Attributed commentary excerpt
Keil & Delitzsch on Numbers 23:7
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Commentary on the Old Testament
C. F. Keil & F. Delitzsch · 19th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.
Balaam's first saying. - Having come back to the burnt-offering, Balaam commenced his utterance before the king and the assembled princes. משׁל, lit., a simile, then a proverb, because the latter consists of comparisons and figures, and lastly a sentence or saying. The application of this term to the announcements made by Balaam ( Num 23:7, Num 23:18, Num 24:3, Num 24:15, Num 24:20), whereas it is never used of the prophecies of the true prophets of Jehovah, but only of certain songs and similes inserted in them (cf. Isa 14:4; Eze 17:2; Eze 24:3; Mic 2:4), is to be accounted for not merely from the poetic form of Balaam's utterances, the predominance of poetical imagery, the sustained parallelism, the construction of the whole discourse in brief pointed sentences, and other peculiarities of poetic language (e.g., בּנו, Num 24:3, Num 24:15), but it points at the same time to the difference which actually exists between these utterances and the predictions of the true prophets. The latter are orations addressed to the congregation, which deduce from the general and peculiar relation of Israel to the Lord and to His law, the conduct of the Lord towards His people either in their own or in future times, proclaiming judgment upon the ungodly and salvation to the righteous. "Balaam's mental eye," on the contrary, as Hengstenberg correctly observes, "was simply fixed upon what he saw; and this he reproduced without any regard to the impression that it was intended to make upon those who heard it." But the very first utterance was of such a character as to deprive Balak of all hope that his wishes would be fulfilled. Num 23:7 "Balak, the king of Moab, fetches me from Aram, from the mountains of the East," i.e., of Mesopotamia, which was described, as far back as Gen 29:1, as the land of the sons of the East (cf. Num 22:5). Balaam mentions the mountains of his home in contradistinction to the mountains of the land of the Moabites upon which he was then standing. "Come, curse me Jacob, and come threaten Israel." Balak had sent for him for this purpose (see Num 22:11, Num 22:17). זעמה, for זעמה, imperative (see Ewald, 228, b.). זעם, to be angry, here to give utterance to the wrath of God, synonymous with נקב or קבב, to curse. Jacob: a poetical name for the nation, equivalent to Israel. Num 23:8-10 "How shall I curse whom God does not curse, and how threaten whom Jehovah does not threaten?" Balak imagined, like all the heathen, that Balaam, as a goetes and magician, could distribute blessings and curses according to his own will, and put such constraint upon his God as to make Him subservient to his own will (see at Num 22:6). The seer opposes this delusion: The God of Israel does not curse His people, and therefore His servant cannot curse them. The following verses ( Num 23:9 and Num 23:10) give the reason why: "For from the top of the rocks I see him, and from the hills I behold him. Lo, it is a people that dwelleth apart, and is not numbered among the heathen. Who determines the dust of Jacob, and in number the fourth part of Israel? Let my soul die the death of the righteous, and my end be like his?" There were two reasons which rendered it impossible for Balaam to curse Israel: (1) Because they were a people both outwardly and inwardly different from other nations, and (2) because they were a people richly blessed and highly favoured by God. From the top of the mountains Balaam looked down upon the people of Israel. The outward and earthly…
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