Balaam’s First Oracle
1 Balaam said to Balak, “Build seven altars here for me and prepare seven bulls here and seven rams for me.” 2 Balak did as Balaam had spoken, and Balak and Balaam offered a bull and a ram on every altar. 3 Balaam said to Balak, “Stand by your burnt offering, and I will go. Perhaps the Lord will come to meet me. Whatever he shows me I will tell you.” And he went to a solitary place.
4 God met Balaam, and he said to him, “I have prepared the seven altars, and I have offered up a bull and a ram on every altar.” 5 The Lord put a word in Balaam’s mouth and said, “Return to Balak, and thus you shall speak.” 6 He returned to him, and he was standing by his burnt offering, he and all the princes of Moab.
7 He took up his parable and said,
“From Aram, Balak has brought me,
the king of Moab, from the mountains of the East.
Come, curse Jacob for me.
Come, defy Israel.
8 How shall I curse whom God has not cursed?
How shall I defy whom the Lord has not defied?
9 For from the top of the rocks I see him.
From the hills I see him.
It is a people that dwells apart.
Among the nations, they are not counted.
10 Who can count the dust of Jacob,
or count even a quarter of Israel?
Let me die the death of the righteous!
Let my last end be like theirs!”
11 Balak said to Balaam, “What have you done to me? I took you to curse my enemies, and you have altogether blessed them.”
12 He answered and said, “Should I not be careful to speak only that which the Lord has put in my mouth?”
Balaam’s Second Oracle
13 Balak said to him, “Please come with me to another place, where you may see them. You will be able to see only the utmost part of them and shall not see all of them. Curse them from there for me.”
14 He took him into the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, and built seven altars and offered up a bull and a ram on every altar. 15 He said to Balak, “Stand here by your burnt offering, while I meet the Lord over there.”
16 The Lord met Balaam and gave him the words to say, “Return to Balak and say this.”
17 He came to him, and he was standing by his burnt offering, and the leaders of Moab with him. Balak said to him, “What has the Lord spoken?”
18 He took up his parable and said,
“Rise up, Balak, and hear!
Listen to me, you son of Zippor.
19 God is not a man, that he should lie,
nor a son of man, that he should repent.
Has he ever declared something and did not do it?
Or has he spoken and will not make it good?
20 I have received a command to bless.
He has blessed, and I cannot reverse it.
21 He has not seen iniquity in Jacob.
Nor has he seen perversity in Israel.
The Lord his God is with him.
The joy of a king is among them.
22 God brought them out of Egypt.
He has, for them, the strength of a wild ox.
23 Surely no omen works against Jacob;
Nor is there any divination against Israel.
Now it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel,
‘Look what has the Lord done!’
24 A people rise up as a lioness.
As a young lion he lifts himself up.
He shall not lie down until he eats of the prey,
and drinks the blood of the slain.”
25 Balak said to Balaam, “Then neither curse them, nor bless them at all.”
26 But Balaam answered Balak, “Did I not tell you, ‘All that the Lord speaks, that I must do?’ ”
27 Balak said to Balaam, “Come with me. I will take you to another place. Perhaps it will please God that you may curse them for me from there.”
28 Balak took Balaam to the top of Peor, that looks down on the desert. 29 Balaam said to Balak, “Build seven altars for me here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me here.”
30 Balak did as Balaam had said and offered up a bull and a ram on every altar.