23:1 Balaam said to Balak, Build me here seven altars, and prepare me here seven bulls and seven rams.
23:2 Balak did as Balaam had spoken; and Balak and Balaam offered on every altar a bull and a ram.
23:3 Balaam said to Balak, Stand by your burnt offering, and I will go: perhaps Yahweh will come to meet me; and whatever he shows me I will tell you. He went to a bare height.
23:4 God met Balaam: and he said to him, I have prepared the seven altars, and I have offered up a bull and a ram on every altar.
23:5 Yahweh put a word in Balaam's mouth, and said, Return to Balak, and thus you shall speak.
23:6 He returned to him, and, behold, he was standing by his burnt-offering, he, and all the princes of Moab.
23:7 He took up his parable, and said, From Aram has Balak brought me, The king of Moab from the mountains of the East: Come, curse me Jacob, Come, defy Israel.
23:8 How shall I curse, whom God has not cursed? How shall I defy, whom Yahweh has not defied?
23:9 For from the top of the rocks I see him, From the hills I see him: behold, it is a people that dwells alone, And shall not be reckoned among the nations.
23:10 Who can count the dust of Jacob, Or number the fourth part of Israel? Let me die the death of the righteous, Let my last end be like his!
23:11 Balak said to Balaam, What have you done to me? I took you to curse my enemies, and, behold, you have blessed them altogether.
23:12 He answered and said, Must I not take heed to speak that which Yahweh puts in my mouth?
23:13 Balak said to him, Please come with me to another place, from whence you may see them; you shall see but the utmost part of them, and shall not see them all: and curse me them from there.
23:14 He took him into the field of Zophim, to the top of Pisgah, and built seven altars, and offered up a bull and a ram on every altar.
23:15 He said to Balak, Stand here by your burnt offering, while I meet [Yahweh] yonder.
23:16 Yahweh met Balaam, and put a word in his mouth, and said, Return to Balak, and thus shall you speak.
23:17 He came to him, and, behold, he was standing by his burnt offering, and the princes of Moab with him. Balak said to him, What has Yahweh spoken?
23:18 He took up his parable, and said, Rise up, Balak, and hear; Listen to me, you son of Zippor:
23:19 God is not a man, that he should lie, Neither the son of man, that he should repent: Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not make it good?
23:20 Behold, I have received [commandment] to bless: He has blessed, and I can't reverse it.
23:21 He has not saw iniquity in Jacob; Neither has he seen perverseness in Israel: Yahweh his God is with him, The shout of a king is among them.
23:22 God brings them forth out of Egypt; He has as it were the strength of the wild-ox.
23:23 Surely there is no enchantment with Jacob; Neither is there any divination with Israel: Now shall it be said of Jacob and of Israel, What has God done!
23:24 Behold, the people rises up as a lioness, As a lion does he lift himself up: He shall not lie down until he eat of the prey, Drink the blood of the slain.
23:25 Balak said to Balaam, Neither curse them at all, nor bless them at all.
23:26 But Balaam answered Balak, Didn't I tell you, saying, All that Yahweh speaks, that I must do?
23:27 Balak said to Balaam, Come now, I will take you to another place; peradventure it will please God that you may curse me them from there.
23:28 Balak took Balaam to the top of Peor, that looks down on the desert.
23:29 Balaam said to Balak, Build me here seven altars, and prepare me here seven bulls and seven rams.
23:30 Balak did as Balaam had said, and offered up a bull and a ram on every altar.