Balaam - Prophesies

Prophesies

All the prophecies that Balaam makes take the form of (Hebrew) poems:

• The first, Numbers 23:7–10, prophesies the unique exaltation of the Kingdom of Israel, and its countless numbers.
• The second, Numbers 23:18–24, celebrates the moral virtue of Israel, its monarchy, and military conquests.
• The third, Numbers 24:3–9, celebrates the glory and conquests of Israel's monarchy.
• The fourth, Numbers 24:14–19, prophesies the coming of a king who will conquer Edom and Moab
• The fifth, Numbers 24:20, concerns the ruins of Amalek
• The sixth, Numbers 24:21–22, concerns the destruction of the Kenites by Assyria
• The seventh, Numbers 24:23–24, concerns "ships of Kittim" coming from the west to attack Assyria and Eber

The poems fall into three groups. The first group consists of two poems which characteristically start immediately. The third group of three poems also start immediately, but are much shorter. The second group, however, consists of two poems which both start:

Balaam the son of Beor hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said: He hath said, which heard the words of God, which saw the vision of the Almighty, falling into a trance, but having his eyes open ...

Of these, the first and third groups are considered, in the documentary hypothesis, to originate within the Elohist text, whereas the second group is considered to belong to the Jahwist. Thus the Elohist describes Balaam constructing giving two blessings, making sacrifices on seven altars, at the high places of Baal, before each, then deciding not to seek enchantments after the third set of sacrifices, but to set his face upon the wilderness, which Balak views as a third blessing, and so Balaam then gives the three final predictions of fate. Conversely, in the Jahwist source, Balaam arrives, the spirit of God comes upon him, and he simply delivers a blessing and a prophecy, in succession.

Nevertheless, the poems themselves are considered to predate the Jahwist and Elohist, and simply to have been embedded by them in their works. While the Elohist took off whatever introduction was present in the poems they chose, the Jahwist left it on. An archaeological discovery in 1967 uncovered references to a Book of Balaam, from which these poems may have originally been taken. The first four poems are commonly regarded as ancient lyrics of the early monarchy of Israel and Judah, although there is some suspicion amongst several critics that they have been edited from either less edifying oracles, or oracles which did not refer to Israel.

There are several odd features about the poems. Agag, mentioned in the third poem, is described as a great king, which does not correspond to the king of the Amalekites who was named Agag, and described in I Samuel 15, since that description considers Amalek to be small and obscure. While it is the Masoretic text of the poem which uses the word Agag, the Septuagint, other Greek versions, and the Samaritan Pentateuch, all have Gog (i.e., king Gyges of Lydia, 716 BC to 678 BC), implying a very late date for the poem. These names are consequently thought to be textual corruptions, and Og has been suggested as the original, though it does not make much of an improvement.

The final three poems do not refer either to Israel or Moab, and are thus considered unusual, since they seem to have little relevance to the narrative. It is thought that they may have been added to bring the number of poems either up to five, if inserted into the Elohist source, or up to seven, if only inserted once JE was constructed. While the sixth poem refers to Assyria, it is uncertain whether it is an historical reference to the ancient Ninevah, or a prophecy, which religious commentators consider refers to the Seleucid kingdom of Syria, which also took the name Assyria. The seventh is also ambiguous, and may either be a reference to the Sea Peoples, or, again in the view of religious commentators, to the conquest of Persia by Alexander the Great.

In the view of textual criticism the narrative, excepting the episode involving the donkey, is simply a framework invented in order to be able to insert much older poems. Whether the poems themselves are considered to constitute prophecies, or simply poems created after the events they appear to prophesy, tends to depend on whether the commentator is religious or not.