Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Numbers 24:1

And when Balaam saw that it pleased the LORD to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments, but he set his face toward the wilderness.

1. he went not, as at the other times, to meet with omens ] The Heb. has a curious idiom which may be rendered either as in R.V. , or ‘as at other times’ (omitting ‘the’), i.e. as was his usual practice on similar occasions. In either case the verse cannot be from the same writer as that of ch. 23, for on the one hand ch. 23 does not relate that Balaam sought for omens, and on the other (if the present words refer to his usual practice) the remark that he did not seek for omens would more naturally have been placed at the beginning of ch. 23 and not after two of his utterances.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Num 24:1-2. Balaam knew that Jehovah wished Israel to be blessed; he did not therefore seek an omen to guide him, but began his declaration at once.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Num 24:1-9

He set his face toward the wilderness.

The face set toward the wilderness

Evidently there is a change at this point in Balaams method. Hitherto he has played the soothsayer. At last he confesses himself vanquished, and instead of renewing the practices of his magic science, awaits, with eye fixed upon the waste distant desert, a revelation different in kind from any that have gone before it. It was a turning-point in his strange history. Not the first, nor the greatest, yet real, and, would he have had it so, saving. He has learned the helplessness of man striving with his Maker. He has learned the futility of approaching the God of truth with a lie in the right hand. He has learned that to set the face toward the wilderness is the one hope and wisdom of inquiring man; to look away from enchantments; to look away from courts and crowds, from pleasures and businesses; to look away from types and forms, and to fix the earnest gaze upon that solitude of earth and heaven which is the presence of the soul in the presence of God. The crisis was lost, we know, upon Balaam. The dreams of avarice and of worldliness prevailed in him, even over the open vision. We cannot alter his destiny; let us learn something from this incident.

1. There is in all of us a strange reluctance to the thing here described–this setting of the face toward the wilderness where God is alone. I might say many things to you of the ministerial man–the man, I mean, whose office it is to communicate with God for the edification of His people. How often, when this ministry, the Churchs prophesying, is to be, exercised, does the indolent, the half-hearted, the perfunctory minister run to his enchantments; to his books and to his manuscripts, to his commentaries; to the old bakemeats, his own or anothers, which have done duty before, and can be made coldly to furnish forth another table! How often–to change the illustration–does the abler, the more ingenious, the more eloquent minister betake himself to his task of preparation for preaching by a mustering of his own gifts of argument, of rhetoric, of pathos and persuasiveness, as the enchantments by which he is to bring God into these hearts I How often does a man–to use the prophets strange but expressive metaphor–sacrifice to his net, and burn incense to his drag; pay the homage of a gratified vanity to his own performance, count instead of weighing his hearers, and set down all to his own credit in prophesying, of which he should rather say to himself in deepest self-humiliation, What hast thou that thou didst not receive?

2. Yet think not that the Balaams of this age are all prophets, or that the warning is only for the professional teacher. I seem to see a place for it in these lives which minister and people live in common. How often, in the anxious questionings which life brings to all of us–at those dubious turnings which compel decision, and cannot be decided upon twice over–is the temptation powerfully present to seek for some enchantment of discrimination between the wrong for us and the right! Who has not made advice such an enchantment? In the multitude of counsellors there is safety; but then the counsellors must be well chosen, must be honestly sought, must be diligently informed, must be faithfully followed.

3. I would add a word upon the application of the text not to the life, but to the soul. Side by side with a bold scepticism which simply passes by the gospel on the other side there is also an anxiety, a curiosity, to hear, which secures an audience wheresoever there is a preacher, which stimulates all manner of agencies for bringing home the gospel. In the same degree the warning is more urgent, that we confound not, in these highest matters, the enchantments and the wilderness. Who feels not in himself the easiness of listening and the difficulty of praying? Who is not conscious of the temptation to compound for inward torpor by outward bustle, and to make a multiplication of services and communions an apology for neglect and shameful sloth in the nearer and more intimate converse between the soul and its God? (Dean Vaughan.)

Balaam . . . the man whose eyes are open.

Balaam–the open eye

An open eye is a rare thing even in the matters of common experience. They are the few who can see clearly the things which God has set round them in their daily paths. Men of science tell us that it is difficult to meet with a competent observer of even the simplest and most familiar phenomena. Lawyers complain that a good witness, who can tell what he knows, and only what he knows, is as rare. It is supposed by experienced persons that a fact is just the most difficult thing in the world to get at, so few walk with their eyes open and care to make themselves simply conductors of truth. We see things through mists which take the colours of prejudice or passion, and it is but a vague outline of them which meets our sight. Lord, that our eyes may be opened, is a prayer full of meaning for all of us as we move amidst the realities of our daily lives. In the higher sphere of the being the open eye is rarer still. The realities in that region are solemn things to look upon. There is something awful in their grandeur, and even in their beauty. A man needs courage and faith to face them as they are.

I. Balaam was a man whose eye was open in his day. He was a man of splendid natural genius. We puzzle over the definition of genius; but perhaps it is only the open eye, the power to see things simply as they are. In every sphere of mans intellectual activity the man of genius is the seer.

II. Balaams is at the same time a character of singular perplexity. He had both the open eye and the itching palm. And this condition is far from rare. Splendid endowments are often mated with moral narrowness or feebleness. With many of these men of insight, men with the seers power, there is a flaw in the thoroughness somewhere. But then these men, when their genius possesses them, rise above the sphere of their humiliation; the temptations which ensnare them snap like the withes of Samson; they see clearly, and declare with the freedom and the force of prophets the things which have been shown to them by the Lord. Lord Bacon may have been capable of very poor ambitions, very grovelling thoughts and actions; but when his genius possessed him, when he loosed his splendid faculty in the quest of truth, the simplest fact became sacred to him; he would not have dared to misrepresent or to tamper with what he saw for worlds. It was thus with Balaam. On the lower level of his life he was grovelling; but when God took possession of his genius he yielded it readily, and then he was true as steel to the vision.

III. The man whose eyes were open saw some things with startling clearness. Some words of his ring out like trumpet notes through the field of lifes battle; they are conceived with a vividness and expressed with a force which makes them prophetic for all ages; we hear from his lips the words of God.

1. The only word which a man can say with power is truth. The word that God also saith, that shall stand (Num 22:38). The counsellor who knows the Divine plan is the man who has power. The position of the Jews among the nations, and the influence which they wielded, which is popularly much under-estimated, rested wholly on the fact that they knew as no other nation knew the Divine counsels, they held the key to the mystery of all these worlds. Balaam saw that the trickster and liar is impotent. Laocoon, locked in the serpent wreaths, wrestling madly, but with the death agony in his face, is not more powerless than the monger of falsehood to escape his doom. The gain is there, it is always there; you can have it if you like by cheating and lying. Balaam saw it, and there was that within him which longed for it. But his eye was open; he dared not touch it. He saw the pure folly as well as the shame of dreaming of it, of thinking that anything but truth, right, and the blessing of God can stand a man in any stead in life, in death, and in the great court of Heaven.

2. He saw with that open eye that the man who stands with God stands absolutely beyond the reach of harm (Num 23:23).

3. There was a third thing that Balaam saw. The man whom God blesses is blessed; the man whom God curses is cursed, absolutely and for ever. (J. B. Brown, B. A.)

How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob.–

The prosperity of the Church

With great admiration he beginneth to declare the future prosperity of that people, and doth it by six similitudes.

1. As the valleys are they stretched forth, or as the rivers say some, which coming from one head spread themselves into great broad waters, so this people having sprung from Jacob, one patriarch, hath spread into this multitude, and yet further shall spread into many more.

2. As gardens by the rivers side. Such gardens are watered so by the rivers as if the heat be never so great, yet they are not burned up. So shall this people in all adversities and dangers be preserved by the power and blessing of God till the coming of the Messiah, and overcome by no assaults of Satan and his instruments.

3. As the trees of lign aloes which the Lord hath planted.

4. As the cedar trees beside the waters, which, growing to a great height, notably show how this people with their offspring should wonderfully grow with their virtue and famous acts, getting a great name in the world.

5. The water droppeth out of his bucket; that is, as such water floweth abroad, so shall this people abound with the water of heavenly doctrine and wisdom, and from them be spread to other nations plentifully, according to that Out of Sion shall a law go, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

6. His seed shall be in many waters. As seed that is cast into a field well watered soon springeth and beareth fruit, so this people. These are the prophetical resemblances of this people Israel, which do still declare unto us the flourishing and happy state of Gods Church, whatsoever worldly men conceive and think. The Church is the tabernacle of God, wherein He dwelleth, and familiarly with His chosen as with His domestics and household servants converseth, providing things necessary both for this life and that to come. The Church is that little river which spreadeth itself far and wide throughout the world. The Church is that well-watered garden, set with sweet trees casting forth the fragrant smell of life, of the knowledge of God and of virtue, whereof Solomon in his Canticles: My sister, my spouse, is a garden enclosed, as a spring shut up, and a fountain sealed up. The Church is that shadow that yieldeth comfortable cooling, in the sense and feeling of Gods wrath to sin. It is that cedar planted by the water-side, and growing so high, whereof the prophet in the Psalm: The righteous shall flourish like a palm-tree, and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. Such as be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They shall still bring forth fruit in their age; they shall be fat and flourishing, &c. The Church is that bucket, containing doctrine of life, and dropping it out to the comfort of souls. Finally, that seed shall live again in the life to come, and for ever spring and flourish. (Bp. Babington.)

Balaams third parable: the glory of the people of God

I. The preparation of the prophet to declare the Divine will.

1. Balaam renounces the search for auguries.

2. He beholds the encampment of Israel.

3. He is inspired by the Holy Spirit.

4. He hears Divine words and sees Divine visions.

II. The declaration by the prophet of Israels glory.

1. Their beautiful appearance.

(1) Beauty–

(a) Of order.

(b) Of culture and fertility.

(2) Fragrance.

(3) Majesty.

2. Their prosperous condition.

3. Their exalted position.

4. Their conquering power.

(1) Great strength.

(2) Great conquests.

(3) Great security.

(4) Great influence. (W. Jones.)

Balaams third parable

Seen from the top of the rocks, everything about Israel is perfection. Had we been down in the valley, and looked into them from an earthly standpoint, we should have seen deformity enough. But from Gods presence everything is changed. But mark the figures under which this beauty is described. As valleys are they spread forth. These are the valleys watered by the river; these are the people of God, made beautiful by the refreshing streams of living water which flow down from the throne of God. Not yet are they as watered valleys, but as gardens by the rivers side. This is a richer description still. They are the garden of the Lord. They are the plants planted by the Father. They have been taken out of the world–transplanted–and are now to bring forth much fruit. The streams from the river of God find their way to the roots of their spiritual life; and thus they become fruitful. Jesus is the source of their life and their fruitfulness. And in all this we see growth–as the valleys are they spread forth; as gardens by the rivers side. The entire figure implies sanctification–growth in grace. There will always be three kinds of growth where the soul is really abiding in Jesus. There will be the outward growth as the lily–the life before men; the hidden growth as the roots of Lebanon–the life before God; and the relation toward men as the branches spreading, the influence which they cast around. But the figure grows in richness: as trees of lign aloes which the Lord hath planted. The aloe tree was highly valued on account of its fragrance, and it was the tree from which the incense was prepared. Thus the believer abiding in Jesus is a sweet savour of Christ. The fragrance of that blessed One is diffused far and wide through him. He is beautiful with the beauty which the Lord puts upon him. His scent is as the wine of Lebanon. And to what cause is all this fragrance due? To the Lords planting. There is one more step in advance in the spiritual life in this verse: as cedar trees beside the waters. As the lily and trees of Lebanon in the passage, in Hosea, so here. The growth of the believer is brought before us under the loftiness of the cedar tree, its luxuriance, and the durability of its wood. Now, having noticed what the people of God are as seen in Jesus, let us mark their testimony. He shall pour the water out of his buckets. The people of God are personified, as a man carrying two pails overflowing with water. A bucket or vessel is empty. It can give nothing. It can only receive. The buckets are the empty vessels to be filled with living water by the Holy Ghost. Like the two pails on a mans shoulder which are filled to the brim, he cannot move a step without the water overflowing. So with the believer abiding in Jesus. He is the empty vessel filled by the Holy Ghost. He cannot move a step without making that influence felt. There will be a trail of living water in his path–a track of light in every step of the way. And oh, what empty places there are within us and around us! Within us–desires, affections, longings, hopes, aims, plans; without us–home, duties, efforts, a weeping Church, and a dying world. Oh, that these buckets were filled with the living water! Then would gladness be written as with a sunbeam on every brow, and sunshine light up every heart. His seed shall be in many waters. This is the effect of the outpoured water from the buckets of the believers soul. He is made a blessing on every side. His king shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom shall be exalted. Christ the King of the Jews is to be higher than all the kings of this world; and Christs kingdom exalted above all other kingdoms. All this glory is then traced to the first great act of redemption God brought him forth out of Egypt. Thus deliverance from Egypt and future glory are linked together. He hath as it were the strength of the buffalo. Here is the power of God abiding with, and resting upon, those whom He has redeemed. Then follows, in connection with their redemption from Egypt, that final triumph and glory. He shall eat up the nations his enemies, and shall break their bones, and pierce them through with his arrows. This is the foretold destruction mentioned in the New Testament, which awaits all the enemies of the Lord at His coming. But in the meantime the attitude of the Church of Christ is one of expectation. Her attitude is not one of judgment yet, but one of grace. This is strikingly brought before us in the next clause; he couched, he lay down as a lion. The couching of the lion is always the attitude of expectation–looking forward to the moment when he shall spring upon his prey. Lying down indicates rest. The believer now rests in Jesus, and awaits His return. In the meantime blessing is his portion–blessed is he that blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee. And we notice how the blessing culminates here. The first was, How shall I curse, or how shall I defy? After it was, He hath blessed, and I cannot reverse it. Lastly, it is Blessed is he that blesseth thee. This last form in which Balaam expresses himself shows us Gods estimate of His people Israel. He that toucheth you toucheth the apple of His eye. (F. Whitfield, M. A.)

Sermon at reopening of a church

I. Let us attempt to justify and elucidate this sacred exclamation. The language is proper.

1. On account of the author of their construction.

2. The beneficial effect of their institution.

3. The pleasantness of their unity.

4. The joys of their fellowships.

5. Their perpetuity, and the certainty of their increase.

II. What ought to be the effects produced upon us by such a survey of the assemblies of the people of God. We should–

1. Cherish a spirit of gratitude for the establishment and increase of these tents of God.

2. Shun all that would impair, and diligently maintain all that would secure the blessing.

(1) Guard against lukewarmness, as that which would deface the beauty of ordinances, and rob us of the advantages we might receive from their celebration.

(2) Take care of holding the truth in unrighteousness.

(3) Be cautious not to violate the true spirit of love.

(4) Preserve the vigour of wholesome, salutary discipline; so that the testimony may be borne you from on high, I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, &c.

(5) Follow up all with importunate prayer. Peace be within thy walls, &c. Pray for the peace of Jerusalem, &c.

3. Endeavour to increase the number of those who frequent the tabernacles, and dwell in the tents of Jacob. Imitate the tribes when ambulating in the wilderness. Remember that you are surrounded by those who have no hope. Tell them plainly that you are pilgrims and strangers. Inform them of the privileges you enjoy by the way; of the manna which drops by your door; of the streams which flow from the rock Christ; of the light which guides your feet; of the cloud which screens you from temptation; of the victories you obtain over your foes; of the prospect you have of passing through Jordan safely; and of the rich land of promise which you are shortly about to enter. Press on them not to linger.

4. Anticipate the time when your tents will be struck, and all the ransomed tribes assemble in the tabernacle above. These tents of the Israelites were valuable as they traversed the sands of Arabia; but they left them when they entered on the rest which their prophets had predicted, and their poets sung. And what are our temples? They are only preparatory for the enjoyments of the Canaan above. May it be your privilege to join the tribes of the redeemed as they go up to Zion with everlasting joy upon their heads! (J. Clayton, M. A.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

CHAPTER XXIV

Balaam, finding that God was determined to bless Israel, seeks

no longer for enchantments, 1.

The Spirit of God coming upon him, he delivers a most important

prophetic parable, 2-9.

Balak’s anger is kindled against him, and he commands him to

depart to his own country, 10,11.

Balaam vindicates his conduct, 12, 13;

and delivers a prophecy relative to the future destruction of

Moab by the Israelites, 14-17;

also of Edom, 18, 19;

of the Amalekites, 20;

and of the Kenites, 21, 22.

Predicts also the destruction of Asshur and Eber, by the naval

power of Chittim, which should afterwards be itself destroyed,

23, 24.

Balaam and Balak separate, 25.

NOTES ON CHAP. XXIV

Verse 1. He went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments] We have already had occasion to observe that the proper meaning of the word nachash is not easily ascertained; see Nu 21:9, and see on Ge 3:1. Here the plural nechashim is rendered enchantments; but it probably means no more than the knowledge of future events. When Balaam saw that it pleased God to bless Israel, he therefore thought it unnecessary to apply for any farther prophetic declarations of God’s will as he had done before, for he could safely infer every good to this people, from the evident disposition of God towards them.

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

To seek for enchantments, i.e. to use enchantments, which he is said to have done, either because when he consulted and sacrificed to God, he did also use enchantments and consult with the devil, that if one would not, the other might help him; or because he consulted God in a magical and superstitious way, by using such postures or instruments or forms of words as enchanters used.

Toward the wilderness, where Israel lay encamped, either with intent to curse Israel without Gods leave; or rather, expecting what God of his own accord would suggest to him concerning this matter.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

1. to seek forthat is, to useenchantments. His experience on the two former occasions [Num 23:3;Num 23:15] had taught him thatthese superstitious accompaniments of his worship were useless, andtherefore he now simply looked towards the camp of Israel, eitherwith a secret design to curse them, or to await the divine afflatus.

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

And when Balsam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel,…. That it was good in his sight, what he approved of, and was well-pleasing to him, and that it was his determined mind that Israel should be blessed, and not cursed, from which there was no turning him, by offering sacrifices to him, and much less by his sorceries and divinations:

he went not as at other times; or, “as at a time in a time” q, at two times, of which see Nu 23:3, he abode in the place where the sacrifices were offered, and did not depart to another at some distance, as he had twice before done:

to seek for enchantments; which it seems he used before, for he not only offered sacrifices to the true God, which yet were attended with superstitious rites, but he made use of his divining art also; and not only went to meet with God, and hear what he would say to him, but consulted the devil also, being willing to have two strings to his bow, and that, if possible, he might carry his point, and get what his covetous and ambitious mind was desirous of: the words may be literally rendered, “to meet enchantments” r; but what should be meant by the phrase is not easy to say; I should rather choose to render them, “to meet serpents”, and make use of them in his divinations, make observations on them, and predictions from them: one sort of divination is called “ophiomancy”, or divining by serpents; so Calchas, on seeing a serpent devour eight sparrows with their dam, foretold the duration of the siege of Troy s:

but he set his face towards the wilderness: where the people of Israel lay encamped, not with an intention to bless them, though he saw it pleased the Lord, but to take an opportunity, if he could, without his leave, to curse them; and therefore he did not go out as he did before, to know his will, but stood by the sacrifice, with his face to the wilderness, where the people were, to take any advantage that offered.

q “sicut vice in vice”, Montanus, Vatablus. r “in occursum auguriorum”, Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus. s Homer. Iliad. 2. see more instances in Bochart. Hierozoic. par. 1. l. 1. c. 3. col. 21, 22.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

The third saying. – Num 24:1 and Num 24:2. From the two revelations which he had received before, Balaam, saw, i.e., perceived, that it pleased Jehovah to bless Israel. This induced him not to go out for auguries, as on the previous occasions. , “as time after time,” i.e., as at former times (Num 23:3 and Num 23:15). He therefore turned his face to the desert, i.e., to the steppes of Moab, where Israel was encamped (Num 22:1). And when he lifted up his eyes, “ he saw Israel encamping according to its tribes; and the Spirit of God came over him.” The impression made upon him by the sight of the tribes of Israel, served as the subjective preparation for the reception of the Spirit of God to inspire him. Of both the earlier utterances it is stated that “Jehovah put a word into his mouth” (Num 23:5 and Num 23:16); but of this third it is affirmed that “the Spirit of God came over him.” The former were communicated to him, when he went out for a divine revelation, without his being thrown into an ecstatic state; he heard the voice of God within him telling him what he was to say. But this time, like the prophets in their prophesyings, he was placed by the Spirit of God in a state of ecstatic sight; so that, with his eyes closed as in clairvoyance, he saw the substance of the revelation from God with his inward mental eye, which had been opened by the Spirit of God. Thus not only does he himself describe his own condition in Num 24:3 and Num 24:4, but his description is in harmony with the announcement itself, which is manifestly the result both in form and substance of the intuition effected within him by the Spirit of God.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

Balaam Blesses Israel a Third Time.

B. C. 1452.

      1 And when Balaam saw that it pleased the LORD to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments, but he set his face toward the wilderness. 2 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. 3 And he took up his parable, and said, Balaam the son of Beor hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said: 4 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: 5 How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel! 6 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. 7 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. 8 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. 9 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.

      The blessing itself which Balaam here pronounces upon Israel is much the same with the two we had in the foregoing chapter; but the introduction to it is different.

      I. The method of proceeding here varies much in several instances. 1. Balaam laid aside the enchantments which he had hitherto depended on, used no spells, or charms, or magic arts, finding they did him no service; it was to no purpose to deal with the devil for a curse, when it was plain that God was determined immovably to bless, v. 1. Sooner or later God will convince men of their folly in seeking after lying vanities, which cannot profit. To what purpose should he seek for enchantment? He knew that God was out of the reach of them. 2. He did not now retire into a solitary place as before, but set his face directly towards the wilderness where Israel lay encamped; and, since there is no remedy, but they must be blessed, he will design nothing else, but will submit by compulsion. 3. Now the Spirit of God came upon him, that is, the Spirit of prophecy, as upon Saul to prevent him from taking David, 1 Sam. xix. 23. He spoke not his own sense, but the language of the Spirit that came upon him. 4. He used a different preface now from what he had used before (Num 24:3; Num 24:4), much like that of David (2 Sam. xxiii. 1-3), yet savouring very much (as some think) of pride and vain-glory, taking all the praise of this prophecy to himself, and magnifying himself as one of the cabinet-council of heaven. Two things he boasts of:– (1.) The favour God did him in making known himself to him. He heard the words of God, and saw the vision of the Almighty. God himself had met him and spoken to him (ch. xxiii. 16), and with this he was greatly puffed up. Paul speaks with humility of his visions and revelations (2 Cor. xii. 1), but Balaam speaks of his with pride. (2.) His own power to receive and bear those revelations. He fell into a trance indeed, as other prophets did, but he had his eyes open. This he mentions twice; but the words in the original are not the same. The man whose eyes were shut, some think it may be read so (v. 3-9), but now having his eyes open, v. 4. When he attempted to curse Israel, he owns, he was in a mistake, but now he began to see his error, and yet still he remained blinded by covetousness and ambition, those foolish and hurtful lusts. Note, [1.] Those that oppose God and his people will sooner or later be made to see themselves wretchedly deceived. [2.] Many have their eyes open that have not their hearts open, are enlightened, but not sanctified; and that knowledge which puffs men up with pride will but serve to light them to hell, whither many go with their eyes open.

      II. Yet the blessing is for substance the same with those before. Several things he admires in Israel:–

      1. Their beauty (v. 5): How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob! Though they dwelt not in stately palaces, but in coarse and homely tents, and these, no doubt, sadly weather-beaten, yet Balaam sees a beauty in those tents, because of their admirable order, according to their tribes, v. 2. Nothing recommends religion more to the good opinion of those that look upon it at a distance than the unity and harmony of its professors, Ps. cxxxiii. 1. The amiableness of this people, and the great reputation they should gain among their neighbours, are compared (v. 6) to the beauty and sweetness of fruitful valleys and fine gardens, flourishing trees and fragrant spices. Note, Those whose eyes are open see the saints on the earth to be excellent ones, and their delight is accordingly in them. The righteous, doubtless, is more excellent than his neighbour. They are trees which the Lord has planted; that is their excellency. The branches of righteousness are the planting of the Lord. See Hos. xiv. 5-7.

      2. Their fruitfulness and increase. This may be intended by those similitudes (v. 6) of the valleys, gardens, and trees, as well as by those expressions (v. 7), He shall pour the water out of his buckets; that is, God shall water them with his blessing like rain from heaven, and then his seed shall be in many waters. Compare Hos. ii. 23, I will sow her unto me in the earth. And waters are in scripture put for peoples, and multitudes, and nations. This has been fulfilled in the wonderful increase of that nation and their vast multitude even in their dispersion.

      3. Their honour and advancement. As the multitude of the people is the honour of the prince, so the magnificence of the prince is the honour of the people; Balaam therefore foretells that their king shall be higher than Agag. Agag, it is probable, was the most potent monarch in those parts; Balaam knew of none more considerable than he was; he rose above the rest of his neighbours. But Balaam foretells that Israel’s chief commander, who, after Moses, was Joshua, should be more great and honourable than ever Agag was, and make a far better figure in history. Saul, their first king, triumphed over Agag, though, it is said, he came delicately.

      4. Their power and victory, v. 8. (1.) He looks back upon what they had done, or rather what had been done for them: God brought them forth out of Egypt; this he had spoken of before, ch. xxiii. 22. The wonders that attended their deliverance out of Egypt contributed more to their honour, and the terror of their adversaries, than any thing else, Josh. ii. 10. He that brought them out of Egypt will not fail to bring them into Canaan, for, as for God, his work is perfect. (2.) He looks down upon their present strength. Israel hath, as it were, the strength of a unicorn, of which creature it is said (Job 39:9; Job 39:10), Will he be willing to serve thee, or abide by thy crib? Canst thou bind him with his band in the furrow? “No, Israel is too powerful to be checked or held in by my curses or thy armies.” (3.) He looks forward to their future conquests: He shall eat up the nations his enemies; that is, “he shall not only destroy and devour them as easily and irresistibly as a lion does his prey, but he shall himself be strengthened, and fattened, and enriched, by their spoils.”

      5. Their courage and security: He lay down as a lion, as a great lion, v. 9. Now he does so in the plains of Moab, and asks no leave of the king of Moab, nor is he in fear of him; shortly will he do so in Canaan. When he has torn his prey, he will take his repose, quiet from the fear of evil, and bid defiance to all his neighbours; for who shall stir up a sleeping lion? It is observed of lions (as the learned bishop Patrick takes notice here) that they do not retire into places of shelter to sleep, but lie down any where, knowing that none dares meddle with them: thus secure were Israel in Canaan, chiefly in the days of David and Solomon; and thus is the righteous bold as a lion (Prov. xxviii. 1), not to assault others, but to repose themselves, because God maketh them to dwell in safety, Ps. iv. 8.

      6. Their interest, and influence upon their neighbours. Their friends, and those in alliance with them, were happy: Blessed is he that blesseth thee; those that do them any kindness will certainly fare the better for it. But their enemies, and those in arms against them, were certainly miserable: Cursed is he that curseth thee; those that do them any injury do it at their peril; for God takes what is done to them, whether good or evil, as done to himself. Thus he confirms the blessing of Abraham (Gen. xii. 3), and speaks as if therefore he did at this time bless Israel, and not curse them, because he desired to share in the blessing of Israel’s friends and dreaded the curse on Israel’s enemies.

Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary

NUMBERS – TWENTY-FOUR

Verses 1-9:

This third parable of Balaam was in different circumstances than the first two. This time Balaam did not seek for “enchantments,” nachash, for a message regarding Israel. The “enchantments” (auguries) were in the nature of omens and signs in the natural world, which the seer observed and interpreted to determine God’s purpose.

This time, the “word of the Lord” did not come unto Balaam. Instead, the “Spirit of God came upon him,” in much the same way that He came upon Saul, 1Sa 19:23. Balaam was in an ecstatic state, semi-conscious and powerless. His outward eyes were closed, and he fell as though struck on seeing the “vision of the Almighty,” while his “inner eyes” (sub-conscious perception) were opened to the vision from God.

Balaam’s “parable” describes the greatness of the people of God. The “valleys” are the watercourses which empty into the river, in this case the Euphrates. Balaam likens the blessings of God upon Israel to the pleasant, fertile fields of Mesopotamia.

“Lignaloes,” ahalim, a large, spreading tree also known as eagle wood. The inner wood of this tree is fragrant, when partially decayed, Ps 45:8.

“He shall pour the water,” literally, “the water shall overflow.”

“Out of his buckets,” the noun is dual, denoting two. The imagery is familiar to those living in an irrigated land. It pictures one who carries two buckets on a pole, buckets so full as to overflow. It is a symbol of plenty.

“Agag,” the official title of the kings of Amalek, as Pharoah was the official title of the Egyptian rulers.

Verses 8, 9 picture the invincible military might of Israel, crushing every foe. This mighty power is tempered with mercy, as there is “blessing” for all who bless the Israel of God.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

1. And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord. It is evident that Balaam, in order to gratify the wicked king for the sake of the reward, endeavored by various shifts and expedients to obtain an answer in accordance with his wishes. Thus do the wicked seek to propitiate God by delusive means, just as we soothe children by coaxing. And God for some time allowed him (163) to gloat upon his fallacious oracle. He now, however, lays closer constraint upon him, and, breaking off all delay, dictates an answer, which He compels him to deliver. For his obedience is not here praised as if, when he understood the will of God, he yielded voluntarily and abandoned his monstrous cupidity; but, because now there was no more room for subterfuge, he dared not stir his foot, as if God had put forth His hand to retain him in his place.

When it is said that “the Spirit of God was upon him,” (164) after he turned his eyes “toward the wilderness” and beheld the camp of Israel, how they were marshalled “according to their tribes,” we must understand it thus: not that he was influenced by a sincere feeling of good-will, so that the sight itself suggested grounds for blessing; but that he was induced by the inspiration of the same Spirit, who afterwards put forth His influence in the prophecy itself. It is said, then, that the Spirit of God was upon him, not as if it had begun to inspire him at that particular moment when he cast his eyes upon the camp of Israel; but because it prompted him to look in that direction, in order that the impulse of prophecy might be stronger in him, as respecting a thing actually before his eyes. But after the Spirit had thus affected his senses, or at any rate had prepared them to be fit instruments for the execution of his office, it then also directed his tongue to prophesy; but in an extraordinary manner, so that a divine majesty shone forth in the sudden change, as if he were transformed into a new man. In a word, “the Spirit of God was upon him,” shewing by manifest token that He was the author of his address, and that he did not speak of his own natural intelligence. To the same intent it is said that “he took up his parable,” because (165) the character of his address was marked with unusual grandeur and magnificent brilliancy.

(163) “Inhiare fallaci oraculo.” — Lat. “Q’uil fust comme a la chasse, pour obtenir quelque fausse revelation;” to be, as it were, in chase of some false revelation. — Fr.

(164) A. V., “came upon him.”

(165) “Sa facon de parler a eu une gravite authentique, pour toucher plus au vif ceux qui l’orroyent;” his manner of speaking possessed a genuine grandeur, in order to touch more closely to the quick those that might hear it. — Fr.

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

Num. 24:1. To seek for enchantments. See Notes on Num. 23:3; Num. 23:23.

He set his face toward the wilderness, i.e., towards the plains of Moab, where the Israelites were encamped.

Num. 24:2. Saw Israel abiding, &c. Keil and Del.: He saw Israel encamping according to its tribes.

The Spirit of God came upon him. The impression made upon him by the sight of the tribes of Israel, served as the subjective preparation for the reception of the Spirit of God to inspire him. Of both the earlier utterances it is stated that Jehovah put a word into his mouth (Num. 23:5; Num. 23:16); but of this third it is affirmed that the Spirit of God came over him. The former were communicated to him, where he went out for a Divine revelation, without his being thrown into an ecstatic state; he heard the voice of God within him telling him what he was to say. But this time, like the prophets in their prophesyings, he was placed by the Spirit of God in a state of ecstatic sight; so that, with his eyes closed as in clairvoyance, he saw the substance of the revelation from God with his inward mental eye, which had been opened by the Spirit of God.Keil and Del.

Num. 24:3. Whose eyes are open. Margin: Who had his eyes shut, but now opened. Dr. A. Clarke takes the latter view: I believe the original , shethum, should be translated shut, not open; for in the next verse, where the opening of the eyes is mentioned, a widely different word is used , galah, which signifies to open or reveal. At first the eyes of Balaam were shut, and so closely too that he could not see the angel who withstood him, till God opened his eyes; nor could he see the gracious intentions of God towards Israel, till the eyes of his understanding were opened by the power of the Divine Spirit.

, with closed eye. does not mean to open, a meaning in support of which only one passage of the Mishnah can be adduced, but to close, like in Dan. 8:26, and in Lam. 3:8, with the softened into or Balaam describes himself as the man with closed eye with reference to his state of ecstasy, in which the closing of the outer senses went hand in hand with the opening of the inner (Hengstenberg). The cessation of all perception by means of the outer senses, so far as self-conscious reflection is concerned, was a feature that was common to both the vision and the dream, the two forms in which the prophetic gift manifested itself (Num. 12:6), and followed from the very nature of the inward intuition. In the case of prophets whose spiritual life was far advanced, inspiration might take place without any closing of the outward senses. But upon men like Balaam, whose inner religious life was still very impure and undeveloped, the Spirit of God could only operate by closing their outward senses to impressions from the lower earthly world, and raising them up to visions of the higher and spiritual worldKeil and Del.

Fuerst however renders , opened of eye, i.e., with opened eye. So also the Speakers Comm. et al.

Num. 24:4. Falling, &c. Omit the into a trance of the A.V. Keil and Del. translate, Falling down and with opened eyes. Balaam fell beneath the power of the Spirit of God, who came upon him (comp. 1Sa. 19:24). In this way the eyes of his spirit were opened.

Num. 24:7. He shall pour the water, &c. Or, Water will flow out of his buckets. Or, He shall stream with water out of his buckets. An image of great prosperity; an abundant supply of water being essential to fertility and prosperity in the burning East. The nation is personified as a man carrying two pails overflowing with water.

His seed, i.e., posterity.

By many waters, a metaphor indicative of rich blessings, particularly in this place, that of a numerous posterity.

Agag, a title common to all the Amalekite kings, as Pharaoh was to those of Egypt. The reason for mentioning the king of the Amalekites was, that he was selected as the impersonation of the enmity of the world against the kingdom of God, which culminated in the kings of the heathen; the Amalekites having been the first heathen tribe that attacked the Israelites on their journey to Canaan (Exo. 17:8)Keil and Del.

His king. his kingdom. The king of Israel, whose greatness was celebrated by Balaam, was neither the Messiah exclusively, nor the earthly kingdom without the Messiah, but the kingdom of Israel that was established by David, and was exalted in the Messiah into an everlasting kingdom, the enemies of which would all be made its footstool (Psalms 2, 110).Ibid.

Num. 24:8. See Num. 23:22.

Num. 24:9. See Num. 23:24.

Num. 24:11. Jehovah hath kept thee back from honour. A bitter and impious sarcasm.A. Clarke, LL.D.

Num. 24:14. Advertise thee. Keil and Del.: Tell thee advisedly. An announcement which includes advice.

Num. 24:17. A Star, &c. In all the typical language of Scripture stars are symbols of lordship and authority, ecclesiastical or civil. Thus a star is the symbol of the highest dominion of all: There shall come a Star out of Jacob; and the actual birth of Him whom Balaam prophesied of here, is announced by a star (Mat. 2:2; cf. Isa. 14:12).R. C. Trench, D.D.

A Sceptre, &c. (comp. Gen. 49:10).

The corners of Moab. Rather, the two sides of Moab, equivalent to Moab on both sides, from one end to the other.

Destroy all the children of Sheth. Speakers Comm.: Overthrow the sons of tumult. Keil and Del.: Destroy all the sons of confusion, by which the Moabites are to be understood as being men of wild, warlike confusion.

Num. 24:18. Edom shall be a possession, &c. Whilst Edom falls, Israel will acquire power (comp. 2Sa. 8:14; 1Ch. 18:11-13; Oba. 1:17 sqq.

Num. 24:19. He that shall have dominion, i.e., the ruler foretold as Star and Sceptre. The Star and Sceptre of the prophecy, like the Sceptre and Lawgiver of Gen. 49:10, point naturally rather to a line of princes than to an individual; or rather are emblems of the kingdom of Israel generally. Thus the victories of David and his successors, generation after generation, over Edom and Moab, are unquestionably recurring and progressive accomplishments of what Balaam foretold; but after all of them the prophecy yet reaches forward to some further and culminating accomplishment; and that too in the latter days (Num. 24:14), the ordinary prophetic designation for the time of the Messiah (cf. Dan. 10:14).

To a Christian, the connection between the Star and Sceptre of Balaam, and the Star of the King of the Jews, which the wise men saw (Mat. 2:2), is self-evident. As they were wise men from the east, so was Balaam also a wise man from the east (cf. Num. 23:7); and the tradition that they were, if not descendants, yet fellow countrymen, of Balaam, and occupied in pursuits kindred to his, is probable enough.Speakers Comm.

Destroy him that remaineth, &c. The phrase tersely describes a conqueror who first defeats his enemies in battle, and then hunts out the fugitives till he has cut off all of every place (cf. 1Ki. 11:16).Ibid.

Num. 24:20. Amalek was the first, &c., i.e., pre-eminent amongst the states or nations which Balaam then had in view of his minds eye. The sense given by the marginal rendering is doubtful.

Num. 24:21. The Kenites. A tribe or nation whose history is strangely interwoven with that of the chosen people. Their origin is hidden from us. But we may fairly infer that they were a branch of the larger nation of Midianfrom the fact that Jethro, the father of Mosess wife, who in the records of Exodus (see Num. 2:15-16; Num. 4:19, &c.), is represented as dwelling in the land of Midian, and as priest or prince of that nation, is in the narrative of Judges (Num. 1:16; Num. 4:11), as distinctly said to have been a Kenite. As Midianites, they were therefore descended immediately from Abraham by his wife Keturah, and in this relationship and their connexion with Moses we find the key to their continued alliance with Israel.Bible Dict.

Num. 24:22. The Kenite. Heb.: Kain. The Speakers Comm. says that Kain is the name of the Kenites abode. Keil and Del.: Kain, the tribe-father, is used poetically for the Kenite, the tribe of which he was the founder. And Fuerst regards it as the name of the tribe. A more faithful rendering of this verse is, For Kain shall not be destroyed until Asshur shall carry him away captive. It is a promise of long-continued safety to the Kenites.

Num. 24:23. Alas, who shall live, &c. The words, Woe, who will live, point to the fearfulness of the following judgment, which went deep to the heart of the seer, because it would fall upon the sons of his own people. The meaning is, Who will preserve his life in the universal catastrophe that is coming! (Hengstenberg.)Keil and Del.

Num. 24:24. Chittim, i.e. Cyprus, the nearest of the western islands, the only one visible from Palestine, and so the representative to Balaam and to Israel of all those unknown western regions across the Mediterranean Sea, from which were at length to come the conquerors of the mighty empires of the East (cf. Isa. 23:1; Isa. 23:12; Jer. 2:10).Speakers Comm.

Eber, i.e., not as Vulg. and LXX, the Hebrews, but generally the descendants of Shem.Ibid.

He also, i.e., the conqueror of Asshur and Eber, who should come across the sea.Ibid.

BALAAMS THIRD PARABLE: THE GLORY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD

(Num. 24:1-9)

This paragraph contains two main divisions:

I. The preparation of the prophet to declare the divine will (Num. 24:1-4).

1. Balaam renounces the search for auguries. And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments. The sacrifices were offered as at former times, but Balaam goes no more apart to look for auguries. He seems to have despaired of accomplishing the desire of Balak by any exercise of his art.

2. He beholds the encampment of Israel. He set his face toward the wilderness. And Balaam lifted up his eyes, and he saw Israel encamping according to their tribes. He seems to have gazed on the imposing spectacle beneath him, and to have allowed it freely to influence him. Its order, unity, vastness, and might, seem to have deeply impressed him. And the impression produced by that sight served as the subjective preparation for the reception of the Spirit of God to inspire him.

3. He is inspired by the Holy Spirit. And the Spirit of God came upon him (see Critical and Explanatory Notes on Num. 24:2). He had, as Attersoll remarks, the Holy Spirit, but not the spirit of holiness; for wheresoever He worketh He is holy, but He doth not always work holiness and sanctification, which evermore accompany salvation. Balaam was inspired to utter the Divine message; but his heart was perverse and corrupt, &c.

4. He hears Divine words and sees Divine visions. And he took up his parable, and said, Balaam the son of Beor hath said, and the man with closed eye hath said: he hath said which heard the words of God, which saw the vision of the Almighty, falling down and with opened eyes (see Critical and Explanatory Notes on Num. 24:3-4). The senses of Balaam now seem to be closed to external impressions, and, for the time being, the Spirit of God has the mastery of his nature, and by voice and by vision reveals the will of God to him. Thus the Lord prepared him for the declaration of His holy will. Do not these words of Balaam display his egotism and pride in his own privileges and power? Keil and Del. hold that they do not. This introduction to his prophecy is not an utterance of bossting vanity; but, as Calvin correctly observes, the whole preface has no other tendency than to prove that he was a true prophet of God, and had received the blessing which he uttered from a celestial oracle. We are unable to take this view of his preface. To us it savours very much of pride and vain glory, taking all the praise of this prophecy to himself, and magnifying himself as one of the cabinet-council of heaven. Paul speaks with humility of his visions and revelations (2Co. 12:1); but Balaam speaks of his with pride. (a)

II. The declaration by the prophet of Israels glory (Num. 24:5-9).

The blessing here pronounced is in its substance very similar to those in the preceding chapter. Balaam declares

1. Their beautiful appearance (Num. 24:5-6). Here are three ideas

(1) Beauty. The beauty of order. How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob; thy tabernacles, O Israel! (b) And the beauty of culture and fertility. As the valleys are spread forth, as gardens by the rivers side. To the minds eye of the seer, the dwellings of Israel in Canaan spread themselves abroad with the loveliness of fertile valleys, and even as gardens along the banks of a river, which are still more lovely than the grassy and flowery valleys (comp. Deu. 8:7-8). (c)

(2) Fragrance. As the trees of lign aloes, which the Lord hath planted. The aloe, imported from China and the far distant east, furnished to the ancients one of the most fragrant and precious spices (cf. Psa. 45:8), All thy garments smell of myrrh, aloes, and cassia (Pro. 7:17). So the reputation of Israel should be fragrant. Their character and condition should produce a delightful impression upon their neighbours.

(3) Majesty. As cedar trees beside the waters. The noblest of trees branching forth in the fairest of situations; an image of majestic beauty. The beauty of Israel is set forth in a somewhat similar manner in Hos. 14:5; Hos. 14:7. The righteous is more excellent than his neighbour. The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold. The truly godly man is beautiful in his principles and spirit, in his character and conduct. The beauty of the Lord our God is upon him.

2. Their prosperous condition. Two aspects of prosperity are probably presented by the prophet:

(1) A fertile soil. He shall pour the water out of his buckets (see Critical and Explanatory Notes).
(2) A numerous posterity. His seed shall be in many waters. Abundant and unfailing prosperity and increase are thus proclaimed as the portion of Israel. And very remarkable was their prosperity at all times when they were faithful to the Lord; and their increase was wonderful.
3. Their exalted position. And his king shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom shall be exalted (see Critical and Explanatory Notes). The glories of the kingdom of Israel were to far exceed those of their heathen neighbours. We may perhaps find the fulfilment of this prediction in the prosperity and power of the kingdom during the latter part of the reign of David and the greater part of that of his successor. But its most splendid fulfilment is to be looked for in the spiritual kingdom of the Messiah.

4. Their conquering power. This is exhibited in several aspects

(1) Their great strength. This is seen in what God had done for them. God leads him forth out of Egypt. And in their present condition. He hath as it were the strength of a wild bull. The people were strong because God was with them as their leader, &c. (see on chap Num. 23:22).

(2) Their great conquests. He shall eat up the nations his enemies, and break their bones, and pierce them through with his arrows. The words point to the complete victory of Israel over their enemies, and their enrichment by means of such conquests. (d)

(3) Their great security. He couched, he lay down as a lion, and as a great lion: who shall stir him up? They were to overcome their foes thoroughly, that none of them would venture to rise up against them again. The prophets words present a striking picture of assured security. Who shall dare to arouse a sleeping lion? During a great part of the reign of David, and during that of Solomon, Israel was thus secure. When His people are faithful to Him, God guarantees their safety. The work of righteousness shall be peace, &c. (Isa. 32:17-18). (e).

(4) Their great influence, as a blessing to their friends, and as a bane to their enemies. Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee. For this cause, let Balak and all their enemies take warning. God makes His peoples cause His own. He that toucheth you toucheth the apple of His eye. Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me. Saul, Saul, why persecutes thou Me?

Here is encouragement to the people of God and to their friends. Here is warning to their enemies.

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) From first to last one thing appears uppermost in this historyBalaams self; the honour of Balaam as a true prophettherefore he will not lie; the wealth of Balaamtherefore the Israelites must be sacrificed. Nay more, even in this sublimest vision his egotism breaks out. In the sight of Gods Israel he cries, Let me die the death of the righteous: in anticipation of the glories of the Eternal Advent, I shall behold Him, but not nigh. He sees the vision of a Kingdom, a Church, a chosen people, a triumph of righteousness. In such anticipations, the nobler prophets broke out into strains in which their own personality was forgotten. Moses, when he thought that God would destroy His people, prays in agonyYet now, if I hou wilt forgive their sin; and if not, blot me, I pray Thee, out of Thy book. Paul speaks in impassioned wordsI have continual sorrow in my heart. For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites. But Balaams chief feeling seems to be, How will all this advance me? And the magnificence of the prophecy is thus marred by a chord of melancholy and diseased egotism. Not for one momenteven in those moments when uninspired men gladly forget themselves; men who have devoted themselves to a monarchy, or dreamed of a republic in sublime self-abnegationcan Balaam forget himself in Gods cause.F. W. Robertson, M.A.

(b) A church is not a load of bricks, remember: it is a house builded together. A church is not a bundle of cuttings in the gardeners band: it is a vine, of which we are the branches. The true church is an organised whole; and life true spiritual life, wherever it is paramount in the Church, without rules and rubrics, is quite sure to create order and arrangement. Order without life reminds us of the rows of graves in a cemetery, all numbered and entered in the register: order with life reminds us of the long lines of fruit trees in Italy, festooned with fruitful vines. Sunday-school teachers, bear ye the banner of the folded lamb; sick visitors, follow the ensign of the open hand; preachers, rally to the token of the uplifted brazen serpent; and all of you, according to your sacred calling, gather to the name of Jesus, armed for the war.C. H. Spurgeon.

(c) One flower is very sweet. I smell its perfume. But I walk into some vast conservatories, into some gentlemans garden, acres in extent, and there are beds of flowers, the blue and scarlet, and yellow. I see the verbena, the calceolaria, and the geranium, and many others, all in order, and in ranks Oh, how glorious this is! Those undulating lawns, those well-trimmed hedges, those trees so daintily kept, all growing in such luxuriance. One flower is sweet, but a garden! a garden! who can tell how sweet this is! So, one glorified saint is one of Gods flowers, but a glorious Church is Christs garden.Ibid.

(d) Every age produces a new crop of heretics and infidels. Just as the current of the times may run, so doth the stream of infidelity change its direction. We have lived long enough, some of us, to see three or four species of atheists and deists rise and die, for they are short-lived, an ephemeral generation. We have seen the Church attacked by weapons borrowed from geology, ethnology, and anatomy, and then from the schools of criticism fierce warriors have issued, but she survives all her antagonists. She has been as ailed from almost every quarter, but the fears that tarry in the Church to-day are blown to the wind to-morrow; yea, the Church has been enriched by the attacks, for her divines have set to work to study the points that were dubious, to strengthen the walls that seemed a little weak, and so her towers have been strengthened, and her bulwarks consolidated.Ibid.

(e) As temporal and earthly governments become more secular, restricting their province to the physical well-being and the external relationships of mankind, there will be felt, amongst all who live a life intellectual and spiritual, the deeper need for the existence of a society and communion more truly corresponding to the higher and proper social nature of man than is possible in monarchies or republics, guilds or clubs. There is no danger of the world learning to do without the Church, or of the Church ceasing to exert a mighty influence over the world. The human rules and customs and creeds of the Churches may be modified; but the Church itself must remain: the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Sooner shall the flames of love sink into the ashes of oblivion, and the stream of human thought pause in its eternal flow, than the Church of Christ shall cease to engage the warmest affections, to attract and employ the highest intelligence, and to enlist in her service and consecrate with her blessing the noblest energies of man.J. R. Thomson, M.A.

THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD

(Num. 24:5)

We had thought of going to the New Testament for a text, and taking one of Pauls splendid and comprehensive addresses; but we recollected how much more powerful the confessions of an adversary are than the testimony of a friend. Christianity has in every age gained more from the reluctant tributes of homage extorted from the lips of enemies than from the loftiest efforts of its friends. The admissions of infidels in favour of the happiness and security of a religious life, and the regrets of worldly and irreligious men, say more on behalf of the real value of the Gospel to perishing man than all the labours of divines and all the boasted learning of the schools.
Besides, we have another advantage in the text. The testimony of Balaam will weigh more with many men than that of Moses, or Isaiah, or Paul. Paul gained great advantage with the philosophers of Athens by quoting their own authoritiesAs certain also of your own poets have said. And here we address intelligent and worldly men in the words of one of their own numberAs one of your own prophets hath said. Balaam was a man of unquestionable genius, whose convictions were in favour of religion, as yours may be; but his heart was against it. He was a lover of this present world; he was quite enchanted with the smiles and flatteries of royalty, and had an open heart and an oily palm to receive the base bribes which the world could bestow. He was quite bent upon rising in the world, determined that nothing should stop him; he had no small opinion of his own pretentions, his genius, his knowledge, his acquaintance with Divine things, of which, as a practised worldling, he knew the full marketable value; and is in fact quite eloquent in portraying his own exalted advantages,The man whose eyes are open hath said, &c. Then he went as far as ever he could in opposing consciencethe voice of the Angelthe drawn swordGod. He was bent upon the thing from first to last: to curse he came; to curse he was determined. When God forbade him to curse by his prophecies, he cursed by his counsels; and actually died in arms against the Church of God. Now, this is the man from whom you are to receive a lecture on the advantages of religion. Mark the blessedness of the righteous as it appears to the eye of worldly and irreligious men. In proof of this happiness we appeal

I. To the reluctant testimony of the men of this world. They express

1. Their envy of the happiness of the righteous. Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel. He came prepossessed against them; yet broke out in their favour,How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, &c. An acknowledgment that they have nothing to compare with the privileges of the people of God. They secretly bend to a religion of more comfortable promise.

2. The utter futility of all opposition against the righteous. Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee.

II. To the nature of the blessings which religion brings.

1. The anxiety it relieves. Doubt and uncertainty, fear and guilt; the disorder and restlessness of spirit.

2. The blessings it reveals. The counsels of Deity laid open; the scheme of redemption unveiled; pardon and peace; certainty of Divine favour; guidance of Divine providence, &c.

3. The progressive advancement in holiness and devotion. Moral triumphs over self, the world, and sin. They shall be higher than Agag.

4. The exalted objects of hope it reveals. There shall come a Star, &c.

III. To the actual experience of good men in every age. They have proved that religion gilds prosperitysoothes adversitysoftens death, &c.
IV. To the avowed design of Divine dispensations.

This is to bless men. Act. 3:25-26.Samuel Thodey.

BALAKS ANGER AND BALAAMS APOLOGY

(Num. 24:10-14)

I. The anger of Balak.

And Balaks anger was kindled against Balaam, and he smote his hands together, &c. See here

1. His bitter disappointment. Balak said unto Balaam, I called thee to curse mine enemies, and, behold, thou hast altogether blessed them these three times. All his efforts and hopes had ended in this. His distinguished embassies and tempting offers to the prophet, his numerous victims and repeated sacrifices to God, his earnest expectations of ultimately having the Israelites cursed, have issued in a triple declaration of their rich and exalted blessedness. Intense and deep was his mortification.

2. His severe rebuke of Balaam. Therefore now flee thou to thy place: I thought to promote thee unto great honour, &c. What a humiliation for a man of Balaams genius and gifts and proud pretensions, to be thus addressed! What a reversal of his cherished purposes and desires as to the issue of this enterprise! Yet, surely Balaam deserved this rebuke. He had pitifully humiliated himself long before Balak uttered his scornful and angry rebuke.

3. His impious reflection against God. Lo, the Lord hath kept thee back from honour. In these words the irony with which Balak scoffs at Balaams confidence in Jehovah is unmistakable; and their profanity is great.

II. The apology of Balaam.

1. His vaunted honesty. And Balaam said unto Balak, Spake I not also to thy messengers which thou sentest unto me, saying, If Balak would give me, &c. This statement was true in the letter, but utterly false in spirit. Balaams whole line of conduct was calculated to encourage in Balak the belief that he would probably succeed in cursing Israel. Balaams boast of his honesty implies a consciousness of his weakness, if not of his failure in that quality. Brave men do not vaunt their courage, nor honourable men their honesty, nor do the truly noble boast of high birth. All who understand the human heart perceive a secret sense of weakness in these loud boasts of immaculate purity. (a)

2. The impotence of man when opposed to God. If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the commandment of the Lord, to do good or bad of mine own mind. He hath blessed; and I cannot reverse it. Sennacherib would have destroyed Jerusalem, but the Lord said unto him, I will put My hook in thy nose, and My bridle in thy lips, and I will turn thee back by the way which thou comest. Satan himself in his hostility against the people of God cannot go beyond the permission of God, as we see from Job. 1:12; Job. 2:6. Surely the wrath of man shall praise Thee; the remainder of wrath shalt Thou restrain.

3. The sovereignty of God. Balak and Balaam could not frustrate His purposes. His supremacy is real and effectual. Quaintly and truly says Trapp, God lets out the tedder to wicked men for a time, and then calls them back with shame enough to their task; lets them have the ball on the foot till they come almost to the goal, and then defeats them of their great hopes; as he did this sinful couple. Balak had not his will, nor Balaam his wages; God fooled them both, pulling the morsel out of their mouths, that they had well-nigh devoured. The Lord reigneth.

Before Balaam takes his departure from Balak he declares unto him still further the blessedness of Israel and their relations in the future to neighbouring nations. And now, behold, I go unto my people; come, I will advertise thee, &c. Some expositors are of opinion that this refers to the diabolical counsel of Balaam spoken of in Num. 31:16; and Rev. 2:14. We reject this opinion for three reasons:

(1) No such counsel is recorded or even further referred to here.
(2) The statement of the prophet in this verse is directly opposed to this opinion. He advertises Balak what Israel would do to the Moabites, not what the Moabites should do to Israel.
(3) The advertisement he is about to make to Balak points on to the distant future. The events were to take place in the latter days, or at the end of the days, an expression which cannot possibly apply to transactions which took place almost immediately afterward.

III. The lessons to be deduced from this part of the history.

1. That human nature is deeply selfish. The selfishness of Balaam has been conspicuous throughout; and now that of Balak is clearly revealed. Formerly, when he hoped to gain his ends by means of Balaams powers, he was lavish in his courtesies and compliments to him; but now he sees that this hope was vain, he utters to him words of scornful and stinging rebuke. (b)

2. That evil enterprises have painful issues. This enterprise has brought to Balak loss, bitter disappointment, and sore annoyance; and to Balaam disappointment equally bitter, painful humiliation, and heavy guilt. God frustrates the designs of his enemies. Even when in the beginning evil courses seem pleasant and prosperous, the end thereof will be wretched and perhaps ruinous. There is a way that seemeth right, &c. (Pro. 14:12). (c)

3. That sin is utterly impolitic. Balaam brought upon himself the scorn of Balak, guilt of conscience, and the anger of God, for the wages of unrighteousness, which he failed to obtain. Sin is extreme folly. The sinner is the greatest fool. (d)

4. That worldliness is utterly incompatible with obedience to God. Balaam tried to harmonize them, and miserably failed in the attempt. He succeeded in neither his worldly nor his religious aims. He did not obtain the rewards of divination; he incurred the righteous anger of the Lord God. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) We observe here perfect veracity with utter want of truth. Balaam was veracious. He will not deceive Balak. And yet there was utter truthlessness of heart. Balaam will not utter what is not true; but he will blind himself so that he may not see the truth, and so speak a lie, believing it to be the truth. He will only speak the tiling he feels; but he is not careful to feel all that is true. He goes to another place, where the whole truth may not force itself upon his mindto a hill where he shall not see the whole of Israel: from hill to hill for the chance of getting to a place where the truth may disappear. But there stands the stubborn factIsrael is blessed; and he will look at the fact in every way, to see if he cannot get it into a position where it shall be seen no longer. Ostrich like!

Such a character is not so uncommon as, perhaps, we think. There is many a lucrative business which involves misery and wrong to those who are employed in it The man would be too benevolent to put the gold in his purse if he knew of the misery. But he takes care not to know. There is many a dishonourable thing done at an election, and the principal takes care not to inquire. Many an oppression is exercised on a tenantry, and the landlord receives his rent, and asks no questions. Or there is some situation which depends upon the holding of certain religions opinions, and the candidate has a suspicion that if he were to examine, he could not conscientiously profess these opinions, and perchance he takes care not to examine.
There are men who would not play false, and yet would wrongly win. There are men who would not lie, and yet who would bribe a poor man to support a cause which he believes in his soul to be false. There are men who would resent at the swords point the charge of dishonour, who would yet for selfish gratification entice the weak into sin, and damn body and soul in hell. There are men who would be shocked at being called traitors, who in time of war will yet make a fortune by selling arms to their countrys foes. There are men respectable and respected, who give liberally, and support religious societies, and go to church, and would not take Gods name in vain, who have made wealth, in some trade of opium or spirits, out of the wreck of innumerable human lives. Balaam is one of the accursed spirits now, but he did no more than these are doing.F. W. Robertson, M. A.

(4) Remember with yourself how gloriously Balaam was welcomed and entertained when he came, and lay it to these words now. Is not the case much altered? So ever was it, and ever will it be in this false world. Men have their drifts and ends, when they give grace and countenance to men; they shoot at a mark, which if they may hit by your means, you shall be a white son still, and all shall be well while you serve their purposes. But if once you fail, and prefer conscience and honesty before their desire, truth before falsehood, and God before the devil; then hands be smitten together, the foot stamps, the brow frowns, the countenance and heart are changed. Great things were intended to us in favour and love, but now all is lost, we must fly to our place, and be packing. And who hath kept us from honour but God? The fault must be laid upon Him. This to many falleth out most unjustly; but here to Balaam it was due, whose heart was tainted with desire of wicked gain, and so lost both God and his gain. An example to worldly minds if God have any portion in them.Babington.

Was there ever a man that was more moral and cultured than Lord Chesterfield? and was there ever a man that was more exquisitely selfish than he? Men whose tendencies incline them to the world, come to see that if they act from motives of economy, it is best for them to go through life with such and such graces and proprieties. They are persuaded that it is the most profitable way to go through life. On that ground they are moral; but that leaves oat some of the essential elements of character. It is not conscience that controls them; it is not faith; it is not hope; it is not spiritual purity; it is not aspiration; it is not rectitude in any shape; it is only a refined form of selfishness. A man may be a thoroughly moral man outwardly, and a thoroughly immoral man inwardly.H. W. Beecher.

(c) It is ill with thee, sinner, because thy joys all hang upon a thread. Let lifes thread be cut, and where are thy merriments? Thy dainty music and thy costly cups, the mirth that flashes from thy wanton eye, and the jollity of thy thoughtless soul, where will these be when death, with bony hand, shall come and touch thy heart, and make it cease its beating? It is ill with you, because when these joys are over you have no more to come. You have one bright chapter in the story, but ah! the never-ending chapter, it is woe, woe, woe, from the beginning to the end: the woe of death, and after death the judgment, and after judgment the woe of condemnation, and then that woe that rolleth onward for evereternal woe, never coming to a pause, never knowing an alleviationC. H. Spurgeon.

(d) Be not like the foolish drunkard who, staggering home one night, saw his candle lit for him. Two candles, said he, for his drunkenness made him see double; I will blow out one; and, as he blew it out, in a moment he was in the dark Many a man sees double through the drunkenness of sinhe thinks he has one life to sow his wild oats in, and then the last part of life in which to turn to God: so, like a fool, he blows out the only candle that he has, and in the dark he will have to lie down forever.Ibid.

BALAAMS FOURTH PARABLE: THE STAR AND THE SCEPTRE OF ISRAEL

(Num. 24:15-19)

The introduction to this prophecy (Num. 24:15-16) corresponds with that which the seer used before (Num. 24:3-4), and which we have already noticed.

The predictions recorded in Num. 24:17-19 were partially fulfilled in the reign of David (comp. 2Sa. 8:2; 2Sa. 8:14; 1Ki. 11:15-16; Psa. 60:8). But it is historically certain that they were not fully accomplished in the reign of David or any of his successors. The Star that shall come out of Jacob, and the Sceptre that shall rise out of Israel, as Canon Liddon observes, is something more than an anticipation of the reign of David: it manifestly points to the glory and power of a Higher Royalty. (a)

It appears to us quite certain that the prophecy applies to Christ and His Kingdom. It sets before us

I. The glory of the Messiah as a King.

There shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel. Attersoll thus interprets the symbol of the Star: He is called by this nameFirst, because He is the fountain of all salvation and comfort; Secondly, to teach that all men by nature walk in darkness, and in the shadow of death; Thirdly, because He will give those that are His, the light of knowledge in this life, and the light of perfect glory in the life to come. We are not sure that the figure warrants all this. But our Lord spake of Himself as The bright and morning Star (Rev. 22:16), and He is frequently spoken of in the Scriptures as the great Light for the moral darkness of the world (Luk. 1:78-79; Luk. 2:32; Joh. 1:4-9; Joh. 8:12; 2Pe. 1:19). (b)

But the principal idea seems to be the glory of Christ as the Sovereign of His people. He is, as M. Stuart (on Rev. 22:16) says, a King all resplendent and glorious, like to the morning star (comp. 2Sa. 21:17; Isa. 14:12; Num. 24:17; Dan. 12:3). It is the splendour and beauty of the morning star which makes it here an object of comparison with the splendour of the King of Zion. His royal glory is not material, but moral. It consists in such things as these

1. The benevolence and sublimity of the objects for which He reigns. He reigns to save and bless men, &c.

2. The righteousness of His laws. These are holy and just and good.

3. The wisdom of His methods. He governs not by force or coercion, but by persuasion and inspiration.

4. The character and privileges of His subjects. They are upright and holy in character. They have the exalted privileges of sons of God here, and shall have eternal blessedness and glory hereafter. The glory of this King is set forth in language of splendid eloquence and power in Psalms 77.

II. The extent of the Messiahs conquests.

1. He shall vanquish all His enemies. He shall smite the corners of Moab, and destroy all the sons of confusion; and shall destroy him that remaineth of the city Edom and Moab are named by Balaam, as they are also by the prophets (of., e.g., Isa. 11:14), not for their own sake merely, but as representatives of the heathen nations (goyeem, cf. Num. 24:8), who were hostile to the theocracy. As Jacob then figures as a constant type of the Kingdom of Messiah in the prophets, so too do Edom and Moab of the enemies of that Kingdom; and in the threatened ruin of Edom and Moab is indicated the eventual destruction of all that resist the Kingdom of God in its power. But how will the King destroy the rebellious foes of His Kingdom? May we not reply, by transforming them into loyal subjects. An enemy is never so completely and gloriously destroyed as when he is converted into a true friend. But if any will not be vanquished by the kindness of the King, they will be broken by His power. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron, &c. (Psa. 2:8-12). (c)

2. He shall take to Himself all the possessions of His vanquished enemies. And Edom shall be a possession, Seir also shall be a possession for his enemies. All treasures and possessions shall surely be ultimately surrendered to Christ the King. The possessors of wealth and of power, the sons of science and the sons of song, the gifted and the beautiful, all will lay their treasures at His feet (comp. Psa. 72:10-11; Psa. 72:15).

III. The prosperity of the Messiahs subjects.

And Israel shall do valiantly. Whilst Edom falls, Israel will acquire power. The Church of the living God, supported from on high, has bravely repelled the assaults of all its enemies, and has come forth from every conflict, not only victorious, but with increased courage and strength for future battles.
When Christ shall again appear, and every eye shall see Him, how shall we behold Him?with joy as our Saviour and King?or, how? (d)

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) Upon whom did the seer look when from the summit of Peor he beheld afar a mysterious personage, and gave as His heraldry the sceptre and the star? This can be none other than He who arose splendid in the midst of universal nighta night of ignorance; a night of guiltas a light to lighten the Gentiles and the glory of His people Israel; this can be none other than He by whose coming the shadows of ceremonial institutions were dispersed, and who gave to the world the means of grace and the hope of glory; this can be none other than He whose setting was in blood, but that blood the purifier of a polluted earth, the purchase of such irradiations from the heaven which is above as shall finally deepen into a sky without a cloud, a day without a night; this can be none other than He who has been invested with all power in heaven and earth, who must reign till He hath put all His enemies under His feet, and whose dominion is to be established upon the wreck of all human sovereignty; and this is Hewe know Him, though spoken of in parables, and shadowed by mystic imagery; He came out of Jacob, He rose out of Israel; for to the Jews as concerning the flesh Christ came who is over all, God blessed for ever. And if it were Christs day upon which Abraham rejoicingly gazed when looking from the summit of Moriah down the long perspective of many generations, it was Christs day which was beheld by Balaam, when from Peors top he discerned, amid the mighty darkness of futurity, a single luminary, the harbinger of morning. If it were Christ of whom the dying Jacob foretold when he spoke of the sceptre departing from Judah, that Shiloh might appear; it was of Christ that Balaam pronounced when he predicted that out of the very people whose sovereignty was then to be destroyed, should arise a sceptre before which even Moab must bow; and Balaam might or might not be aware who the Being was of whom he said, I shall see Him, but not now; I shall behold Him, but not nigh. But we who live in the dawning of that day for which prophets and righteous men longedwe who see advances already made towards the glorious consummation when Jesus as King of kings and Lord of lords shall reign triumphant over every nation and tribe and tongue,we know the Personage whose bright emblazonry was shown to the seer on the vast gloom of future time, and we fall before the one Mediator between God and man as the Star that should come out of Jacob, and the Sceptre that should rise out of Israel.Henry Melville, B.D.

(b) Are there reasons to be given why a star should be selected when the Saviour is to be figuratively described? We reply at oncethat everything which has to do with light may be fitly taken as an image of Christ. There is nothing which so fitly represents the moral condition of the world when Christ appeared on earth, as darkness. Darkness covered the earth, and gross darkness the people; and since Christ came to diffuse the knowledge of truthin other words, to scatter this darknessHis office cannot be better represented than when he is exhibited under figures derived from the nature and the agency of light. But yet you may say, why describe Him as a stara star which shines with comparatively faint lustre, and which does little towards radiating a benighted creation? Why not rather take the sun as His emblemthe sun which cometh forth in his strength as a bridegroom from his chamber; before which the shadows of the night immediately flee, and which pours lavishly its glorious radiance over earth, sea, and sky? Certainly it would seem at first sight, as though the sun were a more appropriate emblem of Christ than a star; and accordingly, whilst you may often hear Christians speaking of their Saviour as the Sun of righteousness, you will hardly ever hear them speak of Him as the bright and morning star. They have indeed scriptural warrant in calling Him the Sun of righteousness, seeing that the words occur in the prophecy of Malachi, and evidently are used of the Redeemer. But this is the single passage in which the emblem of the Sun is employed; whilst that of the star is not of unfrequent occurrence. And if you examine attentively the passage in Malachi, you will find cause to think that it refers specially to a yet future time: for the prophet has just been speaking of that day of the Lord which seems in scripture to denote the second advent of Christ; and it is after describing the fearful desolation which that day will bring upon the wicked, that he is commissioned to say for the comfort of the godlyBut unto you that fear My name, shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in His wings The titleSun of righteousness, as thus given to Christ, would appear to mark with how much fuller and more glorious manifestations the Saviour will show Himself upon His return to this earth, than are vouchsafed to us under the present dispensation. He will be a sun to His Church throughout the millennial and heavenly states; but He is only as a star till those states shall come. The night is yet upon us and around us, though that night may be far spent, and the day may be at hand. We see only through a glass darkly, as we can know but in part. Still it is no longer the starless night which it was ere the Redeemer brought life and immortality to light by His gospel. A Stara morning Star has crossed the horizon, and a tempest-tossed world, in danger of everlasting shipwreck, may steer itself by the light of that Star to the haven where it would be, and where there is to be no more night, though no more sun. And thus, if an emblem is to be found which shall at one and the same time pourtray the Saviour as the source of moral illumination to the world, and yet show that this illumination is that of the dawn, rather than that of the noon-tide, such an emblem must be a stara morning star, rather than that of the great luminary of the heavens. Christianity, as set up in the world is but in its twilight; the night is still unbroken over a vast portion of our globe; and even where revelation has been received and rejoiced in, we must rather speak of streaks like those on the eastern sky, whose gold and purple prophecy of morning, rather than those rich full lustres which flood creation when the sun has reached the zenith. On every account, thereforeon account of what He is to the world, and on account of what (as yet, at least) He is notis our Redeemer aptly figured by the emblem which He applied to Himselfthe emblem of our textthe emblem of the bright and morning star.Ibid.

(c) The sign of the Son of Man is yet to be seen in the heavens, where it was beheld by Balaam, from the summit of Peor. I know not what that sign shall be; perhaps again the starfearful meteor!like that which hung over the fated Jerusalem, boding its destruction; perhaps again the sceptrebrilliant constellation!burning with majesty and betokening the extinction of all meaner royalty; perhaps the Cross as it appeared to the Romans eye, when he was taught to know the God of battles, and to place Christianity upon the throne of the Csars. But whatever the sign, the Being whose emblazonry it exhibits, shall come to deal out a long delayed vengeance on tribes that have refused to walk in His light and submit to His rule. Associate yourselves, O ye people, saith Isaiah, and ye shall be broken in pieces; and give ear all ye of far countries; gird yourselves, and ye shall be broken in pieces. Yes! Edom, and Moab, and Seir, and Sheth, literally the foes of Israel in earlier days, and figuratively those enemies of the Church who shall league for its overthrow at the time of the endagainst you shall that Mighty One arise, whose type in the person of David trampled down the nations who first bore your names. And, therefore, do we feel that the future was indeed giving up its secrets to Balaam, as he stood upon Peor, with Israel encamped in the valley beneath. We place ourselves at his side. What seeth he? Dim and mystic things are coming up to his view; a lonely yet a splendid star is rising out of Jacob, and from Israel is proceeding a sceptre, but it looks not like that which a mortal king wields. What mean these hieroglyphics? Whose is this strange yet beautiful heraldry? The answer is easy. Yonder star is the image of Christ, the enlightener of the world; and yonder sceptre is His, for the whole world shall do Him homage. Yes, you say, but ere Christ can shine upon the nations and reign gloriously over them, there is to be battle, and tumult, and earthquake, and destruction. Prophecy is express on this, that there will be a great banding of the powers of earth against the Lord and His Christ, and these powers must be beaten down ere the reign of righteousness can begin. Beholdest thou, O Seer, aught in the distance which seems to tell thee of foes met and overthrown by Him who hath for His sign the sceptre and the star? We pause for our answer, that we may be certified that it is indeed the Christ on whom the seer looks; and we feel that the prediction is complete when the prophet exclaims, He 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.Ibid.

(d) It has been said by some commentators, that the words of our text have reference to his own final doom, as though Balaam was made aware that he should be banished from the presence of the Being whose coming he was commissioned to predictI shall see Him, but not now; I shall behold Him, but not nigh. He shall be compelled to look on the Mediator; every eye shall see Him; but in place of being allowed to approach Him, he shall be amongst those who will be bidden to depart. Oh! behold Him now by faith as the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world. Then, when He shall come in power and great majesty, you shall behold Him, not at a distance, as a stranger, but nigh to you as a deliverer, an advocate, a friend. The Star shall light up the valley of the shadow of death; the Sceptre shall be extended to you in token of favour and acceptance; though as with a rod of iron He breaks in pieces the hosts of the wicked.Ibid.

CHRIST THE STAR SPOKEN OF BY BALAAM

(Num. 24:15-17)

It has pleased God on various occasions to make known His will to persons of a very unworthy character; and to show that His ways and thoughts are not regulated by the vain maxims of human wisdom. He proclaimed to Ahaz the conception of our Emmanuel in the womb of a virgin. To Nebuchadnezzar He revealed the successive destruction of the four great monarchies, and the erection of the Messiahs kingdom on the ruin of them all. Thus, in the passage before us, we are informed that He declared to Balaam not only His purposes respecting Israel and the nations that surrounded them, but the advent of that glorious Person, who, as a star should enlighten, and as a prince should govern, the whole world.

I. The introduction to the prophecy.

1. It seems very strongly to characterize the person who delivered it. When prophecies have been delivered by pious men, they have either been introduced with a plain declaration, Thus saith the Lord; or the prefatory observations have been calculated to exalt and glorify God. But Balaams prediction is ushered in with a pompous exhibition of his own attainments, intended, as it should seem, to wrest from Balak that respect and honour which he had failed to procure by his preceding prophecies.

2. It shows us how much knowledge we may possess, while yet we are utterly destitute of converting grace. The most highly favoured of Gods servants, from the beginning of the world, had not delivered a clearer prophecy of Christ than that which was uttered by Balaam on this occasion. Yet where shall we find a baser character than Balaams? Having considerable knowledge of the true God, he still continues to use enchantments as a magician. He was so covetous that he preferred the wages of unrighteousness to every consideration, either of duty to God or of love to man (2Pe. 2:15-16). His hypocrisy was conspicuous from first to last; for in the midst of all his high professions of regard to the will and word of God, he laboured to the utmost to counteract the designs of God and to reverse His decrees. More murderous purposes never were entertained in the heart of man; for it was his most earnest desire to curse all the people of God, and to consign them over to destruction by the sword of their enemies. His last act especially was truly diabolical: when he found he could not prevail to destroy their bodies, he taught their enemies how to tempt them and to destroy their souls (Rev. 2:14). After comparing his character with his professions and attainments in divine knowledge, what shall we say? Let us never value ourselves on any discoveries of divine truth, unless we have suitable affections and a correspondent practice (1Co. 13:1-3; Mat. 7:22-23).

II. The prophecy itself.

1. In its primary sense it must be understood in reference to David. The immediate intention of Balaam was to inform Balak what the Israelites should do to his people in the latter days. Accordingly he declares that one, like a star for brightness, should arise from among the Jews at a distant period, to sway the Jewish sceptre, and to destroy the Kingdoms of Edom and Moab. This was fulfilled in David (2Sa. 8:2; 2Sa. 8:14; Psa. 60:8; 1Ki. 11:15-16).

2. But there can be no doubt of its ultimately referring to Christ Himself. He is called in Scripture the Daystar, the bright and morning star; nor did ever any one arise with splendour comparable to His. He too sat upon the throne of His father David, and exercised unlimited dominion. The children of Edom and Moab may be justly considered as representing the enemies of His Church and People. These He subdues and will finally destroy. He must reign till He hath put all enemies under His feet. HIM then did Balaam see, as Abraham also had seen four hundred years before; but not, alas! with Abrahams joyful hope.

Improvement.

1. Should not WE then rejoice who have seen this prophecy accomplished? The star is risen, &c. We have only to yield ourselves up to Jesus, and we shall enjoy all the peace and glory of His Kingdom. Let us improve our privileges: let us pray that this Daystar may arise in our hearts: and let this Monarch so captivate our souls, as to lead us to a willing and unreserved obedience.

2. Should we not be thankful too that we have One engaged to vanquish all our enemies? This is the work and office of the Lord Jesus; nor will He ever fail in the execution of it. The Promised Land is before us, and in vain shall our enemies conspire against us. Be strong and very courageous. Let the weakest rejoice in a confident expectation of victory; for God is not a man, that He should lie; neither the son of man, that He should repent.C. Simeon, M.A.

BALAAMS FINAL PARABLES: NATIONAL REVOLUTIONS

(Num. 24:20-24)

These prophetic parables teach

I. That national revolutions exhibit the instability of earthly greatness and temporal power.

See this in the destruction of the Amalekites, which was commenced under Saul and completed under Hezekiah (1 Samuel 15; 1Sa. 27:8; 1Sa. 30:1-19; 1Ch. 4:43). The Kenites, too, though for a long time secure, were at length oppressed and carried into captivity by the Assyrians. Assyria and Eber also, descendants of Shem, were conquered by powers from the (to Balaam) unknown western regions. And finally these western powers shall perish for ever. The greatest and mightiest empires of ancient days have passed away. All earthly things are transient. (a)

II. That national revolutions manifest the principles of Divine retribution.

In the revolutions predicted by Balaam we have clear and striking illustrations of the great truth that the Divine retribution corresponds to human character and conduct. The Amalekites were a warlike people; and by battles they were destroyed. They that take the sword shall perish with the sword. Again, we see that empires obtained by conquest shall be lost by conquest. By force the Assyrian empire had chiefly been formed, and by force it passed away. We have another illustration of this retributive law in the history of the Kenites. They had been kind to Israel (Exodus 18); Moses had promised them that they should share in the goodness of God to Israel (chap Num. 10:32); Balaam here predicts for them long continued safety; and, as a matter of fact, they shared the fortunes of the Israelites until the captivity of the ten tribes. As v. Hofmann observes: Kain, which had left its inaccessible mountain home in Horeb, enclosed as it was by the desert, to join a people who were only wandering in search of a home, by that very act really placed its nest upon a still safer rock. They had aided Israel, and in turn, they were aided by Israel. In the revolutions of history the kindnesses which have been shown to the cause and people of God are remembered and recompensed by Him. Whosoever shall give you a cup of water to drink in My Name, because ye belong to Christ, verily I say unto you, he shall not lose his reward. Thus these historical revolutions teach us that, With what measure we mete, it shall be measured to us again; and, whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap, &c. (b)

III. That national revolutions are ordered by God.

God doeth this (Num. 24:23). Whoever are the instruments, He is the supreme director. The Lord bringeth low, and lifteth up, &c. (1Sa. 2:7-8). That bringeth the princes to nothing; He maketh the judges of the earth as vanity, &c. (Isa. 40:23-24). Thus saith the Lord God; Remove the diadem, and take off the crown, &c. (Eze. 21:26-27). (c)

Learn

1. The great duty and interest of nations to seek for and to embody truth and righteousness in their governments, institutions, &c. Pro. 14:34; Pro. 25:5; Pro. 29:14; Isa. 60:12.

2. The duty and interest of all men to set their affections on things above, not on things on the earth. The latter are mutable and transient, the former are immutable and permanent. Truth, holiness, love, are abiding things; seek after these. (d)

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) Earthly inheritances are but of brief continuance. The possession of them is limited and uncertain. To every one, they are but at most for term of life. As one of the kings of Spain answered to one of his courtiers, who, thinking to please his master, wished that kings were immortal: If that had been, said he, I should never have reigned.Leighton.

All earthly things last and endure but for a season; men are mortal, riches are uncertain, favour is vanity, honour is changeable, treasures are transitory, pleasures are unstable, profits are corruptible, friends are fading, and oftentimes turn to be enemies: only the treasures of heaven, the favour of God, the pleasures of eternal glory, the riches of the world to come, are immortal, and never decay.Attersoll.

(b) Gods rewards and Gods punishments are all natural. Distinguish between arbitrary and natural. Death is an arbitrary punishment for forgery: it might be changed for transportation. It is not naturally connected. It depends upon the will of the law-maker. But trembling nerves are the direct and natural results of intemperance. They are in the order of nature the results of wrong-doing. The man reaps what he has sown. Similarly in rewards. If God gave riches in return for humbleness, that would be an arbitrary connection. He did give such a reward to Solomon But when He gives Life Eternal, meaning by Life Eternal not duration of existence, but heavenly quality of existence, it is all natural. The seed sown in the ground contains in itself the future harvest. The harvest is but the development of the germ of life in the seed. A holy act strengthens the inward holiness. It is a seed of life growing into more life. Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he reap. He that sows much, thereby becomes more conformed to God than he was beforein heart and spirit. That is his reward and harvest. And just as among the apostles, there was one whose spirit, attuned to love, made him emphatically the disciple whom Jesus loved, so shall there be some who, by previous discipline of the Holy Ghost, shall have more of His mind, and understand more of His love, and drink deeper of His joy than others. They that have sowed bountifully.F. W. Robertson, M.A.

For another illustration on this point, see p. 89.

(c) God increaseth the nations and destroyeth them. He enlargeth the nations and straiteneth them again. We see only the intermediate agents, we are prone to forget that God is the Creator and Controller as well of the moral as of physical volcanoes, and, consequently, are led to imagine, in the day of panic, that sovereignty is engulfed in confusion, and that the garments of battle are the shroud of government. It is thus that the devoutest of us may not unfrequently alarm ourselves into temporary Atheism, and hasten for refuge to the mud-fortresses of mechanical power, when we should fly straight to the pavilion of God. The Lord reigneth, &c. His throne is established of old; He is from everlasting. Kings are His servants, princes are His menials, the universe in His footstool, and heaven itself but a flash of His benignant eye.

We shall have but a shallow knowledge of history if we study it merely in the faint light reflected by victorious thrones, or by the troubled glare of oft-recurring battles. God is the central fact in all history. Growing nations are but his expanding smile, dwindling empires are but His darkening frown. Nebuchadnezzar was only the menial servant of the Most High when he built the great Babylon which he idolized, and all the conquerors of proud Chaldea, from Cyrus to Tamerlane, were the hirelings of the Infinite King. The Ptolemies and the Pharaohs of Egypt held their lease of power from the Most High: and the pompous march of the Csars was but as the dance of the ephemera over the summer stream. He bringeth the princes to nothing, &c. (Isa. 40:23-24). Can it be right, or wise, to ignore His existence when we open the archives of history? Can he have a true conception of the magnitude and grandeur of the landscape who has examined it only by the feeble glimmer of a wasting rushlight? Foolish man! Even an atom would not reveal its beauties in such a mocking light; how much less, then, the mountain, wood, and stream of natures palaces. No, no! The sun must reveal it. And so with history: let the Sun of heaven blaze upon it, and every pinnacle becomes a glorified purposeevery want kindles into sublime significanceJoseph Parker, D.D.

(d) Oh, that I could pour in upon the young the majesty and sanctity of living for the invisible; that is to say, for honour, and truth, and fidelity! Oh, that I could make you feel how essentially brittle, how friable, how perishable, are all material sources of strength! God is the centre of life, and spiritual realities are the only things that will endure. Stone and iron, and silver and gold, and timber, and cities, and nations, and outward things, are but pictures, painted soon to fade away; while truth and love, and fidelity, and purity, shall last for ever and for ever.H. W. Beecher.

DEATH, THE CROWN OF LIFE

(Num. 24:23)

Alas, who shall live when God doeth this?
Our text may be considered either as a plaint, a sigh, or a songa dirge winding to a march. There are, in reality, three questions interlinked in this passage. It is a question of studious curiosity. What kind of a race will then inhabit the earth! Men are naturally inquisitive to know who are to be their successors. Why not? They are to be the heirs in turn of our heritage; the tenants who are to move in as we move out; to enjoy our repairs, and to do, in turn, their own repairing, for those who shall follow them.

Who are they? The question deepens into a sigh. Here we go! just as we begin to take in the meaning of things about us; scarce sooner found than lost. Death! what is it? It must be a mystery full of meaning. It seems as natural as to be born. Has Heaven hid the happiness of death, that man may dare to live? And what is life? It is not so much one grand event as a conjunction of grand events. All are more or less alive to the activities that surround them. All are more or less sensitive to the links that unite us to coming time.

The future is full of suggestion. The poet loves to forecast it for its own sake, and fill the atmosphere with sunshine, or with shade, as suits his fancy best. The poet is an artist too. He paints for us the landscape of the future, and interprets to our strange surprise the distant scenes embodied there. The philosopher listens eagerly for hints that shall confirm his airy schemes and idle speculations. The statesman is zealously intent on discovering the wedge that shall cleave the knots of craggy policies. The saint is anxious to learn of God and Heaven, and solve the awful mystery of our being.
But what of that which is to transpire long after all these are past? What will go on here when I am gone? Some one will tread the path that I am treading! Some one will saunter in the grove where I now linger! Some one will cry out with unutterable longing, as we now cry, Alas, who shall live when God doeth this?

We are baffled at the grave. We put our eyes close to the bars, but we cannot see. Death is the crown of life; and yet it is not the triumph of man over time, but of time over man. Do lasting slumbers hold us? Is there no more of us when we are gone? Oh! the melancholy ring of those wordsWhen I am gone! I admit it is a solemn thing to die. It is a dread passage; and what may happen after it? There is an eternity to this side the grave; the world shall be moving on when I am goneand shall I then be put out for ever? The emphasis is on this wisethis world as it is to be. Where are those who, in the times past, have been dreaming of rapid propulsion as they plodded slowly on? Where are those whose genius had almost wrested from nature the longed-for secret, but died without the sight? Know they now of swift-going ships and dashing railway trains that traverse mountain and valley like things of life? Where are those who dreamed of messages borne on the wings of the wind? Do they read the swift-flying signals from telegraph wires, leaving the winds lagging languidly behind? Verily, what hath God wrought! Yet these are but the meagre preliminaries to what shall be. When the reduplicated forces of the earth shall be put under command; when man shall sit in plumed victory over the opposing energies of nature; when the sword shall be beaten into a ploughshare, and the spear into a pruning hook; when health shall mantle the cheek, and happiness shall festoon the fireside; when man shall keep faith with his fellow-man, and worship and adore his Maker. Alas, who shall live when God doeth this? Shall I live then? The thought gladdens, but it maddens as well. The scepticism that would console me with the thought that death is but a momentary pang; that I shall sleep in deaths dateless night; that all these struggles shall have come to their rest; ah! this scepticism is but a miserable comforter after all. I cry out and complain with all the sadness of my rational nature. I am full of longing to know when this world shall have been finished; then, where shall I be?

When geology shall cease to tamper with the rock; when disease shall be no longer necessary; when Death shall lie on his death-bed; Alas! who shall live when God doeth this? The Great Omnipotent does not weary. Every age becomes impatient; but His doings, as well as His revelation, assure us that with Him a thousand years are as one day. When we have fought our brave round, the Great Captain will order us to the rear and bring up fresh recruits. But what of the battle? Shall we know nothing of its sequel? Alas! who shall live when God doeth this? It is a question of sublime importance to us.

It is voiced in another shapeIf a man die, shall he live again? God has provided a way by which His people may be released, and yet view this earth in all its perfect beauty and glory. The resurrection solves this mighty problem. All who labour shall see the reward of their labour. Every husband man whose time is due to toil shall be gladdened by the sight of the harvest. The sower shall be partaker of the fruit. I heard a voice from heaven, &c. (Rev. 14:13). God works in the shadow of time. Even while we sleep he toils on; His agencies are ever on the alert.

Presently time shall have halted from its confused scramble, and Gods finished workmanship shall have been taken from the loom, and the tapestry shall be revealed in all its beauty and perfectibilitythe pattern will be complete. Then shall we learn that when we die we do not die out; that death is not death; that to die is not to die, but to blossom into life. We say good night to earth, but not good-bye. And all this we shall know when sin has perished; when death is dead; when tears are dried; when earth is immortalwe may then be alive, and never die again. Blessed reality close at hand! Shall we, every one, live when God doeth this?H. S. Carpenter, D.D. (Abridged from The Christian World Pulpit)

THE PARTING OF BALAAM AND BALAK

(Num. 24:25)

Instead of Balaam returned to his place, it is better to translate, turned towards his place. That he really returned home is not implied in the words themselves; and the question, whether he did so, must be determined from other circumstances. In the further course of the history, we learn that Balaam went to the Midianites, and advised them to seduce the Israelites to unfaithfulness to Jehovah, by tempting them to join in the worship of Peor (Num. 31:16). He was still with them at the time when the Israelites engaged in the war of vengeance against that people, and was slain by the Israelites along with the five princes of Midian (Num. 31:8; Jos. 13:22). At the time when he fell into the hands of the Israelites, he no doubt made a full communication to the Israelitish general, or to Phinehas, who accompanied the army as priest, concerning his blessings and prophecies, probably in the hope of saving his life, though he failed to accomplish his end. Such is the opinion of Keil and Del. Hengstenberg, however, suggests that after Balaams departure from Balak, he took his way into the camp of the Israelites, and there made known his prophecies to Moses, or to the elders of Israel, in the hope of obtaining from them the reward which Balak had withheld, and that it was not till after his failure to obtain full satisfaction to his ambition and covetousness here that he went to the Midianites, to avenge himself upon the Israelites, by the proposals that he made to them.

I. Balaam and Balak parted, having utterly failed in their designs.

Balak had not obtained what he desired. His repeated sacrifices to Jehovah, his tempting offers of large rewards and splendid honours to Balaam, and all his other efforts, had proved fruitless and vain: Israel was not cursed but repeatedly and richly blessed. Balaam, too, had not obtained what he so eagerly longed for. He had found himself utterly unable to curse the chosen people, and had not gained the rewards of divination. The coveted wealth and honours, for which he had risked and dared so much, he had not secured. The prophet and the king were both bitterly disappointed and vexed; and during all their plottings and endeavours to curse them, the Israelites were peacefully and securely encamped in the neighbouring plains.
Learn: the devices and deeds of the wicked against the cause and people of God are ever foiled by Him. He that keepeth Israel can neither be surprised, nor circumvented, nor overpowered (Psalms 131). (a)

II. They parted with characters considerably modified by their association with each other.

The solicitations and temptations of Balak had influenced the character of Balaam; and the character and conduct of Balaam had exercised no slight influence upon Balak. What was the result of these influences? We know that the character of Balaam had sadly deteriorated since the first embassage from Balak had visited him; he had also incurred the wrath of God by reason of his sins; and he went forward to deeper and more diabolical wickedness, and to a doom of appalling darkness. And it is impossible to conclude that Balak was not injured by the influence of Balaam. His heinous designs had been encouraged, his hopes allowed and then blighted, and his temper irritated and embittered by the seer. They had mutually influenced each other for evil; they parted worse men than they were when first they met.
Learn: that in our associations with our fellowmen we are ever exerting a most important influence upon their character and destiny. We meet and part; but in our intercourse we have contributed something to the development of each others character either for good or for evil. We shall never be the same beings as we should have been if we had never met. (b)

III. They parted, but not for ever.

Balaam and Balak will meet again. They will both see Him of whom Balaam prophesied, They shall see Him, but not now: they shall behold Him, but not nigh. Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him. Then, if not before, these two who parted upon Peor will meet again; and then each of them will receive the justretribution of his character and conduct.
Learn.That those who have been associated in this present life will meet again in the great hereafter. Tempter and tempted, oppressor and oppressed, companions in evil designs and deeds, and companions in noble aims and enterprises, all will meet again.

Let the thought of that future meeting have its due weight in regulating our present associations. (c)

ILLUSTRATIONS

(a) Sooner would God forget some planets that He had hurled into the firmament than forget the feeblest of His saints. Behold, I have graven thee on the palms of My hands, thy walls are continually before Me. The very hairs of your head are numbered. As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about His people. God has pledged His power on our behalf. He has sworn by His existence that we are dear to Him through the infinite merits of His Son. Who shall tell the limits of our security? If God keeps all worlds in motionif the eyes of the universe are directed to Him for helpif all things are under His benignant control, we may content ourselves in the plenitude of our safety. Say not, brother, that thy solitude is hidden from God, or that in the time of affliction. He will forget thee; perish the thought! The mother may forget her sucking child; but God will hold thee in everlasting remembrance; for the Lord taketh pleasure in His people (Psa. 149:4). God looks at the individual, not at the aggregate. The Christian cannot be lost in the worlds crowd. The Koh-i-noor may be taken for a piece of valueless glass, but the Christian gem cannot be mistaken of God. They who love God shall be accounted jewels in that day. Each is a part of the whole, and unity must be perfected in heaven.Joseph Parker, D.D.

(b) No human being can come into this world without increasing or diminishing the sum total of human happiness, not only of the present, but of every subsequent age of humanity. No one can detach himself from this connection. There is no sequestered spot in the universe, no dark niche along the disk of non-existence, to which he can retreat from his relations to others, where he can withdraw the influence of his existence upon the moral destiny of the world. Everywhere his presence or absence will be felt. Everywhere he will have companions, who will be better or worse for his influence.

It is an old saying, and one of fearful and fathomless import, that we are here forming characters for eternity. Forming characters!whose? our own? or others? Both; and in that momentous fact lie the peril and responsibility of our existence. Who is sufficient for the thought! thousands of my fellow-beings will yearly, and till years shall end, enter eternity with characters differing from those they would have carried thither had I never lived. The sunlight of that world will reveal my finger-marks in their primary formations, and in all their successive strata of thought and life. And they too will form other characters for eternity, until the influence of my existence shall be diffused through all the future generations of this world, and through all that shall be future to a certain point in the world to come. As the little silvery, circular ripple, set in motion by the falling pebble, expands from its inch of radius to the whole compass of the pool; so there is not a child, not an infant Moses placed, however softly, in his bulrush ark upon the sea of time, whose existence does not stir a ripple, gyrating outwards and on, until it shall have moved across and spanned the whole ocean of Gods eternity, stirring even the river of life, and the fountains at which His tall angels drink.Elihu Burritt.

(c) It is said that among the high Alps at certain seasons the traveller is told to proceed very quietly, for on the steep slopes overhead the snow bangs so evenly balanced that the sound of a voice or the report of a gun may destroy the equilibrium, and bring down an immense avalanche, that will overwhelm everything in ruin in its downward course. And so about our way there may be a soul in the very crisis of its moral history, trembling between life and death, and a mere touch or shadow may determine its destiny. A young lady who was deeply impressed with the truth, and was ready, under a conviction of sin, to ask, What must I do to be saved? had all her solemn impressions dissipated by the unseemly jesting and laughter of a member of the Church by her side as she passed out of the sanctuary. Her irreverent and worldly spirit cast a shadow on that young lady not far from the kingdom of God. How important that we should always and everywhere walk worthy of our high calling as Christians! Let us remember that we are always casting the shadow of our real life upon some one; that somebody is following us as John followed Peter into the sepulchre. Happy if, when all the influences of life flow back and meet at the judgment, we can lift up clean hands and spotless robes, and say, I am free from the blood of all men! Happy then, to hear even one soul saying to us out of the great multitude, that, following the shadow of our Christian life and devotion, he found Jesus and heaven.Dr. Storr.

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

G. THE PROPHECY OF BALAAM (Num. 24:1-9)

TEXT

Num. 24:1. And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments, but he set his face toward the wilderness. 2. 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. 3. And he took up his parable, and said, Balaam the son of Beor hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said: 4. 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: 5. How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel! 6. As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the rivers side, as the trees of lignaloes which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar trees beside the waters. 7. 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. 8. God brought him forth out of Egypt; he hath as it were the strength of a unicorn: he shall eat up the nations his enemies, and shall break their bones, and pierce them through with his arrows. 9. 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.

PARAPHRASE

Num. 24:1. And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, he did not go to seek omens, as he had at other times, but he looked intently toward the wilderness. 2. And Balaam lifted up his eyes, and he saw Israel camping tribe by tribe. And the Spirit of God came upon him, 3. and he took up his speech and said, The oracle of Balaam the son of Peor, the oracle of the man whose eye is opened, 4. the oracle of him who hears the words of God, who sees the vision of the Almighty, falling down, but having his eyes opened; 5. How fair are your tents, O Jacob, and your Tabernacles, O Israel! 6. Like valleys that stretch afar, like gardens beside a river, like aloes which the Lord has planted, like cedar trees beside the waters. 7. He shall pour the water out of his buckets, moistening his seed abundantly; and his kings shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom shall be exalted. 8. God brought him out of Egypt: he has, as it were, the strength of a wild ox. He shall eat up the nations his enemies, and shall break their bones in pieces, and shall pierce them through with his arrows. 9. He rested, he lay down like a lion, and like a lioness; who will rouse him up? Blessed be he who blesses you, and cursed be he who curses you.

COMMENTARY

Now persuaded fully that God will not cure Israel, Balaam conducts himself differently. In the previous sacrifices he had resorted to auguries, which would have been omens or signs observed in the world of nature and interpreted for the situation at hand. The custom was soundly denounced to Israel (Lev. 19:26; Deu. 18:10), but was a very common practice among the heathen, As he looks out upon the spreading camp of Gods people, he can no longer feign any type of cooperation with Balak, and is well prepared for the revelation which Gods Spirit will bring him.

The message of God is specified as Balaams parable, or utterance. While the term alone does not exclusively specify a message of divine origin, the circumstances would establish this fact. In stating that his eyes are now open, he speaks of one of the major manners by which Gods communications were delivereda heightened vision. He would be permitted to see what was hidden from normal human eyes, and for the purpose of relaying Gods will to Balak. The message of God directly followed.
Essentially, the communication reinforced the previous prophecy. Once more Balaam pronounced a totally favorable word about Israel. The tents of Jacob would be like wide spreading valleys, resembling riverside gardens of exotic trees. The aloe, for example, which grew no nearer than the Far East, would have been known only through importation of its rare fragrance; the cedars, on the other hand, were indigenous to northern Palestine and Lebanon, and were extensively used in building and decorative work. The two trees are mentioned together not because they are of a common source, but because they are symbolic of living and valuable blessings.
Together with the beautiful trees comes the figure of an abundance of water, carried to the irrigation field in buckets via long poles, or to the household for daily use. The thought suggests an abundance of this life-giving element to a people who would deeply appreciate the fact, having for so long been transients in a barren, near-waterless land.
Like the names Pharoah and Abimelech, Agag is not the name of a single individual, but the title applied to the kings of the Amalekites. The present prophecy was uttered in an area where these kings would have been well known. But the king of Israel would attain a stature high above that of Agaga thought usually understood to refer to more than any one Israelite king, and conceivably a prophecy of the Messiah. At the peak of the Kingdom of Israel, all of the land promised to Abrahamthe territory lying between the Arabian Desert and the Mediterranean, and stretching from the Wilderness of Paran to the great bend of the Euphrates north of Syriaa total of about 60,000 square mileswas under the dominion of David and Solomon. Neither Agag nor Balak nor any of the other kings encountered by the followers of Moses ever attained to such a kingdom. And all possible comparisons fade into insignificance when the passage is viewed symbolically with its Messianic import. The exaltation of His kingdom was twofold: it brought man into a saved relationship with God, and elevated him into an eternal state of bliss. Nothing remotely comparable could be found in any earthly kingdom of any age; hence, the words spoken through Balaam stand without possible contradiction.
The words continued, expressing divine leadership and delivery from Egypt, followed by a constant strengthening and continuing victories to His favored people. Enemies were, by inference, weaker, since Israels strength is compared to that of the wild ox; they were to be devoured as by a conquering lion. The broken bones and arrow-piercing wounds suggest total mastery and defeat of the national enemies. Following his victories, the lion lies complacent at his lair, unafraid of any about him. None dare antagonize him, since his power is unmatched and fearsome. The very choice blessings of God must come upon all who show this nation favor, but divine vengeance falls upon any who subject it to oppression and shame. All this constitutes a remarkable oracle. Its message must be heeded, or the consequences are formidable.

QUESTIONS AND RESEARCH ITEMS

443.

What is different about Balaams conduct as he approaches this third prophecy?

444.

How is it possible that the Spirit of God could come upon a man who was not of the people of Israel?

445.

Explain the term parable or oracle as used of Balaams message.

446.

Show the points on which the prophecies of Balaam were fulfilled literally in later years.

447.

Why is the kingdom in Israels future compared to that of Agags?

448.

Discuss the two aspects of the prophesied kingdom.

449.

Show the validity of comparing this kingdom to a hunting, relaxing lion.

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

XXIV.

(1) He set his face toward the wilderness.i.e., towards the place where the Israelites were encamped on the steppes of Moab.

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

ISRAEL’S HAPPINESS, Num 24:1-4.

1. Enchantments Auguries. See Num 23:3; Num 23:15; Num 23:23, notes.

Toward the wilderness The plains of Moab, where Israel was encamped. Chap. Num 22:1.

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

Chapter 24 Balaam’s Final Failed Attempt Is Followed By Various Prophecies.

Num 24:1

‘And when Balaam saw that it pleased Yahweh to bless Israel, he did not go not, as at the other times, to meet with enchantments, but he set his face toward the wilderness.’

Balaam now recognised that it was Yahweh’s intention to bless Israel. So he realised that his enchantments, his ‘persuaders’, would not work and decided to try another tack. He would set his face towards the wilderness and seek to enter into a trance. Perhaps that would work.

Num 24:2

‘And Balaam lifted up his eyes, and he saw (or ‘looked on’) Israel dwelling according to their tribes, and the Spirit of God came on him.’

And there Balaam fixed his eyes on Israel dwelling in their usual formation, in their tribes. Now he saw the whole of Israel. And as he did so ‘the Spirit of God’ came on him, and he prophesied. What resulted was not his intention but he is seen as having no choice in the matter. Yahweh intervened again to make him bless Israel.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Num 24:5 How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel!

Num 24:5 Comments – Matthew Henry and John Gill suggest that the “admirable” arrangement of the Israelite encampment provoked Balaam’s statement in Num 24:5. [32] Some scholars suggest that the beauty seen in the encampment of the children of Israel was the fact that it took the shape of the Cross of Christ.

[32] Matthew Henry, Numbers, in Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, New Modern Edition, Electronic Database (Seattle, WA: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 1991), in P.C. Study Bible, v. 3.1 [CD-ROM] (Seattle, WA: Biblesoft Inc., 1993-2000), notes on Numbers 24:5; John Gill, Numbers, in John Gill’s Expositor, in e-Sword, v. 7.7.7 [CD-ROM] (Franklin, Tennessee: e-Sword, 2000-2005), comments on Numbers 24:5.

Num 24:7 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 24:7 “and his king shall be higher than Agag” Comments – The name “Agag” ( ) (H90) occurs in only two passages in the Old Testament (Num 24:7, 1Sa 15:8-33). Agag, king of the Amalekites, was defeated and captured by King Saul and killed by Samuel the prophet. Phillip J. Budd expresses the popular view that the reading of the MT as “Agag” is a prophecy of King Saul conquering King Agag in 1Sa 15:1-35. [33]

[33] Phillip J. Budd, Numbers, in Word Biblical Commentary: 58 Volumes on CD-Rom, vol. 5, eds. Bruce M. Metzger, David A. Hubbard and Glenn W. Barker (Dallas: Word Inc., 2002), in Libronix Digital Library System, v. 2.1c [CD-ROM] (Bellingham, WA: Libronix Corp., 2000-2004), comments on Numbers 4:7.

The ancient Hebrew texts show two variant readings in Num 24:7. The Masoretic Text, the Targum of Jonathan, and the Latin Vulgate read ( ) “Agag,” while the Samaritan Pentateuch, Septuagint, Aquila’s Greek Translation of Old Testament, Symmachus, and Theodotion read ( ) “Gog” (H1463). [34] John Sailhamer suggests this verse is an example of post-biblical interpretation where the variant readings emerge from scribal efforts to explain a difficult text, with “Agag” being prophetic of the events in 1Sa 15:8, while “Gog” provides a messianic interpretation with a reference to Eze 38:3.

[34] John H. Sailhamer, Introduction to Old Testament Theology (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, c1995), 220-1.

Eze 38:3, “And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal:”

Commenting on Num 24:7, John Gill, Adam Clarke, KD, Espin, and JFB suggest that the name “Agag” is a royal, hereditary title for the Amalekites, such as “Pharaoh” with the Egyptians and “Abimelech” with the Philistines, rather than a proper name. Gill bases his view on Jewish tradition from Jarchi (Rashi) and Aben Ezra. Gesenius defines “Agag” as “the proper noun of the Amalekite kings.” Thus, the term “Agag” may have been a familiar term to Balaam. Matthew Henry and JFB suggest the royal title of Agag was used by this prophet because this king was the most powerful ruler in this region of the Middle East.

Num 24:8 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.

Num 24:8 Word Study on “an unicorn” Gesenius says the Hebrew word “unicorn” ( ) (H7214) refers to “a wild animal, fierce and untamed, resembling an ox.” Strong says it refers to “a wild bull.” BDB says it is “a wild ox, as fierce and strong.” The BDB says it probably refers to “the great aurochs or wild bulls which are now extinct. The exact meaning is not known”. Therefore, it is often translated “wild ox.” This Hebrew word is found 9 times in the Old Testament and is translated “unicorn” all 9 times in the KJV. This word is only found in Hebrew poetry.

Num 24:17  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.

Num 24:17 Word Study on “Sheth” Strong says the Hebrew word “shayth” ( ) (H8352) means, “put, or substituted”. He believes this name comes from the primitive verb ( ) (H7896), which means, “to place, to appoint”. This same Hebrew verb is used in Gen 4:25, because God appointed another man-child to take the place of Abel. The Enhanced Strong says the word is used nine times in the Old Testament, being translated in the KJV as “Seth 7, Sheth 2.” It refers to Seth, the son of Adam, in all nine occurrences.

Num 24:17 Comments – Num 24:17 is considered by many Christian commentators to be a Messianic prophesy of the coming of Jesus Christ. This poetic language suggests the coming of the Messiah as a ruler to deliver the children of Israel from their enemies.

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

A Third Blessing

v. 1. And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, this conviction having rather been forced upon him by his double experience, he went not, as at other times, as upon the two previous occasions, to seek for enchantments, to look for auguries or omens after the manner of heathen soothsayers, but he set his face toward the wilderness, toward the fields where the children of Israel were encamped, for he could overlook the entire host.

v. 2. And Balaam lifted up his eyes, and he saw Israel abiding in his tents according to their tribes, he was near enough to distinguish the various groups as they were arranged in camps about the Tabernacle; and the Spirit of God came upon him, for the Lord now threw him into a state of ecstasy and used him as His instrument of prophecy. And Balaam also, feeling the uselessness of restraint, yielded the more readily, although it cannot be said that his heart was in his task.

v. 3. And he took up his parable, his prophetic utterance, and said, Balaam, the son of Beor, hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said;

v. 4. 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. It was a Revelation of God which came to Balaam by the Spirit of God. His mind was closed to all external influences, and he sank to the ground, overwhelmed with the ecstasy of the manner of communication which came to him.

v. 5. How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel!

v. 6. As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the river’s side, as the trees of lignaloes which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar-trees beside the waters. The seer beholds not only the habitations of Israel as desirable places to live, but also the land as being most pleasant, for the conception of the aloe-trees breathing out their fragrance, and of the cedar-trees standing in their strength by the watercourses, leads us away from the ordinary beauties of nature to a conception which properly pictures the delights of the spiritual Israel of all ages.

v. 7. He shall pour the water out of his buckets, for they would overflow with moisture, and his seed shall be in many waters, his descendants would find their homes along fruitful streams; and his king shall be higher than Agag, which was the hereditary title of the Amalekite kings, and his kingdom shall be exalted. Above all the enmity of the world as represented by the kingdoms of the heathen, the people of the Lord would be secure in their relation to Jehovah, blessed with prosperity and glory.

v. 8. God brought him (Israel) forth out of Egypt; he hath, as it were, the strength of an unicorn, of the wild ox, which was noted for its fierceness ; he shall eat up the nations, his enemies, devour them in his great wrath and power, and shall break their bones, utterly crush them, and pierce them through with his arrows, or, break their arrows, their weapons of warfare, to pieces.

v. 9. He couched, he lay down as a lion and as a great lion; who shall stir him up? Cf Gen 49:9. Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee. This last contained a warning to Balak, for it intimated that the blessing of Abraham and Isaac, Gen 12:3; Gen 27:29, had been laid upon the entire nation of Israel, and there was danger in being the enemy of such a people.

v. 10. And Balak’s anger was kindled against Balaam, and he smote his hands together, as an expression of his disappointment and disgust; and Balak said unto Balaam, I called thee to curse mine enemies, and, behold, thou hast altogether blessed them. these three times.

v. 11. Therefore now flee thou to thy place, go back home as quickly as possible; I thought to promote thee unto great honor; but, lo, the Lord hath kept thee back from honor. Here the irony with which Balak derided the dependence of Balaam. upon Jehovah is plainly shown. Since Balaam’s power of divination was not strong enough to overcome the opposition of Jehovah, he must take the consequences.

v. 12. And Balaam said unto Balak, Spake I not also to thy messengers which thou sentest unto me, saying,

v. 13. 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? Cf Num 22:18.

v. 14. And now, behold, I go unto my people, the breach between him and? Balak was made; come, therefore, and I will advertise, teach, thee what this people-shall do to thy people in the latter days. All restraint was now removed from Balaam; he wanted to teach and at the same time advise Balak as to his conduct toward the invaders and their overwhelming strength.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

NUM 24:1

As at other times, or, “as (he had done) time after time.” Septuagint, . To seek for enchantments. Rather, “for the meeting with aunties.” . Septuagint, to . Nachashim; as in Num 23:23, is not enchantments in the sense of magical practices, but definitely auguries, i.e. omens and signs in the natural world observed and interpreted according to an artificial system as manifesting the purposes of God. As one of the commonest and worst of heathen practices, it was forbidden to Israel (Le 19:26; Deu 18:10) and held up to reprobation, as in 2Ki 17:17; 2Ki 21:6; 2Ch 33:6. Toward the wilderness. . Not “Jeshimon,” but apparently the Arboth Moab in which Israel was encamped, and which were for the most part desert as compared with the country around.

Num 24:2

The spirit of God came upon him. This seems to intimate a higher state of inspiration than the expression, “God put a word into his mouth” (Num 23:5, Num 23:16).

Num 24:3

Balaam hath said. Rather, “the utterance of Balaam.” is constantly used, as in Num 14:28, for a Divine utterance, effatum Dei, but it does not by itself, apart from the context, claim a superhuman origin. The man whose eyes are open. . The authorities are divided between the rendering in the text and the opposite rendering given in the margin. is used in Dan 8:26, and in Lam 3:8, in the sense of “shut;” but, on the other hand, a passage in the Mishnah distinctly uses and in opposite senses. The Vulgate, on the one hand, has obturatus; the Septuagint, on the other, has , and this is the sense given by the Targums. Strange to say, it makes no real difference whether we read “open” or “shut,” because in any case it was the inward vision that was quickened, while the outward senses were closed.

Num 24:4

Falling into a trance. Rather, “falling down.” Qui cadit, Vulgate. The case of Saul, who “fell down naked all that day” (1Sa 19:24), overcome by the illapse of the Spirit, affords the best comparison. Physically, it would seem to have been a kind of catalepsy, in which the senses were closed to outward things, and the eyes open but unseeing. The word for “open” in this verse is the ordinary one, not that used in Num 24:3.

Num 24:6

As the valleys, or, “as the torrents” (), which pour down in parallel courses from the upper slopes. As gardens by the river’s side. The river (), as in Num 22:5) means the Euphrates. Balaam combines the pleasant imagery of his own cultivated land with that of the wilder scene amidst which he now stood. As the trees of lign aloes. . Aloe trees, such as grew in the further east, where Balaam had perhaps seen them. Which the Lord hath planted, or, “the Lord’s planting,” a poetical ,way of describing their beauty and rarity (cf. Psa 1:3; Psa 104:16).

Num 24:7

He shall pour the water, or, “the water shall overflow.” Out of his buckets. is the dual, “his two buckets.” The image, familiar enough to one who lived in an irrigated land, is of one carrying two buckets on the ends of a pole which are so full as to run over as he goes. And his seed in many waters. It is uncertain in what sense the word “seed” issued. It may be an image as simple as the last, of seed sown either by or actually upon many waters (cf. Ecc 11:1), and so securing a plentiful and safe return; or it may stand for the seed, i.e; the posterity, of Israel, which should grow up amidst many blessings (Isa 44:4). The former seems most in keeping here. His king shall be higher than Agag. Rather, “let his king be higher than Agag.” The name Agag (, the fiery one) does not occur again except as the name of the king of Amalek whom Saul conquered and Samuel slew (1Sa 15:1-35.); yet it may safely be assumed that it was the official title of all the kings of Amalek, resembling in this “Abimelech” and “Pharaoh.” Here it seems to stand for the dynasty and the nation of the Amalekites, and there is no reason to suppose that any reference was intended to any particular individual or event in the distant future. The “king” of Israel here spoken of is certainly not Saul or any other of the kings, but God himself in his character as temporal Ruler of Israel; and the “kingdom” is the kingdom of heaven as set forth by way of anticipation in the polity and order of the chosen race. As a fact, Israel had afterwards a visible king who overthrew Agag, but their having such a king was alien to the mind of God, and due to a distinct falling away from national faith, and therefore could find no place in this prophecy.

Num 24:8

And shall break their bones. (cf. Eze 23:34) seems to mean “crush” or “smash.” The Septuagint has , “shall suck out,” i.e; the marrow, but the word does not seem to bear this meaning. Pierce them through with his arrows, or, “dash in pieces his arrows,” i.e; the arrows shot at him. . The difficulty is the possessive suffix to “arrows,” which is in the singular; otherwise this rendering gives a much better sense, and more in keeping with the rest of the passage The image in Balaam’s mind is evidently that of a terrible wild beast devouring his enemies, stamping them underfoot, and dashing to pieces in his fury the arrows or darts which they vainly launch against him (compare the imagery in Dan 7:7).

Num 24:9

A lion. . A great lion. . See on Num 23:24, and Gen 49:9. Blessed is he that blesseth thee, &c. In these words Balaam seems to refer to the terms of Balak’s first message (Num 22:6). Far from being affected by blessings and cursings from without, Israel was itself a source of blessing or cursing to others according as they treated him.

Num 24:12

Spake I not also. This was altogether true. Balaam had enough of the true prophet about him not only to act with strict fidelity, as far as the letter of the command went, but also to behave with great dignity towards Balak.

Num 24:14

I will advertise thee. has properly the meaning “advise”, but it seems to have here the same subordinate sense of giving information which “advise” has with us. The Vulgate here has followed the surmise of the Jewish commentators, who saw nothing in Balaam but the arch-enemy of their race, and has actually altered the text into “dabo consilium quid populus tuus populo huic faciat” (cf. Num 31:16).

Num 24:16

Knew the knowledge of the Most High. Septuagint, . This expression alone distinguishes this introduction of Balaam’s mashal from the former one (Num 24:3, Num 24:4), but it is difficult to say that it really adds anything to our understanding of his mental state. If we ask when Balaam had received the revelation which he now proceeds to communicate, it would seem most natural to reply that it was made known to him when “the Spirit of God came upon him,” and that Balak’s anger had interrupted him in the midst of his mashal, or possibly he had kept it back, as too distasteful to his patron, until he saw that he had nothing more to expect from that quarter.

Num 24:17

I shall see him, but not now: I shall behold him, but not nigh. Rather, “I see him, but not now: I behold him, but not near” ( exactly as in Num 23:9). Balaam does not mean to say that he expected himself to see at any future time the mysterious Being of whom he speaks, who is identical with the “Star” and the “Scepter” of the following clauses; he speaks wholly as a prophet, and means that his inner gaze is fixed upon such an one, with full assurance that he exists in the counsels of God, but with clear recognition of the fact that his actual coming is yet in the far future. There shall come a Star out of Jacob. Septuagint, . It may quite as well be rendered by the present; Balaam simply utters what passes before his inward vision. The star is a natural and common poetic symbol of an illustrious, or, as we say, “brilliant,” personage, and as such recurs many times in Scripture (cf. Job 38:7; Isa 14:12; Dan 8:10; Mat 24:29; Php 2:15; Rev 1:20; Rev 2:28). The celebrated Jewish fanatic called himself Barcochab, “son of the Star,” in allusion to this prophecy. A Scepter shall rise out of Israel. This further defines the “star as a ruler of men, for the scepter is Used in that sense in the dying prophecy of Jacob (Gen 49:10), with which Balaam was evidently acquainted. Accordingly the Septuagint has here . Shall smite the corners of Moab. Rather, “the two corners” (dual), or “the two sides of Moab,” i.e; shall crush Moab on either side. And destroy all the children of Sheth. In Jer 48:45, where this prophecy is in a manner quoted, the word (qarqar, destroy) is altered into (quadqod, crown of the head). This raises a very curious and interesting question as to the use made by the prophets of the earlier Scriptures, but it gives no authority for an alteration of the text. The expression has been variously rendered. The Jewish commentators, followed by the Septuagint ( ) and the older versions, understand it to mean the sons of Seth, the son of Adam, i.e; all mankind. Many modern commentators, however, take as a contraction of (Lam 3:47“desolation”), and read “sons of confusion,” as equivalent to the unruly neighbours and relations of Israel. This, however, is extremely dubious in itself, for nowhere occurs in this sense, and derives no sup. port from Jer 48:45. It is true that is there replaced by , “sons of tumult,” but then this very verse affords the clearest evidence that the prophet felt no hesitation in altering the text of Scripture to suit his own inspired purpose. If it be true that will not bear the meaning given to it in the Targums of “reign over,” still there is no insuperable difficulty in the common rendering. Jewish prophecy, from beginning to end, contemplated the Messiah as the Conqueror, the Subduer, and even the Destroyer of all the heathen, i.e; of all who were not Jews. It is only in the New Testament that the iron scepter with which he was to dash in pieces the heathen (Psa 2:9) becomes the pastoral staff wherewith he shepherds them. The prophecy was that Messiah should destroy the heathen; the fulfillment that he destroyed not them, but their heathenism (cf. e.g; Psa 149:6-9 with Jas 5:20).

Num 24:18

Seir also shall be a possession for his enemies. Seir (Gen 32:3), or Mount Seir (Gen 36:8), was the old name, still retained as an alternative, of Edom. It is uncertain whether the rendering “for his (i.e; Edom’s) enemies” is correct. The Hebrew is simply , which may stand in apposition to Edom and Seir, “his enemies,” i.e; the enemies of Israel. So the Septuagint, . Shall do valiantly, or, “shall be prosperous” (cf. Deu 8:17; Rth 4:11).

Num 24:19

Shall come he that shall have dominion. Literally, “one shall rule,” the subject being indefinite. Of the city. ; not apparently out of any city in particular, but “out of any hostile city.” The expression implies not only conquest, but total destruction of the foe.

Num 24:20

He looked on Amalek. This looking must have been an inward vision, because the haunts of the Amalekites were far away (see on Gen 36:12; Exo 17:8; Num 14:25, Num 14:45). The first of the nations. Amalek was in no sense a leading nation, nor was it a very ancient nation. It was indeed the very first of the nations to attack Israel, but it is a most arbitrary treatment of the words to understand them in that sense. The prophet Amos (Amo 6:1) uses the same expression of the Jewish aristocracy of his day. As it was in no better position than Amalek to claim it in any true sense, we can but suppose that in either case there is a reference to the vainglorious vauntings of the people threatened; it would be quite in keeping with the Bedawin character if Amalek gave himself out be “the first of nations.”

Num 24:21

He looked on the Kenites. This mashal is excessively obscure, for both the subject of it and the drift of it are disputed. On the one hand, the Kenites are mentioned among the Canaanitish tribes that were to be dispossessed, in Gem Num 15:19; on the other, they are identified with the Midianitish tribe to which Hobab and Raguel belonged, in Jdg 1:16, and apparently in 1Sa 15:6 (see on Num 10:29). It has been supposed that the friendly Kenites had by this time loft the camp of Israel and established themselves by conquest in the south of Canaan, and even that they had occupied the territory and taken the name of the original Kenites of Gen 15:19. This, however, is a mere conjecture, and a very improbable one. That a weak tribe like that of Hobab should have done what Israel had not dared to do, and settled themselves by force of arms in Southern Palestine, and, further, that they should be already known by the name of those whom they had destroyed, is extremely unlikely, and is inconsistent with the statement in Jdg 1:16. And thou puttest thy nest in a rock. Rather, “and thy nest laid () upon a rock.” We do not know where the Kenites dwelt, and therefore we cannot tell whether this expression is to be understood literally or figuratively. If the Canaanitish tribe is here spoken of, it is very likely they had their residence in some strong mountain fastness, but if the Midianitish tribe, then there is no reason to suppose that they had crossed the Jordan at all In that case the “nest” must be wholly figurative, and must refer to that strong confidence which they placed in the protection of the God of Israel.

Num 24:22

Nevertheless the Kenite shall be wasted. . Rather, “Kain shall surely not be wasted.” is of doubtful meaning, but it seems here to have the force of a negative question equivalent to a negation. Kain is mentioned in Jos 15:57 as one of the towns of Judah, but there is little reason to suppose that an insignificant village is here mentioned by name. Probably “Kain” stands for the tribe-father, and is simply the poetical equivalent of Kenite. Until . There is some uncertainty about these two particles, which are sometimes rendered “how long?” In the sense of “until” they are said to be an Aramaism, but this is doubtful.

Num 24:23

When God doeth this. Literally, “from the settling of it by God.” , i.e; when God shall bring these terrible things to pass. Septuagint, . This exclamation refers to the woe which he is about to pronounce, which involved his own people also.

Num 24:24

Chittim. Cyprus (see on Gen 10:4). The “isles of Chittim are mentioned by Jeremiah (Jer 2:10) and by Ezekiel (Eze 27:6) in the sense apparently of the western islands generally while in Dan 11:30 “the ships of Chittim, may have an even wider reference. Indeed the Targum of Palestine makes mention of Italy here, and the Vulgate actually translates “venient in trieribus de Italia.” There is, however, no reason to suppose that Balaam knew or spoke of anything further than Cyprus. It was “from the side of” () Cyprus that the ships of his vision came down upon the Phoenician coasts, wherever their original starting-point may have been. Shall afflict, or, “shall bring low.” The same word is used of the oppression of Israel in Egypt (Gen 15:13). Eber. The Septuagint has here , and is followed by the Peschito and the Vulgate. It is not likely, however, that Balaam would have substituted “Eber” for the “Jacob” and “Israel” which he had previously used. The Targum of Onkelos paraphrases “Eber” by “beyond the Euphrates,” and that of Palestine has “all the sons of Eber.” From Gem Dan 10:21 it would appear that “the children of Eber” were the same as the Shemites; Asshur, therefore, was himself included in Eber, but is separately mentioned on account of his fame and power. And he also shall perish forever. The subject of this prophecy is left in obscurity. It is difficult on grammatical grounds to refer it to Asshur, and it does not seem appropriate to “Eber.” It may mean that the unnamed conquering race which should overthrow the Asian monarchies should itself come to an end for evermore; or it may be that Balaam added these words while he beheld with dismay the coming destruction of his own Shemitic race, and their final subjugation by more warlike powers. It must be remembered that the Greek empire, although overthrown, did not by any means “perish for ever” in the same sense as the previous empires of the East.

Num 24:25

And returned to his place. . It is doubtful whether this expression, which is used in Gen 18:33 and in other places, implies that Balaam returned to his home on the Euphrates. If he did he must have retraced his steps almost immediately, because he was slain among the Midianites shortly after (Gen 31:8). The phrase, however, may merely mean that he set off homewards, and is not inconsistent with the supposition that he went no further on his way than the headquarters of the Midianites. It is not difficult to understand the infatuation which would keep him within reach of a people so strange and terrible.

NOTE ON THE PROPHECIES OF BALAAM

That the prophecies of Balaam have a Messianic character, and are only to be fully understood in a Christian sense, seems to lie upon the face of them. The Targums of Onkelos and Palestine make mention of King Meshiba here, and the great mass of Christian interpretation has uniformly followed in the track of Jewish tradition. It is of course possible to get rid of the prophetic element altogether by assuming that the utterances of Balaam were either composed or largely interpolated after the events to which they seem to refer. It would be necessary in this case to bring their real date down to the period of the Macedonian conquests, and much later still if the Greek empire also was to “perish for ever.” The difficulty and arbitrary character of such an assumption becomes the more evident the more it is considered; nor does it seem consistent with the form into which the predictions are cast. A patriotic Jew looking back from the days of Alexander or his successors would not call the great Eastern power by the name of Asshur, because two subsequent empires had arisen in the place of Assyria proper. But that Balaam, looking forward down the dim vista of the future, should see Asshur, and only Asshur, is in perfect keeping with what we know of prophetic perspective,the further off the events descried by inward vision, the more extreme the foreshortening,according to which law it is well known that the first and second advents of Christ are inextricably blended in almost every case.

If we accept the prophecies as genuine, it is, again, only possible to reject the Messianic element by assuming that no Jewish prophecy overleaps the narrow limits of Jewish history. The mysterious Being whom Balaam descries in the undated future, who is the King of Israel, and whom he identifies with the Shiloh of Jacob’s dying prophecy, and who is to bring to nought all nations of the world, cannot be David, although David may anticipate him in many ways; still less, as the reference to Agag, Amalek, and the Kenites might for a moment incline us to believe, can it be Saul. At the same time, while the Messianic element in the prophecy cannot reasonably be ignored, it is obvious that it does not by any means exist by itself; it is so mixed up with what is purely local and temporal in the relations between Israel and the petty tribes which surrounded and envied him, that it is impossible to isolate it or to exhibit it in any clear and definite form. The Messiah indeed appears, as it were, upon the stage in a mysterious and remote grandeur; but he appears with a slaughter weapon in his hand, crushing such enemies of Israel as were then and there formidable, and exterminating the very fugitives from the overthrow. Even where the vision loses for once its local colouring in one way, so that the King of Israel deals with all the sons of men, yet it retains it in another, for he deals with them in wrath and destruction, not in love and blessing. There is here so little akin to the true ideal, that we are readily tempted to say that Christ is not here at all, but only Saul or David, or the Jewish monarchy personified in the ruthlessness of its consolidated power. But if we know anything of the genius of prophecy, it is exactly this, that the future and the grand and the heavenly is seen through a medium of the present and the paltry and the earthly. The Messianic element almost always occurs in connection with some crisis in the outward history of the chosen people; it is inextricably mixed up with what is purely local in interest, and often with what is distinctly imperfect in morality. To the Jewand to Balaam also, however unwillingly, as the servant of Jehovahthe cause of Israel was the cause of God; he could not discern between them. “Our country, right or wrong,” was an impossible sentiment to him, because he could not conceive of his country being wrong; he knew nothing of moral victories, or the triumphs of defeat or of suffering; he could not think of God’s kingdom as asserting itself in any other way than in the overthrow, or (better still) the annihilation, of Moab, Edom, Assyria, Babylon, Rome, the whole world which was not Israel. The sufferings of the vanquished, the horrors of sacked cities, the agonies of desolated homes, were nothing to him; nothing, unless it were joyjoy that the kingdom of God should be exalted in the earth, joy that the reign of wickedness should be broken.

All these feelings belonged to a most imperfect morality and we rightly look upon them with horror, because we have (albeit as yet very imperfectly) conformed our sentiments to a higher standard. But it was the very condition of the old dispensation that God adopted the then moral code, such as it was, and hallowed it with religious sanctions, and gave it a strong direction God-ward, and so educated his own for something higher. Hence it is wholly natural and consistent to find this early vision of the Messiah, the heaven-sent King of Israel, introduced in connection with the fall of the petty pastoral state of Moab. To Balaam, standing where he did in time and place, and all the more because his personal desires went with Moab as against Israel, Moab stood forth as the representative kingdom of darkness, Israel as the kingdom of light, Through that strong, definite, narrow, and essentially imperfect, but not untrue, conviction of his he saw the Messiah, and he saw him crushing Moab first, and then trampling down all the rest of a hostile world. That no one would have been more utterly astonished if he had beheld the Messiah as he was, is certain; but that is not at all inconsistent with the belief that he really prophesied concerning him. That he should put all enemies under his feet was what Balaam truly saw; but he saw it and gave utterance to it according to the ideas and imagery of which his mind was full. God ever reveals the supernatural through the natural, the heavenly through the earthly, the future through the present.

It remains to consider briefly the temporal fulfillments of Balaam’s prophecies. Moab was not apparently seriously attacked until the time of David, when it was vanquished, and a great part of the inhabitants slaughtered (2Sa 8:2). In the division of the kingdom it fell to the share of Israel, with the other lands beyond Jordan, but the vicissitudes of the northern monarchy gave it opportunities to rebel, of which it successfully availed itself after the death of Ahab (2Ki 1:1). Only in the time of John Hyrcanus was it finally subdued, and ceased to have an independent existence.

Edom was also conquered for the first time by David, and the people as far as possible exterminated (1Ki 11:15, 1Ki 11:16). Nevertheless, it was able to shake off the yoke under Joram (2Ki 8:20), and, although defeated, was never again subdued (see on Gen 27:40). The prophecies against Edom were indeed taken up again and again by the prophets (e.g; Obadiah), but we must hold that they were never adequately fulfilled, unless we look for a spiritual realization not in wrath, but in mercy. The later Jews themselves came to regard “Edom” as a Scriptural synonym for all who hated and oppressed them.

Amalek was very thoroughly overthrown by Saul, acting under the directions of Samuel (1Sa 15:7, 1Sa 15:8), and never appears to have regained any national existence. Certain bands of Amalekites were smitten by David, and others at a later period in the reign of Hezekiah by the men of Simeon (1Ch 4:39-43).

The prophecy concerning the Kenites presents, as noted above, great difficulty, because it is impossible to know certainly whether the older Kenites of Genesis or the later Kenites of 1 Samuel are intended. In either case, however, it must be acknowledged that sacred history throws no light whatever on the fulfillment of the prophecy; we know nothing at all as to the fate of this small clan. No doubt it ultimately shared the lot of all the inhabitants of Palestine, with the exception of Judah and Jerusalem, and was transplanted by one of the Assyrian generals to some far-off spot, where its very existence as a separate people was lost.
The “ships from the side of Cyprus” clearly enough represent in the vision of Balaam invaders from over the western seas, as opposed to previous conquerors from over the eastern deserts and mountains. That the invasion of Alexander the Great was not actually made by the way of Cyprus is nothing to the point. It was never any part of spiritual illumination to extend geographical knowledge. To Balaam’s mind the only open way from the remote and unknown western lands was the waterway by the sides of Cyprus, and accordingly he saw the hostile fleets gliding down beneath the lee of those sheltering coasts towards the harbours of Phoenicia. Doubtless the ships which Balaam saw were rigged as ships were rigged in Balaam’s time, and not as in the time of Alexander. But the rigging, like the route, belonged to the local and personal medium through which the prophecy came, not to the prophecy itself. As a fact it remains true that a maritime power from the West, whose home was beyond Cyprus, did overwhelm the older power which stood in the place and inherited the empire of Assyria. Whether the subsequent ruin of this maritime power also is part of the prophecy must remain doubtful.

HOMILETICS

Verse 41- Num 24:1-25

BALAAM AND HIS PROPHECIES

The prophecies of Balaam were the utterances of a bad man deeply penetrated by religious ideas, and inspired for certain purposes by the Spirit of God; hence it is evident that many deep moral and spiritual lessons may be learnt from them, apart from their evidential value as prophecies. Consider, therefore, with respect to the moral character and conduct of Balaam

I. THAT BALAK AND BALAAM THOUGHT TO MOVE THE GOD OF ISRAEL BY IMPORTUNITY, OR PERHAPS TO GET THE BETTER OF HIM BY CONTRIVANCE; hence Balak repeatedly shifted his ground and brought Balaam to another point of view. Even so do ungodly men imagine that the immutable decrees of right and wrong may somehow be changed in their favour if they use sufficient perseverance and address. By putting moral questions in many different lights, by getting their outward or inward adviser to look at them from diverse points of view, they think to make right wrong, and wrong right. With what insensate perseverance, e.g; do religious people strive, by perpetually shifting’ their ground, to force the Almighty to sanction in their case that covetousness which he has so unmistakably condemned.

II. THAT BALAAM CLEARLY HINTED TO THE ALMIGHTY THAT, AS HE HAD PROCURED MUCH HONOUR FOR HIM FROM BALAK, HE WAS EXPECTED TO DO WHAT WAS POSSIBLE IN THE MATTER FOR HIM. Even so do men who are in truth irreligious, although often seeming very much the reverse, give the Almighty to understand (indirectly and unavowedly, but unmistakably) that they have done much, laid out much, given up much for his honour and glory, and that they naturally look for some equivalent. To serve God for nought (Job 1:9) does not enter into the thoughts of selfish people; to them godliness is a source of gain (1Ti 6:5), if not here, then hereafter.

III. THAT BALAAM WAS MOVED TO WISH HE MIGHT DIE THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS, BUT WAS NOT DISPOSED TO LIVE THE LIFE OF THE RIGHTEOUS; hence his wish was as futile as the mirage of the desert, and was signally reversed by the actual character of his end. Even so do evil men continually desire the rewards of goodness, which they cannot but admire, but they will not submit to the discipline of goodness. A sentimental appreciation of virtue and piety is worse than useless by itself.

IV. THAT BALAAM RECEIVED NO REWARD FROM BALAK BECAUSE HE HAD NOT CURSED ISRAEL, AND NONE FROM GOD BECAUSE HE HAD WISHED TO CURSE HIM. Even so it is with men whose religious feelings restrain, but do not direct, their lives. They miss the rewards of this world because they are outwardly conscientious, and the rewards of the next world because they are inwardly covetous.

V. THAT BALAAM RETURNED TO HIS PLACE, i.e; he went back. as it seemed, to his old home and his old life on the banks of Euphrates; in truth “he went to his own place” (Act 1:25), for he rushed blindly on destruction, and received the recompense of death.

Consider again, with respect to the sayings of Balaam

I. THAT IT IS NOT POSSIBLE TO CURSE WHOM GOD HATH NOT CURSED. There is in fact but one curse which there is any reason to dread, and that is “Depart from me.” Any malediction of men, unless it be merely the echo of this upon earth, spoken with authority, does but fall harmless, or else recoil upon him that utters it.

II. THAT THE SINGULAR GLORY OF ISRAEL WAS HIS SEPARATENESSa separateness which was outwardly marked by a sharp line of distinction from other peoples, but was founded upon an inward and distinctive holiness of life and worship. Even so is the glory of the Church of Christ and of each faithful soul to be “separate from sinners,” as was Christ. And this separation must needs be outwardly marked in many ways and in many cases (1Co 5:11; 2Co 6:17); but its essence is an inward divergence of motive, of character, and of condition before God. To be “even as others” is to be the “children of wrath” (Eph 2:3); to be Christians is to be “a peculiar people” (Tit 2:14). If men cannot bear to be peculiar, they need not look to be blessed; if they must adopt the fashions of this world, they must be content to share its end (Gal 1:4; 2Ti 4:10; 1Jn 2:15-17).

III. THAT THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS IS BLESSED AND AN OBJECT OF DESIRE in a far higher sense than Balaam was able to comprehend. It may appear to the foolish that the life of the righteous is full of sadness, but none can fail to see that his death is full of immortality, that he is in peace by reason of a good conscience, and in hope of glory by reason of the sure mercies of God.

IV. THAT THE LATTER END OF THE RIGHTEOUS IS MORE BLESSED AND DESIRABLE THAN HIS DEATH; for this is to live again, and to live for ever, and to inherit eternity of bliss in exchange for a few short years of strife and patience.

V. THAT IT IS NOT POSSIBLE FOR MAN TO REVERSE THE BENEDICTIONS WHICH GOD HAS PRONOUNCED UPON HIS PEOPLE. This has been tried by Balaam, and by very many since, but to no effect. The blessings which we are called to inherit, as set forth in the New Testament, will certainly hold good in every age and under all circumstances. No matter what the world may say, or we be tempted to think, the “poor” and the “meek” and the “merciful” and the “persecuted for righteousness’ sake” will always be “blessed,” in spite of all appearances to the contrary.

VI. THAT GOD DOTH NOT BEHOLD INIQUITY IN HIS PEOPLE. Not that it doth not exist (as it existed then in Israel), but because it is not imputed to them that repent and believe in Christ Jesus. God doth not behold sin in the faithful soul, because he regards it not in its own nakedness, but as clothed with the righteousness of Christ, which admits not any spot or stain (Gal 3:27; Php 3:9; Rev 3:18). And this non-imputation of sin is not arbitrary now (as it was to a great degree in the case of Israel), because it is founded upon a real and living union with Christ as the source of holiness. There is a spiritual unity of life with him (Joh 3:5; Joh 6:57; Joh 15:4; Gal 2:20; Eph 5:30), and there is a consequent moral unity of life with him (Col 3:3; 1Jn 2:6; 1Jn 3:3; 1Jn 4:17, &c.), which is only slowly and partially attained in this life; but it hath pleased God for the sake of the spiritual unity to regard the moral unity as though it were already achieved, and therefore he imputeth not sin to them that “walk in the light” (1Jn 1:7).

VII. THAT IF THE LORD OUR GOD BE WITH US, THEN THE SHOUT OF A KING IS AMONG us, i.e; the joyful acclamation of them that welcome the King who never fails to lead them to victory. And this is one note of the faithful, that they rejoice in their King (Psa 149:2, Psa 149:5, Psa 149:6; Mat 21:9; Php 4:4), and that gladness is ever found in their hearts (Rom 14:17) and praise in their mouths (Act 16:25; Heb 13:15; 1Pe 2:9; and cf. Eph 5:18-20).

VIII. THAT NO MAGICAL INFLUENCE CAN BE BROUGHT TO BEAR AGAINST THE RIGHTEOUS. If they fear God they need not fear any one else (Luk 12:4, Luk 12:5; Rom 8:38, Rom 8:39). Superstitious fears are unworthy of a Christian. But note that, according to the other rendering of Num 23:23, the spiritual meaning is that the faithful have no need of, and no resort to, any such uncertain and unauthorized pryings into the unseen and unrevealed as superstition and irreligion do ever favour. Here is a warning against all the arts of so-called “spiritualism,” which (if it be not wholly an imposture) is rank heathenism and abominable to God. If the gospel be true, then we have all the light we need for our present path, and we have the assurance of all the light we could desire in our future home (Joh 8:12; 1Co 13:12; 1Jn 3:2).

IX. THAT THE CAMP OF ISRAEL WAS LOVELY IN THE EYES OF THE PROPHET NOT SO MUCH BY REASON OF ITS SIZE, AS BECAUSE OF THE ORDER AND METHOD WITH WHICH IT WAS LAID OUTlike the cultivated gardens of the East. Even so is the order Divinely imparted to the Church its chiefest beauty. It is not its mere size, in which indeed it is inferior to some false religions, but its unity in the midst of variety, its coherence side by side with manifold distinctions, which stamps it as a thing of heavenly origin and growth. The highest art of the gardener is to allow to each tree the fullest liberty of individual growth, while arranging them for mutual protection and for beauty of effect; even so is the art of the Divine Husbandman (Joh 15:1) with the trees which he hath planted in his garden.

X. THAT THE FUTURE PROSPERITY OF ISRAEL WAS SPOKEN OF BY BALAAM UNDER TWO FIGURESOF OVERFLOWING BUCKETS USED IN IRRIGATION, AND OF SEED SOWN BY MANY WATERS. Even so the prosperity of the Church has a twofold character: it stands partly in the diligent and ample watering of that which is already sprung up, which is her pastoral work; partly in the widespread sowing by many waters, far and near, which is her missionary work.

XI. THAT THE CHURCH OF GOD IS NOT AFFECTED BY THE BLESSING OR CURSING, THE GOOD OR EVIL WILL OF MEN, BUT, ON THE CONTRARY, IS THE SOURCE OF BLESSING OR CURSING TO THEM; according as they treat her, so must they fare themselves. For since Christ hath loved her and given himself for her (Eph 5:25), his interests and hers are all one, and howsoever we act towards the Church, he taketh it unto himself (cf. Mat 25:40, Mat 25:45).

Consider again, with respect to the enterprise of Balaam

I. THAT BALAAM WAS HIRED TO CURSE ISRAEL, BUT WAS CONSTRAINED TO BLESS HIM ALTOGETHER (cf. Deu 23:5; Jos 24:10; Mic 6:5). Even so all the efforts of the world to cast infamy and odium upon the Church are turned backward, unless indeed she is untrue to herself. No weapon is forged against her more terrible than the interested enmity of gifted and intellectual men, which often promises to succeed where brute force is powerless; but even this cannot prosper. It is often the policy of the world to assail religion by religious influences, but God overrules this also. Gifts which are truly of his giving cannot be really turned against him or his.

II. THAT GOD‘S PURPOSES AND PRONOUNCEMENTS CONCERNING HIS CHURCH ARE ETERNAL AND IMMUTABLE, SINCE HE CANNOT DENY HIMSELF, NOR GO BACK FROM HIS WORD. The future of his Church is perfectly safe and absolutely unassailable, because it depends not on any human counsel or constancy, but upon the eternal predestination and changeless will of God.

Consider again, with respect to that which Balaam spake by the Spirit of God

I. THAT BALAAM HAD A VISION OF CHRIST HIMSELF, i.e. of a mysterious Being, a King of Israel, exalted and extolled, and very high, whom the Jews believed, and we know, to be the Christ. Even so all true prophecy looks on, more or less consciously, to him in whom all the promises of God are Amen (2Co 1:20), and in whom all the gifts of God to men are concentrated. The spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus (Rev 19:10), because there was nothing else really worth prophesying.

II. THAT BALAAM SAW HIM UNDER THE EMBLEMS OF A STAR AND OF A SCEPTER. Even so the Lord is both a luminary (Luk 2:32; 2Pe 1:19; Rev 22:16) and a ruler (Luk 1:33; Heb 1:8; Rev 12:5) forever.

III. THAT BALAAM SAW HIM AS A DESTROYER, CRUSHING THE ENEMIES OF GOD AND OF HIS PEOPLE. And this is at first sight strange, because he came not to destroy men’s lives, but to save them. But as it is quite naturally explained from a moral point of view when we take into account the moral ideas of Balaam’s age, so it is found perfectly true in a spiritual sense when we consider what the work of Christ really is. For that work is indeed a work of destruction: he came to destroy the works of the devil (1Jn 3:8); he came to destroynot men, butall that is sinful in men; not the enemies of God (for God has no enemies among men), but all in men which is inimical to him and to his truth. Hence he is ever represented as a destroyer in the Apocalypse, which reverts to the imagery of the Old Testament (Rev 6:2; Rev 19:11, Rev 19:13, Rev 19:15, &c.). And this aspect of his work, which is true and necessary, and is jealously guarded as his in Holy Scripture, ought not to be set aside or obscured by the gentler and pleasanter aspects of his reign. That he must put all enemies under his feet is the first law of his kingdom, and must somehow or other be brought to pass in us, as in others.

IV. THAT BALAAM SAW (ACCORDING TO HIS DAY) THE ENEMIES OF THE CHURCH OF GOD UNDER THE SEMBLANCE OF MOABITES, EDOMITES, AMALEKITES, KENITES, AND ASSYRIANS. And these may be interpreted in a spiritual sense as typifying the different forms in which a common hostility to the truth of Christ displays itself. In Moab we may see the hostility of cunning, which fears an open contest, but enlists the intellect and craft of others on its side; in Edom the hostility of insolent opposition, which loses no opportunity of inflicting annoyance and injury; in Amalek we may see vainglorious anger, which resents pretensions greater than its own, and rushes upon a hopeless conflict; in the Kenites we may see confidence in earthly strength, and in a lodgment so naturally strong as to defy all assaults; in Asshur we have the embodiment of brute force brutally used. If, however, the Kenites were the friends, not the foes, of Israel, then we may see in them how vain is the self-confidence even of religious people in any advantages of position or circumstance. The Kenites are not known to have provoked God, as Israel did, and their abode was peculiarly inaccessible and defensible; nevertheless, they too fell victims to Assyria, at the very time perhaps when Hezekiah and Jerusalem escaped.

V. THAT BALAAM WAS STRUCK WITH FEAR WHEN HE FORESAW THESE DESTRUCTIONS EXTENDING EVEN TO HIS OWN PEOPLE. Who shall live? In the crash of these great contending world-powers who could hope to escape? How much more may evil men fear “when God doeth this” which he hath so clearly foretold I And not evil men only, but all who are not in the truest sense of the Israel of God (1Pe 1:17; 1Pe 4:17, 1Pe 4:18; 2Pe 3:11).

HOMILIES BY E.S. PROUT

Num 24:8

THE SAFETY OF ALL WHO ENJOY THE BLESSING OF GOD

God’s “defiance” the signal of destruction; God’s “curse,” fatal. But if protected from these we are safe, for “the curse causeless cannot come.” We are safe from

1. Malicious designs. E.g; Balaam’s wish to curse; the plot of the Jews to stone Paul at Iconium (Act 14:5), and to assassinate him at Jerusalem (Act 23:1-35.).

2. Words of execration. E.g; Shimei (2Sa 16:1-23); the blasphemies spoken against Christ, and the libels uttered against his people (Mat 10:24-26).

3. Witchcraft and divination. In reply to all such foolish fears let it suffice to say, “I believe in God” (Isa 8:13, Isa 8:14 : 1Pe 3:13).

4. Assaults and all violence. E.g; the various attempts to seize or kill Jesus Christ when “his hour was not yet come.” When the hour for suffering “as a Christian is come,” let him glorify God “(1Pe 4:12-16). Such calamities are not “curses” from God, and God can change all other curses into blessings, as in the case of Balaam (Deu 23:5).

5. Every kind of persecution (Rom 8:35-39). The devil’s curse is a telum imbelle; his defiance an empty threat. The objects of God’s care are invincible, if not invulnerable (Isa 54:17).P.

Num 24:19

THE UNCHANGEABLE FAITHFULNESS OF GOD

Two truths are suggested in contrast.

I. IT IS NATURAL TO MEN TO CHANGE THEIR MINI) AND BREAK THEIR WORD.

1. They repent, i.e; they change their mind, frequently, hastily, because of ignorance, or short-sightedness, or prejudice, or narrow-mindedness. Picture a man, fickle, irresolute, and therefore “unstable” (Jas 1:8). When he does not repent it may be a sign of obstinacy rather than of laudable firmness (Jer 8:6).

2. They lie. Children of Satan (Joh 8:44), often trained from childhood in ways of falsehood (Psa 58:3), they help to undermine the foundations of society (Isa 59:13-15), and to tempt truthful men to universal distrust (Psa 116:11). Such men are apt to think that God is like themselves, changeable and unfaithful. They project an image of themselves, like idolaters, and call it God (Psa 115:8). E.g; Balak (Num 24:13, 27), and Balaam himself at first (Num 22:8, Num 22:19).

II. IT IS “IMPOSSIBLE FOR GOD TO LIE.” Some of God’s threats and promises are conditional, though in form they may seem absolute. E.g; Num 14:11, Num 14:12; Eze 33:12-20. But others are fixed and absolute. We see this in

1. Threats. E.g; exclusion of Hebrews from Canaan (chapter 14:20-22); Saul’s loss of the kingdom (1Sa 15:22-29); exclusion of the impure from heaven (Heb 12:14; Rev 21:27). Hence learn the folly of those who hope that God may change his mind, while theirs is unchanged; that God may repent instead of themselves. (Illustrate from Simon Magus, who desired to escape God’s wrath while he gave no hint of abandoning his sinsAct 8:24.)

2. Promises. E.g.,

(1) To Abraham, hundreds of years before (Gen 12:1-3). Therefore Balaam says, verses 19, 20. So we may trace the effects of the promise down to the latest of the Old Testament prophets (Mal 3:6) and the greatest of the Christian apostles (Rom 11:28, Rom 11:29).

(2) To believers in Christ. Because with God there is “no variableness,” &c; therefore we have “strong consolation,” &c. (Heb 6:18, Heb 6:19; Jas 1:17), and hope of the fullness of “eternal life, which God, who cannot lie, promised,” &c. (Mat 24:35; Tit 1:2).

(3) To suppliants who claim God’s promises. God can as soon cease to exist as refuse to “make good” any promise claimed with faith through Jesus Christ our Lord.P.

HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG

Verse 39- Num 23:12

THE FIRST PROPHECY

I. THE NECESSARY PREPARATIONS.

1. The sacrifices. Balak and Balaam, however different their thoughts in other respects, were agreed as to the necessity of the sacrifices, if the desired curse were to be put in the prophet’s mouth. And so there was abundance of sacrificing. Balak first makes spontaneous offerings, and then such as were specified by Balaam. They felt that God was not to be approached in an irregular way or with empty hands. As Balak thought of Balaam, so he thought of God. The prophet was to be bought with riches and honours, and God was to be bought with sacrifices of slain beasts. Here then is this common element in the practice of two men so different in other respects. It is in Aram and Moab alike. The tradition of Abel’s accepted offering has come down far and wide, so that both men are found feeling that such sacrifices were in some way acceptable to God. But the faith and spirit of Abel could not be transmitted along with the knowledge of his outward act. These men did not understand that these sacrifices were worthless in themselves. God is a Spirit, and cannot eat the flesh of bulls and drink the blood of goats. Shedding of blood was for the remission of sins, and these men neither felt sin, confessed it, nor desired the removal of it.

2. The sight of the people to be cursed. The king took the prophet into the high places of Baal, that he might see the utmost part of the people. Very likely Balak himself had not seldom stood there, and gone down again each time more alarmed than ever. Balaam must now see these dreadful people, to satisfy himself that it was neither a trifling nor a needless work he had been called to do; to see how close at hand they were, and to be impressed with the necessity of making the curse potent, speedy, and sure. Added to which, Balak probably believed that, for the curse to operate, Balaam’s eyes must rest on the people. Lane in his Modern Egyptians’ tells us how dreaded is the evil eye. Here then Balaam looked on these people in something of their wide extent. What an opportunity for better thoughts if the spirit that brings them had been in his heart! How he might have said, “Have I been called then to blast this mighty host, who have now lain so long in such close neighbourhood to Balak, yet harmed him not?”

3. The prophet has his own special preparations. While Balak attends to the sacrifices, Balaam retires to his secret enchantments (Num 24:1) in some high, solitary place. God did choose that his servants should go into such places to meet with him alone, but how differently Balaam looks here from Moses going up into Sinai, or Elijah when he went his day’s journey into the wilderness, or Ezekiel when he heard the Lord say, “Arise, go forth into the plain, and I will there talk to thee” (Eze 3:22); above all, from Jesus, in those solitary, refreshing, blessed hours of which we have some hints in the Gospels! How far this retirement was sincere, how far it was meant to deceive Balak, and how far it was mere habit, we cannot tell. The conscience that is welt-nigh dead to practical righteousness, to justice, compassion, and truth, may yet be in an everlasting fidget with superstitious fear.

II. THE UNEXPECTED RESULT.

1. To Balaam. The whole of what happened may not have been unexpected. The meeting with God he certainly would be prepared for. He had met with God only too often of late, and not at all to his peace of mind and the furtherance of his wishes. We may conclude that God allowed him to go through with his enchantments, else he would hardly have gone to repeat them a second time (cf. Num 23:15 and Num 24:1). And perhaps the very fact that there was no interruption to his enchantments may have lifted his mind in hope that God was at last going to be propitious. If so it was but higher exaltation in order to deeper abasement. God meets with him, puts a word in his mouth, and commands him thus to speak with Balak. Are we to understand that by having the word put into his mouth, Balaam there and then had all the prophecy clearly before his mind, so that he could consider every word he had presently to utter? Possibly so. And it is possible also that as he went back to Balak he considered how he could trim this prophecy, as previously he had trimmed the commands of God. And now comes something for which, with all his assertions of only being able to speak the word God put in his mouth, Balaam was probably quite unprepared. He gets no chance of exerting his skill to trim and soften down unacceptable words. God assumes per-feet control of those rebellious, lying lips. God, who opened the mouth of an ass and made it utter human speech, now opens the mouth of one whose heart was ready to deceive and curse, and makes that mouth to utter truth and blessing.

2. To Balak. The words of the prophecy must have been utterly unexpected by him. He had counted with all confidence on getting what he wanted. Not a shadow of doubt had crossed his mind as to Balaam’s power to curse and his own power to buy that power. Hardly a more impressive instance could be found of a man given over to strong delusion, to believe a lie. Counting on the curse as both attainable and efficacious, he now finds to his amazement, horror, and perplexity that Balaam cannot even speak the words of cursing; for doubtless when the Lord took possession of Balaam’s mouth he took possession also of eyes, expression, tone, gesture, so that there would be no incongruity between the words and the way in which they were uttered.

III. THE PROPHECY ITSELF.

1. A clear statement of how these two men come to be standing together. Balak brings Balaam all this long way in order to curse Jacob and defy Israel. The object of all these messages and these smoking sacrifices is stated in naked and brief simplicity. There is no reference to motives, inducements, difficulties. The simple historical fact is given without any note or comment; the request of Balaam mentioned, in order that it may be clearly contrasted with the reason why it is refused.

2. Balaam is forced into a humiliating confession. What he had so long concealed, as dangerous to his reputation, he must now publish from the high places of Baal. And notice that he confines himself to saying that the required curse and defiance are impracticable. No more is put into his mouth than he is able truthfully to say. Glorious as this prophecy is, one might imagine it being made more glorious still by the mingling with it of a penitent, candid confession of wrong-doing. He might have said, “Balak hath brought me,” &c; and surely God would not have sealed his lips if it had been in his heart to add, “I bitterly repent that I came.” He might have said, “How can I curse whom God hath not cursed? and indeed I discovered this long ago, but pride and policy kept the discovery confined within my own breast.” And so we see how, while God kept Bahrain from uttering falsehood, and forced him to utter sufficient truth, yet Balaam the man remained the same. He says no more than he is obliged to say, but it is quite enough; with his own lips he publishes his incapacity to the world.

3. The very place of speaking becomes subservient to the purpose of God. We may presume that Balak well knew he was taking Balaam to the most favourable view-point. It was thought to be the best place for cursing, and from what Balaam now sees and says it would seem to be a very fit place for blessing.

4. And now, as Balaam looks from the top of the rocks and from the hills, what does he see? He may have been struck even already, and at that distance, and before he began the prophecy, with the outward peculiarities of Israel. Some peculiarities of Israel could only be known by a close and detailed inspection; others, e.g; the arrangement of the camp around the tabernacle, were best known by a sort of bird’s-eye view. An intimate knowledge of London is only to be gained by going from street to street and building to building, but one thus gaining a very intimate knowledge of London would yet be without such an impression of it as is to be got from the top of St. Paul’s. As Balaam looks down from the tops of the rocks he sees enough for the present purposes of God. He sees enough to indicate the separation and the vast numerical force of Israel. It was not needful here to speak of more. The immediate purpose of the prophecy was served if it deterred Balak from further folly. A great deal more might have been said of Israel, and was said afterwards. In one sense this was an introductory prophecy, followed up by fuller revelations in later ones; in another sense it stands by itself. The others would not have been spoken if the first had proved sufficient. Passing over the concluding wish of Balaam, “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his!” which demands to be considered by itself, we note

5. The state of suspense in which the prophecy leaves Balak as to his own position. It would have been so easy to introduce a reassuring wordone which, if it did not actually take away Balak’s alarm, would at all events have been fitted to do so. But the king’s request had something so peremptory and dictatorial about it that God’s answer is confined to a refusal. He might have explained that Israel was now busy with its own internal affairs, and would soon, according to his purpose, cross Jordan, and that in the mean time, if Balak would show himself friendly, there was nothing in Israel to make it his foe. But Balak had so acted that the great thing to be done was to impress him with a deep sense of the strength and security of Israel. If we prefer unreasonable and arrogant requests, we must expect to receive answers which, if we were uneasy before, will leave us more uneasy still. God must go on speaking and acting so as to shake the ground under all selfishness.Y.

Num 24:10

LET ME DIE THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS, AND LET MY LAST END, BE LIKE HIS! THE SECRET OF ISRAEL’S PROSPERITY

This certainly appears an extraordinary wish when we bear in mind the position and character of the man who uttered it. Any one taking these words on his lips, and thereby making them his own, would inevitably direct our attention to his life, and compel us to consider what he might be doing to make the wish a reality. From the time of his first entrance on the scene Balaam unconsciously reveals his character. He could not by any stretch of the word be described as a good man; the whole narrative is little but an illustration of his duplicity, selfishness, vanity, greed of gain and glory, and utter disregard of the plain commandments of God. The position of Balaam at this particular time is also to be remembered. He has been called to curse, twice pressed to make a long journey for this special purpose; he has offered sacrifices and sought enchantments to secure it; and yet he not only fails to curse, but, more than that, is compelled to bless; and, last of all, to crown the reversal of what had been so carefully prepared for, he is heard expressing an emphatic wish that he himself might be found among this blessed people.

I. CONSIDER FOR A MOMENT THESE WORDS OF BALAAM DISCONNECTED FROM ALL THEIR ORIGINAL CIRCUMSTANCES. Consider them as placed before some one who knew neither the character nor position of Balaam as the speaker, nor the position of Israel as the nation referred to. Let him know simply that these words were spoken once upon a time, and ask him to imagine for himself the scene in which they might be fitly spoken. Whither then would his thought be turned? Would it not be to some aged believer, gradually sinking to rest, with the experience that as the outward man decayed, the inward man was renewed from day to day, and with the conviction that to be absent from the body was to be present with the Lord; looking forward from time into eternity, according to the familiar illustration, as being “but a going from one room into another.” Such would be the view suggested by the term “righteous,” and the person expressing the wish would seem to be some studious, susceptible observer, with frequent opportunities for observation, who had been impressed by the reality and the superlative worth of the experience on which he had gazed. Then let such a one as we have supposed be confronted with these original circumstances. How perplexed he would be when told that the words were spoken by such a man as Balaam appears in the narrative, and of a people that had done such things as are recorded in the Book of Numbers! These words, looked at in a particular light, might be taken as indicating deep spiritual convictions and earnest, faithful life on the part of whoever speaks them. But we are bound to look at them now in the light of Balaam’s character, and in the light also of Israel’s past career.

II. CONSIDER THE ACTUAL EXTENT OF BALAAM‘S WISH. He wishes to die the death of the righteous. Do not be misled by the prominence of the word “righteous” into supposing that for its own sake Balaam cared about righteousness. It was not righteousness that he desired, but what he saw to be the pleasant, enviable effects of righteousness. He cared nothing about the cause if only he could get the effects. He loved the vine because it produced grapes, and the fig-tree because it produced figs, but if he could have got grapes from thorns and figs from thistles, he would have loved thorns and thistles just as well. We have God revealing to an ungodly man as much as an ungodly man can perceive of the blessedness of the righteous. Balaam was entirely out of sympathy with the purposes of God. tie showed by the best of all evidence that he would have nothing to do with righteousness as a state of heart, habit of conduct, and standard in all dealings with God and men. But though Balaam did not appreciate the need of righteousness, he did appreciate happiness, and that very warmly, in his own carnal way. He saw in Israel everything a man could desire. To have Balaam uttering this wish was as emphatic a way as any God could have taken to show Balak his favour to Israel. Not only from the top of the rocks does the prophet see the separated and multitudinous people, which in itself was enough to drive Balak to unfavourable inferences, but so desirable does the state of the people appear, that Balaam cannot help wishing it were his own. God had told him at first “the people are blessed,” and now, as soon as he sees them, God also makes the greatness of the blessedness sufficiently manifest even to his carnal and obscured heart.

III. THUS WE SEE THE DEEP IMPRESSION WHICH THE BLESSED LIFE OF GOD‘S PEOPLE IS CAPABLE OF MAKING ON THE UNGODLY. Those who as yet have no sympathy with righteousness may have a keen desire for security, joy, and peace, and a keen perception of the fact that these somehow belong to real believers in Christ. It is a characteristic of the Scriptures, and a very notable and important one, that many of the appeals found in it are to what seem comparatively low motives. Has it not indeed been made a charge against Christian ethics that they make so much of rewards and punishments? But surely this is the very wisdom of God to draw men by inducements suitable to their low and miserable state, to promise joy to the joyless, peace to the distracted, security to the fearful, life to the dying. Certainly Christ the Saviour can do nothing for us as long as we remain impenitent, unbelieving, and unreconciled, but in his mercy he speaks first of all in the most general and sympathetic terms concerning our needs. The most comprehensive invitation the Saviour ever gave runs thus: “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Not a word there of conviction of sin, wrath of God, need of righteousness, need of saving faith! Is it by accident that the first psalm begins with a reference to happiness? The sermon on the mount starts with this as the very beginning of Christ’s teaching: “Men are unhappy; how can they find and keep blessedness, real happiness?” Suppose a man who has no experimental knowledge of the saving power of Christ, reading through the promises of the New Testament and the actual experiences therein recorded; suppose him to see that if words count for anything, godliness is indeed profitable for the life that now is. Would it be anything strange for such a man to say, “If righteousness brings such effects as these, then let me die the death of the righteous”? Appealing to high motives alone would be all very well if those appealed to were unfallen spirits or perfected saints; but men being what they are, God does not esteem it too great a condescension to draw them to himself by the promise of blessedness, high, peculiar, rich, and lasting.

IV. GOD GIVES HERE THROUGH BALAAM A CLEAR INDICATION OF HOW THIS DESIRABLE BLESSEDNESS COMES. Israel is not only the happy people, but the righteous people. Righteousness brings the happiness, and is the condition and the guarantee of its continuance. Wherever there is righteousness there is an ever-living and ever-fruitful cause of blessedness. The presence of this righteousness as essential is still more clearly indicated in the next prophecy: “God hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob.” That is the great difference between Israel and Moab. Moab is not without its possessions and treasures, its carnal satisfactions; Moab has much that it thinks worth fighting for; it has honours and rewards to offer Balaam such as have brought him all this way to utter, if he can, a curse against Israel. But Moab is not righteous, and the sight of its happiness will never provoke such a wish as Balaam’s here.

V. THIS BRINGS US TO CONSIDER THE PECULIAR WAY IN WHICH THE WISH IS EXPRESSED. “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his!” This is as comprehensive a way as was possible at the time of stating the blessedness of the righteous. Life and immortality were not yet brought to light. To die the death of the righteous was a very emphatic way of indicating the present life of the righteous in all its possible extent. No matter how long that life may stretch, it is one to be desired. “The righteous goes on as far as I can see him,” Balaam seems to say, “and comes to no harm.” The blessedness of God’s people, if only they observe the requisite conditions, is a continuous, unbroken experience: not an alternation of oases and deserts. The fluctuations in that blessedness, the flowing and ebbing tides, come from defects in ourselves. Where there is the fullness of faith, prayer, and humility there surely will be the fullness of blessedness also. Then also, when we consider what Christ has shown us by his own experience of what lies beyond death; when we consider his own personal triumph, and the definite, unhesitating way in which a blessed resurrection is assured to his followers, and an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, we see a great prophetic importance in this particular mode of expression: “Let me die the death. Balaam’s wish in the very form of it, so peculiar, and we may even say at first so startling, expressed far more than he had any possible conception of. Death stands crowning with one hand the temporal life of the righteous, and with the other opening to him the pure fullness of eternity.

VI. It is very important to notice that by the reference to Israel as the righteous AN UNERRING INDICATION IS GIVEN AS TO WHERE RIGHTEOUSNESS IS TO BE FOUND. Not they who call themselves righteous, but whom God calls righteous, are the people whose death one may desire to die. The true Israelite is he who fulfils the law and the prophets, as he is called to do and made competent to do by the fullness of that Holy Spirit which is given to every one who asks for him. “If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them.” There is a worthless and deceiving righteousness which excludes from the kingdom of heaven, though the scribes and Pharisees, its possessors, make much of it. There is also a righteousness to be hungered and thirsted after (Mat 5:1-48). We must be careful in this matter, lest we spend money for that which is not bread, and labour for that which satisfieth not (Isa 55:2). God hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, for where he beholds iniquity the seed of Jacob is assuredly absent. Those who have learned the corruption and deception, the necessary ignorance and incapacity, of the unrenewed heart, and thereby been impelled to seek and enabled to find renewal, life and light from on high, and holy principles and purposes for their future course, they are the righteous. Israel born of the flesh exists but as the type. We must not limit our view by him. “Think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham” (Mat 3:9).Y.

Num 24:13 -26

THE SECOND PROPHECY. BALAK’S STATE OF MIND

Balaam has cursed where he was expected to bless, he has said things very hard to listen to and keep presence of mind, but Balak has not by any means lost faith in Balaam and his resources. He rather takes the blame to himself than to Balaam. If there be wrath in his heart with the speaker, who, instead of cursing Israel, has blessed it altogether, he manages to conceal the wrath. He cannot afford to quarrel with Balaam, the only known resource he has. He suggests, therefore, as the great cause of failure that the place of cursing has been badly chosen. Remove the cause, and the effect will disappear. Let the prophet come away from the top of the rocks to where his mind will not be filled with the presence of this bewildering multitude; and Balaam, whatever his private thoughts, consents to the experiment. It is the way of the blind, deluded world; all reasons for failure are accepted and acted on save the right one. Balak cannot yet see, will not see for a while, perhaps will never really see, that there is no place on earth where such requests can be granted. He is showing himself now, as Balaam had done before, unsatisfied with the first intimation. Balaam had been told plainly at the very first that Israel was blessed, yet here he is dabbling in superstitions, in enchantments and divinations, with no clear perception of the nature and character of God. Thus, all the narrative through, we see what egregious and scarcely credible blunders men make when they are left to themselves to make discoveries of God. What a proof that revelation in all the large extent of its Scriptural fullness is absolutely indispensable! God must not only give us the truth concerning himself, and the proper relation of men to him, but must also open our hearts and our eyes, and give us light whereby we may see the truth already given. How constantly we should remember the inevitable ignorance of those to whom gospel truth, light, and perceptive power have not yet penetrated! Take pity on them and help themsuch darkened mindsas you think of Balak stumbling from one blunder to another, from one discredited resource to another, from one disappointment to another, only to find at last that all his schemes are vanity. And now we advance to consider the second prophecy. It is not only spoken in Balak’s hearing, but is a direct appeal to himself. We are to imagine Balak standing with strained and eager look, already full of excitement and expectation, before ever a word is spoken. But this is not enough; he must be solemnly exhorted to attention.

“Things are about to be said directly concerning you, and it may be that when you have heard them, and allowed them to have full effect on your mind, you will cease from these foolish attacks on the established purpose and counsel of Jehovah.” That this call upon Balak for attention was not a superfluous one is shown by the fact, that after hearing the prophecy he nevertheless made a third attempt, modified indeed, but still such as to show that he had not taken in the prophecy to anything like its full extent. We know how the Scriptures abound in expressions of which “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear,” and “Verily, verily, I say unto you,” are representative. Such expressions do not make truth any truer, but they do throw on us a great responsibility, and involve us in unquestionable blame for neglect of the things which belong to our salvation.

I. THE PROPHECY BEGINS BY CORRECTING BALAK‘S FATAL MISAPPREHENSIONS CONCERNING GOD. Balak having failed the first time he tried Balaam, succeeded the second; having failed the first time he tries Jehovah, it is natural for him to think he may succeed the second. Hitherto he has known only the idols of Moab, and these of course only in such aspects as the priests presented them. As the priests were, so were the gods; and Balak, having experienced Balaam’s final compliance, might excusably argue from Balaam to that Being whom he took to be Balaam’s God. And now there falls out of a holier sphere some unexpected and much-needed knowledge for poor Balak, whose chief experience had been of equivocating, vacillating, unstable men. “God is not what you think him to he; he is true and steadfast, neither changing his purposes nor failing in them.” Notice the way in which this all-important statement is put. God puts himself in contrast with his fallen, unfaithful, and disgraced creature, man. “God is not a man;” and, as if to emphasize this matter, he speaks the word of truth concerning his own truth through lying lips. “Men change their minds, and therefore break their words; they lie because they repent.” What a hint then for us all to change from deceitful hearts to sincere ones, from lying lips to truthful ones, from vain purposes that must some day be relinquished, engendered as they are in our own selfishness and folly, to such purposes as are inspired by the unchanging God himself! Changing thus, we shall get into a state partaking somewhat of God’s own steadfastness; or, rather, the only change will be from good to better and better to best. Man may become such that it shall no longer be his reproach that he lies, either carelessly, ignorantly, or maliciously, and repents, playing the weathercock to every wind that blows. God, we may be sure, desires the day to come when, instead of finding in man this awful and humiliating contrast to himself, he will rather be able to say, “Man is now true, clear from all belief in lies, from all deception and evasion, and steadfast in all the ways of righteousness, holiness, and love.

II. THE PROPHECY GOES ON TO REVEAL STILL MORE OF ISRAEL‘S STRENGTH. The unchangeable God, having purposed to bless Israel, must go on blessing them. lie does it in word continually through the great official channel (Num 6:22-27), and now it is Balaam’s lot (strange expositor of the Divine goodness!) to show clearly that the blessing of God is anything but a nominal or a secondary one. Much has been done to show this in the first prophecy, but a great deal more is done in the second. God has not only put Israel by themselves and made them into this vast multitude, which was a great deal to do, for Jacob’s posterity is likened to the dust in number; but now through Balaam he shows quality as well as quantity. The people are not only separated outwardly and visibly, but separated still more by some great peculiarity in their inward life. Their vast numbers are but the most easily perceptible result of the vigorous, abundant vitality within. When Balaam got his first glance from the top of the rocks he saw the most obvious fruit of Israel’s peculiar relation to God. Now in the second survey he comes as it were nearer, and sees the root and trunk and branches, the sap and substance whence these fruits take their origin.

1. There is the righteousness of the people. God, who searches into all secrets, and to whom the darkness and the light are both alike, has beheld no iniquity in Jacob, no wrong in Israel; that is to say, putting the thing plainly, there was no iniquity in Jacob. And though it seems a strange thing to say, considering God’s late dealings with the people, we feel at once that it must not only be true, but very important, or it would not be put so prominently forward. God looks upon the ideal Israel which lies yet undeveloped in the midst of all the unbelief and carnality of the present generation. Though at the present moment any dozen Israelites might be as debased as any dozen Moabites, yet in Israel there was a seed of holiness, a sure beginning of the perfect and the blessed, which was not to be found anywhere in Moab. God, bear in mind, sees what we cannot see. God is not a man, that he should lie; neither is he a man that his eye should be stopped by the surface and first appearance of things. Jesus sought a solid ground for the future of his saving work in the world, and he found it not amidst the world’s wisdom, but where we assuredly should never have lookedamong the stumbling, ignorant disciples whom he gathered in Galilee. Looking with other eyes than men, and where proud men never look, he finds what they never find.

2. There is the presence of God with them, and that not only as God, but as King. “When you attack Israel, O Balak, you attack the kingdom of God. You, the king of Moab, appeal to the King of Israel to curse his own people.” His sanctuary is also his throne, and where he is worshipped, there he also rules. Every act of worship is also an expression of loyalty. Balak described Israel as a people come out of Egypt (Num 22:5); he is now to learn that they came because they were brought; because that very God brought them whose curse he had so laboriously and patiently sought to invoke. “Does it stand to reason, O Balak, that God can have brought them so far now to leave them for the sake of your sacrifices and Balaam’s enchantments?” Thus also we may gather that as God in all the fullness of his being, Father, Son, and Spirit, has so long given his indubitable presence to his Church, he will assuredly for this very reason continue it to the end. God indeed looks on that Church in its actual coldness, indolence, and carnality,and the Israel of God to-day is quite as far away from the fullness of its privileges, the perfection of its faith, and the exactness of its service as was Israel in the wilderness,but he regards the ideal still. It is through the believers in Christ alone, the spiritual children of the faithful Abraham, that the nations are to be truly blessed. The ideal believer is the ideal man. Where the faithful and true God finds germs of faithfulness and truth in man, there he will abide and never depart.

3. There is strength for all required service and toil. “He hath as it were the strength of the unicorn (or buffalo). “Much increase is by the strength of the ox” (Pro 14:4), but an animal stronger even than the ordinary ox is needed to set forth the extent of Israel’s advantages. We may take it that the figure here is intended to set forth strength pure and simple. Israel will have power to do whatever the course of events ,nay bring to be done. It is strong to do God’s work as long as it is left to the peaceful pursuit of that work, and it is also strong to make a complete defense whenever it may be attacked. “Rouse Israel by your attacks, and the force that has hitherto been used for internal progress will become a wall against you; and not only so, but you ,nay be swept away in the rush of the roused and maddened unicorn.” There is thus a warning to Balak not to provoke. It is when the Church has been provoked by persecution that her true strength has been shown to the world. What a mockery of this world’s boasted resources, when all its persuasions, cajoleries, threats, and torments have failed to shake the faith of humble believers! It can burn, but it cannot convert. It is marvelous, the strength, energy, and patience which God has bestowed on some of his servants. Paul toiling on among infirmities and persecutions is a proverb; but, to come nearer home, consider John Wesley, hardly ever out of the saddle except when he was in the pulpit, amply furnished for all the weariness of travel and the work of incessant preaching till long past his eightieth year; and in matters of defense so wonderfully strengthened with the strength of the unicorn that he passed unharmed through all physical perils and social opposition. It is one of the most remarkable of all his remarkable experiences that he could say in his seventy-fourth year, “I have traveled all roads by day and by night these forty years, and never was interrupted yet.”

4. God gives his people certain, authoritative, regular knowledge as to his will and favour. He does not leave them to auguries and divination. These things indeed were not only useless, but forbidden (Le Joh 19:26). Whatever he has to say he says through appointed and recognized channels, and confirms and illustrates it by suitable acts. There was place and need for lawgivers, prophets, and priests in Israel, but no room for men like Balaam, augurs, magicians, and priestcraft in general. Enchantments and divination had been the mainstay of Balak’s hope, and though Balaam’s experience may have prevented him from trusting so fully in them, he nevertheless considered them a very important element in propitiating Jehovah. Man’s ways of reaching God are all vanity. God himself has to come down and lay a way very clearly marked and strictly prescribed. In that way, and in that alone, there is certainty and sufficiency of knowledge, safety, and blessedness of life. “The law of his God is in his heart; none of his steps shall slide” (Psa 37:31).

III. THE PROPHECY CLOSES BY INDICATING HOW THERE WILL BE IN ISRAEL THE SPIRIT OF DESTRUCTION AND THE STRENGTH TO DESTROY. Israel has not only the strength of the buffalo, but the spirit and propensities of the lion. This is the first intimation of threatening. The prophecy closes with, as it were, a growl and menace from the lion of the tribe of Judah. Up to this time God has told Balak to go round about Zion and tell the towers thereof, and mark well her bulwarks (Psa 48:12, Psa 48:13), that he might see how God’s ideal people are invulnerable to all enemies. But now the defensive is suddenly turned into the offensive. Israel is a lion. We know from the frequent references to the lion in the Old Testament that this figure must have been a very impressive one to Balak. In Isaiah’s prophecy concerning Moab we find these words: “I will bring lions upon him that escapeth of Moab” (Isa 15:9). The roar, the spring, the resistless attack, the sudden and complete collapse of the victim, all rise to our minds the moment this majestic animal is mentioned. The idea of defense scarcely enters into our minds in connection with the lion. His resources are those of attack. What shall Balak do if he has to meet a foe whose strength is that of the unicorn, and whose ardour is that of the lion? The figure, remember, is suitable to the occasion. There is a time to compare the people of God to the sheep whom the shepherd leads out and in, and gathers within the protecting fold, but there is also a time to compare them to the restless lion, seeking for his prey, and not lying down till he drinks its blood. The Church of Christ is a destroying institution, and this part of its work must not be concealed and softened down to suit the prejudices of the world. The claws of the lion must not be clipped when it is dealing with vested interests and established iniquities. As it is not the way of the lion to make compromises with its prey, so neither must we make compromises with any evil. We have nothing to do with evil, save, in the name of the God of righteousness, to destroy it as soon as we can. Nor need there be any fear of carrying the comparison too far. He who has taken in the meaning of those words, “Be wise as serpents, and harmless as doves,” will well understand how to be ardent, enthusiastic, uncompromising, almost fierce and lion-like, against monster evils, yet at the same time gentle as the lamb, pitiful as God himself, towards the men whose hearts have been hardened and their consciences blinded by the way in which their temporal interests have become intimately mixed with wrong. Wilberforce was one of the most gentle, affectionate, and considerate of men, always on the alert to say a word or write a letter for the spiritual good of others, yet his greatest work took the form of destroying evil. For many long years he had to look in the sight of the world a combatant more than anything else. When the slave trade was abolished in 1807 it is reported of him that he asked his friend Thornton, “What shall we abolish next?” a playful question, of course, but capable of a very serious meaning. No sooner does one great evil vanish from the scene than another becomes conspicuous. Evil seems continually growing as well as good. It is perhaps not without significance that so many associations clamouring for the attention of good and patriotic men have in the names of them such words as these: “abolition,” “repression,” “prevention.” It must needs be so, even to the end. The devil well knows how to make the selfish interests of one half the world dependent on the sufferings and miseries of the other half.Y.

Verse 27- Num 24:14

THE THIRD PROPHECY

I. THE CIRCUMSTANCES IN WHICH IT WAS UTTERED.

1. With regard to Balak. After hearing the second prophecy, and especially its menacing conclusion, he is naturally much irritated. It is bad enough to have been disappointed even once, but kings like worse to have threatening added to disappointment, and at first Balak makes as if he would have nothing more said on the subject, one way or another. If Balaam cannot curse the people, neither shall he bless them. But becoming a little calmer, Balak determines to try a third time, and from a still different place; so little did he need the solemn assertion of God’s unchangeable purposes to which his attention had been specially called. The conduct of Balak is a warning to us to keep our hearts right at all times with regard to the reception of Divine truth. Truths stated very clearly and emphatically, and in critical circumstances, may yet be utterly neglected. That which is necessary to be known will, we may be quite sure, have a clearness corresponding to the necessity. However clear and simple statements are in themselves, they must needs be as idle breath if we refuse to give humble and diligent attention to them.

2. With regard to Balaam. He no longer goes out seeking for enchantments, although be still clings to the inevitable sacrifices. This forsaking of the enchantments and clinging to the sacrifices, is it not a sort of testimony out of the very depths and obscurities of heathenism that God cannot be approached without something in the way of vicarious suffering? Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel. It had taken him a long time and caused him a great deal of trouble to see this, and yet the sequel proves (Num 31:8, Num 31:16) that, after all, seeing, he did not perceive, and hearing, he did not understand. Nevertheless, at this time he saw sufficient to convince him how vain were Balak’s hopes of a curse from Jehovah. If Israel was to be overthrown, it was not in that way. Observe that in uttering this prophecy Balaam is thrown into a higher state of receptivity than before. When Balak refused to be satisfied with the first prophecy, he got a second one, specially addressed to himself, and fuller; more indicative of Israel’s resources, varied, ample, and unfailing as they were for every possible need. But now he does not so much get a prophecy fuller in itself; it is rather a clearer proof that Balaam is indeed employed by God as a prophet. He is thrown into an ecstatic state, His eyes are closed to the outward world, but the mind’s eye is opened, and a picture, first beautiful, and then terrible, is presented to his vision. We see from this how much God can do in controlling the powers of carnal and unsympathizing men. God not only puts his own words into Balaam’s lying lips, but he makes him see such visions as were customarily confined to men who were spiritually fit for them. Balaam doubtless, looking away into the distance of time from the present encampment of Israel in Moab to their future life in Canaan, would rather have seen ruin, confusion, and desolationsomething to rejoice the heart of his employer, and bring to himself the promised rewards. But he could only see what God showed him. If then God held this ungodly Balaam in such control, what may not his power be over those who submit to him with all their hearts? There is a sort of proportion in the matter. As the unwilling Balaam is to the completely submissive believer, so what God did to Balaam is to what God will do for such a believer. The more you give to God for working on, the more, by consequence, he will give to you in return. Yield yourselves to God, that he may not only work through you by his mighty power, but in you and for you according to the purpose of his love and the riches of his grace. The sad reflection is that Balaam allowed himself to be an evidence of the power, but not the grace; allowed God’s blessings to go through him, yet, in spite of his own expressed wish, made no attempt to keep blessings for himself.

II. THE PROPHECY ITSELF. Here are set before us two pictures, as it were, a beautiful one and a terrible one. Picture the first. A spectator in an ordinary state of mind, looking down with his natural vision on the Israelite camp, sees long ranges of tents, set in four divisions, and at a reverent distance from the tabernacle in the midst of them. The people dwelt “not in stately palaces, but in coarse and homely tents, and those, no doubt, sadly weather-beaten.” But Balaam in his ecstasy, when the Spirit of God came upon him, looked upon a more attractive and respiring scene. What he gazed upon at first was indeed these rows of tents, but, just as if in a dissolving view, they faded away before his eyes, and in place of them, valleys, gardens by the river-side, aloes of Jehovah’s planting, and cedars beside the waters were spread out before him. Everything is suggestive of quiet, steady prosperity, of fruitfulness, peace, and beauty. This is the internal life of the Church of Christ, when his people are living to the extent of their privileges. This is the difference between the external appearance and the inward life and experience, Just at that moment when the lot of the Christian looks least attractive to the casual and uninstructed glance, it may be rich in all the great elements of true blessedness. The position of the Christian in this world is not seldom like that of the kernel within the shell: outside, the rough, repulsive, unpromising shell; inside, the precious kernel, with “the promise and potency” in it of a tree like that from which it was taken. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit” (1Co 2:9, 1Co 2:10). And thus it is here. It was not possible for Balaam to describe the blessed circumstances of Israel in direct language. He had to fall back on the comparison to certain visible things, such things as would raise in the mind of a dweller in Moab or Canaan, or anywhere round about, a picture of the highest satisfaction and success. Picture the second. The first picture is beautiful, and very beautiful; it is Eden raised in the waste wilderness. The second picture is terrible, and very terrible; yet what else could be expected? If Balak will go on presumptuously defying the sacred and beloved people of God, undeterred by the menaces to which he has already listened, then those menaces must be repeated with all the force and thoroughness of expression that can be thrown into them. The sudden transition from such a peaceful, beautiful scene as goes before heightens the effect, and probably was meant to do so. On one side is Israel engaged in tilling, the garden, the work to which man was set apart in the first days of innocence, watering his far-spread crops and enjoying his fragrant aloes and his cedars; on the other side is Israel the Destroyer, emphatically the Destroyer. The qualities of no one animal, however destructive, are sufficiently expressive to set him forth. Fierce, furious, strong, resistless as the lion is, the lion by himself is not enough to show forth Israel, and you must add the unicorn; and there you are invited to gaze on this unicorn-lion, strong in power, thorough in execution, leaving not one of his enemies unsubdued and undestroyed. Let Balak well understand that Israel, under the good hand of God, is climbing to the highest eminence among the nations. The repetition of the references to the unicorn and the lion shows how important the references are, and how needful it is to let the mind of the Christian dwell encouragingly on them. Balak sets forth the intolerant and suspicious spirit of the world in all its kingdoms; and the world does not heed prophecies; it does not take them to heart, else it would cease to be the world. These prophecies, though they were first spoken by a Balaam and listened to by a Balak, were meant in due course to reach, guide, assure, and comfort Israel. If there are times when we are tempted to fear the world, with its designs, its resources, and the might of its fascinating spirit, then we shall do well to recollect that, by a double and enlarged assurance, God reckons his Church to have the strength of the unicorn and the spirit of the lion, utterly to subdue and destroy all those kingdoms of the world which, to keep up the figure, are considered as the natural prey of the Church.Y.

HOMILIES BY J. WAITE

Num 24:7-10

BALAAM-THE FIRST PARABLE

The word “parable” is used here in a somewhat peculiar sense. It is not, as in the New Testament, a fictitious narrative embodying and enforcing some moral truth, but a “dark saying,” a mystic prophecy cast in the form of figurative poetic language, a prophecy that partakes of the nature of allegory. In these ecstatic utterances the impulse of Balaam s better nature overmasters his more sordid passion, and a true prophetic spirit from God takes the place of the false Satanic spirit of heathen divination. The thoughts respecting Israel to which Balaam gives utterance in this first parable are deeply true of the redeemed people of God in every age.

I. THEIR SPECIAL PRIVILEGE AS OBJECTS OF THE DIVINE FAVOUR. “How shall I curse,” &c. Balak had faith in Balaam’s incantations. “I wot that he whom thou blessest,” &c. (Num 22:6). But he himself knew well that there was an arbitrament of human interests and destinies infinitely higher than his. God has absolute sovereignty for good or ill over all our human conditions. There is no real blessing where his benediction does not rest, nor need any curse be dreaded by those who live beneath his smile. “If God be for us,” &c. (Rom 8:31). No alternative so momentous as thisthe favour or the disfavour of God. Note, respecting the Divine favour, that

1. It is determined by spiritual character. Not an arbitrary, capricious bestowment. It is for us to supply the conditions. We must “be reconciled to God” if we would know the benediction of his smile. God is “for” those who are for him. The cloud in which his glory dwells gives light to those who are. in. spiritual accord with him, but is darkness and confusion to his foes.

2. It is neither indicated nor disproved by the outward experiences of life. External conditions are no criterion of the state of the soul and its Divine relations. The wicked may “have all that heart can wish” of the good of this life, and their very “prosperity may slay them ;” while it is often true that “whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth” with sorest tribulations, and those tribulations “work out for them a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.” We judge very falsely if we suppose that spiritual experiences must needs be reflected in outward conditions.

3. It is the source of the purest joy of which the soul of a man is capable. This is true blessednessto walk consciously in the light of God s countenance. “His favour is life,” his loving kindness “better than life.” This was the pure joy of the well-beloved Sonthe abiding sense of the Father’s approval. Have this joy in you, and you may defy the disturbing influences of life and the bitterest maledictions of a hostile world.

II. THEIR SEPARATENESS. “Lo, the people shall dwell alone,” &c. (Num 24:9). The Jews were an elect people (“Ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people”Exo 19:5), chosen and separated, not as monopolizing the Divine regard, but as the instruments of a Divine purpose. They were called to be witnesses for God among the nations,the majesty of his Being, the sanctity of his claims, the method of his government, &c.,and to be the channels of boundless blessing to the world. The same grand distinction belongs to all whom Christ has redeemed from among men. “Ye are a chosen generation,” &c. (1Pe 2:9). He says to all his followers, “Ye are not of the world,” &c. (Joh 15:19; Joh 17:16, Joh 17:17). This separation is

1. Not circumstantial, but moral; lying not in the renunciation of any human interest or the rending of any natural human tie, but in distinctive qualities of spiritual character and life. In moral elevation and spiritual dignity only are they called to “dwell alone.”

2. Not for the world’s deprivation, but for its benefit Not to withdraw from it powers that might better be consecrated to its service, but to bring to bear upon it, in the cause of righteousness, an energy higher and diviner than its own.

III. THEIR MULTIPLICITY. “Who can count the dust,” &c. The promise given to Abraham is gloriously fulfilled in God’s spiritual Israel. “Thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth,” &c. (Gen 28:14). This indicates at once the grandeur of the Divine purpose and the diffusive power of the Divine life in men. On both these grounds their numbers will surely multiply till they “cover the face of all the earth.” Little as we may be able to forecast the future, we know that the question, “Are there few that be saved?” will find its triumphant answer in “the great multitude which no man can number, of all nations,” &c. (Rev 7:9).

IV. THE BLESSEDNESS OF THEIR END. “Let me die the death,” &c. We gather from this not only Balaam’s faith in the intrinsic worth of righteousness, but also in the happy issue to which a righteous life in this world must lead as regards the life to come. Why this wish if he had no faith in a glorious immortality and in righteousness as the path to it? There is an instinct in the soul even of a bad man that leads to this conclusion, and his secret convictions and wishes will often bear witness to a diviner good of which his whole moral life is the practical denial. You must be numbered with the righteous now if you would find your place with them hereafter, and live their life if you would die their death.W.

Num 24:23

BALAAM-THE SECOND PARABLE

We may look upon Balaam here as representing the Satanic powers that have ever been plotting and working against the kingdom of God among men, and as the unwilling prophet of their ultimate defeat. The spell of a higher Power is over him, and he cannot do the thing that he would. Looking down from “the high places of Baal” upon the tents of Israel spread Out over the plain beneath, he is constrained in spite of himself to utter only predictions of good. His magic arts are utterly baffled in presence of the Divinity that overshadows that strange people. It is a picture of what is going on through all the ages. In the triumphant host approaching the borders of the land of promise we see the ransomed Church moving on to its glorious destination, its heavenly rest; the kingdom that Christ has founded among men consummating itself, “covering the face of the whole earth.” And in the failure of his enchantments we see the impotence of the devices of the powers of darkness to arrest its progress. The Satanic working has assumed different forms.

I. PERSECUTION. The followers of Christ soon verified his prophetic word: “In the world ye shall have tribulation.” The infant Church was nursed and cradled in the storms. It no sooner began to put forth its new-born energies than it found the forces of earth and hell arrayed against it. But what was the result? The first outbreak of hostility only brought to the minds of those feeble men, with a meaning undiscovered before, the triumphant words (Psa 2:1-12), “Why do the heathen rage,” &c. It drove them nearer to the Divine Fountain of strength. It made them doubly bold (Act 4:23, Act 4:30). Scattered abroad, they :went everywhere preaching the word, and the hand of the Lord was with them.” A prophecy was thus given of the way in which persecution would always serve the cause it meant to destroy, and God would “make the wrath of man to praise him.” Ecclesiastical authority has leagued itself with the tyrannous powers of the world in this repressive work. The sanctions of religion have been invoked for the destruction of the truth. But ever to the same issue. Whatever form it takes, the persecuting spirit is always essentially Satanic; there is nothing Divine in it. And it always defeats its own end. “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.” The fire that has swept over the field, consuming the growth of one year, has only enriched it and made it more prolific the next. The kingdom of Christ has rooted itself in the earth, and its Divine energies have been developed by reason of the storms that have raged against it. Not only has “no weapon formed against it prospered,” but the weapon has generally recoiled on the head of him who wielded it. The Satanic enchantments have been foiled just when they seemed to reach the climax of their success, and the curses of a hostile world have turned to blessings.

II. CORRUPTING INFLUENCES WITHIN THE PALE OF THE CHURCH ITSELF. Christianity has suffered far more from foes within than ever it did from foes without. Christ has been wounded most “in the house of Ms friends.” Read the history of the first three or four centuries of the Christian era if you would know to what an extent the hand of man may mar the fair and glorious work of God. They tell how Christian doctrine, worship, polity, social life gradually lost their original simplicity and purity. The traditions of Judaism, heathen philosophies and mythologies, the fascinations of a vain world, the basest impulses of our nature, all played their part in the corrupting process. The human element overbore and thrust aside the Divine, till it seemed as if Satan, baffled in the use of the extraneous persecuting powers, were about to triumph by the subtler forces of corruption and decay. But God has never left his Church to itself any more than to the will of its adversaries. In the darkest times and under the most desperate conditions the leaven of a higher life has been secretly working. Nothing is more wonderful than the way in which the interests of Christ’s kingdom have been preserved, not only in spite of, but often through, the instrumentality of events and institutions that in themselves were contrary to its spirit and its laws. What are many of our modern agitations but the struggles of the religious life to east off the fetters that long have bound it, to shake itself from the dust of ages, symptoms of the vis vitoe by which nature throws off disease. Even the retrograde movements that sometimes alarm us will be found by and by to have conspired to the same end. And when the Church shall “awake, and put on her beautiful garments” of simple truth and love and power, when “the Spirit is poured out upon her from on high,” then shall it be seen how utterly even these subtler Satanic “enchantments” have failed to arrest her progress towards the dominion of the earth.

III. THE ASSAULTS OF UNBELIEF. The intellectual force of the world in some of its most princely and commanding forms has ever set itself in deadly antagonism to the Church of Christ. Far be it from us to say that all who hold or teach anti-Christian doctrine are consciously inspired by the spirit of evil. But beneath the fairest aspects of aggressive unbelief we discern the Satanic aim to darken the glory that shines from heaven on human souls. It is given to “the mystery of iniquity” to pervert the genius, the learning, even the very mental integrity and honest purpose of men to its own false uses. But have these forces of unbelief ever gained a substantial victory? One would suppose, from what is often said on their side, that they were victorious along the whole line. Is it really so? Is there any one stronghold of revealed truth that they have stormed and taken? In all the battles that have been fought on the field of Christian doctrine, has any ground really been lost? Have any of the “standards” fallen? Is Christianity in any sense a defeated or even damaged cause? Nay, we rather believe that “the foolishness of God is wiser than men,” and “the weakness of God is stronger than men.” The camp of Israel need fear no hostile “enchantment,” for “the Lord their God is with them, and the shout of a king is among them.”W.

HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG

Num 24:10-14

BALAK RELINQUISHES HIS PROJECT

He sees now clearly that there is no chance of prevailing over Israel by means of a curse, and that any further appeal to the prophet would only bring words more galling to his pride and more menacing to his position, if indeed such words could be found. Considerations of policy and prudence need no longer restrain him in speaking out all his mind to the prophet.

I. BALAK‘S TREATMENT OF HIS UNSUCCESSFUL ACCOMPLICE.

1. An outbreak of selfish wrath. Balaam indeed did not deserve much sympathy, seeing how he had played into Balak’s hands from the very beginning. But if he had deserved sympathy ever so much, he would not have met with it. Balak has eyes, heart, and recollection for nothing but his own disappointment. He has no real sympathetic regard for Balaam, no consideration for one who is far from home, and whose professional reputation all around will be sadly damaged by this failure on a critical occasion. Wicked men in the hour of disaster show small consideration for their accomplices. Those in whose hearts the temptation of some great reward for evil-doing is beginning to prevail should consider that if they fail they will meet with scant mercy or excuse. When the Balaks of the world get a Balaam into their bands, they look on him just as a tool. If the tool does its work as they want it, well and good; keep it carefully for further use; but if it turns out a failure, fling it without more ado on the dunghill. Balak acts here towards Balaam just as he might be expected to act.

2. He lays the whole blame on Balaam. He does not consider that the evil purposes of his own heart must needs be frustrated. Three prophecies, full of solemn and weighty matter, uttered in his hearing, have not made him in the slightest degree conscious of the folly and iniquity of his project. He sees indeed that the project must fail, but is blind as a bat to the real reason of the failure. All that he has heard concerning Jehovah, his character, his past dealings with Israel, and his purposes for them, has not impressed him one whit, save with the fact that somehow, he cannot get his own way. His curse project has ended in a huge, humiliating, exasperating failure, and Balaam must bear the blame of it. Wicked men cannot be got to give Heaven credit for all its timely and irresistible interferences with their darling schemes. The fault in Balak’s angry eye rested with Balaam, and with him alone. “The Lord hath kept thee back from honour.” A true word indeed, but not applicable in the way in which Balak intended it. The Lord had kept Balaam back from honour, but not from the paltry honour which Balak would have conferred on him. The lesson for us is, that whenever any selfish plan of ours fails, we should not, like this blind, besotted king, go laying blame elsewhere, as if it would exonerate ourselves. Balaam of course was to blame, grievously to blame, a great deal more than Balak, seeing he sinned against greater light. But we must not let the grievous and conspicuous faults of others cast our own into the shade. We are at the best very poor judges of the transgressions of our fellow-men. When we fail in anything, it is far the wisest, kindest, and most profitable course to give diligent heed to such causes of failure as are in our own heart. Whatever disappointments may come to us in life, we shall never fail in anything of real importance if only we keep our own hearts right with God.

II. BALAK‘S VAIN ATTEMPT TO GET PROMPT RIDDANCE OF THE PROPHET. He thinks it is enough to say, “Stop.” But as he was not able to make Balaam speak what he wanted and when he wanted, so neither is he able to make Balaam cease when the Lord’s message is on his lips. God opened Balaam’s mouth, and it is not for Balak to close it. Before Balak is left, his impotence shall be manifested in the completest possible way. He had been the thoughtless and unwitting means of turning on the stream of glorious prophecy, and now he finds he cannot stop that stream at will. Jehovah did not seek this occasion, but when it is furnished he deems it well to avail himself of it to the full. And now Balak finds that, whether he will or not, he must listen to the doom of his own people, expressly and clearly announced. Learn that when you begin the headstrong course of making everything on earthand perhaps, after Balak’s fashion, in heaven as wellsubservient to self, you cannot stop whenever the consequences begin to get troublesome. Balak said, “Let my will be done, not because it is right, but because it is mine,” and he was not contented with a refusal, once or even twice. He must have it a third time, and then he finds that the choice is no longer under his control. Let us choose wisely while we are able to choose.Y.

Num 24:15-25

THE STAR OUT OF JACOB AND THE SCEPTER OUT OF ISRAEL

The final prophecy, unsolicited by Balak, which indeed he would have been glad to stop, goes far beyond the concerns of his kingdom and his reign. It stretches over an ever-widening extent of space and time. As long as there is any Moab kind of nation to be destroyed, Israel must continue to prevail’. The kingdoms of this world not only will become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ, but no other conclusion is easily conceivable. The power by which Israel conquers one enemy enables it to conquer all; and the disposition which leads it against one enemy must lead it against all. It will again and again be attacked, and must defend where it is attacked. It must expand by the ever-strengthening life within. The more it grows, the more room it will require, until at last the kingdoms of the world become its own. Notice

I. THE ADVANCE IN THIS PROPHECY UPON THE PRECEDING ONE, AS SHOWN BY THE DIFFERENT FIGURE EMPLOYED. The lion destroys, and that most effectually, but he can do nothing more than destroy. The horse or the ox will draw the cart, and thus serve constructive purposes. Even the tiniest bird can build its compact and symmetrical nest, but the lion can do nothing save destroy. You may cage it and curb its savage propensities a little, but it is not tamed; the lion-nature is there, and the smallest taste of blood will cause it to burst forth in all its fury. The lion being thus a destroyer, and nothing but a destroyer, it is needful to present Israel as able to do moreable to destroy in order that there may be room for the construction of something more worthy to endure. It does not become God to stay the current of prophecy with a menace of dreadful destruction as the last word, and so he makes Balaam to speak of the star and the scepter. The lion, as it rages about, can make a solitude; it can take away wickedness by taking away all wicked men; but a solitude is not a kingdom. The true kingdom of God is only gained when he gets willing hearts. The destruction which is spoken of with such energy and almost fierceness of illustration is for the purpose of completely taking away the evil out of human society, so that only the good may remain to serve and glorify the Maker of mankind.

II. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STAR, AS INDICATING THE METHOD IN WHICH GOD WILL WORK TO CONQUER EVIL AND ESTABLISH GOOD. The star, it is said, is mentioned here as the symbol of governing power, according to the astrological notions of antiquity. It is further said that the joining of the scepter with the star shows that authority and supremacy are the main things to be indicated by the mention of the star. Certainly the prophecy is full of the idea of supremacy and authority; but if this idea was the only thing to be considered, the mention of the scepter would be enough. The star is a symbol of power, but it is also a symbol of many great realities besides. Let us ask not only why the scepter is joined with the star, but why the star is joined with the scepter. The very first thing that a star indicates is light. God will establish his rule by sending the Star out of Jacob to rise in the darkness. Christ, the fulfillment of the star, has come a light into the world, a rival to-existent lights, and destined to outshine them all. He is a light ever protesting against the darkness, not comprehended by it, not swallowed up and lost in it. Rejoice in this, that the Star out of Jacob is inaccessible to the meddling of those who hate its inconvenient revelations. Christ comes to destroy, and at the same time to construct by letting light in upon all dark, idolatrous chambers and all self-deceiving hearts. The light is from him who knows what is in man, his wickedness, his weakness, and his wants. He brings reality where others only bring appearance. He brings truth where they, even in their very sincerity, bring error. There is no room for a Balaam in his kingdom. The Demas who makes a few steps within soon retreats from a light far too trying for the darkness of his heart. Notice, further, that the light of the star is in some respects more significant of the work of Christ than would be the light of the sun. We must have a figure which will keep before us both the light and the darkness. To us, individually, Christ may be as the sun, filling our hearts with light. We know, alas, that he is far from being a sun to many. Their light is still darkness, but the Star of Bethlehem shines in the firmament, waiting for the hour when in humility they may betake themselves to it. After all the search for truth, and whatever knowledge may be gained, there is still the sense of incompleteness; the knowledge stops with the intellect; it does not find its way to enlighten and comfort the whole heart. We can by no means dispense with the Star out of Jacob, the Star that shines from every page of the Scriptures.

III. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE SCEPTRE, AS INDICATING THE REALITY OF THE DOMINION. The scepter is that of Christ’s truth, wielded with all the power of God’s Holy Spirit. We must have much assurance, not only of the illumination that comes from Christ, but of the consequent actual illumination in accepting human hearts.

We must ever be ready in our approaches to God to say, “Thine is the kingdom and the power. Thine is not only the rightful authority, but also the actual authority.” What is a more offensive sight than a merely nominal submission to Christ? How soon it becomes evident to the discerning eye that there is an utter want of harmony! Those who are really Christ’s subjects soon justify their loyalty by the commotion they make among the accepted customs and traditions of the world. There is a sense in which they may covet often to hear the word, “They that have turned the world upside down have come hither also.” As we read the acts of the Apostles, we feel that there was not only a new teaching being diffused among men, but, above all things, a new power. It was not only fresh thought they brought to men, but a new and gladdening life.

IV. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE MANY NATIONS REFERRED TO, AS INDICATING THE EXTENT AND COMPLETENESS OF THE DOMINION. The details connected with each nation have of course their peculiar significance, but the significance of the details is not quite so clear as that of the great common element which runs through them all. All the details point forward to a time when the Star out of Jacob shall outshine the star out of every other nation, when the Scepter out of Israel shall break every other scepter. The kingdoms of the world are to fallthe kingdoms of mammon, of pleasure, of unbelief in Christ, of science falsely so called, of rationalism, of atheism, of individual self-assertion. These are kingdoms that now stretch their authority far and wide, in all continents, and in all ranks of men, and many are subjects of more than one of the kingdoms. In the kingdoms of this world it is largely true that there is neither Jew nor Greek, bond nor free, male nor female. The Star out of Jacob then has a large work to do in subduing and transforming the many and mighty kingdoms of this world. And all the glorious burden of prophecy heaves and swells with the emphatic assurance that he will do it. The day is to come when we shall all learn that to be king over one’s own nature is more than to sway the most populous and wealthy territory among men. Then indeed will the description,” King of kings, and Lord of lords,” fully apply, when God in Christ Jesus reigns over kings and lords such as these. The cry concerning man will no longer be,

“Lord of himself, that heritage of woe!”

but, lord of a heritage reclaimed, purified, and made docile by the work of Jesus as he inspires in the breast every loving, righteous, and truthful motive.Y.

HOMILIES BY J. WAITE

Num 24:1-9

BALAAM-THE THIRD PARABLE

This passage marks the period at which Balaam becomes finally convinced that it is vain for him to attempt to satisfy Balak, or to carry out the baser promptings of his own heart. He confesses his defeat. gives up his enchantments, “sets his face towards the wilderness” where the camp of Israel lay, and utters the words that God puts into his mouth. But still his spirit is not subdued, for, as we learn from Num 24:14, instead of casting in his lot, as he might have done, with the chosen nation, he resolves in spite of all to go back to his own people and his old ways. Combining these two features of his case, we see how a man may “approve the right and follow the wrong.” It affords a striking example of

(1) true convictions followed by

(2) a false and fatal determination.

I. TRUE CONVICTIONS. Though it was by the constraint of a higher Power that Balaam uttered these words of benediction, we must regard them also as being, to a great extent, the result of his own intuitions, symptoms of the struggling of better thought and feeling within him. He was not the mere senseless medium of the spirit of prophecy. Unwillingly, but not altogether unwittingly, was he made the organ of a Divine inspiration. A bad man may utter words that are good and true, and may often be compelled by the force of outward testimony, or of the inward witness of his own conscience, to do honour to that in others which condemns himself. There are chiefly three characteristics here which find their higher counterpart in the spiritual Israel, and which her enemies, like Balaam, have often been constrained to confess.

1. Beauty. How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob! Rich valleys, stuffing gardens, lign-aloes and cedars planted beside the water-courses, are, to the poetic imagination of the seer, the fitting images of their goodly array. But what is the beauty that captivates the eye compared with that which appeals to the sensibility of the soul? All outward forms of loveliness are but the shadow and reflection of the Diviner beauties of holiness, the spiritual glory of truth, purity, goodnessthe “adorning of the hidden man of the heart in that which is not corruptible.” The richest Oriental imagery can but feebly represent the changing phases of this beauty. And many a man has felt the charm of it, and yet been utterly destitute of that sympathy of spirit that would move him to make it his own. It compels his admiration, but does not win his love.

2. World-wide fruitfulness. “He shall pour the water out of his buckets,” &c.the image of abundant, far-reaching beneficence. The promise to Abraham was fulfilled: “In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed” (Gen 22:16, Gen 22:17). The benefits the seed of Abraham conferred upon the human race did but foreshadow those of Christianity. It is the “light of the world,” the “salt of the earth,” carrying the stream of a new life over all lands, diffusing a healing influence through all the waters. Its adversaries know this, and are often constrained in spite of themselves to acknowledge it. They are themselves living witnesses to its truth, for they owe to Christianity the very culture, the spiritual force, the social advantages, the literary facilities, &e, that they turn as weapons against it.

3. Victorious power. The triumphant way in which God led forth his people out of Egypt was prophetic of the power that should always overshadow them and dwell among them; often a latent, slumbering strength like that of a crouching or sleeping lion, but irresistible when once it rouses itself to withstand their foes. Such power dwells ever in the redeemed Church. “God is in the midst of her,” &c. (Psa 46:5). “The weapons of our warfare,” &c. (2Co 10:4). Nothing so strong and invincible as truth and goodness. The light must triumph over the darkness. The kingdom of Christ is a “kingdom that cannot be moved,” and many a man whose heart has had no kind of sympathy with the cause of that kingdom has been unable to suppress the secret conviction that it will surely win its way, till it shall have vanquished all its enemies and covered the face of the whole earth.

II. A FALSE AND FATAL DETERMINATION. “And now, behold, I go unto my people” (Num 24:14). He returns to his former ways, plunges again into the darkness and foulness of idolatrous Mesopotamia, having first, it would appear, counseled Balak as to how he might corrupt with carnal fascinations the people whom it was vain for him to “curse” (see Num 31:16; Rev 2:14), and at last is slain with the sword among the Midianites (Num 31:8; Jos 13:22). Learn

1. How powerless are the clearest perceptions of the truth in the ease of one whose heart is thoroughly set in him to do evil. There are those who “hold the truth in unrighteousness” (Rom 1:18). “They profess that they know God, hut in works they deny him” (Tit 1:16).

2. How there is often a deeper fall into the degradation of sin when such an one has been uplifted for a while by the vision and the dream of a better life. “The last state of that man is worse than the first” (Mat 12:45). “For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness,” &c. (2Pe 2:21, 2Pe 2:22).W.

Num 24:17

BALAAM-THE FOURTH PARABLE

Balaam appears before us here as one who “seeing, sees not. His “eyes are open,” but he has no real vision of the eternal truth of things. He has a “knowledge of the Most High,” but not that which consists in living sympathy with his character and will and law. He recognizes the blessedness of the ransomed people, but has no personal share in that blessedness. He discerns the bright visions of the future, the rising of Jacob’s Star, the gleam of the royal Scepter that shall rule the world, the coming of the world’s redeeming Lord, but he sees him only from afar. Not “now,” not “nigh,” does he behold him; not with a vivid, quickening, self-appropriating consciousness; not as the light, the hope, the life, the eternal joy of his own soul. It is a moral portraiture, a type of spiritual condition and personal character, with which we are only too familiar. The faith of many is thus destitute of efficient saving power. “It is dead, being alone.” Their religious perceptions are thus divorced from religious life. They have just such a formal, ideal acquaintance with God, without any of that immediate personal fellowship with hint which renews their moral nature after his likeness. They walk in the embrace of his presence, but their “eyes are holden that they should not know him.” So near is He, and yet so far; so clearly revealed, and yet so darkly hidden; so familiar, and yet so strange.

I. This is seen in THE INSENSIBILITY OF MEN TO THE DIVINER MEANING OF NATURE. The material universe exists for spiritual ends. God has surrounded his intelligent creatures with all the affluence and glory of it in order to reveal himself to them and attract their thought and affection to himself. “The invisible things of him from the beginning of the world are clearly seen,” &c. (Rom 1:20). But how dead are men often to Divine impressions! They hear no voice and feel no influence from God coming to them through his works. They know none but the lower uses of nature, and never dream of entering through it into communion with Him who inspires it with the energy of his presence. Tribes whose life is nursed and cradled in the fairest regions of the earth are often mentally the darkest and morally the most depraved. The worst forms of heathenism have been found in those parts of the world where the Creator has most lavished the tokens of his glorious beneficence. The sweet associations of rural and pastoral life in a Christian land like ours are connected less than we should expect them to be with quickness of spiritual perception and tenderness of spiritual sensibility. Stranger still that men whose souls are most keenly alive to all the beauty of the world, and with whom it is an all-absorbing passion to search out its wonders and drink in its poetic inspirations, should fail, as they so often do, to discern in it a living God. Physical science is to many as a gorgeous veil that darkly hides him. rather than the glass through which the beams of his glory fall upon them, the radiant pathway by which they climb up to his throne. Their eyes are wondrously “open;” they have a “knowledge of the Most High” in the forms and modes of his working such as few attain to; “visions of the Almighty” in the glorious heavens above and the teeming earth beneath pass continually before them, and yet they see and feel and know him not. How different such a case from that of Job: “O that I knew where I might find him!” &c. (Job 23:1-10). There you have the passionate outbreathing of a soul that is hungering and thirsting after a God that “hideth himself.” Here you have God urging, pressing upon men the signals and proofs of his presence without effect. There is no blindness darker and sadder than that of those who boast that their “eyes are open,” and yet, in a glorious world like this, can find no living God.

II. It is seen in THE INDISPOSITION OF MEN TO RECOGNISE THE VOICE OF GOD IN HOLY SCRIPTURE. To know that the Bible is a revelation of truth from God, and to know God as he reveals himself in the Bible, are two widely different things. There are those to whom revelation is as a Divine voice uttered long ago, but “not now;” a voice coming down to them through the ages as in distant echo, but not instant and near. To them these old records may be sacred, venerable, worthy to be preserved and defended, but in no sense are they a channel of direct personal communication between the living God and our living souls; “inspired” once, but not instinct with the spirit of inspiration now. No wonder the word is powerless and fruitless under such conditions. It is of no use to tell men that the Scriptures are “inspired” if they don’t feel God to be in them. dealing as a personal Spirit with their spirits to draw them into fellowship with himself. A new kind of consciousness is awakened, a new order of effects produced, when once a man begins to feel that the written word is the living voice of God to his own soul. He cannot despise it then. It carries with it an authority that needs no extraneous authority to support itthe true “demonstration of the Spirit.” Apart from this, the soul in presence of all these Divine revelations is like one under the influence of some powerful anaesthetic, receiving impressions on the outward sense of all that is going on around him, but conscious of nothing. The “eyes are open,” but there is no living, spiritual realization. “They seeing, see not, and hearing, hear not, neither do they understand” (Mat 13:13; Joh 12:40; 2Co 4:3, 2Co 4:4).

III. It is seen in THE PURELY IDEAL RELATION IN WHICH MEN TOO OFTEN STAND TOWARDS CHRIST. By multitudes Christ is seen, as it were, “afar off.” He is to them but as the vision of a dream, a vague, distant abstraction, a mere historic figure, the central actor in a tragical historic drama. They have never entered into any kind of personal relation with him, have never bowed before him in heart-broken penitence, adoring wonder, childlike trustfulness, grateful, self-surrendering love. “Virtue” has never gone forth out of him to heal the disease of their souls, because they have not yet “touched him.” There is a wide distinction between the knowledge that comes by mere hearsay and that which comes by personal converse, between a distant vision and the living “touch.” Though faith be in great part blind and unintelligent, yet if there is the quick sensibility of life in it, it is better than all the clear, unclouded vision of an eye that is no real inlet to the soul. There is a future manifestation of Christ. “Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him” (Rev 1:7). What shall be the relation in which we stand towards him then? There are those whose eyes will then be opened as they never were before. Shall it be only to have them closed again in everlasting night, “consumed with the brightness of his appearing”? You must be in living fellowship with Christ now if you would look with joy upon him when he comes in his “power and great glory.”W.

Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary

Num 24:1. To seek for enchantments In the margin, to the meeting of enchantments; by which is meant the same as he calls, meeting the Lord, in the 3rd and 15th verses of the last chapter. It is difficult to understand what is meant by these words. “Interpreters,” says Mr. Saurin, “think they have found some passages in Scripture, where the verb, from which the word enchantment is derived, is taken in a good sense, and denotes the knowledge of futurity. See Gen 5:15. They conclude from this criticism, that the word enchantment signifies no more than the revelations which Balaam desired of God concerning the destiny of the Israelites. It is certain, that the sacred historian says nothing throughout his whole narration, capable of convincing us that Balaam used enchantments on the first of the two high places: I am apt to suspect that this man, abandoned to covetousness; not being able to find any thing to his purpose in the divine inspirations, would at length have betaken himself to magical arts; but that the spirit of God restrained him.” Mr. Saurin here seems not to have attended with his usual accuracy to the text; from which it is plain, that Balaam only omitted to do now, what he had done before; for it is said, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments; so that whatever the phrase may imply, it is unquestionable, that he had done, at his two former meetings with the Lord, what he now omitted to do, from a full persuasion that any further inquiries into the will of the Lord upon this subject would be fruitless: and I am very strongly of opinion, that the phrase implies no more, than the meeting the Lord for information as to his will; and, perhaps, it might not improperly be rendered, He went not as before, for the meeting, or obtaining divinations: i.e. for information into future things from the Lord; for which purpose he retired, as we have observed on ch. Num 23:3. Houbigant is of the same opinion; who says, that the word nechashim, auguries, is here understood in a good sense; for Balaam interpreted the will of the true God, not of the God of Moab, from these auguries. The meaning of the passage seems no more than this; that Balaam, convinced that it was perfectly in vain to retire any more, after the sacrifices, to meet God and receive his commands, accordingly no more retired to the high and secret place, but without any ceremony delivered the divine oracles. Le Clerc explains it briefly thus: He judged it superfluous to inquire further into the mind of God, as God had sufficiently declared his purpose to bless the Israelites.

He set his face toward the wilderness We have had occasion more than once before to observe, that any large and extensive champaign country, even though it may happen to have villages in it, is called in the Scripture, wilderness. It is evident from the 2nd verse, that wilderness here means the plains of Moab, where the Israelites lay encamped, ch. Num 22:1.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

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

G.THE THIRD BLESSING

Num 23:25 to Num 24:9

25And Balak said unto Balaam, Neither curse them at all, nor bless them at all. 26But Balaam answered and said unto Balak, Told not I thee, saying, All that the Lord speaketh, that I must do?

27And Balak said unto Balaam, Come, I pray thee, I will bring thee unto another place; peradventure it will please God that thou mayest curse me them from thence. 28And Balak brought Balaam unto the top of Peor, that looketh toward Jeshimon. 29And Balaam said unto Balak, Build me here seven altars, and prepare me here seven bullocks and seven rams. 30And Balak did as Balaam had said, and offered a bullock and a ram on every altar.

Num 24:1.And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for1 enchantments, but he set his face toward the wilderness. 2And 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.

3And he took up his parable, and said,

Balaam the son of Beor hath said,
And the man whose eyes are2 open hath said:

4He hath said, which heard the words of God,

Which saw the vision of the Almighty,
Falling into a trance, but having his eyes open:

5How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob!

And thy tabernacles, O Israel!

6As the valleys are they spread forth,

As gardens by the rivers side,
As the trees of lign-aloes which the Lord hath planted,

And as cedar trees beside the waters.

7He 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.

8God 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.

9He 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.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

[Num 24:1. Heb. as time after time.A. G.].

[Num 24:3. a divine saying used ordinarily with Jehovah, found only here and Pro 30:1; 2Sa 23:1, with the genitive of the human bearer of the saying.A. G.].

[Num 24:3. Rather closed like to close, the being later softened into or . See Hengst., pp. 136139, and the authorities quoted.A. G.].

[Num 24:4. Falling downhaving his eyes open, i. e., the inward eye. The words are different from those in Num 24:3.A. G.].

[Num 24:7. The dual form: personifying the nation as a man carrying two pails overflowing with water.A. G.]

[Num 24:8. . Those who beset him round.A. G.].

[Num 24:8. The suffix in refers to Israel, and the verb is without an expressed object. Hirsch meets the difficulty by making the singular suffix refer to God, as His arrows, the arrows of God, Israel wounds.A. G.].

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Balak is betrayed into the greatest confusion, utters things which are self-contradictorya usual result of such cunningly-laid schemes. At first he says: Thou shalt neither curse them nor bless them, i. e. keep silence with respect to them. But immediately another superstitious idea occurs to him. He had erred perhaps in only letting the curser see the extreme limits of the Israelitish camp. Possibly the result might be entirely different if he should overlook the whole camp at one time and in one view. Then perchance his alarm at the sight of this great swarming host would overwhelm him, and so lead him to pronounce the curse. He leads him therefore at once to the top of Mount Peor. This mountain lay nearest the camp of Israel, one of the peaks of the Abarim range and overlooking the whole plain. It was probably not far from the city Beth-Peor. [It was north from Pisgah, and nearly opposite Jericho, six Roman miles higher than Libbias. The locality is important in connection with the prophetic utterances which follow, See Smiths Bib. Dict., Art. Balaam, Stanleys Hist. of Jewish Church, p. 213217. Behind him lay the vast expanse of desert extending to the shores of his native Assyrian river. On his left were the red mountains of Edom and Seir; opposite were the dwelling-places of the Kenite, in the rocky fastnesses of Engedi; further still was the dim outline of the Arabian wilderness, where ruled the then powerful tribe of Amalek; immediately below him lay the vast encampment of Israel, amongst the Acacia groves of Abel-Shittimlike the water-courses of the mountainslike the hanging gardens beside his own river Euphrates with their aromatic shrubs and their wide-spreading cedars. Beyond them, on the western side of Jordan, rose the hills of Palestine, with glimpses through their valleys of ancient cities towering on their crested heights. And beyond all, though he could not see it with his bodily vision, he knew well that there rolled the deep waters of the great sea, with the Isles of Greece, the Isle of Chittima world of which the first beginnings of life were just stirring, of which the very name here first breaks upon our ears.A. G.] The same costly sacrifice must be offered again. It could only have been in an ironical temper that Balaam, after his previous utterances, could start upon this new attempt or make these requisitions for it.

He knows now definitely the will of Jehovah, and does not go as before to meet or seek auguries, but turns his back directly towards the wilderness, and surveys the whole people of Israel encamped there. Then the Spirit of God came upon him in a new and higher way. The words are no longer put into his mouth, and uttered under constraint and legal fear; he speaks out now in his ecstatic condition winged words, although we cannot say that they came from the heart. [He no longer attempted by any magic art to control the purpose of God, but became the organ which God used in the communication of His will. He spake now in the spirit of prophecy Hirsch. It was not the mere sight of the ordered camp which formed the subjective preparation for receiving the Spirit of God, but the sight in connection with the previous living conviction that Israel was the blessed people of God. Hengstenberg.A. G.]

Num 24:3-4. He begins with a description of his new higher and more exalted state. From his very opening words Balaam himself is conscious for the time of prophetic powers. From Balaam the son of Beor he has become the man who has his inward prophetic eyes opened, since he has passed now into prophetic ecstacy. He first heard the words of (the mighty) Godas hearing usually precedes vision in the miraculous revelationand then saw the vision (face) of the Almighty, but was so overpowered that he fell down (as Saul, 1Sa 19:24; Daniel, Dan 10:9; the Seer in the Apocalypse, Revelation 1; and as generally the prophets were prostrated in their calling); but with the fall, his spiritual eyes were unveiled, so that he can now make known the divine sayings. [Keil: He calls his prediction a divine saying, a , for the purpose of designating it as a divine revelation received from the Spirit of God. The falling to the ground was not necessarily or even generally an attendant upon the prophetic state and calling. There seems to be an intimation in the phrase, is Saul also among the prophets? that this condition was common. But that is a slight basis upon which to build a theory of the prophetic state. It is only in cases like Balaam and Saul, when the Spirit finds an alien condition of will and heart, that His coming is attended by these marks of violence, as if they were overcome and thrown down by a hostile power. As Hengstenberg well says, we are not justified in inferring from these cases that this was the condition with all the prophets. We could scarcely conceive it to have occurred with Samuel, as with Saul. To those whose ordinary states are pervaded by the Spirit He comes as to His own. The falling with David, Ezekiel, John, are not parallel; for in their case it was the splendor and glory of the manifestation which led them to prostrate themselves in reverence and fear. Whose eyes are open, not with the margin: who had his eyes shut, but now open, referring in both cases to his inward eye, but with most modern commentators, as now shut or closed. It is descriptive of his present ecstatic state. His bodily eyes and senses are closed to the external world, while his inner eye is open to the visions which the Spirit gave. The contrast between the third and fourth verses in the original favors this interpretation. It does not follow, however, that every prophet in his prophetic condition, had his bodily eyes closed, or the senses, as it were, suspended, so far as self-conscious reflection is concerned. With men like Balaam, whose inner eye was darkened by lusts and passions, it seems necessary; but with those who were spiritually-minded, who were not sunken in the world of the senses and of self, it was not necessary, and probably did not occur.A. G.] But here again the blessing is richer in its pathetic form than in its contents. The figures used are massed, and sometimes obscure. We meet again not only the image of the swift-rushing buffalo, but of the lion in a modified form. He describes the goodly and splendid appearance of the tent-city, which may be regarded as an unconscious type of the theocracy or the church (Num 24:5-6). In the next place he describes the glorious development of this people (Num 24:7). Then thirdly he celebrates its powerand indeed its destructive power over the heathen (Num 24:8-9). Only a faint glimmer of hope for the nations shines through the closing words: Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee.

Num 24:5. How goodly are thy tents, etc.The word is typically significant, not only in reference to the theocracy, but to the Christian Church. [It is Israel which comes before his mental visionthe people in its higher nature, in its relation to God, and therefore all who are Israel, down to the most distant ages.A. G.]

Num 24:6. From the dwellings to the land. Well-watered valleys spread themselves out in beautiful pictures, and to these the still more beautiful gardens by the river side. The conception of the aloe-groves breathing out their fragrance, and the cedar trees standing in their strength by the water courses, leads us away from the ordinary beauties of nature, to a higher paradisaic nature and culture. As an unconscious typical word, it foretells the Canaan to come, and the wider and succeeding glorification of the earth. [Bible Com. The aloe imported from China and the far distant east furnished to the ancients one of the most fragrant and precious of spices. Comp. Ps. 45:48. All thy garments smell of myrrh, aloes and cassia, Psa 7:17. The images of the prophecy seem to have a basis or ground partly in the scene which lay before his natural eyes before the trancethe camp with its wide surroundings, and partly in those with which he was familiar along the banks of his own Euphrates.A. G.]

Num 24:7. The people are presented under the image of a water carrier, whose two buckets (the dual form) which he carries, are overflowing with water. [He shall pour the water.He shall not only prosper, have abundance of water, as water was so essential to all fertility, but he shall pour from his overflowing buckets, he shall distribute to others out of his fullness of blessings. In thee shall all families of the earth be blessed, Gen 12:3.A. G.] His seed, i. e., his progeny (not his sowing corn, as Bunsen), shall be in many waters, i. e., shall spread itself abroad, be cheered with great and varied blessing. His king shall be higher than Agag, i. e., the kings of his ancient enemies, the Amalekites, who were called Agag (the fiery). [Agag seems to have been the common name of the kings of the Amalekites, as Pharaoh of the kings of Egypt, and Abimelech of the kings of the Philistines. And Hengstenberg has shown clearly, from the immediate context, in which Balaam speaks only in general terms of the good which should come to Israel, and from the relation which this third saying has to those which precede it, and that which follows, forming as it were a middle member in the whole prophetic utterance, a transition from the general and ideal, to the particular or individual, that we cannot suppose a reference to any individual king as the Agag overthrown by Saul, 1Sa 15:8. It is only in the fourth saying, and even then in a general way, that he passes on to an individual application of the predictions to particular hostile nations. This is still further confirmed by the fact that his king is not any particular king, as Saul or David, nor even the Messiah exclusively, but his king generally, i.e., the king whom Israel should receive. His king here is equivalent to the kingdom which should be exaltedin and through which the power of Israel should be fully developed and established over all enemies. There is too an historical reason why the Amalekite kingdom should appear here as the representative of the enmity of the world to the kingdom of God (see Exo 17:8). And they were still probably among the most mighty of Israels foes, which was not the case at the time of Saul. There is no valid ground therefore for the supposition that this passage indicates a later origin of the book of Numbers. On the contrary, it may be fairly urged as showing how deeply the idea of the kingdom lies imbedded in all conceptions of the people of God as a power in the world, as showing that it is not an idea of late growth, but one with which the people of God, and even Balaam was familiar.A. G.] His kingdom shall be exalted, i. e., raise itself by its activity, vigor and growth. In the words his king he indicates the establishment of a royal dynasty in Israel, but that the kings of the Amalekites (and not Edom, Assyria, Babylon) are chosen as the type of heathen enmity proves the antiquity of the narrative. The singular greatness of the people corresponds to the singular greatness of the king. There is no verbal and conscious prophecy of the Messiah here (Keil: The king was neither the Messiah exclusively, nor the earthly kingdom without the Messiah); for with the conception of the ideal Messiah, which unfolds itself later, out of the natural and generic Messiah, the conception of salvation as extending to all assumes a definite form. The words, however, in a typical sense have an unmistakable significance: the great people of God with its great king overcoming and towering above all heathen kingdoms and kings. [Hengstenberg: for as Israel only attains the complete realization of its idea in the erection of the kingdom, so the kingdom reaches completely its destination only, with the appearance of the Messiah. In Him first the king of Israel is truly higher than Agag, the representative of the hostile world-power.A. G.]

Num 24:8. The repeated reference to Egypt and the Exodus appears to be designed to bring out more vividly the contrast between this poor race of liberated slaves, and its destruction of the heathen nations as its enemies. We explain the latter and difficult clauses thus: he will crush (not gnaw) the bones of his enemies, and then break his own arrows, because the instruments of warfare have become useless. (See Isa 2:4.) It is a strange order surely to say that he will first gnaw the bones of his enemies, and then pierce them with his arrows. We would rather account for the change from the plural to the singular thus: as he will crush the hostile nations, so he will break his (the enemies) arrows. [Keil renders: he shall dash them in pieces with his arrows, making the enemies the object of the verb. The violent alterations in the text suggested by J. D. Michaelis and Knobel are unnecessary. The order may be, from the crushing defeat of Israels enemies, to the instruments by which it is secured, arrows standing for the weapons of war. Hirsch: And as the arrows of God, Israel wounds, i.e., Israel is the weapon in the hand of God in His warfare with His malignant foes, the enemies of the dominion of His moral law upon the earth, and it is only as the arrow of God that Israel has victorious power over the nations.A. G.]

The figure of the lion has a deeper significance than in Num 23:22. There the lion goes in search of his prey; he has not yet lain down; here he appears as a triumphant lion, who has lain down in his majesty, and will injure no more. As to the typical meaning underlying this prediction of the kingdom of Israel conquering and destroying all heathen power, see Psalms 2, 110; Isaiah 9, 11; Dan 2:34-35.

Num 24:9. Comp. Gen 12:3; Gen 27:29; Gen 49:9; Mat 10:40-42.

The last words must lead to a rupture between Balak and Balaam, for their application to themselves, and their opposite purposes, was apparent. Balaam as the blesser felt himself blessed; and since Balak still wished to curse Israel, he was pursued already by the curse. [The future history will scarcely justify the supposition that Balaam felt himself blessed. He was conscious that he did not bless with the heart; it was not a blessing he desired which he utters, and hence he could not feel that he himself was heir to the blessing.A. G.]

Footnotes:

[1]Marg. To the meeting of enchantments.

[2]Marg. who had his eyes shut but now opened.

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

CONTENTS

We have in this Chapter, the continuation and conclusion of the history of Balak and Balaam. And never surely was there afforded a more memorable evidence, than there is in it, of the LORD’S over-ruling the minds of men to his own glory, his people’s joy, and his enemies’ destruction. Balaam and Balak part in anger, and the former is constrained by the same power, under whose influence he had through the whole conference been guided, to inform the latter, what events, from the LORD and his people should befall him and Moab in the end.

Num 24:1

This verse is the key to the whole history. Here it is explained to us by the HOLY GHOST himself, that Balaam’s pretended withdrawing from Balak at the time of his standing by his sacrifice, was not to consult the LORD, but to use enchantments. Compare this verse, with Num 23:15Num 23:15 . But Reader, let me again and again, charge you to observe with me, how our gracious GOD over-rules the mind in compelling the magician to do the reverse of what he intended. So the LORD worketh upon another occasion by the magicians of Egypt: Exo 8:18-19 . What a beautiful light is thrown upon the whole history of Israel in Egypt, by that single verse of the Psalmist; “He turned their heart to hate his people.” Psa 105:25 . Reader, if you are a child of GOD, never anymore be at a loss to explain the cause of all that enmity the world manifests against GOD’S people. How sweet is that truth of the prophet, that GOD will work, and who shall let it. Isa 43:13 . Well might Balaam determine to lay aside his enchantments, for to what purpose make a third experiment, when baffled twice before?

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

Trance and Trench

Num 24:16

It is the picture of a man, or rather of a group of men, in which we may find our own faces; for we, like Balaam, know something of that double life which corresponds to the trance and the trench the falling into a trance, and yet living the common, working, trench life; the rapture and the routine, religion and business, commerce and our Communions, the Sacramental and the social, the secular and the sacred. And we thought sometimes that these two lives are hopelessly at variance, and we made the mistake of pitting these two lives one against the other in terrible competition instead of combining both of them together falling into a trance, leading the spiritual life, and yet having our eyes open to the common daily life; the trance the devotional life; the trench the daily life. We made that dreadful mistake, and therefore life was a dismal failure, or it was utterly dreary, or deadly dull, because we either felt that life must be wholly ideal or else it must be wholly at low level. And then we learned that we belonged to both worlds at the same time. It is not in the separation, it is not in the divorce, but it is in the union of these two lives that we find our strength and our happiness.

I. The Trench Life. We are to lead the trench life, but we are not to lead it apart from the trance life. The trench life our eyes are to be open to the world in which we live. God knew what He was about when He put us where He has. To close our eyes to facts, to the seamy side of life, would be the height of folly. We must be wideawake, if we would not go to the wall in the life on earth that God has put us in. The man that wool-gathers is the man that is worsted in life. Having our eyes open, we must go through the world, we must send our children out into the world with their eyes wide open to the world as we have met it, to the world as they will meet it. Our eyes must be, opened when, morning by morning, every post brings in this circular or that circular, from the money-lender, from the one who at some exorbitant interest will pander to the passing want that so many of us have felt, and then, then it is that the eyes must be wide open to the realities of the life that is around us; but not to the exclusion of the trance.

II. The Trance Life. There are men known to us all who have combined these two lives the trance and the trench in one. There are thousands of honest men. There are merchants, there are shopmen, there are business men and business women, who have seen the trance and yet have their eyes fully open to the trench. Men and women who will say their prayers before they go out to their work, men of standing, men looked up to in commerce and the money market, who are regular Communicants as well as regular in their business. It is false to say that you must be either all trench or all trance; it is the action of the trance life upon the trench life that makes that solid body of British merchants, or English business people, who form the backbone, the very spinal cord of the English nation.

III. The Union of Trance and Trench This is the life that you and I have got to aim at. Some men never look at the trance, they are all trench. They never look above the fog, the mere low level of self-interest. Their eyes are never open save to the short sight that comes from living in the midst of self-contemplation from week end to week end. They are like the animals, always looking down as the animals do, and not as a man, looking up at men, should do. They need their trance. You may remember the oldest Church in England, St. Martin’s, Canterbury. There, in days gone by, a woman knelt, praying that her husband’s eyes might be opened, and that he might see the trance of Christianity which she had seen, and lo! a vision, wondrous and beautiful, came to Ethelbert, and he too had his eyes opened, and he saw the outward through the inward, became a Christian, and England was converted. Monica prayed for Augustine as he was dipping into all the depths of the sin of Carthage. His eyes were opened; he, too, became the man of the trance and the man of the trench. Some are all trance and no trench, living in an unreal, dreamy state, always in the clouds, whose religion chiefly consists in making things uncomfortable for other people, upsetting the home life, and refusing the commonplace always being in a trance. They, too, need the sharp ordeal of being taught the other side of life. They want the home-spun life, they want the trench life. But it is in the union of these two lives that they alone can happily live. Have your trance and have your trench; so try to live, ‘falling into a trance, but having your eyes open’.

E. E. Holmes, Church Times, Vol. LIV. 1905, p. 303.

References. XXV. 6-8. J. M. Neale, Sermons Preached in Sackville College Chapel, vol. i. p. 258; see also Readings for the Aged (4th Series), p. 60. XXVI. 63-65. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxvii. No. 2198. XXVII. 18. J. Baines, Twenty Sermons, p. 277. XXXI. 8. Henry Alford, Quebec Chapel Sermons, vol. iii. p. 218. XXXI. 16. B. J. Snell, Christian World Pulpit, vol. li. 1897, p. 153. XXXI. 23. T. G. Rooke, The Church in the Wilderness, p. 312.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

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

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 24:1 And when Balaam saw that it pleased the LORD to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments, but he set his face toward the wilderness.

Ver. 1. He went not as at other times. ] As being resolved to curse howsoever, and without God’s leave; yea, al despito di Dio, as that mouth of blasphemy, Pope Julius III, once said in another case; a to take his own course whatever came of it.

He set his face. ] As fully bent to do it, and nothing should hinder him. So our Saviour Christ “steadfastly set ( ) his face to go to Jerusalem.” Luk 9:51 He steeled his forehead against all oppositions.

a Act. and Mon., fol. 1417.

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

pleased the LORD. Hebrew was good in the eyes of Jehovah.

the LORD. Hebrew. Jehovah. App-4.

other times. Compare Num 23:3, Num 23:15, and see Structure (p. 215).

to seek for enchantments = to meet with familiar spirits (Deu 18:10, Deu 18:14). Hebrew. nechashim, from nachash, a serpent. Compare Gen 3:1, and see App-19.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Num 24:1-25

So when Balaam saw that it pleased the LORD to bless Israel, he didn’t even go up, as the other times before the LORD, [to seek the face or] to seek for enchantments, but he just set his face towards the wilderness. And Balaam lifted up his eyes, and he saw Israel abiding in their tents according to their tribes; and the spirit of God came alive ( Num 24:1-2 ).

He saw the camp, the peoples abiding there, the tabernacle in the middle and the people around about it.

And Balaam the son of 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 my 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 side, as the trees align aloes which the LORD hath planted, and as the 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 24:3-7 ).

Of course the king and kingdom looking ahead in prophecy to Jesus Christ.

God brought him forth out of Egypt; and he hath as it were the strength of a unicorn: and he shall eat up the nations his enemies, and shall break their bones, and pierce them through with the arrows. He couched, and he lay down as a lion, and as a great lion: and who shall stir him up? Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and curses thee that curses thee. And the king’s anger was kindled, and he clapped his hands together: and he said unto Balaam, Look I called you to curse my enemies, and you’ve altogether blessed them these three times. Now you better flee to your own place: Or I thought to promote thee to great honour; but, lo, the LORD hath kept thee back from honour ( Num 24:8-11 ).

I was gonna make you a great man but the Lord has kept you from that. You know, there is an honor that it is well that you be kept from; the rewards of unrighteousness. I was gonna promote you to great honor but the Lord-ah, that’s the honor you don’t want, I’ll tell ya, the honor that the Lord holds back.

And Balaam said to Balak, I told you… your messengers, that if you would give me your whole house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the commandment of the LORD, either to do good or bad of mine own mind; but what the LORD has said, I will speak? And now, I am going to my people: and I will advertise thee what the people shall do and the people in the latter days ( Num 24:12-14 ).

So I’m gonna tell you one more thing. And so he prophesied once more concerning Jesus Christ. And it’s a beautiful prophecy concerning the Lord, verse sixteen

He hath said, which heard the words of God, and knew the knowledge of the most High, he 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, [or a kingdom] and shall smite the corners of Moab, and destroy all the child of Sheth. And Edom shall be a possession, Seir also shall be a possession for his enemies; and Israel shall do valiantly. And out of Jacob shall come he that shall have dominion, and shall destroy him that remaineth of the city. And when he looked on Amalek, he took up his parable, and said, Amalek was the first of the nations; but his latter end shall be that he shall perish for ever ( Num 24:16-20 ).

Amalek is always, in the scripture, a type of the flesh. I don’t have time to go into this tonight but when we get to the book of Esther we’ll deal with Amalek, the type of the flesh. But this is God’s word against the flesh. It’s going to perish forever. The flesh life, going to perish forever. God’s instructions to Saul concerning Amalek was what? “Wipe it out utterly.” That is God’s continual commandment concerning Amalek, concerning your flesh; wipe it out utterly. If you don’t destroy it, it can destroy you. Paul said, “If we, by the spirit, do mortify the deeds of the flesh, we shall live”( Rom 8:13 ). The flesh life; we’re not to give place to the flesh or to the flesh life but walk after the spirit and you’ll not fulfill the desires of your flesh.

So, the parable against Amalek is a very important parable as God declares the end of the flesh life; “it shall utterly perish forever”.

Then he looked on the Kenites, and took out the parable, and said, Strong is your dwellingplace, and you have put thy nest in a rock. Nevertheless the Kenite shall be wasted, until Asshur shall carry thee away captive. And he took the parable, and said, Alas, who shall live when God is doing this! And the ship shall come from the coast of Chittim, shall afflict Asshur, and shall afflict Eber, and shall perish for ever. And Balaam rose up, and went and returned to his place: and Balak also went his way ( Num 24:21-25 ).

And you think “Awe, goody, goody for you Balaam, good man.” No, unfortunately. Balaam said, “I shall see but not know, I shall behold”, but I do not believe that Balaam will share in the kingdom of God though he was a prophet of God indeed. But he allowed greed to master his heart. The king had offered all of these rewards, Balaam sought God that he might go and when God wouldn’t curse them and the king said, “All right, that’s too bad. You go home. I told you to curse them and you blessed them, you know, I was gonna give you great honor, I can’t”.

Now Balaam, greedy for the rewards that had been offered by the king began to give to the king evil counsel. And in the thirty-first chapter of Numbers we are told in verse sixteen, “Behold, these cause the children of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to commit trespass against the LORD in the matter of Peor” ( Num 31:16 ). We’ll get to that in the next chapter here, the thing that happened in Peor. But what happened, happened as the result of the advice that Balaam had given to king Balak because he was greedy for the rewards that the king was offering.

So in the book of Jude in the New Testament; the book of Jude we are commanded and the central message of the book of Jude is “keep yourself in the love of God.” And we are given examples of three persons who failed to keep themselves in the love of God; Korah, Cain and Balaam. And of Balaam it said, “Because of his greed, his desire for the riches that the king was offering that they have gone the way of Balaam. It’s referred to as the way of Balaam, who for reward for the greed that was there”. The desire for the riches prostituted himself to the king. He was bought off.

In Revelation chapter two as the Lord deals with the church of Ephesus, no beg your pardon it must in chapter-it must be the church of Pergamos. God said to Pergamos that they had there “those who held to the doctrine of Balaam”. At verse fourteen, I have chapter two, “A few things against thee because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam who taught Balak to cast a stumbling block before the children of Israel to eat things sacrificed unto idols and to commit fornication”.

So the doctrine of Balaam: idolatry and spiritual fornication that Balaam set the king Balak up to do. Now it doesn’t tell us right immediately in our text that this is what happened, but by looking at other scriptures now we understand the next chapter and what is brought out this next chapter. In second Peter chapter two and in verse fifteen Peter also makes mention of Balaam and he’s talking about the false prophets. There’ll be many of them. “False teachers who privately will bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord. And many will follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the truth is evil spoken of. And through covetousness shall with feigned words [or deceitful words] make merchandise of you” ( 2Pe 2:1-3 ):

Every religious system or every so-called prophet of God who seeks to make merchandise of you through deceitful words is a false prophet and you can tell them easily. They are using these deceitful words to get you to support them. And I believe in that every computerized letter sent out by these men is guilty of feigned words; “Dear Charles”.

I have a friend that was here this week, an editor of Christianity Today and he said they get the same computerized letters that says, “Dear Mr. Today, I’ve been thinking about you this past week. Is every thing all right, Today? Now please go out and borrow twenty-five dollars and send it to me because I’m desperate.” Those are feigned words and the purpose is to make merchandise of you. The Bible classifies them as false prophets. What is feigned words? It’s saying something you don’t really mean. “Oh, all of you beautiful children, I love you”. Yeah. You don’t even know me, how can you love me? Feigned words, fair speeches, seeking to make merchandise out of people.

Now, among these false prophets Peter warns us that actually they are much like Balaam which, verse fifteen “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” ( 2Pe 2:15 ). The guy loved the wealth. A false prophet, taking the monies and using it for his own enrichment, prostituting his ministry.

And so he advised the king this way, he said, “Look Balak, I can’t go into a little spiritual trip and bring a curse. God won’t allow me to do that. But these people, their strength lies in the fact that they worship one God and God honors them and God has taken them as his people. But the God that they worship is a very jealous God and if they start worshiping other gods, then His wrath will come upon them and he’ll destroy them. Now here’s what you got to do. Take a lot of the beautiful young girls that are here and send them down and let them flirt with the young guys. And let them entice the young fellows into acts of fornication and when they get them all involved in these kinds of acts then let the girls bring out their little gods and say, “Look these are the gods that we worship. You want to see how we worship these gods.” And their gods were worshipped in sex acts.

Many of the pagan religious systems, the actual sex act was a part of the worship of the goddess of Venus and Aphrodite and some of these other pagan gods. And in the sex act itself were spiritual rights of these religions. “So, let us show you how we worship our gods.” And so the king followed the advice of the prophet and that brings us into chapter twenty-five.

“

Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary

From the closing sentences in chapter twenty-three we learn that Balaam was taken to yet another place of vision, from whence he looked on the desert. The Spirit of God came upon him and again he uttered only the things which God would have him speak. Here the indexing statement is, How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, Thy tabernacles, O Israel!

Thus there was given to him the vision of a people victorious and prosperous.

The progressive note of these utterances is self-evident. First, there was revealed a people separated to God, dwelling alone. Second, they were seen as a people governed by God. Finally, they were seen therefore as a people victorious.

All this lead to the fourth and final prophecy of Balaam, the principal note of which is: There shall come forth a star out of Jacob.

Thus the far-distant movements of the divine economy were for a moment laid bare to his vision. He beheld a Person shining as a star, swaying a scepter, and conquering as He goes.

The last word having been spoken, Balaam left Balak and went to his place. Having failed to curse the people of God, he set himself to injure them. As John says in his Apocalypse, he “cast a stumbling-block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit fornication” (Rev 2:14). How fearfully he succeeded is shown in the subsequent story.

Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible

Balaams Vision of Israels Prosperity

Num 24:1-14

In these remarkable words Balaam describes the condition and prospects of Gods people. They reveal the innermost thought which even a bad, double-dealing man has of the saint. Balaam had his times of illumination, when he touched the very truth of things. A man may know and speak truth, which he does not himself obey. Would that we all realized the high ideals which sinful men have of religion!

We are intended to be as gardens by the river, lign-aloes planted by the Lord, and cedars fed by perennial streams. Oh, for more of exalted royalty of soul, the invincible strength, the victory that eats up the adversary, and actually feeds on what threatens to destroy! We can only attain to such an ideal by a close union with the risen Savior. Let us live on the plane which is ours in Him and for which He imparts the Holy Spirit!

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

Num 24:1

In Balaam we have a man who, while his audacity and superstition are monstrous, still has a strong fear of Almighty God upon him, a determination not to disobey Him openly, a hope that at last he may be found on God’s side. But it was with him as it is with others who deceive themselves and perform a juggler’s trick with their own soul. First they wish to have their own way in life and then have it blessed by God as if it were His way. Next they cease to think it impossible to elude or deceive even God. We see here a man beseeching God to allow him to do what He had twice and thrice forbidden him to do. God punished him by letting him take his own course. And it is after his example that all will be lost who from a high standing fall into wickedness. Take these three points:-

I. If Balaam was lost, it was through himself that he was lost. God gave him both an earnest desire to be saved and the knowledge how to be saved. Yet he is a lost man already when he comes before us. He was lost because he did not follow out his wish into action, and because he did not use the knowledge which he had.

II. What was the means he took for his own destruction, when he had both the wish and the knowledge to be saved? Exactly that which offers itself to us as very natural-an attempt to combine the service of God and the service of the world. He wished to stand well with the Lord God, but he also wished to have a brilliant alliance with and a strong influence over one of the principal personages of his time.

III. Even the disobedient prophet prophesied of Christ; even the disobedient boy serves Christ’s will. Both do it without meaning it; therefore they have no reward. But they cannot choose but serve Him one way or another.

Archbishop Benson, Boy Life: Sundays in Wellington College, p. 204.

Reference: Num 24:1.-Preacher’s Monthly, vol. v., p. 237.

Num 24:3

I. Balaam was a man whose eye was open in his day. He was a man of splendid natural genius. We puzzle over the definition of genius; but perhaps it is only the open eye, the power to see things simply as they are. In every sphere of man’s intellectual activity the man of genius is the seer.

II. Balaam’s is at the same time a character of singular perplexity. He had both the open eye and the itching palm. He had power to see realities, while his heart lusted after vanities, and this condition is far from rare. Splendid endowments are often mated with moral narrowness or feebleness. On the lower level of Balaam’s life he was base and grovelling; but when God took possession of his genius, he yielded it readily, and then he was true as steel to the vision. But the sensual nature was really master. It dragged the eagle-eyed spirit down. Faint, trembling, before the vision, he soon dropped to his congenial earth again, and finally he buried his splendid genius in the pit.

Notice: (1) The only word which a man says with power is truth. “The word that God also saith, that shall stand.” (2) Balaam saw with his open eye that the man who stands with God stands absolutely beyond reach of harm. (3) There was a third thing that Balaam saw: the man whom God blesses is blessed; the man whom God curses is cursed, absolutely and for ever.

J. Baldwin Brown, The Sunday Afternoon, pp. 370, 378.

Num 24:9

I. These were the words of the Eastern sage, as he looked down from the mountain height upon the camp of Israel, abiding among the groves of the lowland according to their tribes in order, discipline, and unity. Before a people so organised he saw well none of the nations round could stand. He likens them not to the locust swarm, the sea-flood, nor the forest fire, but to the most peaceful and most fruitful sight in nature or in art. They are spread forth like the watercourses which carry verdure and fertility as they flow. Their God-given mission may be stern, but it will be beneficent. They will be terrible in war; but they will be wealthy, prosperous, civilised, and civilising in peace.

II. The transformation thus wrought in less than two generations in those who had been the wretched slaves of Egypt was plainly owing to their forty years of freedom, but of freedom under a stern military education, of freedom chastened by discipline and organised by law. No nation of those days enjoyed a freedom comparable to that of the old Jews. They were the only constitutional people of the East. The burdensomeness of Moses’ law, ere it was overlaid in later days by rabbinical scrupulosity, has been much exaggerated. Little seemed to have been demanded of the Jews save those simple ten commandments which we still hold to be necessary for all civilised society.

III. And their obedience was, after all, a moral obedience, the obedience of free hearts and wills. Without their moral discipline they would have broken up, scattered, or perished, or at least remained as settlers or as slaves among the Arab tribes. With that moral discipline they held together and continued one people till the last; they couched, they lay down as a lion, and none dared rouse them up.

C. Kingsley, Discipline, and Other Sermons, p. 1.

Reference: Num 24:10-19.-Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ii., p. 439.

Num 24:11

Balaam, it need hardly be said was a very eminent, he was even an extraordinary, man. He lived largely among the wild race of the Midianites, but he had gifts and powers which, so far as we know, were entirely unshared by those among whom he dwelt.

I. (1) He was a careful observer of contemporary events; he was a man of trained political sagacity. (2) He was in possession of a truth which, quite apart from its awful and intrinsic value, gave purpose and meaning to a human life: he believed in one God. (3) He was endowed in a high degree with the gift of supernatural prophecy. Of this gift his closing words to Balak afford one remarkable specimen. His prediction of the star and sceptre that were to arise out of Jacob is not fully satisfied by the conquests of David, of Omri, of John Hyrcanus; it points to the spiritual empire of Jesus Christ. Balaam was in one age what Melchisedek had been in another, and Job in a third-an organ of truth beyond the frontiers of the kingdom of truth.

II. With gifts like these, Balaam was naturally a person of great public consideration. Balak, the king of Moab, seems to have looked upon him as a very powerful wizard. Balak’s view of Balaam illustrates the way in which in all ages statesmen are apt to look upon religion and its representatives. They see in it only one of the great forces which modify or control human life, and they desire, by whatever means, to enlist it on the side of the policy or the government which they for the moment represent.

III. The real character of Balaam was a very mixed one. On the one hand, he was a man with a clear idea of duty, based on a certain knowledge of God; on the other, we find that his notion of duty was clearly not what he could discover to be God’s will, but only what God would not allow him to ignore. It was a minimising rule of duty.

IV. There are two or three considerations which the history suggests: (1) The ministry of grace and truth to others maybe quite independent of the personal character of the minister. (2) It is possible to know a great deal about truth, to make sacrifices for it, to be kept back from honour out of deference to its requirements, and yet to be at heart disloyal to it. (3) The only true safeguard against such a fate as Balaam’s is the love of God.

H. P. Liddon, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiii., p. 241.

References: Num 24:11-13.-Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. x., p. 158. Num 24:15-24.-J. Monro Gibson, The Mosaic Era, p. 305. Num 24:15-25.-Expositor, 2nd series, vol. v., p. 341. Num 24:17.-Expositor, 3rd series, vol. v., p. 166; J. G. Murphy, The Book of Daniel, p. 18; H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit, No. 1664. Num 25:6-8.-J. M. Neale, Sermons in Sackville College, vol. i., p. 258. Num 25:11.-J. G. Rogers, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxi., p. 1. Num 25:12.-Parker, vol. iv., p. 60. Num 25:12, Num 25:13.-T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. vi., p. 49. Num 25:13.-G. Brooks, Outlines of Sermons, p. 411

Fuente: The Sermon Bible

saw: Num 22:13, Num 23:20, Num 31:16, 1Sa 24:20, 1Sa 26:2, 1Sa 26:25, Rev 2:14

at other times: Num 23:3, Num 23:15

to seek for enchantments: Heb. to the meeting of enchantments, Num 23:23

Reciprocal: Gen 19:37 – Moabites Gen 31:21 – set his Num 3:17 – Gershon Num 23:16 – General Jos 13:22 – Balaam Isa 19:25 – the Lord

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

TOWARD THE WILDERNESS

And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments, but he set his face toward the wilderness.

Num 24:1

In Balaam we have a man who, while his audacity and superstition are monstrous, still has a strong fear of Almighty God upon him, a determination not to disobey Him openly, a hope that at last he may be found on Gods side. But it was with him as it is with others who deceive themselves and perform a jugglers trick with their own soul. First they wish to have their own way in life, and then have it blessed by God as if it were His way. Next they cease to think it impossible to elude or deceive even God. We see here a man beseeching God to allow him to do what He had twice and thrice forbidden him to do. God punished him by letting him take his own course. And it is after his example that all will be lost who from a high standing fall into wickedness. Take these three points:

I. If Balaam was lost, it was through himself that he was lost.God gave him both an earnest desire to be saved and the knowledge how to be saved. Yet he is a lost man already when he comes before us. He was lost because he did not follow out his wish into action, and because he did not use the knowledge which he had.

II. What was the means he took for his own destruction, when he had both the wish and the knowledge to be saved?Exactly that which offers itself to us as very naturalan attempt to combine the service of God and the service of the world. He wished to stand well with the Lord God, but he also wished to have a brilliant alliance with and a strong influence over one of the principal personages of his time.

III. Even the disobedient prophet prophesied of Christ; even the disobedient boy serves Christs will.Both do it without meaning it; therefore they have no reward. But they cannot choose, but serve Him one way or another.

Archbishop Benson.

Illustration

(1) The truth is always the same, whether it be seen by a bad man or a good, just as a landscape is. Balaam had his times of illumination, when he saw into the heart of things and pierced the veil of sense. Would that our lives more aptly realised these delineations! That we should be as gardens by the riverside, as lign-aloes planted by the Lord, as cedar trees beside the waters, whilst rivers of water flowed forth from us!

(2) This is a very common habit, strange though it may seem. People try to make God and Satan to agree.

I daresay there is hardly one amongst us who has not attempted it, not perhaps openly and unreservedly as Balaam did, but who has tried to make God agree with his or her own will and desires, while those desires have been implanted by Satan. We do the thing not so intelligibly as Balaam, but as truly we try to retain some object or will that we know is contrary to the Word of God, and then to make God agree with us, but we cannot do it; thus Balaam had to cease his enchantments. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. Gods will is to bless without any sorrow added to it. The blessing of the Lord maketh rich, His blessing of salvation in Christ shuts out sorrow.

Balaam lifted up his eyes and saw Israel abiding in their tents, and he opened his mouth and took up his parable, and spoke of himself as the man whose eyes are open. His eyes were opened at last, he had not the dimness of sight resulting from enchantments; he had before spoken truth, but his thoughts had not gone with his words; he had been speaking with his eyes closed, so that he could not see the vision though he was obliged to utter it. Now that his eyes were open, he was aware of the circumstances in which he was, and the God with whom he was dealing. He speaks of having heard the words of God, and seen the vision of the Almighty, falling into a trance, but having his eyes open.

Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary

Num 24:1. He went not as at other times At former times; to seek for enchantments The word , from which , necashim, here rendered enchantments, is derived, signifies to augur, conjecture, search, make trial, find out: 1Ki 20:33, it is translated, to observe diligently; Gen 30:27, to learn by experience, and, in the margin of Gen 44:5, to make trial, although in the text there it is rendered to divine. It certainly is not necessary to understand the word of enchantments. Nor is there any proof that Balaam had had recourse to any on either of the two former occasions. On the contrary, the sacred historian informs us, that he retired both times, not to meet evil spirits, and receive communications from them, but to meet JEHOVAH, and receive intimations of his will, saying to Balak on the first occasion, Whatsoever he showeth me I will tell thee. And both times we read that Jehovah put a word in Balaams mouth. All, therefore, that we can reasonably conclude from the passage before us is, that Balaam omitted to do now what he had done before. He went not Retired not, as he had done the former times, for the meeting, or obtaining of divinations, that is, for the purpose of obtaining information from the Lord concerning future things, or to make inquiries about them. M. Saurin seems to be clearly of this opinion, and to consider the expression as signifying no more here than the revelations which Balsam desired of God concerning the destiny of the Israelites. Houbigant is of the same mind, observing that the word nechashim, auguries, is here to be understood in a good sense, because Balaam interpreted the will of the true God, and not the will of the god of Moab, from these auguries. Thus also Le Clerc, paraphrasing the passage, says, He judged it superfluous to inquire further into the mind of God, as God had sufficiently declared his purpose to bless Israel. Indeed, as Christ is known to have no communion with Belial, it seems strange that any Christian should ever have imagined that God would thus have made known his will, and thus lay open the secrets of futurity, to a man that had or attempted to have intercourse with evil spirits. See Isa 8:19; and Isa 44:25; and Isa 47:12. He set his face toward the wilderness Where Israel lay encamped, expecting what God, of his own accord, would suggest to him concerning this matter.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Num 24:7. He shall pour the water. This is a fine prediction of the increase of Jacobs seed, and of the temporal blessings which should fall to their lot. Agag, a perpetual name assumed by the kings of Amalek, was, it would seem, the strongest prince of his age. This nation, devoted to destruction, was nearly cut off by Saul. 1 Samuel 15.

Num 24:9. He couchedas a lion, and as a great lion. The original term here rendered a great lion, is rendered in some versions a lioness; in others, an old lion, and in others, a fierce lion. But are not all lions fierce? From the variety of readings it is evident, that the meaning of Moses is not now distinctly ascertained. Homer also mentions the great lion. I will not affirm that either Moses, Balaam, or Homer had any allusion to the Carnivorus Incognitum; an entire skeleton of which has lately been discovered. But evident it is, that the Behemoth, described in Job 40:16, was an animal far superior to the elephant. What inspired man would say of an animal but ten or twelve feet high, that his tail was like a cedar; and, Behold he drinketh up a river? It has been observed by moderns, that the ancients, often local in their situation, were very much circumscribed in knowledge; and on that account the christian fathers had not sufficient information to clear up many passages in the old testament. Bones however of very enormous animals have long been dug up in different parts of Siberia, and in other parts of the world, some of whose teeth are formed for eating herbs, and others for eating flesh.

In America, and particularly on the shores of the Mississippi, and the Wabash, bones of this kind were so frequently found as to interest learned inquiries. At length two entire skeletons were dug up; the one carnivorous, the other herbivorous, which seem to have perished in battle with each other, or to have been thrown together by some catastrophe of nature. The herbivorous animal called Mammoth, or Behemoth, shall be described in the fortieth chapter of Job. But the huge terrific animal which subsisted on prey, called the Megalonyx, or great lion, whose skeleton has been removed to William and Marys college, and erected at the expense of the congress, is said to be twenty five feet high, and to measure from the nose to the tail, not less than sixty feet. The bones of one of his feet are now exhibited in the Liverpool Museum. It is sheathed, says Mr. Ashe, and ertractile, in the manner of a cat, tiger, and lion. When this paw was dilated on its prey, filled with muscles, flectors, and cartilage, clothed with flesh, with turgid skin and hair, it must have covered a space of ground four feet by three. In a word, this animal must have had a body of unequalled magnitude and strength, joined to the greatest agility, which rendered him the terror of the forest and of man. And from the force expressed by the visible seat of the muscles, his bounds must have been prodigious, enabling him to fall on his prey, to seize it with his teeth, tear it with his claws and devour it. Accustomed to measure his strength with that of all the other animals he used to encounter, the habit of conquering must have rendered him haughty, and intrepid, great and ferocious beyond conception.

Finding however no clear traces, that the Megalonyx has existed since the flood, I give no confidence to the tradition of the Shawanece orator, quoted by the above gentleman.

Num 24:17. I shall see him, but not now. I do see him by faith, or by the revelation of the Spirit. The future tense is often put for the past, and for the present tense. He speaks of David, and of the Messiah, of whose regal power and victories, David was a remarkable figure. He was the day star of the world.

Num 24:22. The Kenite shall be wasted until Asshur shall carry thee away captive. The Kenites seem to have been a branch of the Midianites, dwelling under the protection of Amalek, whom Saul spared when Amalek was cut off. 1Sa 15:6. Jethros family was probably a branch of this people, for they also are called Kenites. Jdg 1:16; Jdg 4:11. Asshur was the Assyrians, Gen 10:11, whose empire was absorbed in that of Babylon. We have here therefore a prediction of the vast conquests of the Babylonians.

Num 24:24. ShipsChittim shall afflict Asshur (Assyria) and afflict Eber, the father of the Hebrews. Gen 10:21. Kittim is the name of the patriarch, Gen 10:4, whose posterity populated Cyprus, the Isles and coasts of Greece and Italy. These invading armies, according to Dan 11:30, should utterly destroy the Assyrian empire, and after that afflict Heber, and burn the city of the Jews. Dan 9:26-27. Moses calls these Roman armies that came in the ships of Chittim, a nation from afar, whose language the Hebrews could not understand. Deu 28:59; Deu 28:64. This most luminous prophecy, which the prophets recite one after another, is then of itself a grand proof of the certainty of divine revelation, and was fully accomplished when the Romans, invited as allies, delivered the Jews from oppression, and afterwards destroyed Jerusalem for revolt.

REFLECTIONS.

This Balaam, this druid of Chaldea, this mercenary prophet, having three times complied with Balak, and dared to seek divinations against Israel, at last desisted from his wicked design. And surely he would have been destroyed in the attempt, had not God reprieved him a few days, that he might awe the nations to quietness whom providence would not now destroy, and drive those to despair, whose doom was near by the brightest predictions of Israels prosperity. Nor let the christian be surprised, that the richest truths should drop from the lips of a wicked man: it is no new thing in the history of the church. Pharaoh was inspired with dreams respecting the famine for the salvation of nations; and both the Abimelechs had dreams concerning the safety of Abraham. Leaving therefore his seven altars, Balaam came and contemplated the camp of Israel. Here the light of vision broke in upon his soul, and unfolded futurity to a daring mortal. The sight of the tabernacle in the centre of the host, the rivers flowing in the vales, the cedars adorning the hills, the lions couching in the forests, and the power of Agag, aided by a glare from the Shekinah, inspired him with ideas respecting the prosperity of Israel. And it is evident from his blessing the friends, and cursing the enemies of this people, that he was not unacquainted with the promises made to Abraham. What an account must he have to give for the abuse of knowledge and gifts!

Balaam, who made his person venal, and his ministry profane, when reproached by Balak for blessing instead of cursing his enemies, was extremely solicitous to support a fair appearance. He pleaded, that though the impetuosity of the Spirit constrained his tongue to speak; yet his heart was firm to Moab: for he was very unwilling to forfeit the kings favour and promised rewards. So false apostles, however divine their words, seek their own interest, and not the glory of Christ. They preach themselves, and not their Lord and master. Now it was, we may presume, that he taught Balak to cast a stumblingblock before the children of Israel. 2Pe 2:15-16. Seeing divinations fail, and Israel rising to empire, he advised the king to cultivate friendship with them by religion and marriage, as in the succeeding chapter. Here Balaam discovered his real character, and the nakedness of his heart appeared. Sooner than lose the wages of unrighteousness, he gave the king advice worthy only of a devil. Lord, what is man! One grain of holiness is worth all the gifts, and all the fame in the world.

If Balaam was favoured with all this light, and all these views of futurity, to quiet and intimidate Moab and Midian; it should greatly humble the popular preacher, who is conscious of an unsanctified heart and habit; who displays an angelic eloquence in the pulpit, but who never feels more at home than when in company with gay and carnal people. Why, it may be asked, is this man qualified to speak as the best of saints, and as the greatest of ministers? Why is he enabled to draw religious characters, and religious affections to the life? Why does he with gracious smiles lead the people to Pisgah, and show them the promised land; and why do they all weep under the unction of his word? It is because God still gives Balaam light for the sake of the people. But after all these fine speeches have escaped the lips of the speaker, he has nothing left but his covetousness, his pride, his voluptuousness, and all the miseries of a hypocritical character.

This prophet not only saw Israels prosperity, but he saw the Messiahs kingdom and glory under the figure of a star, and a sceptre: and all his victories by his gospel, and his judgments over the gentile world. It is common for prophecies to have a double acceptation; the one present, or near, the other remote. The man of God who came to Bethel gave Jeroboam a sign of the accomplishment of his prediction, by rending the altar, and scattering the ashes. David, in this view, was the star, and the sceptre of Israel. David vanquished Moab, put all the neighbouring nations to tribute, and extended his borders to the Euphrates, as God had promised. 2 Samuel 7. But Jesus Christ is the everlasting light and glory of the church. He is the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star. Rev 22:16. He is the day-star that shall arise in his peoples hearts. 1Pe 1:19. In a word, he is the day-spring from on high which hath visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death. Luk 1:78. And it was, no doubt, in consideration of this prophecy and expectation, that providence announced the Messiahs birth to Chaldea by a singular star, which guided the wise men to Bethlehem. They worshipped him, and rejoiced while all Jerusalem was troubled at his birth: and God forbid that we should ever slight the Lord Jesus, while the nations abroad welcome his beams. Balaam, who was at first received as a god, is now dismissed as a hypocrite. He lost all preferment, and all additional rewards. But God did not let him go unrewarded. Leaving Moab impressed with the badness of his character, he seems to have lingered in Midian till many of them fell by the sword; and Balaam, poor Balaam, with all his sordid wisdom, was numbered with the slain. Hence the angel by the way brandished not his sword against him in vain. He cried, I have sinned, but his repentance vanished with the idea of danger; like the disobedient prophet, slain by a lion, he was not suffered to come to the sepulchre of his fathers. In him let every wary and sordid hypocrite read his end.

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 23:25 to Num 24:2. Balaks Sacrifices preliminary to Balaams third Oracle.The scene of these was Peor, some mountain overlooking the desert bordering the Dead Sea on the W. The inconsistency between Balaks indignant dismissal of Balaam in Num 23:25 and his renewed attempt in Num 23:27 f. to gain what he wanted has suggested that with Num 23:25 one account of the episode ends, and that what follows comes from another, with editorial links. The allusion in Num 24:1 to the use of enchantments (better, divinations or omens) on previous occasions certainly does not correspond to the accounts in Num 23:3 f., or Num 23:15 f., so that the conclusion that here the editor has used another source of which a portion has been omitted, seems justified. Probably E has been mainly employed in Numbers 23, and J in Numbers 24.

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

BALAAM’S THIRD PROPHECY

(vs.1-13)

THE BEAUTY OF LIFE

At least Balaam had learned by now that the Lord had the unchangeable purpose of blessing Israel, so this time he knew it was useless to seek enchantments from evil spirits, but “set his face toward the wilderness, where the children of Israel were encamped as ordered by God” (v.1). Then the Spirit of God took possession of him to convey another wonderful prophecy.

He announced this as the oracle of Balaam, the man whose eyes were opened. He was sufficiently enlightened to know that Israel was unchangeably blessed by God, though his eyes were not by any means opened spiritually, as is the case in new birth. Yet he had heard the words of God and had seen the vision of the Almighty (v.4).

In seeing the visions of God, Balaam was compelled to fall down, as he did before the angel (ch.22:31), yet with his eyes so opened as to see Israel from God’s viewpoint. How sad that this had no lasting effect on his heart!

We may not think of tents as being beautiful, but Israel’s tents were lovely to God (v.5), for the tents speak of their pilgrims and strangers, not settling down in an ungodly world, for which cause God was not ashamed to be called the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Heb 11:13-16). The expression “your dwellings” may be prophetic of Israel’s future possession of their own land.

“Valleys,” “gardens by the riverside,” “aloes planted by the Lord,” and “cedars beside the waters” (v.6) tell us of the vibrant beauty and fruitfulness of Israel as in the counsels of God, which will have its full display in the millennial age. In all of this is the expression of life with its energy of producing fruit. This is typical of the much greater blessing of eternal life given now to every child of God, and which produces lovely fruit.

“He shall pour out water from his buckets” (v.7) reminds us that “rivers of living water” flow from the inward parts of a believer (Joh 7:38) for the blessing of others also. So that Israel will be a source of refreshment for all the nations in the Millennium. “His seed shall be in many waters.” The waters speak of the Gentile nations (Rev 17:15). Thus the descendants of Israel will spread an influence of great blessing over the whole world.

“His King (the Lord Jesus) shall be higher than Agag,” whose name means “I will overtop.” He was the king of the Amalekites (1Sa 15:20), and symbolizes the pride that thinks of everything as being under his domination. But the highest claims of men are reduced to nothing by Him who is King of kings and Lord of lords, whose kingdom will be highly exalted.

Balak was reminded that God brought Israel out of Egypt by His superior strength (v.8), and that God would consume the nations that antagonized Israel, breaking their bones and piercing them with His arrows. What of the enemies of believers today? While we patiently pray for them instead of fighting, yet we know that in God’s own time He will “repay with tribulation those who trouble you” (2Th 1:6), “when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ” (vs.7-8)

“He bows down, he lies down as a lion; and as a lion who shall rouse him up?” (v.9). After devouring the prey the lion lies down. So, when God brings rest to Israel after the defeat of all their enemies, He promises, “Jacob shall return, have rest and be quiet, and no one shall make him afraid” Jer 30:10). No nations will be disposed to stir up Israel’s anger all through the thousand years of peace. Even at the end of that time, when nations come in united hostility against Israel, there will be no need for Israel to fear, because God will destroy their enemies with fire from heaven (Rev 20:7-10).

How appropriate therefore are Balaam’s closing words, “Blessed is he who blesses you, and cursed is he who curses you.” This had been true through the ages. Nations that have shown kindness to Israel have been blessed, while those who have oppressed the Jews have suffered.

But Balaam’s message greatly stirred Balak’s anger (v.10). Why did he not bow to the Word of God? Just because of a stubborn will! He knew that it was the Lord who had kept Balaam back from being honored by Balak, but he had no intention of listening to the Lord, in spite of the three occasions of testimony to the blessing of Israel. He gave up all hope of having Israel cursed, and only wanted Balaam to get away, without payment for his services.

Balaam could only respond as before, that he must speak what he was given to speak. If an evil spirit had given him a message of cursing he would have been glad to speak that, but God intervened to give a message that He compelled Balaam to speak. A house full of gold and silver could not change that, as Balaam knew (v.13).

However, Balaam did not leave then, as Balak told him to. For God required Balaam to speak a further prophecy and Balak found himself powerless to resist listening, even though Balaam announced that the message would be that of Israel’s conquest of Moab in the latter days. Since Balak had ignorantly challenged God when he determined to have God’s people cursed, then God gave Balak four messages that he could not avoid hearing, much as he might have desired to suppress at least the fourth! Thus, God is not mocked, and Balak was given a testimony that ought to have persuaded him that when he stands before God at the Great White throne, God’s Word will stand, and Balak will only listen!

BALAAM’S FOURTH PROPHECY

(vs.15-25)

Balaam begins this in much the same strain as in his third prophecy, as the man whose eyes were opened, and who hears the words of God and has knowledge of the Most High. How sad that that knowledge was only an evidential knowledge, not the vital knowledge of a believer. Yet it was accurate, for he actually saw the vision of the Almighty, subdued before God, to fall down with his eyes open. Therefore, what he prophesied is absolute truth which he could only know by God’s revelation.

But at the outset he is made to speak of his own tragic position, saying, “I shall see Him, but not now; I shall behold Him, but not near” (v.17). The following verses make clear that he is speaking of the Lord Jesus, the Star and the Scepter. Balaam’s fate will be that of all unbelievers. Believers see the Lord Jesus now by faith (Heb 2:9), but Balaam had no intention of bowing his heart to Him at the time, and therefore in the future he will see Him, but not near, for it will be only in awesome judgment when he sees Him on the Great White Throne (Rev 20:11-15). Terrible prospect!

As the Star the Lord Jesus is the one of heavenly character and heavenly light, thus a star gave testimony of His birth to the wise men of the east (Mat 2:1-2). As the Scepter He is the expression of God’s authority, for the scepter signifies kingly authority. This compares with Psa 45:6 : “A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom.”

He will “batter the brow of Moab” or “shall crush through the forehead of Moab” (NASB). The forehead speaks of intelligence manifested either as, in the unbeliever, strongly opposed to God, or in a believer, firmly obedient to God (Eze 3:7-9). but as David killed Goliath with a stone striking his forehead, so will the Lord Jesus crush the defiance of Moab, with its proud mind set against God. Also He will destroy all the sons of tumult. Who are the sons of tumult? Those who engage in noisy protest against anything and everything.

But Balaam speaks of more than Moab. Edom adjoined Moab, and Edom will become a possession of Israel (v.18). Edom speaks of the flesh, and the flesh then will be put in the place of nothingness. For Israel in the Millennium will not be in the perfect state: the flesh will still be in them, but put under control. Seir also will be a possession. Esau had adopted Seir as his home (Gen 33:16), so that it is in close proximity to Edom and to Moab. These will be fully subjugated to Israel.

“Out of Jacob One shall have dominion, and destroy the remains of the city” (v.19). Whatever city this means, the large fellowship that it implies will be destroyed. People want their cities in order to find strength in unity, but it is in men’s cities that corruption thrives, and the Lord Jesus will destroy all this.

However, while Moab and Edom are to be subjugated to Israel, Amalek will suffer a more solemn judgment. Though Amalek was first among the nations, he will totally perish, as Exo 17:14 affirms, “I will utterly blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven”. For Amalek symbolizes the lusts of the flesh, which God will not spare.

The Kenites are then spoken of as having an enduring dwelling place, established in the rock (v.21), but “Kain (the Kenites) shall be burned and Asshur carry him away captive.” The Kenites had shown kindness to Israel when they came out of Egypt (1Sa 15:6), but evidently at the last their character of disobedience to God will call for their judgment too. What appears to be good, if it does not have Christ as its Object, will be proven at the last only “enmity against God” (Rom 8:7) Asshur (Assyria) will take them captive at the time of the end.

Again it is said Balaam “took up his oracle” (v.23), for the subject here goes deeper. He is so awe-inspired as to say, “Alas, who shall live when God does this?” Ships will come from the coasts of Kittim (v.24). This name was at the time applied to Cyprus, but later was widened to involve Greece and Italy. thus there seems no doubt that this refers to the coming of the “Beast” of the revived Roman Empire in opposition to the king of Assyria (Asshur) when that king, called “the king of the north,” will come like a whirlwind to invade Israel (Dan 11:40-41). This will occur immediately following the setting up of “the abomination of desolation” by the Antichrist at the middle of Daniel’s seventieth week (Dan 9:27). Asshur and Eber will also “come to destruction” (v.24 — NASB). The destruction spoken of here is only of those nations in the middle east of which Balak had knowledge. The Beast of Rome too will suffer utter destruction (Rev 19:20), but this is not mentioned here.

Balaam then went home, his heart unchanged by the truth he was forced to announce, and Balak left also, a much sadder man, though we might wish we could say a wiser man too. But we fear the knowledge he gained did not make him wiser.

Fuente: Grant’s Commentary on the Bible

24:1 And when Balaam saw that it pleased the LORD to bless Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments, but he set his face toward the {a} wilderness.

(a) Where the Israelites camped.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

41

BALAAMS PARABLES

Num 22:39-41, Num 24:1-9

THE scene is now on some mountain of Moab from which the encampment of the Hebrew tribes in the plain of the Jordan is fully visible. At Kiriath-huzoth, possibly the modern Shihan, about ten miles east of the Dead Sea, and to the south of the Amon valley, preparation for the attempt against Israels destiny has been made by a great sacrifice of oxen and sheep intended to secure the good-will of Chemosh, the Baal or Lord of Moab. On the range overhanging the Dead Sea, somewhat to the north of the Amon, perhaps, are the Bamoth-Baal, or high places of Baal, and the “bare height” where Balaam is to seek his auguries and will be met by God.

The evening of Balaams arrival has been spent in the sacrificial festival, and in the morning Balak and his princes escort the diviner to the Bamoth-Baal that he may begin his experiment. After his usual manner, Balaam pompously requires that great arrangements be made for the trial of auguries by means of which his oracle is to be found. Balak has offered sacrifices to Chemosh; now Jehovah must be propitiated, and seven altars have to be built, and on each of them a bullock and a ram offered by fire. The altars erected, the carcases of the animals prepared, Balaam does not remain beside them to take actual part in the sacrifice. It is, in fact, to be Balaks, not his; and if the God of Israel should refuse His sanction to the curse, that will be because the offering of the king of Moab has not secured His favour. Accordingly, while the seven wreaths of smoke ascend from the altars, and the invocations of the Divine power which usually accompany sacrifice are chanted by the king and his princes, the soothsayer withdraws to a peak at some distance that he may read the omens. “Peradventure,” he says, “Jehovah will come to meet me.”

It was now a critical hour for the ambitious prophet. He had indeed already found distinction, for who in Moab or Midian could have commanded with so royal an air and received attention so obsequious? But the reward remained to be won. Yet may we not assume that when Balaam reached Moab and saw the pitiable state of what had been once a strong kingdom, the cities half ruined, filled with poor and dejected inhabitants, he conceived a kind of contempt for Balak and perceived that his offers must be set aside as worthless? God met Balaam, we are told. And this may have been the sense in which God met him and put a word into his mouth. What was Moab compared with Israel? A glance at Kiriath-huzoth, a little experience of Balaks empty boastfulness and the entreaties and anxiety which betrayed his weakness, would show Balaam the vanity of proposing to reinvigorate Moab at the expense of Israel. His way led clearly enough where the finger of the God of Israel pointed, and his mind almost anticipated what the Voice he heard as Jehovahs declared. He saw the smoke streaming south-eastward, and casting a black shadow between him and Moab; but the sun shone on the tents of Israel, right away to the utmost part of the camp. {Num 22:41} The mind of Balaam was made up. It would be better for him in a worldly sense to win some credit with Israel than to have the greatest honour Moab could offer. Chemosh was in decline, Jehovah in the ascendant. Perhaps the Hebrews might need a diviner when their great Moses was dead, and he, Balaam, might succeed to that exalted office. We never can tell what dreams will enter the mind of the ambitious man, or rather, we do not know on what slender foundations he builds the most extravagant hopes. There was nothing more unlikely, the thing indeed was absolutely impossible, yet Balaam may have imagined that his oracle would come to the ears of the Israelites, and that they would send for him to give favourable auguries before they crossed the Jordan.

Rapidly the diviner had to form his decision. That done, the words of the oracle could be trusted to the inspiration of the moment, inspiration from Jehovah, whose superiority to all the gods of Syria Balaam now heartily acknowledged. He accordingly left his place of vision and returned to the Bamoth where the altars still smoked. Then he took up his parable and spoke.

“From Aram Balak brought me, Moabs king from the mountains of the east; “Come, curse for me Jacob, And come, menace Israel.”

“How can I curse whom God hath not cursed? And how can I menace whom God hath not menaced? For from the head of the rocks I see him, And from the hills I behold him. Lo, a people apart he dwells, And among the nations he is not counted.”

“Who can reckon the dust of Jacob, And in number the fourth of Israel? Let my soul die the death of the righteous; And be my last end like his!”

In this parable, or mashal, along with some elements of egotism and self-defence, there are others that have the ring of inspiration. The opening is a vaunt, and the expression, “How can I curse whom God hath not cursed?” is a form of self-vindication which savours of vanity. We see more of the cowed and half-resentful man than of the prophet. Yet the vision of a people dwelling apart, not to be reckoned among the others, is a real revelation, boldly flung out. Something of the difference already established between Israel and the goim, or peoples of the Syrian district, had been caught by the seer in his survey of past events, and now came to clear expression. For a moment, at least, his soul rose almost into spiritual desire in the cry that his last end should be of the kind an Israelite might have; one who with calm confidence laid himself down in the arms of the great God, the Lord of providence, of death as well as life.

A man has learned one lesson of great value for the conduct of life when he sees that he cannot curse whom God has not cursed, that he would be foolish to menace whom God has not menaced. Reaching this point of sight, Balaam stands superior for the time to the vulgar ideas of men like the king of Moab, who have no conception of a strong and dominant will to which human desires are all subjected. However reluctantly this confession is made, it prevents many futile endeavours and much empty vapouring. There are some indeed whose belief that fate must be on their side is simply immovable. Those whom they choose to reckon enemies are established in the protection of heaven; but they think it possible to wrest their revenge even from the Divine hand. Not till the blow they strike recoils with crushing force on themselves do they know the fatuity of their hope. In his “Instans Tyrannus” Mr. Browning pictures one whose persecution of an obscure foe ends in defeat.

I soberly laid my last plan

To extinguish the man.

Round his creep-hole, with never a break,

Ran my fires for his sake;

Overhead, did my thunder combine

With my underground mine:

Till I looked from my labour, content

To enjoy the event.

When sudden how think ye, the end?

Did I say, Without friend?

Say rather from marge to blue marge

The whole sky grew his targe,

With the suns self for visible boss,

While an Arm ran across,

Which the earth heaved beneath, like a breast

Where the wretch was safe prest!

“Do you see? Just my vengeance complete,

The man sprang to his feet,

Stood erect, caught at Gods skirts and prayed! –

So, I was afraid!”

In smaller matters, the attempts at impudent detraction which are common, when the base, girding at the good, think it possible to bring them to contempt, or at least stir them to unseemly anger, or prick them to humiliating self-defence, the law is often well enough understood, yet neither the assailants nor those attacked may be wise enough to recognise it. A man who stands upon his faithfulness to God does not need to be vexed by the menaces of the base; he should despise them. Yet he often allows himself to be harassed, and so yields all the victory hoped for by his detractor. Calm indifference, if one has a right to use it, is the true shield against the arrows of envy and malice.

Balaams vision of Israel as a separated people, a people dwelling alone, had singular penetration. The others he knew-Amorites, Moabites, Ammonites, Midianites, Hittites, Aramaeans-went together, scarcely distinguishable in many respects, with their national Baals all of the same kind. Was Ammon or Chemosh, Melcarth or Sutekh, the name of the Baal? The rites might differ somewhat, there might be more or less ferocity ascribed to the deities; but on the whole their likeness was too close for any real distinction. And the peoples, differing in race, in culture, in habit, no doubt, were yet alike in this, that their morality and their mental outlook passed no boundary, were for the most part of the beaten, crooked road. Strifes and petty ambitions here and there, temporary combinations for ignoble ends, the rise of one above another for a time under some chief who held his ground by force of arms, then fell and disappeared-such were the common events of their histories. But Israel came into Balaams sight as a people of an entirely different kind, generically distinct. Their God was no Baal ferocious by report, really impotent, a mere reflection of human passion and lust. Jehovahs law was a creation, like nothing in human history ascribed to a God. His worship meant solemn obligation, imposed, acknowledged, not simply to honour Him, but to be pure and true and honest in honouring Him. Israel had no part in the orgies that were held in professed worship of the Baals, really to the disgrace of their devotees. The lines of the national development had been laid down, and Balaam saw to some extent how widely they diverged from those along which other peoples sought power and glory. Amorites and Hittites and Canaanites might keep their place, but Israel had the secret of a progress of which they never dreamed. Wherever the tribes settled, when they advanced to fulfil their destiny, they would prove a new force in the world.

For the time Israel might be called the one spiritual people. It was this Balaam partly saw, and made the basis of his striking predictions. The modern nations are not to be distinguished by the same testing idea. The thoughts and hopes of Christianity have entered more or less into all that are civilised, and have touched others that can scarcely be called so. Yet if there is any oracle for the peoples of our century it is one that turns on the very point which Balaam seems to have had in view. But it is, that not one of them. as a nation, is distinctly moved and separated from others by spirituality of aim. Of not one can it be said that it is confessedly, eagerly, on the way to a Canaan where the Living and True God shall be worshipped, that its popular movements, its legislation, its main endeavours look to such a heavenly result. If we saw a people dwelling apart, with a high spiritual aim, resolutely excluding those ideas of materialism which dominate the rest, of them it would not be presumptuous to prophesy in the high terms to which the oracles of Balaam gradually rose.

Regarding the wish with which the diviner closed his first mashal, hard things have been said, as for example, that “even in his sublimest visions his egotism breaks out; in the sight of Gods Israel he cries, Let me die the death of the righteous.” Here, however, there may be personal sorrow and regret, a pathetic confession of human fear by one who has been brought to serious thought, rather than any mere egoistic craving. Why should he speak of death? That is not the theme of the egotist. We hear a sudden ejaculation that seems to open a glimpse of his heart. For this man, like every son of Adam, has his burden, his secret trouble, from which all the hopes and plans of his ambition cannot relieve his mind. Now for the first time he speaks in a genuinely religious strain. “There are the righteous whom the Great Jehovah regards with favour, and gathers to Himself. When their end comes they rest. Alas! I, Balaam, am not one of them; and the shadows of my end are not far away! Would that by some mighty effort I could throw aside my life as it has been and is, revoke my destiny, and enter the ranks of Jehovahs people-were it only to die among them.”

Wistfully, men whose life has been on the low ground of mere earthly toil and pleasure may, in like manner, when the end draws near, envy the confidence and hope of the good. For the old age of the sensualist, and even of the successful man of the world, is under a dull wintry sky, with no prospect of another morning, or even of a quiet night of dreamless sleep.

“The weariest and most loathed worldly life,

That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment

Can lay on nature, is a paradise

To what we fear of death.”

Courage and peace at the last belong to those alone who have kept in the way of righteousness. To them and no others light shall arise in the darkness. The faithfulness of God is their refuge even when the last shadows fall. He whom they trust goes before them in the pillar of fire when night is on the world, as well as in the pillar of cloud by day. To the man of this earth even the falling asleep of the good is enviable, though they may not anticipate a blessed immortality. Their very grave is a bed of peaceful rest, for living or dying they belong to the great God.

It was with growing dissatisfaction, rising to anxiety, Balak heard the first oracle that fell from the diviners lips. Despite the warning he had received that only the words which Jehovah gave should be spoken, he hoped for some kind of a curse. His altars had been built, his oxen and rams sacrificed, and surely, he thought, all would not be in vain! Balaam had not travelled from Pethor to mock him. But the prophecy carried not a single word of heartening to the enemies of Israel. The camp lay in the full sunshine of fortune, unobscured by the least cloud. It was the first blow to Balaks malignant jealousy, and might well have put him to confusion. But men of his sort are rich in conjectures and expedients. He had set his mind on this as the means of finding advantage in a struggle that was sure to come; and he clung to his hope. Although the curse would not light on the whole camp of Israel, yet it might fall on a part, the remote outlying portion of the tribes. In superstition men are for ever catching at straws. If the anger of some heavenly power, what power mattered little to Balak, could be once enlisted against the tribes, even partially, the influence of it might spread. And it would at least be something if pestilence or lightning smote the utmost part of that threatening encampment.

One must be sorry for men whose impotent anger has to fall on expedients so miserably inadequate. Moab defeated by the Amorites sees them in turn vanquished and scattered by this host which has suddenly appeared, and to all ordinary reckoning has no place nor right in the region. Sad as was the defeat which deprived Balak of half his land and left his people in poverty, this incursion and its success foreboded greater trouble. The king was bound to do something, and, feeling himself unable to fight, this was his scheme. The utter uselessness of it from every point of view gives the story a singular pathos. But the world under Divine providence cannot be left in a region where superstition reigns and progress is impossible-simply that a people like the Moabites may settle again on their lees, and that others may continue to enjoy what seem to them to be their rights. There must be a stirring of human existence, a new force and new ideas introduced among the peoples, even at the expense of war and bloodshed. And our sympathy with Balak fails when we recollect that Israel had refrained from attacking Moab in its day of weakness, had even refrained from asking leave to pass through its impoverished territory. The feelings of the vanquished had been respected. Perhaps Balak, with the perversity of a weak man and an incompetent prince, resented this as much as anything.

Balaam was now brought into the field of Zophim, or the Watchers, to the “top of Pisgah,” whence he could see only a part of the camp of Israel. The Hebrew here as well as in Num 22:41 is ambiguous. It has even been interpreted as meaning that on the first occasion part of the encampment only was in view, and on the second occasion the whole of it (so Keil in loco). But the tenor of the narrative corresponds better with the translation given in the English Version. The precise spot here called the top of Pisgah has not been identified. In the opinion of some the name Pisgah survives in the modern Siag-hah; but even if it does we are not helped in the least. Others take Pisgah as meaning simply “hill,” and read “the field of Zophim on the top of the hill.” The latter translation would obviate the difficulty that in Deu 34:1 it is said that Moses, when the time of his death approached, “went up from the plains of Moab unto Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah that is over against Jericho.” Pisgah may have been the name of the range; yet again in Num 27:12, and Deu 32:49, Abarim is given as the name of the range of which Nebo is a peak. We are led to the conclusion that Pisgah was the name in general use for a hill-top of some peculiar form. The root meaning of the word is difficult to make out. It may at all events be taken as certain that this top of Pisgah is not the same as that to which Moses ascended to die. Batak and his princes had not as yet ventured so far beyond the Amon.

At Balaams request the same arrangements were made as at Bamoth-Baal. Seven altars were built, and seven bullocks and seven rams were offered; and again the diviner withdrew to some distance to seek omens. This time his meeting with Jehovah gave him a more emphatic message. It would seem that with the passing of the days incidents the vatic fire in his mind burned more brightly. Instead of endeavouring to conciliate Balak he appears to take delight in the oracle that dashes the hopes of Moab to the ground. He has looked from the new point of vision and seen the great future that awaits Israel. It is vain to expect that the decree of the Almighty One can be revoked. Balak must hear all that the spirit of Elohim has given to the seer.

Up, Balak, and hear; Hearken to me, son of Zippor: No man is God, that He should lie; And no son of man, that He should repent.

Hath He said, and shall He not do it? And spoken, and shall He not make good? Behold to bless I have received; And He hath blessed and I cannot undo.

He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, Nor seen perverseness in Israel. Jehovah his God is with him; And the shout of a King is with him.

God brings them forth from Egypt: Like the horns of the wild ox are his. Surely no snake-craft is in Jacob, And no enchantment with Israel.

“At the time it shall be said of Jacob and Israel, What hath God wrought? Behold the people as a lioness arises, And as a lion lifts himself up; He shall not lie down till he eat the prey, And drink the blood of the slain.”

The confirmation of the first oracle by what Balaam has realised on his second approach to Jehovah compels the question which rebukes the kings vain desire. “Hath He said, and shall He not do it?” Balak did not know Jehovah as Balaam knew Him. This God never went back from His decision, nor recalled His promises. And He is able to do whatever He wills. Not only does He refuse to curse Israel, but He has given a blessing which Balaam even, powerful as he is, cannot possibly hinder. It has become manifest that the judgment of God on His peoples conduct is in no respect adverse. Reviewing their past, the diviner may have found such failure from the covenant as would give cause for a decision against them, partial at least, if not general. But there is no excuse for supposing that Jehovah has turned against the tribes. Their recent successes and present position are proofs of His favour unrevoked, and, it would seem, irrevocable. There is a King with this people, and when they advance it is with a shout in His honour. The King is Jehovah their God; mightier far than Balak or any ruler of the nations. When the loud Hallelujah rose from the multitude at some sacred feast, it was indeed the shout of a monarch.

Singular is it to find a diviner like Balaam noting as one of the great distinctions of Israel that the nation used neither augury nor divination. The hollowness of his own arts in presence of the God of Israel who could not be moved by them, who gave His people hope without them, would seem to have impressed Balaam profoundly. He speaks almost as if in contempt of the devices he himself employs. Indeed, he sees that his art is not art at all, as regards Israel. The Hebrews trust no omens; and either for or against them omens give no sign. It was another mark of the separateness of Israel. Jehovah had fenced His people from the spells of the magician. True to Him, they could defy all the sorcery of the East. And when the time for further endeavour came, the nations around should have to hear of the God who had brought the Hebrew tribes out of Egypt. With a lion-like vigour they would rise from their lair by the Jordan. The Canaanites and Amorites beyond should be their prey. Already perhaps tidings had come of the defeat of Bashan: the cities on the other side of Jordan should fall in their turn.

As yet there is nothing in the predictions of Balaam that can be said to point distinctly to any future event in Israels history. The oracles are of that general kind which might be expected from a man of the world who has given attention to the signs of the times and perceived the value to a people of strong and original faith. But taking them in this sense they may well rebuke that modern disbelief which denies the inspiring power of religion and the striking facts which come to light not only in the history of nations like Israel but in the lives of men whose vigour springs from religious zeal. Balaam saw what any whose eyes are open will also see, that when the shout of the Heavenly King is among a people, when they serve a Divine Master, holy, just, and true, they have a standing ground and an outlook not otherwise to be reached. The critics of religion who take it to be a mere heat of the blood, a transient emotion, forget that the grasp of great and generous principles, and the thought of an Eternal Will to be served, give a sense of right and freedom which expediency and self-pleasing cannot supply. However man comes to be what he is, this is certain, that for him strength depends not so much on bodily physique as on the soul, and for the soul on religious inspiration. The enthusiasm of pleasure-seeking has never yet made a band of men indomitable, nor need it be expected to give greatness; we cannot persuade ourselves that apart from God our blessedness is a matter of surpassing importance. We are a multitude whose individual lives are very small, very short, very insignificant, unless they are known to serve some Divine end.

It has been seen by one philosopher that if the religious sanction be taken away from morality some other must be provided to fill up the vacuum. Further, it may be said that if the religious support and stimulus of human energy be withdrawn there will be a greater vacuum more difficult to fill. The would-be benefactors of our race, who think that the superstition of a personal God is effete and should be swept away as soon as possible, so that man may return to nature, might do well to return to Balaam. He had a penetration which they do not possess. And singularly, the very apostle of that impersonal “stream of tendency making for righteousness,” which was once to be put in the place of God, did on one occasion unwittingly remind us of this prophet. Mr. Matthew Arnold had a difficult thing to do when he tried to encourage a toiling population to go on toiling without hope, to plod on in the underground while a select few above enjoyed the sunlight. The part was that of a diviner finding auguries for the inevitable. But he spoke as one who had to pity a poor blind Israel, no longer inspired by the shout of a king or the hope of a promised land, an Israel that had lost its faith and its way and seemed about to perish in the desert. Well did he know how difficult it is for men under this dread to endure patiently when those above have abolished God and the future life; men, who are disposed to say, yet must be told that they say vainly, “If there is nothing but this life, we must have it. Let us help ourselves, whenever we can, to all we desire.” Was that Israel to be blessed or cursed? There was no oracle. Yet the cultured Balak, hoping for a spell at least against the revolutionaries, had a rebuke. The prophet did not curse; he had no power to bless. But Moab was shown to be in peril, was warned to be generous.

Balaams enough there are, after a sort, with more or less penetration and sincerity. But what the peoples need is a Moses to revive their faith. The hollow maledictions and blessings that are now launched incessantly from valley to hill, from hill to valley, would be silenced if we found the leader who can re-awaken faith. It would be superfluous, then, for the race in its fresh hope to bless itself, and vain for the pessimists to curse it. With the ensign of Divine love leading the way, and the new heavens and earth in view, all men would be assured and hopeful, patient in suffering, fearless in death.

The second oracle produced in the mind of Balak an effect of bewilderment, not of complete discomfiture. He appears to be caught so far in the afflatus that he must hear all the prophet has to tell. He desires Balaam neither to curse nor bless; neutrality would be something. Yet, with all he has already heard giving clear indication what more is to be expected, he proposes another place, another trial of the auguries. This time the whole of Israel shall again be seen. The top of Peor that looketh down upon Jeshimon, or the desert, is chosen. On this occasion when the altars and sacrifices are prepared the order is not the same as before. The diviner does not retire to a distance to seek for omens. He makes no profession of mystery now. The temperature of thought and feeling is high, for the spot on which the company gathers is almost within range of the sentinels of Israel. The adventure is surely one of the strangest which the East ever witnessed. In the dramatic unfolding of it the actors and spectators are alike absorbed.

The third prophetic chant repeats several of the expressions contained in the second, and adds little; but it is more poetical in form. The prophet standing on the height saw “immediately below him the vast encampment of Israel amongst the acacia groves of Abel Shittim-like the watercourses of the mountains, like the hanging gardens beside his own river Euphrates, with their aromatic shrubs and their wide-spreading cedars. Beyond them on the western side of Jordan rose the hills of Palestine, with glimpses through their valleys of ancient cities towering on their crested heights. And beyond all, though he could not see it with his bodily vision, he knew well that there rolled the deep waters of the great sea, with the Isles of Greece, the Isle of Chittim-a world of which the first beginnings of life were just stirring, of which the very name here first breaks upon our ears.” From the deep meditation which passed into a trance the diviner awoke to gaze for a little upon that scene, to look fixedly once more on the camp of the Hebrew tribes, and then he began:

“Balaam the son of Beor saith, And the man whose eye was closed saith: He saith who heareth the words of El, Who seeth the vision of Shaddai, Falling down and having his eyes opened.”

Thus in the consciousness of an exalted state of mind which has come with unusual symptoms, the ecstasy that overpowers and brings visions before the inward eye, he vaunts his inspiration. There is no small resemblance to the manner in which the afflatus came to seers of Israel in after-times; yet the description points more distinctly to the rapture of one like King Saul, who has been swept by some temporary enthusiasm into a strain of thought, an emotional atmosphere, beyond ordinary experience. The far-reaching encampment is first poetically described, with images that point to perennial vitality and strength. Then as a settled nation Israel is described, irrigating broad fields and sowing them to reap an abundant harvest. Why comparison is made between the power of Israel and Agag one can only guess. Perhaps the reigning chief of the Amalekites was at this time distinguished by the splendour of his court, so that his name was a type of regal magnificence. The images of the wild ox and the lion are repeated with additional emphasis; and the strain rises to its climax in the closing apostrophe:

“Blessed be every one that blesseth thee And cursed be every one that curseth thee.”

So strongly is Israel established in the favour of Shaddai, the Almighty One, that attempts to injure her will surely recoil on the head of the aggressor. And on the other hand, to help Israel, to bid her God-speed, will be a way to blessedness. Jehovah will make the overflowing of His grace descend like rain on those who take Israels part and cheer her on her way.

In the light of what afterwards took place, it is clear that Balaam was in this last ejaculation carried far beyond himself. He may have seen for a moment, in the flash of a heavenly light, the high distinction to which Israel was advancing. He certainly felt that to curse her would be perilous, to bless her meritorious. But the thought, like others of a more spiritual nature, did not enter deeply into his mind. Balaam could utter it with a kind of strenuous cordiality, and then do his utmost to falsify his own prediction. What matter fine emotions and noble protestations if they are only momentary and superficial? Balaks open jealousy and hatred of Israel were, after all, more complimentary to her than the high-sounding praises of Balaam, who spoke as enjoying the elation of the prophet, not as delighting in the tenor of his message. Israel was nothing to him. Soon the prosperity to which she was destined became like gall and wormwood to his soul. The encampment roused his admiration at the time, but afterwards, when it became clear that the Israelites would have none of him, his mood changed towards them. Ambition ruled him to the end; and if the Hebrews did not offer in any way to minister to it, a man like Balaam would by-and-by set himself to bring down their pride. Weak humanity gives many examples of this. The man who has been an expectant flatterer of one greater than himself, but is denied the notice and honour he looks for, becomes, when his hopes have finally to be renounced, the most savage assailant, the most bitter detractor of his former hero. And so strong often are the minds which fall in this manner, that we look sometimes with anxiety even to the highest.

Fuente: Expositors Bible Commentary