very dark and awful stage of man’s downward history. “Woe unto them,” says Jude, “for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward and perished in the gainsaying of Core.” Peter, too, presents Balaam as a prominent figure in one of the very darkest pictures of fallen humanity – a model on which some of the vilest characters are formed. He speaks of those “having eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin; beguiling unstable souls; an heart they have exercised with covetous practices; cursed children: which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness; but was rebuked for his iniquity: the dumb ass speaking with man’s voice forbad the madness of the prophet.” 2 Peter 2: 14-16.

These passages are solemnly conclusive as to the true character and spirit of Balaam. His heart was set upon money – “he loved the wages of unrighteousness,” and his history has been written by the pen of the Holy Ghost, as an awful warning to all professors to beware of covetousness which is idolatry. We shall not dwell further upon the sad story. The reader may pause for a few moments, and gaze upon the picture presented in Numbers 22. He may study the two prominent figures, the crafty king, and the covetous self-willed prophet; and we doubt not he will rise up from the study with a deepened sense of the evil of covetousness, the great moral danger of setting the heart’s affections upon this world’s riches, and the deep blessedness of having the fear of God before our eyes.

We shall now proceed to examine those marvellous prophecies delivered by Balaam in the audience of Balak, king of the Moabites.

It is profoundly interesting to witness the scene enacted on the high places of Baal, to mark the grand question at stake, to listen to the speakers, to be admitted behind the scenes on such a momentous occasion. How little did Israel know or imagine what was going on between Jehovah and the enemy. It may be they were murmuring in their tents at the very moment in the which God was setting forth their perfection by the tongue of the covetous prophet. Balak would fain have Israel cursed; But, Blessed Be God, He will not suffer any one to curse His people. He may have to deal with them Himself, in secret, about many things; but He will not suffer another to move his tongue against them. He may have to expose them to themselves; but He will not allow a stranger to expose them.

This is a point of deepest interest. The great question is not so much what the enemy may think of God’s people, or what they may think about themselves, or what they may think of one another. the real – the All-important question is, What does God think about them? He knows exactly all that concerns them; all that they are; all that they have done; all that is in them. Everything stands clearly revealed to His all penetrating eye. The deepest secrets of the heart, of the nature, and of the life, are all known to him. Neither angels, men, nor devils know us as God knows us. God knows us perfectly; and it is with Him we have to do, and we can say, in the triumphant language of the apostle,” If God be for us, who can be against us? (Rom. 8) God sees us, thinks of us, speaks about us, acts towards us, according to what He Himself has made us, and wrought for us – according to the perfection of His own work. “Beholders many faults may find;” but, as regards our standing, our God sees us only in the comeliness of Christ; we are perfect in Him. When God looks at His people, He beholds in them His own workmanship; and it is to the glory of His holy name, and to the praise of His salvation, that not a blemish should be seen on those who are His – those whom He, in sovereign grace, has made His own. His character, His name, His glory, and the perfection of His work are all involved in the standing of those with whom He has linked Himself.

Hence, therefore, the moment any enemy or accuser enters the scene, Jehovah places Himself in front to receive and answer the accusation; and His answer is always founded, not upon what His people are in themselves, but upon what He has made them through the perfection of His own work. His glory is linked with them, and, in vindicating them, He maintains His own glory. He places himself between them and every accusing tongue. His glory demands that they should be presented in all the comeliness which He has put upon them. If the enemy comes to curse and accuse, Jehovah answers him by pouring forth the rich current of His everlasting complacency in those whom He has chosen for Himself, and whom He has made fit to be in His presence for ever.

All this is strikingly illustrated in the third chapter of the prophet Zechariah. There, too, the enemy presents himself to resist the representative of the people of God. How does God answer him? Simply by cleansing, clothing, and crowning the one whom Satan would fain curse and accuse, so that Satan has not a word to say. He is silenced for ever. The filthy garments are gone, and he that was a brand is become a mitred priest – he who was only fit for the flames of hell is now fitted to walk up and down in the courts of the Lord.

So also when we turn to the Book of Canticles we see the same thing. There the Bridegroom, in contemplating the bride, declares to her, “Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee.” (Cant. 4: 7) She, in speaking of herself, can only exclaim “I am black.” (Cant. 1: 5, 6) So also in John 13 the Lord Jesus looks at His disciples, and pronounces them “Clean every whit;” although, in a few hours afterwards, one of them was to curse and swear that he did not know Him. So vast is the difference between what we are in ourselves and what we are in Christ – between our positive standing and our possible state.

Should this glorious truth as to the perfection of our standing make us careless as to our practical state? Far away be the monstrous thought! Nay, the knowledge of our absolutely settled and perfect position in Christ is the very thing which the Holy Ghost makes use of in order to raise the standard of practice. Hearken to those powerful words from the pen of the inspired apostle, “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. when Christ, our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. Mortify therefore your members,” &c. (Col. 1 – 5.) We must never measure the standing by the state, but always judge the state by the standing. To lower the standing because of the state, is to give the death-blow to all progress in practical Christianity.

The foregoing line of truth is most forcibly illustrated in Balaam’s four parables. To speak after the manner of men, we never should have had such a glorious view of Israel, as seen in “The vision of the Almighty” – “from the top of the rocks” – by one “having his eyes open,” had not Balak sought to curse them. Jehovah, blessed be His name, can, very speedily, open a man’s eyes to the true state of the case, in reference to the standing of His people, and His judgement respecting them. He claims the privilege of setting forth His thoughts about them. Balak and Balaam with “all the princes of Moab” may assemble to hear Israel cursed and defied; they may “build seven altars,” and “offer a bullock and a. lamb on every altar;” Balak’s silver and gold may glitter under the covetous gaze of the false prophet; but act all the powers of earth and hell, men and devils combined, in their dark and terrible array, can evoke a single breath of curse or accusation against the Israel of God. As well might the enemy have sought to point out a flaw in that fair creation which God had pronounced “very good,” as to fasten an accusation upon the redeemed of the Lord. Oh! no; they shine in all the comeliness which He has put upon them, and all that is needed, in order to see them thus, is to mount to “the top of the rocks” – to have “the eyes open” to look at them from His point of view, so that we may see them in “the vision of the Almighty.”

Having thus taken a general survey of the contents of these remarkable chapters, we shall briefly glance at each of the four parables in particular. We shall find a distinct point in each – a distinct feature in the character and condition of the people, as seen in “The vision of the Almighty.”

In the first of Balaam’s wonderful parables, we have the marked separation of God’s people from all the nations, most distinctly set forth. “How shall I curse, whom God hath not cursed? or how shall I defy, whom the Lord hath not defied? For from the top of the rocks I see him, and from the hills I behold him: lo, the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations. Who can count the dust of Jacob, and the number of the fourth part of Israel Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his.”*

{*Poor, wretched Balaam! miserable man! He would fain die the death of the righteous. Many there are who would say the same; but they forget that the way” to die the death of the righteous” is to possess and exhibit the life of the righteous. Many – alas! how many – would like to die the death who do not live the life. Many would like to possess Balak’s silver and gold, and yet be enrolled amongst the Israel of God. Vain thought! Fatal delusion! We cannot serve God and Mammon.}

Here we have Israel singled out, and partitioned off to be a separated and peculiar people – a people who, according to the divine thought concerning them, were never, at any time, on any ground, or for any object Whatsoever, to be mingled with or reckoned amongst the nations. “The people shall dwell alone.” This is distinct and emphatic. It is true of the literal seed of Abraham, and true Of all believers now. Immense practical results flow out of this great principle. God’s people are to be separated unto Him, not on the ground of being better than others, but simply on the ground of what God is, and of what He would ever have His people to be. We shall not pursue this point further just now; but the reader would do well to examine it thoroughly in the light of the divine word. “The people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations.” Numbers 23: 8, 9.

But if Jehovah, in His sovereign grace, is pleased to link Himself with a people; if He calls them out to be a separate people, in the world – to “dwell alone,” and shine for Him in the midst of those who are still “sitting in darkness and the shadow of death,” He can only have them in such a condition as suits Himself. He must make them such as He would have them to be – such as shall be to the praise of His great and glorious name. Hence, in the second parable, the prophet is made to tell out, not merely the negative, but the positive condition of the people. “And he took up his parable and said, rise up, Balak, and hear; hearken unto me, thou son of Zippor: God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good? Behold, I have received commandment to bless; and he hath blessed; and I cannot reverse it. He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel: the Lord his God is with him, and the shout of a king is among them. God brought them out of Egypt; he hath as it were the strength of an unicorn. Surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel: according to this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, What hath God wrought [not what hath Israel wrought?] Behold, the people shall rise up as a great lion, and lift up himself as a young lion: he shall not lie down until he eat of the prey, and drink the blood of the slain.” Num. 23: 18-24.

Here we find ourselves on truly elevated ground, and on ground as solid as it is elevated. This is, in truth “The top of the rocks” – the pure air and wide range of “the hills,” where the people of God are seen only in “the vision of the Almighty” – seen as He sees them, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing – all their deformities hidden from view – all His comeliness seen upon them.

In this very sublime parable, Israel’s blessedness and security are made to depend, not on themselves, but upon the truth and faithfulness of Jehovah. “God is not a man that he should lie; neither the son of man that he should repent.” This places Israel upon safe ground. God must be true to Himself. Is there any power that can possibly prevent Him from fulfilling His word and oath? Surely not. “He hath blessed; and I cannot reverse it.” God will not, and Satan can not reverse the blessing.

Thus all is settled. “It is ordered in all things and sure.” In the previous parable, it was, “God hath not cursed.” Here it is, “He hath blessed.” There is very manifest advance. As Balak conducts the money-loving prophet from place to place, Jehovah takes occasion to bring out fresh features of beauty in His people, and fresh points of security in their position. Thus it is not merely that they are a separated people dwelling alone; but they are a justified people, having the Lord their God with them, and the shout of a king among them. “He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel.” The enemy may say, “There is iniquity and perverseness there all the while.” Yes, but who can make Jehovah behold it, when He Himself has been pleased to blot it all out as a thick cloud for His name’s sake? If He has cast it behind His back, who can bring it before His face “It is God that justifieth; who is he that condemneth?” God sees His people so thoroughly delivered from all that could be against them, that He can take up His abode in their midst, and cause His voice to be heard amongst them.

Well, therefore may we exclaim “What hath God wrought” It is not “What hath Israel wrought!” Balak and Balaam would have found plenty to do in the way of cursing, had Israel’s work been in question. The Lord be praised, it is on what He hath wrought that His people stand, and their foundation is as stable as the throne of God. “If God be for us, who can be against us” If God stands right between us and every foe, what have we to fear? If He undertakes, on our behalf, to answer every accuser, then, assuredly, perfect peace is our portion.

However, the king of Moab still fondly hoped and sedulously sought to gain his end. And, doubtless, Balaam did the same, for they were leagued together against the Israel of God, thus reminding us forcibly of the beast and the false prophet, who are yet to arise and play an awfully solemn part in connection with Israel’s future, as presented on the apocalyptic page.

“And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments [what a dreadful disclosure is here] but he set his face toward the wilderness. And Balaam lifted up his eyes, and he saw Israel abiding in His tents, according to their tribes; and the Spirit of God came upon him. And he took up his parable, and said, Balaam the son of Beor hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said, he hath said, which heard the words of God, which saw the vision, of the Almighty, falling into a trance, but having his eyes open: How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel! As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the river’s side, as the trees of lign aloes which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar trees beside the waters. He shall pour the water out of his buckets, and his seed shall be in many waters, and his king shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom shall be exalted. God brought him forth out of Egypt; he hath, as it were, the strength of an unicorn: he shall eat up the nations his enemies [terrible announcement for Balak!] and shall break their bones, and pierce them through with his arrows. He couched, he lay down as a lion, and as a great lion: who shall stir him up? Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee.” Numbers 24: 1-9.

“Higher and higher yet” is surely the motto here. we may well shout “Excelsior,” as we mount up to the top of the rocks, and hearken to those brilliant utterances which the false prophet was forced to give out. It was better and better for Israel – worse and worse for Balak. He had to stand by and not only hear Israel “blessed,” but hear himself “cursed” for seeking to curse them.

But let us particularly notice the rich grace that shines in this third parable. “How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel!” If one had gone down to examine those tents and tabernacles, In “the vision” of man they might have appeared “Black as the tents of Kedar.” But, looked at in ‘the vision of the Almighty,” they were “goodly,” and whoever did not see them thus needed to have “his eyes opened” If I am looking at the people of God “from the top of the rocks,” I shall see them as God sees them, and that is as clothed with all the comeliness of Christ – complete in Him – accepted in the Beloved. This is what will enable me to get on with them, to work with them, to have fellowship with them, to rise above their points and angles, blots and blemishes, failures and infirmities.* If I do not contemplate them from this lofty – this divine ground, I shall be sure to fix my eye on some little flaw or other, which will completely mar my communion, and alienate my affections.

{*The statement in the text does not, by any means, touch the question of discipline in the house of God. We are bound to judge moral evil and doctrinal error. 1 Cor. 5: 12, 13.}

In Israel’s case, we shall see, in the very next chapter, what terrible evil they fell into. Did this alter Jehovah’s judgement? Surely not. “He is not the son of men that he should repent.” He judged and chastened them for their evil, because He is holy, and can never sanction, in His people, anything that is contrary to His nature. But He could never reverse His judgement respecting them. He knew all about them. He knew what they were and what they would do; but yet He said, “I have not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither have I seen perverseness in Israel. How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel!” Was this making light of their evil? The thought were blasphemy. He could chasten them for their sins; but the moment an enemy comes forth to curse or accuse, He stands in front of His people and says, “I see no iniquity” – “How goodly are their tents”

Reader, dost thou think that such views of divine grace will minister to a spirit of Antinomianism? Far Be the thought! we may rest assured we are never further away from the region of that terrible evil than when we are breathing the pure and holy atmosphere of “the top of the rocks” – that high ground from whence God’s people are viewed, not as they are in themselves, but as they are in Christ – not according to the thoughts of man, but according to the thoughts of God. And, furthermore, we may say that the only true and effectual mode of raising the standard of moral conduct is to abide in the faith of this most precious and tranquillising truth, that God sees us perfect in Christ.

But we must take one more glance at our third parable. Not only are Israel’s tents seen to be goodly in the eyes of Jehovah, but the people themselves are presented to us as abiding fast by those ancient sources of grace and living ministry which are found in God. “As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the river’s side, as the trees of lign aloes which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar trees beside the waters.” How exquisite! How perfectly beautiful! And only to think that we are indebted to the godless confederacy between Balak and Balaam for those sublime utterances!

But there is more than this. Not only is Israel seen drinking at those everlasting well-springs of grace and salvation, But, as must ever be the case, as a channel of blessing to others. “He shall pour the water out of his buckets.” It is the fixed purpose of God that Israel’s twelve tribes shall yet be a medium of rich blessing to all the ends of the earth. This we learn from such scriptures as Ezekiel 47 and Zechariah 14, on which we do not now attempt to dwell; we merely refer to them as showing the marvellous fullness and beauty of these glorious parables. The reader may meditate, with much spiritual profit, upon these and kindred scriptures; but let him carefully guard against the fatal system falsely called spiritualising, Which, in fact, consists mainly in applying to the professing church all the special blessings of the house of Israel, while, to the latter, are left only the curses of a broken law. We may rest assured that God will not sanction any such system as this. Israel is beloved for the fathers’ sakes; and “the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.” Romans 11.

We shall close this section by a brief reference to Balaam’s last parable. Balak, having beard such a glowing testimony to Israel’s future, and the overthrow of all their enemies, was not only sorely disappointed, but greatly enraged; “And Balak’s anger was kindled against Balaam, and he smote his hands together: and Balak said unto Balaam, I called thee to curse mine enemies, and, behold, thou hast altogether blessed them these three times. Therefore now flee thou to thy place: I thought to promote thee unto great honour; [?] But, lo, the Lord hath kept thee back from honour. and Balaam said unto Balak, Spake I not also to thy messengers which thou sentest unto me, saying, If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold [the very thing his poor heart craved intensely,] I cannot go beyond the commandment of the Lord, to do either good or bad of mine own mind; but what the Lord saith, that will I speak. And now, behold, I go unto my people: come therefore, and I will advertise thee what this people shall do to thy people in the latter days. [This was coming to close quarters.] And he took up his parable, and said, Balaam the son of Beor hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said: he hath said, which heard the words of God, and knew the knowledge of the most High, which saw the vision of the Almighty, falling into a trance, but having his eyes open: I shall see him, but not now: I shall behold him, but not nigh: [tremendous fact for Balaam!] there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel, and shall smite the corners of Moab, and destroy all the children of Sheth.” Verse 10-17.

This gives great completeness to the subject of these parables. The top-stone is here laid on the magnificent superstructure. It is, in good truth, grace and glory. In the first parable we see the absolute separation of the people; in the second, their perfect justification; in the third, their moral beauty and fruitfulness; and, now, in the fourth, we stand on the very summit of the hills – on the loftiest crag of the rocks, and survey the wide plains of glory in all their length and breadth, stretching away into a boundless future. We see the Lion of the tribe of Judah crouching; we hear his roar; we see Him seizing upon all his enemies, and crushing them to atoms. The Star of Jacob rises to set no more. The true David ascends the throne of His father, Israel is pre-eminent in the earth, and all his enemies are covered with shame and everlasting contempt.

It is impossible to conceive anything more magnificent than these parables; and they are all the more remarkable as coming at the very close of Israel’s desert wanderings, during which they had given such ample proof of what they were – of what materials they were made – and what their capabilities and tendencies were. But God was above all, and nothing changeth His affection. Whom He loves, and as He loves, He loves to the end; and hence the league between the typical “beast and false prophet” proved abortive. Israel was blessed of God and not to be cursed of any. “And Balaam rose up, and went, and returned to his place: and Balak also went his way.”

Fuente: Mackintosh’s Notes on the Pentateuch

Num 22:1-4. Moabs Fear of Israel.Of these verses I comes from P, the rest from JE (the presence of both constituents being shown by the repetitions in Num 22:3). As the Moabites were great breeders of sheep (2Ki 3:4), they feared that the pasturage would not suffice for both themselves and Israel (likewise a pastoral people). The reference in Num 22:4 (and also Num 22:7) to Midian is probably due to an editor who wished to bring Ps allusions to Balaam in Num 31:8; Num 31:16 into connexion with the present story.

Num 22:1. beyond the Jordan: i.e. E. of the river, described from the point of view of a resident on the W. of it.

Num 22:3. was distressed because of: better, loathed.

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

BALAK HIRING BALAAM

(vs.1-21)

Still within Moab, Israel moved again to the plains and camped near Jordan, across from Jericho. Moab had no power to withstand them, however, though Balak, king of Moab, was in terror of them because of their great number (v.3).

He saw his only hopeful resource to be in a man who had a reputation of great success in occult practices, Balaam, the son of Beor. Balak sent messengers to Balaam to urge him to come and put a curse upon the people who had come from Egypt, so that Balak might be able to defeat them and drive them out of his land. For he said he understood that both Balaam’s blessings and his curses were effective (v.6). Balaam was clearly dependent on satanic power, though he evidently did not realize this himself unless he knew he was guilty of deliberate deception.

The messengers delivered the message to Balaam, who told them to stay the night and he would give them an answer as the Lord directed him. He could use the Lord’s name in this way, though he did not even intend to really seek the Lord’s name in this way, though he did not even intend to really seek the Lord’s guidance, but to receive an answer from the occult power he was accustomed to. Chapter 24:1 tells us this, that he was looking for enchantments as a sorcerer. But God intervened, coming to Balaam to ask who these messengers were. Balaam answered that they had come from Balak who wanted Balaam to curse a people come from Egypt (vs.10-11). Neither Balak nor Balaam used the peoples’ name “Israel,” for they were likely fearful of that name, which means “a prince with God.” But God spoke decisively to Balaam, “You shall not go with them; you shall not curse the people, for they are blessed” (v.12).

When God had told Balaam not to go with the princes of Moab, Balaam realized he was helpless without a supernatural power to back him up, so he could only tell Balak’s messengers that the Lord refused to give him permission to go with them (v.13). They returned to tell Balak that Balaam refused his offer. Balak sent other princes more honorable and more numerous than the first, to urge Balaam to allow nothing to stop him from coming, and promising him great reward for doing so (vs.15-17).

Balaam’s reply to them was plausible and sanctimonious, to the effect that, no matter how great reward Balak would give him, Balaam could not go beyond the word of the Lord his God. But if he really believed the word of the Lord, he would have told them that God’s word had already been given, and this was final: the people must not be cursed, for they are blessed. However, Balaam was still hopeful of a reward, and told the messengers he would inquire again of the Lord (v.19), for a false prophet considers that the Lord may change His mind, as do false gods, for his usual contact was with evil spirits, not the Lord.

God again intervened and because Balaam wanted to go. God told him to do so, but that he must speak only what God told him to. How little Balaam knew what would be the consequences of not bowing to God’s first word to him! If after God has expressed His will, we still want our own way, God may likely allow us to have our way in order that we may learn by experience the folly of our own self-will.

A DONKEY SPEAKING

(vs.22-35)

God did not intend Balaam to take the journey without understanding that he was disobeying His word as He had given it at the first. Therefore, in anger against Balaam, He had the Angel of the Lord stand in his way as he rode on a donkey. The donkey saw the Angel with a sword drawn, and turned to the side into a field. Balaam did not see the Angel, and he angrily struck the donkey to turn it back to the road (v.23). The Angel then took another stand where there were walls on both sides, and the donkey, trying to avoid the Angel, crushed Balaam’s foot against a wall. Again Balaam struck the donkey (v.25), when he ought to have realized that God was dealing with him in some serious way.

The Angel then chose a more narrow spot still, where the donkey could not turn either way, and the donkey simply laid down. But rather than even questioning in his mind why these things had happened, Balaam in a bad temper struck the donkey again with his staff (v.27). Then God put words into the mouth of the donkey, asking Balaam why he had struck her these three times. Even this amazing miracle had no effect on Balaam, for he replied in anger to the donkey that he wished he had a sword with which to kill her! Though God had given Balaam several opportunities to realize that He Himself was intervening to awaken Balaam to a sense of his own folly, Balaam was totally insensitive to this, which would not have been the case if he were a true prophet of God.

Again the donkey spoke to him, asking him if she had ever, in all his experience with her, done what she had done that day (v.30). He answered “No,” but seemed still too dense to realize there was a special reason for this happening. God was not in his thoughts.

Finally the Lord opened Balaam’s eyes so that he saw the Angel standing in the way with a drawn sword in his hand (v.31). In shocked terror Balaam fell on his face. The Angel then reproved the bad temper of Balaam in striking his donkey, telling him that if the donkey had not avoided the Angel, He would have killed Balaam and spared the donkey (vs.32-33). What a lesson is this, that an unbeliever is more ignorant as regards God than a beast!

Balaam acknowledged that he had sinned (v.34), but let himself down easily in pleading his ignorance of the Angel standing in the way. But he was not ignorant of the fact that God had forbidden him to curse Israel, so that his way was perverse before the Lord. He still did not decide to bless Israel, but offered to turn back if God was displeased. He had before been told of God’s displeasure against any cursing of Israel, but he had no desire to take God’s viewpoint himself.

The Angel of the Lord told him to go, however, with the absolute command that he speak only what the Angel spoke to him (v.35). Notice that this indicates that in the Old Testament the term “The Angel of the Lord” refers to the Lord Himself, whose words Balaam must speak.

Balak came to meet the false prophet, remonstrating with him because he had not come before, since Balak was able to give him great honor (v.37). Balaam answered that he had no power even to speak but must receive his words from God. He needed a supernatural power by which to speak, and he called this power “God,” though he did not know the true God. Balak responded by offering oxen and sheep (v.40), likely as a bribe to get Balaam’s god on his side.

Fuente: Grant’s Commentary on the Bible

22:1 And the children of Israel set forward, and pitched in the plains of Moab on {a} this side Jordan [by] Jericho.

(a) Being at Jericho, it was beyond the Jordan, but where the Israelites were, it was on this side.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

Moab’s attempts to curse Israel chs. 22-24

This section of the book shows what a threat Israel had become to the other peoples in the area that they passed through on the way to the Promised Land. The Moabites’ attempts to frustrate the fulfillment of God’s promise to give Israel the land demonstrate His power in overcoming these enemies and His faithfulness (cf. Gen 12:3).

Balak’s arrangement with Balaam ch. 22

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

Moab had not attacked Israel as the people of God had moved north along Moab’s eastern border. In fact the Moabites sold the Israelites bread and water (Deu 2:28-29). The Moabites probably counted on Sihon, who had formerly defeated Moab, to take care of Israel too (Num 21:26; cf. Jdg 11:25). When Sihon lost, Balak looked for other help. He allied with his neighbors to the southeast, the Midianites.

Israel’s victories over the two mighty Amorite kings filled Balak, the King of Moab, with fear (Num 22:5-6). He allied with Midian and sent for Balaam, a famous magician, to curse the Israelites. Baalam’s town, Pethor (Num 22:5), was probably the Mesopotamian village of Pitru by the Euphrates River (cf. Deu 23:4). [Note: The New Bible Dictionary, 1962 ed., s.v. "Balaam," by A. van Selms.]

Balaam has been a problem for Bible students. On the one hand he appears to have been a pagan, but on the other there are indications that he may have been a believer. Some commentators believe he was an idol-worshipping false prophet whom God compelled against his will to bless Israel. Others hold that he was a true prophet of Yahweh who simply fell before the temptations of ambition and money.

"As a biblical character . . . Balaam appears to be neither fish nor fowl." [Note: Sailhamer, The Pentateuch . . ., p. 405.]

 

"Was he a sinner or saint? . . . The text of chs. 22-24 is not concerned to pronounce on the matter. Balaam’s character is incidental to the story. . . .

 

"As the old saying goes, ’The Lord can strike a mighty blow with a crooked stick,’ . . ." [Note: Ashley, pp. 435, 436.]

Balaam’s name probably came from a Hebrew root meaning "destroyer" or "devourer." His father’s name, Beor, apparently came from another word meaning "to burn," "eat off," or "destroy." The name of Balaam’s father suggests that he may have been a sorcerer and may have given Balaam his power as well as his name at birth. However, Balaam may have received his name later in life when his powers with the spirit world became known. In either case Balaam’s name suggests that he was a veteran conjurer of curses.

The Old Testament never calls Balaam a prophet or seer but a diviner (soothsayer; Jos 13:22). This title never describes true prophets of Yahweh elsewhere. God prohibited divination in Israel (Deu 18:10-13), and the Israelites regarded it as a serious sin (1Sa 15:23; Eze 13:23; 2Ki 17:17) as well as a mark of a false prophet (Eze 13:9; Eze 22:28; Jer 14:14). Balaam customarily sought omens (Num 24:1) to understand the future by divination. He also had a reputation for being able to persuade the gods to take a particular course of action.

Nevertheless Balaam knew Yahweh, submitted to Him, and received revelations from Him (Num 22:8; Num 22:13; Num 22:18-20; Num 22:38; Num 23:5; Num 23:12; Num 23:16; Num 24:1; Num 24:13). There are many indications in the narrative that Balaam genuinely feared Yahweh. He seems to have been sincerely sympathetic with the Israelites, and he praised them (Num 23:10).

Balaam’s behavior is similar to the Jewish exorcists of Jesus’ day who cast out demons in Jesus’ name but did not follow Him (Mar 9:38-39; Luk 9:49). He also resembles Simon Magus who was a sorcerer before he professed faith in Christ and submitted to baptism. Simon’s fascination with supernatural powers and desire for personal gain diverted him from his Christian commitment (Act 8:13).

"Balaam is the pagan counterpart to Moses the man of God. The recovery of prophetic texts of Balaam in Aramaic from the sixth century at Deir-’Allah in Jordan shows how very famous this man was in the ancient Near East, even centuries after his death." [Note: Allen, p. 887. See also Jacob Hoftijzer, "The Prophet Balaam in a 6th-Century Aramaic Inscription," Biblical Archaeologist 39:1 (March 1976):11-17; "Prophecy of Balaam found in Jordan," Bible and Spade 6:4 (Autumn 1977):121-24; Andre Lamaire, "Fragments from the Book of Balaam Found at Deir Alla," Biblical Archaeology Review 11:5 (September-October 1985):27-39; Charles H. Savelle, "Canonical and Extracanonical Portraits of Balaam," Bibliotheca Sacra 166:664 (October-December 2009):387-404.]

Whether Balaam was a true believer or not, his love of money got him in trouble (2Pe 2:15; Jud 1:11). He served Yahweh, but he also wanted the reward that Balak offered him. At best he was double-minded. This characteristic accounts for the instability of his character and makes Balaam hard to classify with certainty (cf. Lot). Balaam later died in the Israelites’ battle with the Midianites (Num 31:8).

Balaam’s importance in Numbers should be obvious in view of the amount of text Moses devoted to his activities (chs. 22-25). His oracles are the centerpiece of this revelation. God announced through these revelations that He would bless Israel and that He would fulfill His promises to the patriarchs. The restatement of these promises was especially appropriate at this moment in Israel’s experience. The nation received a reminder that God would give them the land of Canaan west of the Jordan, not just the territories of Sihon and Og. That these messages had come through a man who was not an Israelite, but received pay to curse Israel from her enemies, would have given the Israelites even greater confidence. The oracles, therefore, not only weakened the will of Israel’s enemies in Moab, Midian, and the other Canaanite nations, but they encouraged the Israelites.

Balak acknowledged Balaam’s power to bring a real curse.

"Balak believed, in common with the whole of the ancient world, in the real power and operation of the curses, anathemas, and incantations pronounced by priests, soothsayers, and goetoe." [Note: Keil and Delitzsch, 3:165.]

This power was real, as is clear from the narrative, though the heathen world may have distorted it.

"The custom of cursing an enemy before battle was widespread in the ancient world . . . ." [Note: Philip, p. 243.]

"In the ancient Near East it was believed that an enemy could be combatted in two ways: with arms or by means of incantations, and if possible by means of a combination of the two. The incantations are based on the concept that a people and its deity constitute a unit; they seek to force, by means of various kinds of magic, the deity of the enemy to withhold his power from his people. Thus the enemy will be powerless and become an easy prey for the opponent. Moab does not dare use the first means, since Israel has already proven to be superior in military power to Sihon, whom Moab had been forced to acknowledge as their superior in the past. This leaves only the second means; they must find the kind of man who in the Euphrates-Tigris valley is called a baru (’seer’). The baru belongs to the priestly class, and his specialty is ’seeing’ what will happen on the basis of phenomena that escape the common person, but are found e.g., in the liver of a ritually slaughtered animal, or in the configuration of drops of oil on water, or in the stars, or in the shape of the clouds. Such barus were believed to be able to influence the will of the gods because of their secret knowledge and mysterious manipulations, and to force the gods to do, or not to do, a given thing." [Note: Noordtzij, p. 199. See also Morris Jastrow Jr., Aspects of Religious Belief and Practice in Babylonia and Assyria, p. 162-74.]

Had Balaam been completely faithful to Yahweh he would have sent the messengers home and refused to entertain them again (Num 22:7-14). Unfortunately his love for reward led him to compromise later.

". . . from the early part of the narrative, when he first encounters the true God in visions, and in the humorous narrative of the journey on the donkey, Balaam begins to learn what for him was a strange, bizarre, even incomprehensible lesson: An encounter with the God of reality was fundamentally different than anything he had ever known." [Note: Allen, p. 887.]

Several types of divination were common in the ancient Near East.

1.    Extispicy was the examination of the entrails of a sacrificed sheep by a trained specialist to determine messages from the gods. The intricate arrangements of the internal organs are what believers in this form of divination regarded as indicative of divine revelation.

 

2.    Astrology studied the arrangements of the moon, sun, meteors, planets, and fixed stars to discover the future. Eclipses were particularly significant.

 

3.    Augury was the study of the appearance, movements, and behavior of birds. The seers supposed the direction and manner of flight of birds was revelatory.

 

4.    Kleromancy was divination by means of lots. The various configurations of symbolic objects, actors, and areas yielded a binary ("yes" or "no") answer to a given question.

 

5.    Oneiromancy was revelation by dreams that sometimes contained verbal communication from a god or non-verbal communication. In the latter type certain colors, animals, or activities corresponded to types of misfortune, happiness, or success.

In all the types of divination, fortunetellers used tricks to deceive and impress their clients. They often clothed their predictions in mysterious ambiguous language to cover possible error. Devout Israelites were to reject divination as a way of discovering the likely outcome of events and to rely on God to make known what He wanted them to know. [Note: See Harry A. Hoffner Jr., "Ancient Views of Prophecy and Fulfillment: Mesopotamia and Asia Minor," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 30:3 (September 1987):257-65.]

Balaam’s mind had apparently been dwelling on the reward Balak’s messengers had mentioned since he named his price in a clever way (Num 22:18-20). He would not go for a large sum, but when his visitors offered a sum larger than what he had mentioned would be inadequate, he reconsidered (Num 22:18).

God evidently allowed Balaam to go with the messengers because He intended to bless Israel (Num 22:20). God had previously prohibited him from going (Num 22:12) because He would not curse Israel. Num 22:12 contains the directive will of God and Num 22:20 the permissive will of God. The change was due to God’s yielding to Balaam’s desire. Compare God’s yielding to Moses’ intercessory prayers and God giving the Israelites meat. The permission of Num 22:20 constituted a test for Balaam, which he failed. Balaam knew the will of God (Num 22:12), but God gave him permission to obey or disobey (Num 22:20).

Strangely Balaam was aware that he must be obedient in revealing God’s message whether for good or ill (Num 22:20). This conviction apparently came to him as a result of God’s changed permission. God seems to have been teaching Balaam by these two words (Num 22:12; Num 22:20) that He is the true God who is flexible but all-powerful. Balaam was learning that Yahweh was not like the lesser spirits with whom he had dealt previously.

"The story of Balaam is thus an example of the folly of attempting to destroy the eternal blessing of the people of the Lord." [Note: Allen, p. 888.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

BALAAM INVOKED

Num 22:1-19

WHILE a part of the army of Israel was engaged in the campaign against Bashan, the tribes remained “in the plains of Moab beyond the Jordan at Jericho.” The topography is given here, as elsewhere, from the point of view of one dwelling in Canaan; and the locality indicated is a level stretch of land, some five or six miles broad, between the river and the hills. In this plain there was ample room for the encampment, while along the Jordan and on the slopes to the east all the produce of field and garden, the spoil of conquest, was at the disposal of the Israelites. They rested therefore, after their long journey, in sight of Canaan, waiting first for the return of the troops, then for the command to advance; and the delay may very likely have extended to several months.

Now the march of Israel had kept to the desert side of Moab, so that the king and people of that land had no reason to complain. But the campaign against the Amorites, ending so quickly and decisively for the invaders, showed what might have taken place if they had attacked Moab, what might yet come to pass if they turned southward instead of crossing the Jordan. And there was great dismay. “Moab was sore afraid of the people, because they were many; and Moab was distressed because of the children of Israel.” Manifestly it would have been unwise for Balak the king of the Moabites to attack Israel single-handed. But others might be enlisted against this new and vigorous enemy, among them the Midianites. And to these Balak turned to consult in the emergency.

By the “Midianites” we must understand the Bedawin of the time, the desert tribes which possibly had their origin in Midian, east of the Elanitic Gulf, but were now spread far and wide. On the borders of Moab a large and important clan of this people fed their flocks; and to their elders Balak appealed. “Now,” he said, “shall this multitude lick up all that is round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field.” The result of the consultation was not an expedition of war but one of a quite different kind. Even the wild Bedawin had been dismayed by the firm resolute tread of the Israelites, a people marching on, as no people had ever been seen to march, from far-away Egypt to find a new home. The elders of Moab and of Midian cannot decide on war; but superstition points to another means of attack. May they not obtain a curse against Israel, under the influence of which its strength shall decay? Is there not in Pethor one who knows the God of this people and has the power of dreadful malediction? They will send for him; Balaam shall invoke disaster on the invaders, then peradventure Balak will prevail, and smite them, and drive them out of the land.

There can be no doubt in what direction we are to look for Pethor, the dwelling-place of the great diviner. It is “by the River,” that is to say, by the River Euphrates. It is in Aram, for thence Balaam says Balak has brought him. It is in “the land of the children of Amino,” {Num 22:5} for such is the preferable translation of the words rendered “children of his people.” The situation of Pethor has been made out. “At an early period in Assyrian research,” says Mr. A.H. Sayce, “Pethor was identified by Dr. Hincks with the Pitru of the cuneiform inscriptions. Pitru stood on the western bank of the Euphrates, close to its junction with the Sajur, and a little to the north of the latter. It was consequently only a few miles to the south of the Hittite capital Carchemish. Indeed, Shalmaneser II tells us explicitly that the city was called Pethor by the Hittites. It lay on the main road from east to west, and so occupied a position of military and commercial importance.” Originally an Aramaean town, Pethor had received, on its conquest by the Hittites, a new element of population from that race, and the two peoples lived in it side by side. The Aramaeans of Pethor called themselves “the sons of (the god) Ammo”; and, according to Mr. Sayce, Dr. Neubauer is right in explaining the name of Balaam as a compound of Baal with Ammi, which occurs as a prefix in the Hebrew names Ammiel, Amminadab, and others. It is also worthy of mention that the name of Balaks father-Zippor, or “Bird”-occurs in the notice, still extant, of a despatch sent by the Egyptian government to Palestine in the third year of Menephtah II.

It may be further said with regard to Mr. Sayces valuable work, that he does not attempt to deal particularly with the prophecies of Balaam. “They must,” he says, “be explained by Hebrew philology before the records of the monuments can be called upon to illustrate them. It may be that the text is corrupt; it may be that passages have been added at various times to the original prophecy of the Aramaean seer; these are questions which must be settled before the Assyriologist can determine when it was that the Kenite was carried away captive, or when Asshur himself was afflicted.”

The divination of which so great things were expected by Balak is amply illustrated in the Babylonian remains. Among the Chaldeans the art of divination rested “on the old belief in every object of inanimate nature being possessed or inhabited by a spirit, and the later belief in a higher power, ruling the world and human affairs to the smallest detail, and constantly manifesting itself through all things in nature as through secondary agents, so that nothing whatever could occur without some deeper significance which might be discovered and expounded by specially trained and favoured individuals.” The Chaldeo-Babylonians “not only carefully noted and explained dreams, drew lots in doubtful cases by means of inscribed arrows, interpreted the rustle of trees, the plashing of fountains and murmur of streams, the direction and form of lightnings, not only fancied that they could see things in bowls of water, and in the shifting forms assumed by the flame which consumed sacrifices and the smoke which rose therefrom, and that they could raise and question the spirits of the dead, but drew presages and omens, for good or evil, from the flight of birds, the appearance of the liver, lungs, heart, and bowels of the animals offered in sacrifice and opened for inspection, from the natural defects or monstrosities of babies or the young of animals-in short, from any and everything that they could possibly subject to observation.” There were three classes of wise men, astrologers, sorcerers, and soothsayers; all were in constant demand, and all used rules and principles settled for them by the so-called science which was their study.

We cannot of course affirm that Balaam was one of these Chaldeans, or that his art was precisely of the kind described. He is declared by the narrative to have received communications from God. There can, however, be no doubt that his wide reputation rested on the mystical rites by which he sought his oracles, for these, and not his natural sagacity, would impress the common mind. When the elders of Moab and Midian went to seek him they carried the “rewards of divination” in their hands. It was believed that he might obtain from Jehovah the God of the Israelites some knowledge concerning them on which a powerful curse might be based. If then, in right of his office, he pronounced the malediction, the power of Israel would be taken away. The journey to Pethor was by the oasis of Tadmor and the fords at Carchemish. A considerable time, perhaps a month, would be occupied in going and returning. But there was no other man on whose insight and power dependence could be placed. Those who carried the message were men of rank, who might have gone as ambassadors to a king. It was confidently expected that the soothsayer would at once undertake the important commission.

Arriving at Pethor they find Balaam and convey the message, which ends with the flattering words, “I know that he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou cursest is cursed.” But they have to treat with no vulgar thaumaturgist, no mere weaver of spells and incantations. This is a man of intellectual power, a diplomatist, whose words and proceedings have a tone of high purpose and authority. He hears attentively, but gives no immediate answer. From the first he takes a position fitted to make the ambassadors feel that if he intervenes it will be from higher motives than desire to earn the rewards with which they presume to tempt him. He is indeed a prince of his tribe, and will be moved by nothing less than the oracle of that unseen Being whom the chiefs of Moab and Midian cannot approach. Let the messengers wait, that in the shadow and silence of night Balaam may inquire of Jehovah. His answer shall be in accordance with the solemn, secret word that comes to him from above.

Three of the New Testament writers, the Apostles Peter, John, and Jude, refer to Balaam in terms of reprobation. He is “Balaam the son of Beor who loved the hire of wrongdoing”; he “taught Balak to cast a stumbling-block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit fornication”; he is the type of those who run riotously in the way of error for hire. Gathering up the impressions of his whole life, these passages declare him avaricious and cunningly malignant, a prophet who, perverting his gifts, brought on himself a special judgment. At the outset, however, Balaam does not appear in this light. The pictorial narrative shows a man of imposing personality, who claims the “vision and the faculty Divine.” He seems resolute to keep by the truth rather than gratify any dreams of ambition or win great pecuniary rewards. It is worth while to study a character so mingled, in circumstances that may be called typical of the old world.

Did Balaam enjoy communications with God? Had he real prophetic insight? Or must we hold with some that he only professed to consult Jehovah, and found the answer to his inquiries in the conclusions of his own mind?

It would appear at first sight that Balaam, as a heathen, was separated by a great gulf from the Hebrews. But at the time to which the narrative of Numbers refers, if not at the period of its composition, the boundary line implied by the word “gentile” did not exist. Moses had clearly taught to the Hebrews ethical and religious truths which neighbouring nations saw very indistinctly; and the Israelites were beginning to know themselves a chosen race. Yet Abraham was their father, and other peoples could claim descent from him. Edom, for example, is in Num 20:1-29 acknowledged as Israels brother.

At the stage of history, then, to which our passage belongs, the strongly marked differences between nation and nation afterwards insisted upon were not realised. And this is so far true in respect of religion, that though the Kenites, a Midianite tribe, did not follow the way of Jehovah, Moses, as we have seen, had no difficulty in joining with them in a sacrificial feast in honour of the Lord of Heaven. If beyond the circle of the tribes any one, impressed by their history, attributing their rescue from Egypt and their successful march towards Canaan to Jehovah, acknowledged His greatness and began to approach Him with sacred rites, no doubt would have existed among the Hebrews generally that by such a man their God could be found and His favour won. The narrative before us, stating that Jehovah called Balaam and communicated with him, simply declares what the more patriotic and religious Israelites would have had no difficulty whatever in receiving. This diviner of Pethor had heard of Israels deliverance at the Red Sea, had followed with keen interest the progress of the tribes, had made himself acquainted with the law of Jehovah given at Sinai. Why, then, should he not worship Jehovah? And why should not Jehovah speak to him, make revelations to him of things still in the future?

So far, however, we touch only the beliefs, or possible beliefs, of the Israelites. The facts may be quite different. We are in the way of considering revelations of the Divine will to have been so uncommon and sacred that a man of very high character alone could have enjoyed them. If indeed God spoke to Balaam, it must have been in another way than to Abraham, Moses, Elijah. Especially since his history shows him to have been a man bad at heart, we are inclined to pronounce his consultation of God mere pretence; and as for his prophecies, did he not simply hear of Israels greatness and forecast the future with the prescience of a clear calculator, who used his eyes and reason to good purpose? But with this the gist of the Bible narrative cannot be said to agree. It seems to be certainly implied that God did speak to Balaam, open his eyes, unfold to him things far off in the future. Although many cases might be adduced which go to prove that an acute man of the world, weighing causes and tracing the drift of things, may show wonderful foresight, yet the language here used points to more than that. It seems to mean that Divine illumination was given to one beyond the circle of the chosen people, to one who from the first was no friend of God and at the last showed himself a malicious enemy of Israel. And the doctrine must be that any one who, looking beneath the surface of things, studying the character of men and peoples, connects the past and the present and anticipates events which are still far off, has his illumination from God. Further it is taught that in a real sense the man who has some conception of Providence, though he is false at heart, may yet, in the sincerity of an hour, in the serious thought roused at some crisis, have a word of counsel, a clear indication of duty, a revelation of things to come which others do not receive. Still we must interpret the words, “God said to Balaam,” in a way which will not lift him into the ranks of the heaven-directed who are in any sense mediators, prophets of the age and the world. This man has his knowledge so far from above, has his insight as a true gift, receives the word of prohibition, of warning, veritably from a Divine source. Yet he does not stand in a high position, lifted above other men. The whole history is of value for our instruction, because as surely as Balaam received directions from God, we also receive them through conscience; because as he opposed God so we also may oppose Him in self-will or the evil mind. When we are urged to do what is right the urgency is Divine, as certainly as if a voice from heaven fell on our ears. Only when we realise this do we feel aright the solemnity of obligation. If. we fail to ascribe our knowledge and our sense of duty to God, it will seem a light thing to neglect the eternal laws by which we should be ruled.

Reaching Pethor the messengers of Balak state their request. Instead of going with them at once, as a false man might be expected to do, Balaam declares that he must consult Jehovah; and the result of his consultation is that he declines. In the morning he says to the princes of Moab, “Get you into your land, for Jehovah refuseth to give me leave to go with you.” The question whether Israel was a fit subject for blessing or for cursing has been practically settled in his mind. When he lays the matter before Jehovah, as he knows Him through His law and the history of Israel, it is made unmistakable that no malediction is to be pronounced. But what, then, was the secret of Balaams delay, of his consultation of the oracle? If it had been an absolute determination to serve the interests of righteousness, he could now frame his reply to the princes in such a way that they would understand it to be final. He would not say demurely, “Jehovah refuseth to give me leave,” for these words allow the belief that somehow the power to curse may yet be obtained. Balaam permits himself to hope that he will find some flaw in Israels relation to Jehovah which will leave room for a malediction. He delays, and professes to consult God, diplomatically, that even by the refusal his fame as a diviner acquainted with the Unseen Power may be established. And the answer he returns means that his own reputation is not to be hazarded by any divination which Jehovah will discredit.

Had not the future proceedings of Balaam cast their shadow back on his career and words, he might have been pronounced at the outset a man of integrity. The rewards offered him were probably large. We may believe that whatever reputation Balaam had previously enjoyed this embassy was the most important ever sent to him, the greatest tribute to his fame. And we would have been inclined to say, Here is an example of conscientiousness. Balaam might go with the princes at least, though he can pronounce no curse on Israel; but he does not; he is too honourable even to profess the desire to gratify his patrons. This favourable judgment, however, is forbidden. It was of himself, of his fame and position, he was thinking. He would not have gone in any case unless it had precisely suited his purpose. Understanding that Israel is not to be cursed, he manages so that his refusal shall enhance his own reputation.

Still, the small amount of sincerity there is in Balaam, superimposed on his self-love and diplomacy, is in contrast to the utter want of it which men often show. They are of a party, and at the first call they will make shift to denounce whatever their leaders bid them denounce. There is no pretence even of waiting for a night to have time for quiet reflection; much less any anxious thought regarding Divine providence, righteousness, mercy, by means of which duty may be discovered. It is possible for men to appear earnest defenders of religion who never go even as far as Balaam went in seeking the guidance of truth and principle. They pass judgments with a haste that shows the shallow heart. Tempted by some envious Balak within, even when no appeal is made, they set up as soothsayers and take on them to prophesy evil.

The messengers of Balak returned with the report of their disappointment; but what they had to say caused, as Balaam no doubt intended, greater anxiety than ever to secure his services. One who was so lofty, and at the same time so much in the secrets of the God Israel worshipped, was indeed a most valuable ally, and his help must be obtained at any price. Did he say that Jehovah refused to give him leave? Balak will assure him of rewards which no God of Israel can give, very great recompense, tangible, immediate. Other messengers are sent, more, and more honourable than the former, and they carry very flattering offers. If he will curse Israel, Balak the son of Zippor will do for him whatever he desires. Nothing is to hinder him from coming; neither the prohibition of Jehovah nor anything else.

The conduct of Balaam when he is appealed to the second time confirms the judgment it has been found necessary to pronounce on his character. He behaves like a man who has been expecting, and yet, with what conscience he has, dreading, the renewed invitation. He appears indeed to be emphatic in declaring his superiority to the offer of reward: “If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the word of the Lord my God, to do less or more.” The air of incorruptible virtue is kept. The Moabites and Midianites are to understand that they have to do with a man whose whole soul is set on truth. And the protestation would deceive us-only Balaam does not dismiss the men. Giving him all credit for an intention still to keep right with the Almighty, or, shall we say? allowing that he was too clever a man to imperil his reputation by intending a curse which would not be followed by any ill effects, we find immediately that he is unwilling to let the opportunity pass. He asks the messengers to tarry for the night, that he may again consult Jehovah in the matter. He has already seen the truth as to Israel, the promise of its splendid career. Yet he will repeat the inquiry, ask once more regarding the prospect he has distinctly seen. It is ambition that moves him, and perhaps, along with that, avarice. May he not be able to say something that will sound like a curse, something on which Balak shall fasten in the belief that it gives him power against Israel? It would, at all events, be a gratification to travel in state across the desert, to appear amongst the princes of Midian and Moab as the man after whom kings had to run.. And there was the possibility that without absolutely forfeiting his reputation as a seer of things to come he might obtain at least a portion of the reward. He will at all events do the messengers the honour of seeking another oracle for their sakes, though he dishonours the name of God from whom he seeks it.

It was possible for Balaam during the interval of the two embassies to recover himself. He was one who could understand integrity, who knew enough of the conditions of success to see that absolute consistency is the only strength. There was a straight way which he might have followed. But temptation pressed on him. Tired of the narrow field within which he had as yet exercised his powers, he saw one wider and more splendid open to him. The wealth was no small inducement. He was in the way of divining for reward; this was the greatest ever in his reach. And Balaam, knowing well how base and vain his pretext was, resigned his integrity, even the pretence of it, when he bade the messengers wait.

Yet was his fault a singular one? We cannot say that he showed extraordinary covetousness in desiring Balaks silver and gold. For the time, in the circumstances, scarcely anything else could be expected of a man like him. To judge Balaam by modern Christian rules is an anachronism. The remarkable thing is to find one of his class at all scrupulous about the means he employs to promote himself. We say that he was guilty of perverting conscience; and so he was. But his conscience did not see or speak so clearly as ours. And are not Christian men liable to have their heads turned by the countenance of those in a higher rank than their own, and to succumb to the enticement of great wealth? When they are asked to reconsider a decision they know to be right, do they never tamper with conscience? It is one of the commonest things to find persons nominally religious indulging in the same desires and acting in the same way as Balaam. But the earthly craving that makes any one go back to God a second time about a matter which ought to have been settled once for all, involves the greatest moral hazard. No human being, in any situation, has spiritual strength to spare. There is a point where he who hesitates casts the whole of his life into the balance. For young persons, especially, a great warning, often needed, lies here.

The fault of Balaam, a fault of which he could not fail to be conscious, was that of tampering with his inspiration. The insight he possessed-and which he valued-had come through his sincere estimate of things and men apart from any pressure brought to bear on him to take a side either for money or for fame. His mind using perfect freedom, travelling in a way of sincere judgment, had reached a height from which he enjoyed wide prospects. As a man and a prophet he had his standing through this superiority to the motives that swayed vulgar minds. The admission of sordid influences, whether it began with the visit of Balaks messengers or had been previously allowed, was perhaps the first great error of his life. And it is so in the case of every man who has found the strength of integrity and reached the vision of the true. The Christian who has held himself free from the entanglements of the world, refusing to touch its questionable rewards, or to be influenced by its jealousy and envy, has what may be called his inspiration, though it lifts him to no prophetic height. He has a clear mind, a clear eye. His own way is plain, and he can also see the crookedness of paths which others follow and reckon straight enough. He can go with a firm step and say fearlessly, “Be ye followers of me.” But if the base considerations of gain and loss, of ease or discomfort, of the applause or enmity of other men, intrude, if even in a small way he becomes a man of the world, at once there is declension. He may not be ambitious nor covetous. Yet the withdrawal of his mind from its sole allegiance to God and the righteousness of God tells at once on his moral vision. It is clouded. The oracle becomes ambiguous. He hears two voices, many voices; and the counsels of his mind are confused. Like others, he now takes a crooked course, he feels that he has lost the old firmness of speech and action.

It is a sad thing when one who has felt himself “born to the good, to the perfect,” who has gained the power that comes through reverence, and sees greater power before him, yields to that which is not venerable, not pure. The beginnings of the fatal surrender may be small. Only a throb of self-consciousness and satisfaction when some one speaks a word of flattery or with show of much deference prefers an astute request. Only a disposition to listen when in seeming friendship counsel of a plausible kind is offered, and milder ways of judging are recommended to lessen friction and put an end to discord. Even the strong are so weak, and those who see are so easily blinded, that no one can count himself safe. And indeed it is not the great temptations, like that which came to Balaam, we have chiefly to dread. The very greatness of a bribe and magnificence of an opportunity put conscience on its guard. Peril comes rather when the appeal for charity, or the casuistry of protesting virtue, sends one to reconsider judgment that has been solemnly pronounced by a voice we cannot mistake; when we forget that the matter is only rightly determined for men when it is clearly and irrevocably decided by the law of God, whatever men may think, however they may deplore or rebel.

“Thou and God exist-So think!-for certain; think the mass-mankind-Disparts, disperses, leaves thyself alone! Ask thy lone soul what laws are plain to thee-Thee and no other, -stand or fall by them! That is the part for thee: regard all else For what it may be-Times illusion.”

Men in their need, in their sorrow, their self-esteem, would have the true man revoke his judgment, yield a point at least to their entreaties. He will do them kindness, he will show himself human, reasonable, judicious. But on the other side are those to whom, in showing this consideration, he will be unjust, declaring their honour worthless, their sore struggle a useless waste of strength; and he himself stands before the Judge. The one sure way is that which keeps the life in the line of the statutes of God, and every judgment in full accord with His righteousness.

Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary