Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his!- Num_23:10.
1. We know not whence the story of Balaam was obtained-from a Moabitish or an Assyrian source; some facts only Balaam himself could have recorded; others, such as the speaking ass and the vision of the angel, are essentially pagan, not Israelite fancies. The mysteries that surround the origin of Balaam, the sources of his inspiration, his means and methods of divination may all be passed by. He suddenly appears on the page of sacred history as a diviner whose fame had spread from the Euphrates to the Jordan, and probably farther. The Israelites, toughened physically and morally by their long sojourn in the desert, and now well consolidated into a nation, are beginning to emerge from their southern retreat, and to betray their designs upon the regions bordering on the Jordan. They have met and defeated the desert tribes, and are now threatening Moab, which lies in their way. Its politic ruler, Balak, thoroughly appreciated his danger, and measured the natural possibilities of defence with serious foreboding. Stronger kings than he had fallen, and the rumour of a powerful tribal deity who had done wonders in Egypt in his father's day, and still accompanied the invaders to victory, filled him and his chieftains with apprehension and dismay. He has learned that the Israelites are led by Moses, a prophet of Jehovah, and that his prayers in the battle against Amalek secured the victory. He will see what of the same sort he can do on his side. Hundreds of miles away, near the head waters of the Euphrates, there lived another prophet of Jehovah, whose reputation filled the whole region. Balak sends for him. The Israelites have a prophet; he will have a prophet. He sees in the battles hitherto fought a weight not belonging to the battalions, a spiritual force that won the victory; he will employ that force on his side. Israel had a prophet who blessed them; he would employ a prophet who should curse them.
2. Balaam was a foreigner, a Gentile, scion of an idolatrous race. He is, however, rather a diviner than a prophet; he is the soothsayer, whose fame spreads throughout the East, who has a supernatural power to bless and to curse, to whom ambassadors come with the rewards of divination in their hands, who takes his post on the mountain-top that thence his curse may be effective, who goes out to meet with enchantments, to whom the Elohim speak. But it was not simply as a magician of note that Balak resorted to him; it was as one who affected the worship of Jehovah, and who was therefore thought likely to have had some special influence in obtaining a curse on the children of Israel from their own national God, whose power had hitherto been exerted on their behalf. He was of heathen descent and dwelt among heathen, and yet he had an extraordinary knowledge of the true God, whose will he interpreted to his fellow-men. Men recognized that those whom he cursed were cursed.
Balaam, then, is to be regarded as one reared in the midst of falsehood, on whom the light is beginning to dawn, and who really appreciates its beauty and worth. Balaam was in a transitional stage, a position he could not long maintain; one from which he must advance into full light, or creep back to bury himself once more in his old darkness. Entangled as he was in the meshes of incantations and magic, he had an incipient knowledge and fear of God, which might have led on to the full character of a genuine prophet had it not been resisted.
Brought up in the irrational methods of heathenism, accustomed to believe in the omnipotence of rites and spells, and anxious to magnify his office, Balaam has yet a certain openness of mind to facts, a capacity of his own to read their consistency and rhythm and a courage to face their consequences, which prevail over the prejudices and interests by which he is swayed. There is a primitive integrity of mind and a primitive reverence in the man which grips our respect-grips our respect and also lets us see how God in all ages has chosen and equipped His prophets. Nor is our appreciation of this mind, groping so far back there on the confines of light and darkness, lessened by the fact that it did not rise clear of all the passion of its time, but is described (Num_24:15-16) as working heavily in trance or ecstasy.
Rede of Balaam, Beór's son,
Rede of the eye-sealed (?) man:
In vision he sees the Almighty,
Falling yet open of eye (?).
In Israel the beginnings of prophecy were also in trance; and uncontrollable excitement has characterized the origins of genuinely religious movements within Christianity itself. Balaam has the servile temper which does not understand the fulness of the truth that has come to him, and staggers beneath it. He grovels under the approach of his convictions, but he honestly utters them when they arrive. If I may take another Arabian prophet, upon much the same stage of development as Balaam, I would remind you that Mohammed behaved very similarly under the earliest impulses of his calling-a bemused, ecstatic, perhaps epileptic man: yet he lived to bring all Arabia to his feet.
For this is the kind of man whom, though blinded and prostrate, God shall one day call to stand up and send upon his way in full control of his faculties.… In Balaam we have one end of that long course of gradual revelation of which the other is reached in Christ and His disciples.1 [Note: George Adam Smith, in The Expositor, 8th Ser., v. 8.]
It seems to be certainly implied that God did speak to Balaam, open his eyes, unfold to him things far off in the future. Although many cases might be adduced which go to prove that an acute man of the world, weighing causes and tracing the drift of things, may show wonderful foresight, yet the language here used points to more than that. It seems to mean that Divine illumination was given to one beyond the circle of the chosen people, to one who from the first was no friend of God and at the last showed himself a malicious enemy of Israel. And the doctrine must be that any one who, looking beneath the surface of things, studying the character of men and peoples, connects the past and the present and anticipates events which are still far off, has his illumination from God. Further it is taught that in a real sense the man who has some conception of Providence, though he is false at heart, may yet, in the sincerity of an hour, in the serious thought roused at some crisis, have a word of counsel, a clear indication of duty, a revelation of things to come which others do not receive.2 [Note: R. A. Watson, The Book of Numbers, 267.]
3. When the elders of Moab and Midian who were selected as envoys had arrived at Pethor and delivered their errand, Balaam bade them stay till he had ascertained the will of God; and when he learned, through a vision, that God disapproved of the journey and the curse, since the Israelites were a blessed nation, he declined to accompany the messengers. On hearing their reply, Balak sent a second and still more weighty embassy, promising Balaam the highest distinctions and rewards, if he yielded to his wishes. But Balaam declared to the nobles that no treasures or honours, however splendid, could induce him to act against the command of God, whom therefore he would again consult. This time he received permission to proceed to Moab, on condition, however, that he should strictly adhere to God's suggestions; after which he entered upon the journey together with the ambassadors.
The situation of Balaam at this point of the narrative is a common one, allowing for the differences of time and custom and the accidentals of life. It is simply the situation of a man who is keenly desirous of doing something which he knows to be wrong, and who seeks to reconcile a real conscientiousness with his desire. Balak offers him things which his heart covets, if he will go to him and curse for him the Israelites. Balaam is persuaded in his own mind that he cannot do this as things stand, that it will be contrary to the will of God, who has blessed Israel; and yet he would fain earn the reward in some way without being absolutely false. He would not accept once for all the plain intimation of God's will and the simple demands of duty; but at the same time he is determined not to disobey the dictates of conscience. Instead of sending the envoys away the second time, he bade them wait in the hope that he might be able to get a more favourable answer. He seemed to succeed; for he did receive permission to go. “God said unto Balaam, If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them.” Nothing was really altered. He knew he was not allowed to curse instead of bless. But he still hoped that some further concession might be granted which would enable him to earn the reward. He was only entering into temptation, getting nearer to it, playing with it, going with open eyes into a situation which would inevitably make it more difficult for him to be true. The permission he received to go did not change the facts of the case, did not alter God's will, could not alter it; it only brought Balaam himself into deeper waters, and gave him a harder battle to fight with temptation; it was a long step towards the ultimate degradation and the final plunge.
The incident of the miraculous voice of the ass brought him to a sense of his sin; and he said to the opposing angel, “I have sinned; for I knew not that thou stoodest in the way against me: now therefore, if it displease thee, I will get me back again.” However, he is bidden to proceed on his mission. God is displeased with him, yet He appears to go with him, and to allow him to proceed in the crooked ways of his covetousness.
I heard a preacher take for his text: “Am not I thine ass, upon which thou hast ridden ever since I was thine unto this day? was I ever wont to do so unto thee?” I wondered what he would make thereof, fearing he would starve his auditors for want of matter. But hence he observed:
1. The silliest and simplest, being wronged, may justly speak in their own defence.
2. Worst men have a good title to their own goods. Balaam a sorcerer; yet the ass confesseth twice he was his.
3. They who have done many good offices, and fail in one, are often not only unrewarded for former service, but punished for that one offence.
4. When the creatures, formerly officious to serve us, start from their wonted obedience (as the earth to become barren, and air pestilential) man ought to reflect on his own sin as the sole cause thereof.
How fruitful are the seeming barren places of Scripture. Bad ploughmen, which make balks of such ground. Wheresoever the surface of God's word doth not laugh and sing with corn, there the heart thereof within is merry with mines, affording, where not plain matter, hidden mysteries.1 [Note: Thomas Fuller, Good Thoughts in Worse Times.]
Nine days before his death, Dr. Berry preached a sermon on “Mistaken Interpretations of Experience,” based on the words: “And Balaam rose up in the morning, and saddled his ass, and went with the princes of Moab. And God's anger was kindled because he went: and the angel of the Lord stood in the way for an adversary against him” (Num_22:21-22). The points of an ever-memorable discourse, one of the most powerful that Berry ever preached, were these: While Balaam saddled an ass to carry him, God commissioned an angel to obstruct him; in what followed, owing to his wilful blindness, he mistook the beneficence of an angel for the stupidity of an ass; and not until he ceased buffeting his beast of burden did he awake to the presence of a minister of instruction. It was not the ass, but the angel, that stopped him; yet being such as he was and in such furious temper at obstruction, he persistently and repeatedly mistook the angel for an ass. The beginning of all mistaken interpretations of life must be traced to the false ideas with which we start-false estimates of life's resources in liberty and self-sufficiency, false ideas of life's meaning and intent, false motives and aims in life's pursuits. Balaam had calculated and provided for all the requirements of his journey. He had counted, weighed, estimated, anticipated the facts of the situation as they presented themselves to his notice. He had looked behind, around, ahead. Why should he not feel confident and complacent? So asks worldly wisdom, but the wisdom that is more than worldly detects an omission. Balaam forgot to look above. This initial blunder was the elimination of God out of life's equation. Do not most men live in an atmosphere that magnifies the ass and hides the angel? Life is not independent and self-sufficient, but dependent and under government; it is not given us for selfishness and luxury, but for discipline, for the formation of character, for the attainment of virtue and power; its inclosing and completing circumference is not to be found in a small rim round the centre, but in a circle, and sweeps through eternity and reaches out after the infinite! Begin life with any other views, from any other point, in any other spirit, and as sure as Balaam's ass crushed his master's foot against the wall, as sure as Balaam met with a check that filled him with dismay and temper, so will you be turned upon and rebuked by the ass of your own conceit, on which you have chosen to ride through life to fortune.1 [Note: S. Drummond, Charles A. Berry, 205.]
4. The scene of action is reached at last. Surrounded by the princes of Moab, the weird seer stands above the craggy steep beside the seven reeking altars. Willing to curse, and ready at heart to fulfil the contract and earn the honours and rewards of blasting malediction, Balaam is borne up perforce on wings of rich and rare beatitude. His higher mood o'ermasters him. Prophet and poet blot out the charlatan; the word which God has put in his mouth, that must he speak. “How shall I curse whom God hath not cursed? 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?” And then as with a deep sigh of discontentment at his own false position which yet he will not abandon, he adds, as though it were to himself, “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his!”
Balaam next turns to enchantments; he tries to elicit the curses of the demons; if he cannot bend the immortals, he will move hell from beneath. But enchantment is vain; malediction is but babblement where God's benediction rests. The future is as assured as the present. Righteous Israel must triumph. Like a great lion he shall lift himself, and cease not till he devour the prey and drink the blood of the slain: “God hath blessed, and I cannot reverse it.” Balak and his princes are utterly disconcerted. The royal anger burns fiercely, and utters itself in scornful remonstrance, but the soul of the seer is on fire; he must speak forth its hot burden; Balak cannot choose but hear. Higher still into the atmosphere of prophecy rises the quickened soul of the son of Beor. Visions of future glory for Israel are unfolded in rapid and blinding flashes of unearthly light. A king is described higher than Agag. A star gleams out of Jacob, a sceptre rises out of Israel that smites the corners of Moab and blasts the children of Seth. Amalek, first of the nations, perishes. The Kenites are seen led from their fastnesses to the bondage of Asshur. The ships of Chittim come from the West, and Asshur and Eber are in turn laid desolate to perish for ever.
In the ecstasy of prophecy he had climbed a moral pinnacle whence he could spurn at once the bribes he had hankered after and the royal briber who had offered them; and, careless of consequences, he had spoken the word that God put in his mouth. It is the first prophetic outlook beyond Israel into the world at large; from that Pisgah height we have a predictive glance at once to Gentile East and Gentile West. We are held too by the splendour of the poetry, Homeric rather than Hebrew in its amplitude, iteration, ring; for true sublimity of thought, for breadth and precision, the prophecies which Balaam uttered are scarcely second to any.
The Hebrew prophets did not foresee and foretell curious coincidences, but they foresaw and foretold the inevitable triumph of righteousness. First, they foretold it for all the men and nations of their own day, and especially for those colossal unrighteous kingdoms of the heathen world which looked everlasting; then, for all time. “As the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more”;-sooner or later it is, it must be, so. Hebrew prophecy is never read aright until it is read in this sense, which indeed of itself it cries out for; it is, as Davison finely says, impatient for the larger scope. How often, throughout the ages, how often, even, by the Hebrew prophets themselves, has some immediate visible interposition been looked for! “I looked,” they make God say, “and there was no man to help, and I wondered that there was none to uphold: therefore mine own arm brought salvation unto me. The day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of my redeemed is come.” O long-delaying arm of might, will the Eternal never put thee forth, to smite these sinners who go on as if righteousness mattered nothing? There is no need; they are smitten. Down they come, one after another; Assyria falls, Babylon, Greece, Rome; they all fall for want of righteousness.… To Israel are the promises, and to Israel they are fulfilled. “The nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish, yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted.” It is so; since all history is an accumulation of experiences that what men and nations fall by is want of conduct. To call it by this plain name is often not amiss, for the thing is never more great than when it is looked at in its simplicity and reality. Yet the true name to touch the soul is the name Israel gave: righteousness.1 [Note: Matthew Arnold, Literature and Dogma, 204.]
5. All this is admirable; and, were this all, the son of Beor would deserve to be named among the moral heroes of the world, but it is sad to remember that, whilst such lofty predictions are flowing from his lips, Balaam is leading Balak from place to place, building altars and sacrificing bullocks and rams, if by chance from some point of view he may be able to see Israel cursed of God. He will not say what he does not feel about Israel, but he is quite willing to be blinded to Israel's greatness. He feels bound to say what he knows, but he is willing to know as little as possible. He dare not disobey God, but he has no real sympathy with His purposes. And so he goes home without reward or honour, having incurred the displeasure of Balak.
