Balaam

Balaam, the name of a prophet not of Hebrew blood, mentioned in Numbers, xxii.-xxiv. According to the story, Balak, king of the Moabites, alarmed at the irruption of the Hebrews into his territories, forms a league with the Midianites, and sends messengers to Balaam with the rewards of divination in their hands. Refused permission from God, he consents to go only after a second summons from the king. On the way the angel of the Lord met him. The prophet's ass saw the apparition, and three different times turned aside out of the way in terror. Balaam, not seeing the angel, beat his ass three times, whereupon the beast opened his mouth, and 'spake with man's voice, and stayed the madness of the prophet.' At last his eyes were opened to see the angel, and he was denounced for his sin. Three different times he tries to curse Israel for Balak, but as often the cursings turn to blessings in his mouth, and he breaks out into the loftiest strains of prophetic poetry in praise of the glorious destiny of Israel. But though he could not belie the prophetic function by cursing the Israelites, he succeeded in causing them for a time to forfeit the favour of Jehovah, by leading them into sin through a special temptation which Balak and the Moabites on his advice spread before them. The prophet perished in the vengeance taken by the command of Jehovah upon the sinners. Such is the strange story of the true prophet 'who loved the hire of wrong-doing,' and who is taken in the Scriptures as the constant type of those men who prostitute their powers and hold the truth in unrighteousness, receiving the wages thereof.