Numbers 23:1-8 ▼

1 Then Balaam said to Balak, “Build seven altars for me here, and prepare for me seven bulls and seven rams here.”

2 Balak did just as Balaam had said, and Balak and Balaam offered a bull and a ram on each altar.

3 Then Balaam said to Balak, “Stand beside your burnt offering and I will go. Perhaps the LORD will come to meet me; and whatever He shows me I will tell you.” So he went to a desolate hill.

4 Now God met Balaam, who said to Him, “I have prepared seven altars, and I have offered a bull and a ram on each altar.”

5 Then the LORD put a speech in Balaam’s mouth, and said, “Return to Balak, and you shall speak thus.”

6 Balaam returned to Balak, and behold, he was standing by his burnt sacrifice, he and all the leaders of Moab.

7 Balaam took up his [first] discourse (oracle) and said: “Balak, the king of Moab, has brought me from Aram (Syria), from the mountains of the east, [saying,] ‘Come, curse [the descendants of] Jacob for me; And come, [violently] denounce Israel.’

8 “How shall I curse those whom God has not cursed? Or how can I [violently] denounce those the LORD has not denounced?