# Numbers 23

> Lumin Translation

Source: https://www.lumin.faith/read/numbers/23

Lumin’s own translation, drafted with AI from the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, checked verse by verse against them, and approved by Lumin. Brackets mark verses not found in the earliest manuscripts.

How it was made: https://www.lumin.faith/lumin-translation.md

1. Balaam said to Balak, “Build me seven altars here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me here.”
2. Balak did as Balaam had said, and Balak and Balaam offered a bull and a ram on each altar.
3. Then Balaam said to Balak, “Stand here beside your burnt offering while I go off. Perhaps Yahweh will come to meet me. Whatever he shows me I will tell you.” And he went off to a barren height.
4. God met Balaam, and Balaam said to him, “I have set up seven altars, and I have offered a bull and a ram on each altar.”
5. Yahweh put a word in Balaam’s mouth and said, “Go back to Balak and say this.”
6. So he went back to him, and there was Balak standing beside his burnt offering, with all the officials of Moab.
7. Then Balaam spoke his oracle: “Balak brought me from Aram, the king of Moab from the mountains of the east. ‘Come, curse Jacob for me; come, denounce Israel.’
8. How can I curse those whom God has not cursed? How can I denounce those whom Yahweh has not denounced?
9. From the top of the rocks I see him; from the hills I watch him. Here is a people that lives apart and does not count itself among the nations.
10. Who can count the dust of Jacob or number even a fourth of Israel? Let me die the death of the upright, and let my end be like his!”
11. Balak said to Balaam, “What have you done to me? I brought you to curse my enemies, but you have done nothing but bless them!”
12. He answered, “Must I not be careful to say what Yahweh puts in my mouth?”
13. Then Balak said to him, “Please come with me to another place where you can see them. You will see only the edge of them, not all of them. Curse them for me from there.”
14. So he took him to the field of Zophim, on the top of Pisgah. There he built seven altars and offered a bull and a ram on each altar.
15. Balaam said to Balak, “Stand here beside your burnt offering while I go to meet him over there.”
16. Yahweh met Balaam and put a word in his mouth and said, “Go back to Balak and say this.”
17. So he went to him, and there was Balak standing beside his burnt offering, with the officials of Moab. Balak asked him, “What did Yahweh say?”
18. Then Balaam spoke his oracle: “Get up, Balak, and listen; hear me, son of Zippor.
19. God is not a man, that he would lie, or a human being, that he would change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill it?
20. I have received a command to bless; he has blessed, and I cannot reverse it.
21. He has not looked on wrongdoing in Jacob or seen trouble in Israel. Yahweh his God is with him; the shout of a king is in his midst.
22. God brings them out of Egypt; he has the strength of a wild ox.
23. There is no sorcery against Jacob, no divination against Israel. Now it will be said of Jacob and of Israel, ‘See what God has done!’
24. Look, a people rises up like a lioness and rouses itself like a lion. It does not lie down until it devours its prey and drinks the blood of the slain.”
25. Then Balak said to Balaam, “Do not curse them at all, and do not bless them at all!”
26. But Balaam answered Balak, “Did I not tell you, ‘I must do whatever Yahweh says’?”
27. Then Balak said to Balaam, “Come, please, and I will take you to another place. Perhaps it will please God to let you curse them for me from there.”
28. So Balak took Balaam to the top of Peor, which overlooks Jeshimon.
29. Balaam said to Balak, “Build me seven altars here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me here.”
30. Balak did as Balaam had said, and he offered a bull and a ram on each altar.

## Nearby chapters

[Numbers 22](https://www.lumin.faith/read/numbers/22.md)
[Numbers 24](https://www.lumin.faith/read/numbers/24.md)

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