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23:1  Then Balaam said to Balak, “Build me seven altars here, and here prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me.”
23:2  So Balak did as Balaam had ordered, and Balak and Balaam offered a bull and a ram on each altar.
23:3  Balaam said to Balak, “Stand here by your burnt offering while I go over there. Perhaps the Lord will meet me, and then I will tell you whatever he lets me see.” And so he went out on the barren height.
23:4  Then God met Balaam, and Balak said to him: “I have erected the seven altars, and have offered a bull and a ram on each altar.”
23:5  The Lord put an utterance in Balaam’s mouth, and said: Go back to Balak, and speak accordingly.
23:6  So he went back to Balak, who was still standing by his burnt offering together with all the princes of Moab.
23:7  Then Balaam recited his poem: From Aram Balak has led me here, Moab’s king, from the mountains of Qedem: “Come, curse for me Jacob, come, denounce Israel.”
23:8  How can I lay a curse on the one whom God has not cursed? How denounce the one whom the Lord has not denounced?
23:9  For from the top of the crags I see him, from the heights I behold him. Here is a people that lives apart and does not reckon itself among the nations.
23:10  Who has ever counted the dust of Jacob, who numbered Israel’s dust-cloud? May I die the death of the just, may my end be like theirs!
23:11  “What have you done to me?” cried Balak to Balaam. “It was to lay a curse on my foes that I brought you here; but instead, you have blessed them!”
23:12  Balaam replied, “Is it not what the Lord puts in my mouth that I take care to repeat?”
23:13  Then Balak said to him, “Please come with me to another place from which you can see them; but you will see only some, not all of them, and from there lay a curse on them for me.”
23:14  So he brought him to a lookout post on the top of Pisgah, where he built seven altars and offered a bull and a ram on each of them.
23:15  Balaam then said to Balak, “Stand here by your burnt offering, while I seek a meeting over there.”
23:16  Then the Lord met Balaam, and, having put an utterance in his mouth, said to him: Return to Balak, and speak accordingly.
23:17  So he went to Balak, who was still standing by his burnt offering together with the princes of Moab. When Balak asked him, “What did the Lord say?”
23:18  Balaam recited his poem: Rise, Balak, and listen; give ear to my testimony, son of Zippor!
23:19  God is not a human being who speaks falsely, nor a mortal, who feels regret. Is God one to speak and not act, to decree and not bring it to pass?
23:20  I was summoned to bless; I will bless; I cannot revoke it!
23:21  Misfortune I do not see in Jacob, nor do I see misery in Israel. The Lord, their God, is with them; among them is the war-cry of their King.
23:22  They have the like of a wild ox’s horns: God who brought them out of Egypt.
23:23  No, there is no augury against Jacob, nor divination against Israel. Now it is said of Jacob, of Israel, “Look what God has done!”
23:24  Here is a people that rises up like a lioness, and gets up like a lion; It does not rest till it has devoured its prey and has drunk the blood of the slain.
23:25  “Neither lay a curse on them nor bless them,” said Balak to Balaam.
23:26  But Balaam answered Balak, “Did I not tell you, ‘Everything the Lord tells me I must do’?”
23:27  Then Balak said to Balaam, “Come, let me bring you to another place; perhaps God will approve of your laying a curse on them for me from there.”
23:28  So he took Balaam to the top of Peor, that overlooks Jeshimon.
23:29  Balaam then said to Balak, “Build me seven altars here; and here prepare for me seven bulls and seven rams.”
23:30  And Balak did as Balaam had ordered, offering a bull and a ram on each altar.