🔢WEB · Numbers 22:19
What does Numbers 22:19 mean?
"Now therefore please stay here tonight as well, that I may know what else Yahweh will speak to me.”"
— Numbers 22:19 (World English Bible)
Surrounding context
They came to Balaam, and said to him, “Thus says Balak the son of Zippor, ‘Please let nothing hinder you from coming to me,
for I will promote you to very great honor, and whatever you say to me I will do. Please come therefore, and curse this people for me.’”
Balaam answered the servants of Balak, “If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I can’t go beyond the word of Yahweh my God, to do less or more.
Now therefore please stay here tonight as well, that I may know what else Yahweh will speak to me.”
God came to Balaam at night, and said to him, “If the men have come to call you, rise up, go with them; but only the word which I speak to you, that you shall do.”
Balaam rose up in the morning, and saddled his donkey, and went with the princes of Moab.
God’s anger burned because he went; and Yahweh’s angel placed himself in the way for an adversary against him. Now he was riding on his donkey, and his two servants were with him.
Explanation
Numbers 22:19 records Balaam’s response to the second delegation sent by Balak, king of Moab. Having already told Balak’s princes that he could not do anything contrary to the command of Yahweh his God (verse 18), Balaam nonetheless asks them to remain overnight so that he can inquire once more of the Lord, to see if there is any further word. In plain language, Balaam is saying, “Wait here again tonight, and let me check with God one more time to see what he will tell me.”
The context is the story of Balak’s fear of Israel as they camped on the plains of Moab after their wilderness journey. Balak, seeing the vast number of Israelites, hired Balaam, a diviner or prophet known beyond Israel’s borders, to curse them so that Moab could defeat them in battle. Balaam had already received a clear answer from God the first time Balak’s messengers came: he was not to go with them, because Israel was blessed (22:12). Yet when Balak sent a second, higher-ranking delegation with promises of
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