Why did God change his mind and allow Bilaam to curse the Jewish people?
By Rabbi Ari Enkin, Rabbinic Director, United with Israel
This week’s Torah portion is “Balak” (Numbers 22:2-25:9), and it is named after the evil king of Moab.
Balak was worried about the imminent approach of the Jewish people towards his territory. As all the nations in the region witnessed, Balak saw how the Jews were victorious over all their enemies, and Moab was likely to lose the war as well.
Balak realized that he could not destroy the Jewish people with conventional methods, so he had something very creative up his sleeve.
He decided to “send messengers to Bilaam, son of Beor…” [Num. 22:5]. Bilaam was a well-known wizard and expert in black magic who had a good track record in cursing people to death. Balak wanted to hire his services to curse the Jewish people.
Balak’s messengers arrived at Bilaam’s house and told them why they were there. Bilaam asked them to spend the night so he could find out from God whether he would be able to accept their offer to curse the Jews or not. As planned, God came to Balaam in a dream and told him not to go with Balak’s messengers and not to curse the Jewish people, “for they are [already] blessed.” Bilaam was left with no choice but to disappoint his guests, and he told them that he could not go with them.
When the messengers returned to Balak’s palace empty-handed, the king was furious but he assumed that Bilaam’s decline was due to a question of compensation. So, Balak sent a new group of messengers with all kinds of salary and benefit commitments in order to entice Bilaam to accept. Surprisingly, Bilaam told this new group of messengers that he could do nothing without God’s permission, and permission was recently denied. All the gold in the world couldn’t change that.
Nevertheless, he told this group of messengers to spend the night to see if God might have changed His mind, and lo and behold, permission was granted this time! As the verse says, “If these people are coming for your advantage [i.e. you have something to gain], then go with them! Just only speak that which I tell you” [22:20]. God indeed changed His mind. Or at least it so appeared.
How could that be?
It is explained that when profit was now at stake, God withdrew his objections and let Bilaam proceed. This is the difference between the first visit of messengers and the second. The first proposal included no monetary benefit for Bilaam. He would have gone along for free had God said yes. But the second time around there was wealth. There was honor. There was personal gain.
It is explained that one of the greatest and most positive forces that exists in a person is the willingness to do something good without ulterior motives. Doing something simply because one believes it to be right is a force beyond belief. However, when people do things because they stand to make a buck, rather than for completely altruistic motives, it loses its potency.
As such, when Bilaam was offered, and wanted to accept, to curse the Jews for no reward whatsoever, simply because he hated the Jews, God said no. Had Bilaam gone to curse the Jews, he very well may have been successful. He would have gone with no ulterior motives…only because he hated the Jews. But once money entered the equation, and Bilaam was doing it more for the money and the fame, his “sincerity” in cursing the Jews would not have been as strong.
And so it is with us. When we are driven by conviction, we can succeed. But when we are driven by ulterior motives, no matter how legitimate or noble, there’s no certainty in the result. Conviction will always be a more powerful drive.
For more insights by Rabbi Enkin on this week’s Torah portion, click on the links below.
https://unitedwithisrael.org/living-torah-villains-in-the-bible/
https://unitedwithisrael.org/living-torah-to-judge-leaders-look-at-their-followers/