1
Then Balaam said to King Balak, “Build me seven altars here, and prepare seven young bulls and seven rams for me to sacrifice.”
2
Balak followed his instructions, and the two of them sacrificed a young bull and a ram on each altar.
3
Then Balaam said to Balak, “Stand here by your burnt offerings, and I will go to see if the Lord will respond to me. Then I will tell you whatever he reveals to me.” So Balaam went alone to the top of a bare hill,
4
and God met him there. Balaam said to him, “I have prepared seven altars and have sacrificed a young bull and a ram on each altar.”
5
The Lord gave Balaam a message for King Balak. Then he said, “Go back to Balak and give him my message.”
6
So Balaam returned and found the king standing beside his burnt offerings with all the officials of Moab.
7
This was the message Balaam delivered: “Balak summoned me to come from Aram;
the king of Moab brought me from the eastern hills.
‘Come,’ he said, ‘curse Jacob for me!
Come and announce Israel’s doom.’
8
But how can I curse those
whom God has not cursed?
How can I condemn those
whom the Lord has not condemned?
9
I see them from the cliff tops;
I watch them from the hills.
I see a people who live by themselves,
set apart from other nations.
10
Who can count Jacob’s descendants, as numerous as dust?
Who can count even a fourth of Israel’s people?
Let me die like the righteous;
let my life end like theirs.”
11
Then King Balak demanded of Balaam, “What have you done to me? I brought you to curse my enemies. Instead, you have blessed them!”
12
But Balaam replied, “I will speak only the message that the Lord puts in my mouth.”