1Then Balaam said to Balak, “Build seven altars for me here, and prepare for me here seven bulls and seven rams.”
2And Balak did just as Balaam had spoken, and Balak and Balaam offered a bull and a ram on each altar.
3Then Balaam said to Balak, “Stand by your burnt offering, and I will go; perhaps the Lord will come to meet me, and whatever He shows me I will tell you.” So he went to a desolate height.
4And God met Balaam, and he said to Him, “I have prepared the seven altars, and I have offered on each altar a bull and a ram.”
5Then the Lord put a word in Balaam’s mouth, and said, “Return to Balak, and thus you shall speak.”
6So he returned to him, and there he was, standing by his burnt offering, he and all the princes of Moab.
7And he took up his 23:7 prophetic discourseoracle and said:
“Balak the king of Moab has brought me from Aram,
From the mountains of the east.
‘Come, curse Jacob for me,
And come, denounce Israel!’
8“How shall I curse whom God has not cursed?
And how shall I denounce whom the Lord has not denounced?
9For from the top of the rocks I see him,
And from the hills I behold him;
There! A people dwelling alone,
Not reckoning itself among the nations.
10“Who can count the 23:10 Or dust clouddust of Jacob,
Or number one-fourth of Israel?
Let me die the death of the righteous,
And let my end be like his!”
11Then Balak said to Balaam, “What have you done to me? I took you to curse my enemies, and look, you have blessed them bountifully!”
12So he answered and said, “Must I not take heed to speak what the Lord has put in my mouth?”
Balaam’s Second Prophecy
13Then Balak said to him, “Please come with me to another place from which you may see them; you shall see only the outer part of them, and shall not see them all; curse them for me from there.”
14So he brought him to the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, and built seven altars, and offered a bull and a ram on each altar.
15And he said to Balak, “Stand here by your burnt offering while I 23:15 So with MT, Tg., Vg.; Syr. call; LXX go and ask Godmeet the Lord over there.”
16Then the Lord met Balaam, and put a word in his mouth, and said, “Go back to Balak, and thus you shall speak.”
17So he came to him, and there he was, standing by his burnt offering, and the princes of Moab were with him. And Balak said to him, “What has the Lord spoken?”
18Then he took up his oracle and said:
“Rise up, Balak, and hear!
Listen to me, son of Zippor!
19“God is not a man, that He should lie,
Nor a son of man, that He should repent.
Has He said, and will He not do?
Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?
20Behold, I have received a command to bless;
He has blessed, and I cannot reverse it.
21“He has not observed iniquity in Jacob,
Nor has He seen 23:21 troublewickedness in Israel.
The Lord his God is with him,
And the shout of a King is among them.
22God brings them out of Egypt;
He has strength like a wild ox.
Nor any 23:23 fortune-tellingdivination against Israel.
It now must be said of Jacob
And of Israel, ‘Oh, what God has done!’
24Look, a people rises like a lioness,
And lifts itself up like a lion;
It shall not lie down until it devours the prey,
And drinks the blood of the slain.”
25Then Balak said to Balaam, “Neither curse them at all, nor bless them at all!”
26So Balaam answered and said to Balak, “Did I not tell you, saying, ‘All that the Lord speaks, that I must do’?”
Balaam’s Third Prophecy
27Then Balak said to Balaam, “Please come, I will take you to another place; perhaps it will please God that you may curse them for me from there.”
28So Balak took Balaam to the top of Peor, that overlooks the 23:28 Heb. Jeshimonwasteland.
29Then Balaam said to Balak, “Build for me here seven altars, and prepare for me here seven bulls and seven rams.”
30And Balak did as Balaam had said, and offered a bull and a ram on every altar.
New King James Version®, Copyright© 1982, Thomas Nelson. All rights reserved.
