What Balaam's Blessings Might Mean
A Numbers 23-24 Rewrite
What the Conquest Means
As I read through a rather dry and tedious Bible Reference book about archaeology in the land of the Bible (Amihai Mazar Archeology of the Land of the Bible 10,000-586 BCE), I’ve discovered that there is very little archaeological evidence for the Israelites’ conquest in Canaan as recorded in the Bible. While archaeologists have uncovered many of the cities mentioned in Numbers, Joshua, and I & II Samuel, those cities don’t seem to have been destroyed or inhabited when the Biblical conquest says they were destroyed or inhabited (approx 1200-1100 BCE depending on who you ask).
As you can imagine, this has sparked lots of debate between two groups of people. The what-we-dig-up-is-all-there-is people and the what-the-Bible-says-is-all-factual-data people. There are also people between these two camps.
What Does God Mean To Say To Us?
What I find fascinating about all this, aside from pondering why archaeology as of now doesn’t seem to confirm the Biblical conquests, is wondering why these conquest stories are in the Bible at all. They contain details about many specific, strange, and often humbling events for the Israelites. What was God trying to communicate to the established Kingdom of Israel through these conquest stories? And why is Israel’s conquest important to us Christians today? I don’t think it’s so we can say who has political rights in that region. I also don’t think it’s so that we know exactly historical data.
I’m learning that Ancient Near East civilizations used language differently than we do. Poetry, metaphors, and repetition of events were often used to explain the significance of an actual historical event. For example, the gospels rearrange the events in Jesus’ life in different ways to emphasize different aspects of Jesus’ identity. I & II Kings is a repeat of I & II Chronicles. Throughout the Bible, the Exodus story is retold in different ways to emphasize what God did for the Israelites.
I don’t think God intended the Bible to be a history book in chronological order with exact numbers, names, and places. This doesn’t mean that the events in the Bible didn’t happen, but that the authors of the Bible, inspired by God, may have arranged the events in their oral history to highlight truths about God’s character and his intentions for his people.
Since Israel and the Church are often paralleled in scripture as Abraham’s family, I think how God established Israel in the Promise Land foreshadows how God establishes the Kingdom of Heaven on earth today. Let me draw a more direct parallel.
The Example of Balaam
Take, for example, the story of Balaam in Numbers 22-24. (By the way, among the data supporting the Biblical evidence is a plaster inscription dating approximately 799-600 BCE, which mentions Balaam the seer from Numbers 22-24.) Anyway, in the Book of Numbers, the king of Moab is fearful of Israel’s attack, so he tries to bribe a famous seer, Balaam, to curse Israel. However, instead of cursing Israel, Balaam blesses Israel three times.
The first two times, Balaam speaks from a high place in view of a fraction of the Israelites. The final time Balaam speaks, he faces the wilderness where his eyes are opened, and he says he sees a vision of tribe after tribe of these people. Could this be a reference not only to the Israelite kingdom to come, but the Church, which consists of every tribe and every nation?
Metaphorical Language in the Blessings
Let’s examine Balaam’s blessings in light of this possibility. Maybe there’s more in this Numbers passage for us than we realize. Before I begin, here’s an explanation of some of the symbols I’ll use in this passage.
The Bible tells us that King Balak, king of Moab, hired Balaam. Balak’s people, the Moabites, came from Lot and his daughters when they got him drunk in a cave after Sodom and Gomorrah burned (Gen 19). What if Balak represents people whose senses have been dulled by the earth’s riches? They are drunk with earth power or earth love or earth schemes, so much so that God and God’s people feel like a threat to their way of life. These kinds of people seek a way to destroy God’s people. I will use Balak and the Moabites like this in the passage below.
The person of Balaam, while he sees a vision from God and blesses Israel, is not a character to imitate. In Revelation we read how Balaam influenced Balak to entice the Israelites into worshiping Baal (Rev 2:14). He’s described as one who rushes off to gain a profit in Jude 1:11 and loves the wages of wickedness in 2 Peter 2:15. His name is used to describe people who see personal profit as the end goal. We might describe Balaam like the thorns that choke the seeds in Jesus’ parable of the soils. I will use Balaam synonymously with exploiters.
Finally, Jacob and Israel are mentioned several times in succession. While I suppose this might just be using synonyms for the same people group, I’m going to use Jacob to mean three developing themes: the old nation of Israel, the old covenant with that nation, and the physical man God created in Genesis. I’m going to use Israel, the new name God gave Jacob, to mean: Christendom, the new covenant, and the spiritual man created through Christ.
Here’s a summary of all this:
Balak: people afraid of God’s people and who are seeking to destroy them
Balaam: people who exploit God’s people for personal gain
Jacob: Israel, the old covenant, the physical man
Israel: Christendom, the new covenant, the spiritual man
Below, verses are cited in bold for cross-reference purposes, but please keep in mind, this is not a word-for-word translation. The NIV follows for your comparison. Here we go!
The First Blessing (Numbers 23:7-10)
7 Then users of God’s people were used by God to speak this message: “People who fear Christians and the Israelite nation brought me from my wealthy lands, these people who are angry at Christians and the Jews came from east of Eden. ‘Come,’ they said, ‘curse the Israelite nation for us; come, denounce the Christians too.’ 8 "How can I curse those whom God has not cursed? How can I denounce those whom the Lord has not denounced? 9 "For from a bird's eye view, I see them, from above time and space I view them. I see a people unlike the others who do not consider themselves citizens of one earthly nation. 10 "Who can count the people who call themselves Jews or estimate the cloud of witnesses with the Spirit?* Let me pass into this river with the baptized, and may my life be spent like theirs!” *In some translations what I've written as ”estimate the cloud” is rendered “number the dust clouds.” I thought this was a neat parallel reference similar to Hebrews 12:1's great cloud of witnesses. I chose to rewrite “let me die the death of the righteous" as “let me pass into this river with the baptized” because death and going down to the watery depths often mean the same thing in scripture. Baptism = a kind of death.
Original Passage Numbers 23:7-10 NIV
7 Then Balaam spoke his message: “Balak brought me from Aram, the king of Moab from the eastern mountains. 'Come,’ he said, ‘curse Jacob for me; come, denounce Israel.’ 8 "How can I curse those whom God has not cursed? How can I denounce those whom the Lord has not denounced? 9 "From the rocky peaks I see them, from the heights I view them. I see a people who live apart and do not consider themselves one of the nations. 10 "Who can count the dust of Jacob or number even a fourth of Israel? Let me die the death of the righteous, and may my final end be like theirs!”
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