24:1 8 When Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, 9 he did not go as at the other times 10 to seek for omens, 11 but he set his face 12 toward the wilderness.
1 sn The ritual of lifting the hands filled with the offering and waving them in the presence of the
2 sn The “wave offering” may be interpreted as a “special gift” to be transferred to the
3 tn The imperfect tense here would then have the nuance of permission. It is not an instruction at this point; rather, the prohibition has been lifted and the person is free to drink wine.
4 tn Heb “him.”
5 tn The expression is “in/by/against their life.” That they sinned against their life means that they brought ruin to themselves.
6 tn The form is the perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive. But there is no expressed subject for “and they shall make them,” and so it may be treated as a passive (“they shall [must] be made”).
7 tn Or “throw, toss.”
8 sn For a thorough study of the arrangement of this passage, see E. B. Smick, “A Study of the Structure of the Third Balaam Oracle,” The Law and the Prophets, 242-52. He sees the oracle as having an introductory strophe (vv. 3, 4), followed by two stanzas (vv. 5, 6) that introduce the body (vv. 7b-9b) before the final benediction (v. 9b).
9 tn Heb “it was good in the eyes of the
10 tn Heb “as time after time.”
11 tn The word נְחָשִׁים (nÿkhashim) means “omens,” or possibly “auguries.” Balaam is not even making a pretense now of looking for such things, because they are not going to work. God has overruled them.
12 tn The idiom signifies that he had a determination and resolution to look out over where the Israelites were, so that he could appreciate more their presence and use that as the basis for his expressing of the oracle.
13 tn The verb is the Hiphil perfect with a vav (ו) consecutive from the verb פָּרַר (parar, “to annul”). The verb functions here as the equivalent of an imperfect tense; here it is the apodosis following the conditional clause – if this is the case, then this is what will happen.
14 tn Heb “which [she is] under it.”
15 tn Heb “mouth.”