Balak (Midrash)

Prophecy in the Nations—and in Israel

This week’s parasha is a kind of digression or excursus from the narrative flow of events that befell Israel during the forty years in the wilderness. Suddenly, the perspective shifts to without, to the other nations observing and reacting to this strange new tribe that has appeared on the stage of history: specifically, to the king of Moab and his ill-fated machinations to hire a prominent sorcerer/prophet, Bilaam, to curse Israel. Both the midrash and, later on, many of the classical commentators attempt to understand why the Torah tells this story. The opening section on this week’s Torah portion, Numbers Rabbah 20.1, gives one classical answer:

“And Balak son of Zippor saw…” [Num 22:1]. This is alluded to by the verse: “The Rock, Whose work is perfect; for all of His ways are just” [Deut 32:4]. The Holy One blessed be He did not leave the pagans an opening for the future, to say: You pushed us away. What did the Holy One blessed be He do? Just as He set up kings and sages and prophets in Israel, so did he set them among the pagan nations.

“An opening”—pithon peh. The Midrash has a multi-valenced attitude of the relationship between Israel and the other nations. In many midrashim, such as those about the encounter between Jacob and Esau, there is a kind of division of realms between Israel and the nations: the latter enjoy power and dominance over the material world, enjoying political and military control and wealth, while Israel, as the “precious people” of God, persecuted and downtrodden in this world though they may be, enjoy that which is of ultimate value and meaning—closeness to God through His Torah, and the World to Come. The nations, in turn, are indifferent or even contemptuous of the spiritual, other-worldly focus of Jewish existence (e.g., Esau selling his birthright). But, as here, they may also be are jealous of the spiritual gifts God has showered upon Israel; hence, God prepares in advance an answer as to why He gave these to Israel, and not to them: namely, that they too had an opportunity to have prophecy, and they misused it.

He placed Solomon as king over Israel and over the entire earth, and so did he do to Nebuchadnezzar. This one built the Temple and recited many songs of praise and petitionary prayers. That one destroyed it and cursed and blasphemed, and said “I shall ascend beyond the highest cloud” [Isa 14:14].

He gave David wealth, and he bought the Temple [materials for it? the Temple site?] for His name; and He gave Haman wealth, and he bought an entire nation so as to slaughter them. Every form of greatness that Israel received, you find that the nations received its like.

The nations, given the same opportunities for wealth and dominion as Israel, used it for negative ends: egotistical arrogance, destruction of all that is holy, and bloodshed.

He raised up Moses among Israel, and Bilaam among the pagans. See the difference between the prophets of Israel and the prophets of the pagans! The prophets of Israel warn Israel against sin, as is said, “And now, son of man, I have made you a watchman…” [Ezek 33:7]. And the prophet who rose up among the nations set up a breach to destroy the creatures from the world.

Here we see that Bilaam was not only a sorcerer, but also an actual prophet: one who freely communicated with God. Some traditions go so far as to say that he was even a greater prophet than Moses himself! The parallel versions of this midrash, in Tanhuma and Yalkut Shimoni, sharpen the contrast by reading here, “the prophets of Israel warned THE NATIONS against sin,” followed by a garbled quote from Jer 1:5 (see Mirkin ad loc., 10: 249). The “breach” alluded to refers to the attempt by Bilaam, after failing to curse Israel, to lead them into sin by setting up the daughters of Midian to entice them into lewdness (at the very end of this parsha and into the next: Num 25:1-15).

There is a paradox here, of course: prophecy, as the ability to speak with and be spoken to by the Divine, is seen as somehow divorced from the moral contents of prophecy, which are part and parcel of Biblical prophecy. And the moral nature of prophecy—to call upon the people to repent, to walk in the ways of God, to abandon evil and iniquity and perversity —is of course rooted in the moral nature of God Himself: knowledge of God‘s Being is bound up with His moral nature, and with the call to human beings to imitate His ways: “to perform justice and righteousness”; “just as He is compassionate and merciful, so shall you be compassionate and merciful”; etc.

Yet there is nevertheless a certain truth here: that somehow the mystical, the charismatic, mantic powers, the faculty of penetrating behind the veil, so to speak; even (perhaps especially!) the ability to attain that state of unitive vision in which good and evil are both seen as stemming from the Source of Being—all these do in fact have a certain independent existence, which can somehow be separated from the ethical. We have all heard of charlatans in the name of religion: unscrupulous swamis and gurus who enthrall hordes of followers, founding cults and extracting from their adoring followers money, sexual favors, and just about anything else they want (even their lives, as in cultic suicide). The question is whether such people are pure charlatans, skilled in the psychology of manipulation, or whether some of them at least do in fact possess real spiritual powers, albeit their use of them is utterly amoral or even immoral. Such a one, we may imagine, was Bilaam.

Moreover, all the prophets displayed the attribute of compassion towards both Israel and the pagan nations, as Jeremiah said “My heart moans for Moab like a flute” [Jer 48:36]. And so also Ezekiel: “Son of Man, lift up a dirge for Tyre” [Ezek 27:2]. And that one was cruel, set out to uproot an entire people in naught, for no cause. Hence the chapter of Bilaam was written, to tell why the Holy One blessed be He removed his Holy Spirit from the nations of the world, for that one rose up among them, and see what he did.

But whether or not a person can be a “prophet,” in the sense of communicating with the one true God, and still be immoral, nay, wantonly cruel, one thing is certain: much cruelty and inhumanity can and does exist in the name of religion. In this new, “post-modern” age, in which fanatical Islamic extremism is bound to play an utterly unexpected role, one that no one could have imagined even twenty years ago (even after Ayatolla Houmeini’s triumphant return to Iran, which we saw then as a local phenomena), this fact looms larger than ever—particularly following a week such as this.

I had originally intended to develop the theme of prophecy write much more this week, but I must again postpone it. Let me close with a question: Is there any connection between the fact that the prophecy of Bilaam is usually read on the last Shabbat before the 17th of Tamuz: that is, immediately preceding the three weeks during which we read a series of haftarot filled with some of the most passionate and intense of Israelite prophecies? I will hopefully return to this question soon.