The King of Moab Sends for Balaam

¹The Israelites moved on and set up camp in the plains of Moab east of the Jordan and opposite Jericho.

²When the king of Moab, Balak son of Zippor, heard what the Israelites had done to the Amorites and how many Israelites there were,

³he and all his people became terrified.

⁴The Moabites said to the leaders of the Midianites, “This horde will soon destroy everything around us, like a bull eating the grass in a pasture.” So King Balak

⁵sent messengers to summon Balaam son of Beor, who was at Pethor near the Euphrates River in the land of Amaw. They brought him this message from Balak: “I want you to know that a whole nation has come from Egypt; its people are spreading out everywhere and threatening to take over our land.

⁶They outnumber us, so please come and put a curse on them for me. Then perhaps we will be able to defeat them and drive them out of the land. I know that when you pronounce a blessing, people are blessed, and when you pronounce a curse, they are placed under a curse.”

⁷So the Moabite and Midianite leaders took with them the payment for the curse, went to Balaam, and gave him Balak's message.

⁸Balaam said to them, “Spend the night here, and tomorrow I will report to you whatever the Lord tells me.” So the Moabite leaders stayed with Balaam.

⁹God came to Balaam and asked, “Who are these people that are staying with you?”

¹⁰He answered, “King Balak of Moab has sent them to tell me

¹¹that a people who came from Egypt has spread out over the whole land. He wants me to curse them for him, so that he can fight them and drive them out.”

¹²God said to Balaam, “Do not go with them, and do not put a curse on the people of Israel, because they have my blessing.”

¹³The next morning Balaam went to Balak's messengers and said, “Go back home; the Lord has refused to let me go with you.”

¹⁴So they returned to Balak and told him that Balaam had refused to come with them.

¹⁵Then Balak sent a larger number of leaders, who were more important than the first.

¹⁶They went to Balaam and gave him this message from Balak: “Please don't let anything prevent you from coming to me!

¹⁷I will reward you richly and do anything you say. Please come and curse these people for me.”

¹⁸But Balaam answered, “Even if Balak gave me all the silver and gold in his palace, I could not disobey the command of the Lord my God in even the smallest matter.

¹⁹But please spend the night, as the others did, so that I may learn whether or not the Lord has something else to tell me.”

²⁰That night God came to Balaam and said, “If these men have come to ask you to go with them, get ready and go, but do only what I tell you.”

²¹So the next morning Balaam saddled his donkey and went with the Moabite leaders.

Balaam and His Donkey

²²God was angry that Balaam was going, and as Balaam was riding along on his donkey, accompanied by his two servants, the angel of the Lord stood in the road to bar his way.

²³When the donkey saw the angel standing there holding a sword, it left the road and turned into the fields. Balaam beat the donkey and brought it back onto the road.

²⁴Then the angel stood where the road narrowed between two vineyards and had a stone wall on each side.

²⁵When the donkey saw the angel, it moved over against the wall and crushed Balaam's foot against it. Again Balaam beat the donkey.

²⁶Once more the angel moved ahead; he stood in a narrow place where there was no room at all to pass on either side.

²⁷This time, when the donkey saw the angel, it lay down. Balaam lost his temper and began to beat the donkey with his stick.

²⁸Then the Lord gave the donkey the power of speech, and it said to Balaam, “What have I done to you? Why have you beaten me these three times?”

²⁹Balaam answered, “Because you have made a fool of me! If I had a sword, I would kill you.”

³⁰The donkey replied, “Am I not the same donkey on which you have ridden all your life? Have I ever treated you like this before?” “No,” he answered.

³¹Then the Lord let Balaam see the angel standing there with his sword; and Balaam threw himself face downward on the ground.

³²The angel demanded, “Why have you beaten your donkey three times like this? I have come to bar your way, because you should not be making this journey.

³³But your donkey saw me and turned aside three times. If it hadn't, I would have killed you and spared the donkey.”

³⁴Balaam replied, “I have sinned. I did not know that you were standing in the road to oppose me; but now if you think it is wrong for me to go on, I will return home.”

³⁵But the angel said, “Go on with these men, but say only what I tell you to say.” So Balaam went on with them.

Balak Welcomes Balaam

³⁶When Balak heard that Balaam was coming, he went to meet him at Ar, a city on the Arnon River at the border of Moab.

³⁷Balak said to him, “Why didn't you come when I sent for you the first time? Did you think I wasn't able to reward you enough?”

³⁸Balaam answered, “I came, didn't I? But now, what power do I have? I can say only what God tells me to say.”

³⁹So Balaam went with Balak to the town of Huzoth,

⁴⁰where Balak slaughtered cattle and sheep and gave some of the meat to Balaam and the leaders who were with him.

Balaam's First Prophecy

⁴¹The next morning Balak took Balaam up to Bamoth Baal, from where Balaam could see a part of the people of Israel.

Exclusion from the Lord's People

¹“No man who has been castrated or whose penis has been cut off may be included among the Lord's people.

²“No one born out of wedlock or any descendant of such a person, even in the tenth generation, may be included among the Lord's people.

³“No Ammonite or Moabite—or any of their descendants, even in the tenth generation—may be included among the Lord's people.

⁴They refused to provide you with food and water when you were on your way out of Egypt, and they hired Balaam son of Beor, from the city of Pethor in Mesopotamia, to curse you.

⁵But the Lord your God would not listen to Balaam; instead he turned the curse into a blessing, because he loved you.

⁶As long as you are a nation, never do anything to help these nations or to make them prosperous.

⁷“Do not despise the Edomites; they are your relatives. And do not despise the Egyptians; you once lived in their land.

⁸From the third generation onward their descendants may be included among the Lord's people.

Keeping the Military Camp Clean

⁹“When you are in camp in time of war, you are to avoid anything that would make you ritually unclean.

¹⁰If a man becomes unclean because he has had a wet dream during the night, he is to go outside the camp and stay there.

¹¹Toward evening he is to wash himself, and at sunset he may come back into camp.

¹²“You are to have a place outside the camp where you can go when you need to relieve yourselves.

¹³Carry a stick as part of your equipment, so that when you have a bowel movement you can dig a hole and cover it up.

¹⁴Keep your camp ritually clean, because the Lord your God is with you in your camp to protect you and to give you victory over your enemies. Do not do anything indecent that would cause the Lord to turn his back on you.

Various Laws

¹⁵“If slaves run away from their owners and come to you for protection, do not send them back.

¹⁶They may live in any of your towns that they choose, and you are not to treat them harshly.

¹⁷“No Israelite, man or woman, is to become a temple prostitute.

¹⁸Also, no money earned in this way may be brought into the house of the Lord your God in fulfillment of a vow. The Lord hates temple prostitutes.

¹⁹“When you lend money or food or anything else to Israelites, do not charge them interest.

²⁰You may charge interest on what you lend to foreigners, but not on what you lend to Israelites. Obey this rule, and the Lord your God will bless everything you do in the land that you are going to occupy.

²¹“When you make a vow to the Lord your God, do not put off doing what you promised; the Lord will hold you to your vow, and it is a sin not to keep it.

²²It is no sin not to make a vow to the Lord,

²³but if you make one voluntarily, be sure that you keep it.

²⁴“When you walk along a path in someone else's vineyard, you may eat all the grapes you want, but you must not carry any away in a container.

²⁵When you walk along a path in someone else's grainfield, you may eat all the grain you can pull off with your hands, but you must not cut any grain with a sickle.

God and His People

¹Give thanks to the Lord, proclaim his greatness; tell the nations what he has done.

²Sing praise to the Lord; tell the wonderful things he has done.

³Be glad that we belong to him; let all who worship him rejoice.

⁴Go to the Lord for help; and worship him continually.

^5-6You descendants of Abraham, his servant; you descendants of Jacob, the man he chose: remember the miracles that God performed and the judgments that he gave.

⁷The Lord is our God; his commands are for all the world.

⁸He will keep his covenant forever, his promises for a thousand generations.

⁹He will keep the agreement he made with Abraham and his promise to Isaac.

¹⁰The Lord made a covenant with Jacob, one that will last forever.

¹¹“I will give you the land of Canaan,” he said. “It will be your own possession.”

¹²God's people were few in number, strangers in the land of Canaan.

¹³They wandered from country to country, from one kingdom to another.

¹⁴But God let no one oppress them; to protect them, he warned the kings:

¹⁵“Don't harm my chosen servants; do not touch my prophets.”

¹⁶The Lord sent famine to their country and took away all their food.

¹⁷But he sent a man ahead of them, Joseph, who had been sold as a slave.

¹⁸His feet were kept in chains, and an iron collar was around his neck,

¹⁹until what he had predicted came true. The word of the Lord proved him right.

²⁰Then the king of Egypt had him released; the ruler of nations set him free.

²¹He put him in charge of his government and made him ruler over all the land,

²²with power over the king's officials and authority to instruct his advisers.

²³Then Jacob went to Egypt and settled in that country.

²⁴The Lord gave many children to his people and made them stronger than their enemies.

²⁵He made the Egyptians hate his people and treat his servants with deceit.

²⁶Then he sent his servant Moses, and Aaron, whom he had chosen.

²⁷They did God's mighty acts and performed miracles in Egypt.

²⁸God sent darkness on the country, but the Egyptians did not obey his command.

²⁹He turned their rivers into blood and killed all their fish.

³⁰Their country was overrun with frogs; even the palace was filled with them.

³¹God commanded, and flies and gnats swarmed throughout the whole country.

³²He sent hail and lightning on their land instead of rain;

³³he destroyed their grapevines and fig trees and broke down all the trees.

³⁴He commanded, and the locusts came, countless millions of them;

³⁵they ate all the plants in the land; they ate all the crops.

³⁶He killed the first-born sons of all the families of Egypt.

³⁷Then he led the Israelites out; they carried silver and gold, and all of them were healthy and strong.

³⁸The Egyptians were afraid of them and were glad when they left.

³⁹God put a cloud over his people and a fire at night to give them light.

⁴⁰They asked, and he sent quails; he gave them food from heaven to satisfy them.

⁴¹He opened a rock, and water gushed out, flowing through the desert like a river.

⁴²He remembered his sacred promise to Abraham his servant.

⁴³So he led his chosen people out, and they sang and shouted for joy.

⁴⁴He gave them the lands of other peoples and let them take over their fields,

⁴⁵so that his people would obey his laws and keep all his commands. Praise the Lord!