sayer."2
It may be added that some of the older scholars tended to
relate the Hebrew city name to the root rtp [Aramaic rwp], "to interpret
(a dream),” and they suggested this city as a center for mantic arts.3
1 For this terminology, see now WHS, pp. 15-16; UT, pp. 62-
63. On the interpretation of the LXX, cf, the view of Yaure, discussed below,
2 Compare also the Syriac rendering, "an interpreter of dreams,"
Larnsa, Peshitta, p. 182. The Palestinian Targum reads, "Pethor, a name
signifying an interpreter of dreams, " Etheridge, Targum of Palestine, II, 418.
3 So Hengstenberg, History of Balaam, p. 364; Robbins, "Balaam,"
p. 351. Keil, however, regarded the equation as "more than doubtful."
Cf., The Pentateuch, III, 165.
155
One may now say with some confidence, however, that the Hebrew word
rOtP; refers to Pitru [Pi-it-ru] of the Assyrian texts, a city located on
the river Sagur, near its junction with the Euphrates.1 This identification
seems to have been made first by Eberhard Schrader in the 1870's.2 Pitru
is mentioned by Shalmaneser III (ca. 859-824 B. C.)3 in the annalistic report
of 853 B. C.4 This is the report which concerns the highly significant battle
at Qarqar between Assyria and the Syro-Palestinian coalition (which included
Ahab of Israel).5
In this text Shalmaneser III states:
I crossed the Euphrates another time at its flood on rafts (made
buoyant by means) of (inflated) goatskins. In Ina-Ashur-utir-asbat,
1 Harrison, Introduction, p. 620. Noth says that Pethor "can
scarcely be anything other than Pitru," Numbers, p. 173.
2 So William Dellar Jaggers, "The Nature of the Balaam Oracles"
(unpublished master's thesis, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1955),
p. 30. Reference is made to Eberhard Schrader, Die Keilinschriften and das
Alto Testament. Cf. Michael Heilprin, The Historical Poetry of the Ancient
Hebrews (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1879). Consult also, E.
H. Plumptre, "Assyrian and Babylonian Inscriptions in Their Bearing on Old
Testament History. IX. Balaam the Son of Beor, " Expos., 2d series, 1
1881), 445-46.
3These dates are given by D. J. Wiseman in his article,
"Assyria," NBD, pp. 100--106.
4 The text is dated in the year of the eponym Daian-Ashur. A
full list of the Assyrian eponyms may he found in Edwin R Thiele, The
Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings (rev. ed.; Grand Rapids: William
B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1965), pp. 209-14.
5 See John Bright, A History of Israel (2d ed.; Philadelphia:
The Westminster Press, 1972), pp. 239--40; Bruce K. Waltke, "History of
Israel" (unpublished class notes, Old Testament 254, Dallas Theological
Seminary, 1967), p. 65.
156
which he people of Hattina call Pitru, on the other side of the
Euphrates, on the river Sagur, I received tribute from the kings of
the other side of the Euphrates , . . 1 [ Emphasis added ]
The Meaning of the Phrase: "The Land of the Sons of His People"
A second phrase in Numbers 22:5 relative to the home of Balaam
seems to add little to the verse as it is usually translated, "the land of the
sons of his people." This is an old rendering, however, as may be seen
by comparing the Hebrew words vmf-ynb as they were translated in
the LXX gh?j ui[w?n laou? au]tou?. Robbins attempted to explain these words
as "probably added merely to designate Balaam as a native Aramaean, which
renders his blessing of the Israelites more unexpected and wonderful, than
if he had dwelt. farther west, or had been in any way connected with the
Israelites."2 It seems somewhat difficult, however, to sustain the force
1 ANET, p. 278. Baly and Tushingham locate Pitru as "perhaps
Tell Ahmar," a site near the Euphrates, about twelve miles south of Car-
chernish. Denis Baly and A. D. Tushingham, Atlas of the Biblical World
(New York: The World Publishing Company, 1971), p. 205; cf. p. 103,
map 16. See also the photograph of the area in WB, I, 226, where the
Assyrian riame Pith: was given in the text quoted above is translated: "to
the god Ashur I gave back I have taken (the city)." Pethor/Pitru is not
located by Yohanan Aharoni and Michael Avi-Yonah, The Macmillan Bible
Atlas (New York: The Macmillan Company; London: Collier-Macmillan,
Ltd., 1968), p. 81, map 127.
2 Robbins, "Balaam, " p. 352; compare Henstenberg: "The
addition, 'the land of the children of his people, 'should remind us that
Balaam dwelt in Aram not perhaps after the manner of Jacob, but rather was
an Aremeen by birth and descent." "Balaam," p. 365. Sutcliffe also gives
a similar argument: these words "are not otiose, but give additional infor-
mation.” See E. P. Sutcliffe, "A Note on Numbers XXII,” Biblica, XVIII
157
of this argument.1
It would appear that some of the ancient versions had difficulty
with this phrase, so interpreted. Both the Vulgate and the Peshitta read
Nvmf instead of vmf, reading "the land of the children of Ammon." Such
an interpretation only compounds our problem, however, for it leads to a
conflict of ancestry: Ammonite versus Aramaean.
Writing in 1922 E. E. Kellett expressed hope concerning a
new approach in which the word vmf was taken as a proper name:
In Sayce's Hittites, p. 22, the vmf of Nu 22 5 is treated as a
proper name, equivalent to the cAmma of the mountains: a city in
the neighborhood of Pethor. I should be glad to know if this identi-
fication commends itself to scholars; to translate vmf, as 'his
people,' seems unsatisfactory.2
One may now cite information given by Albright in 1950 which
he regarded as of "the greatest interest to students of the Mosaic tradition."3
(1937), 441; cf. also his earlier study, "De unitate litteraria Num. XXII,”
Biblica, VII (1926), 15-18. Burrows (wrongly!) relates the phrase to Balak
and not to Balaam. Eric Burrows, The Oracles of Jacob and Balaam, "The
Bellarmine Series," III, ed. Edmund F. Sutcliffe (London: Burns Oates &
Washbourne, Ltd., 1938), p. 78, n. 1.
1 Yahuda speaks off the translation in rather negative terms:
"It is obvious that this translation is a makeshift which does not make
sense, besides being grammatically impossible, for rhnh (with the article;)
cannot he in the construct case. " A. S. Yahuda, "The Name of Balaam's
Homeland, " JBL, LXIV (1945), 547.
2 E. E. Kellett, "Some Old Testament Notes and Queries, "
ET, XXXIII (1921-22), 426.
3 William Foxwell Albricriht, "Some Important Recent Discoveries:
Alphabetic Origins and the Idrimi Statue, " BASOR, CVIII (April, 1950), 15, n.
13.
158
This concerns his translation of the Idrimi Inscription, an inscription on a
statue of king Idrimi of Alalakh, whose reign Albright dates ca. 1480-1450
B. C.1 The statue was discovered by Sir Leonard Woolley in 1939 at Tell
Atshanah, near the bend of the Orontes River, east of Antioch.2 Albright
observes that Idrimi was king of Alalakh and also reigned over the lands of
Mukishkhe, Ni', and cAmau. Concerning this last location, Albright states:
At the last moment I find the obviously correct identification of
cAmau with the biblical land of cMW in Num. 22:5, where the
diviner Balaam . . . is said to come from "PTR on the River in the
land of the children . . . of cMW." Since the LXX, going back to
a Hebrew prototype of the fourth century or even earlier, had the
same consonantal text before them, it is quite unnecessary to emend
cMW to cAmmon or (with me in 1915) cEden (where Pitru was situated
in the ninth century B. C. ). Since Balaam's contacts with Israel
may safely be dated about 1250 B. C., only about 200 years after
Idrimi, the name of the land in question would be expected to
persist. cAmau would then be the region of the Sajur Valley between
Aleppo and Carchemish. This location rounds out the territory of
Idrimi in the happiest way. Needless to say, this discovery is of
the greatest interest to students of the Mosaic tradition.3
l Ibid., p. 19.
2 See now the recently published translation by A. Leo Oppen-
heim, ANES, pp. 557-58.
3 Albright, "Idrimi Statue," p. 15, n, 13. The reference to his
view of 1915 is to be found in his article, "The Home of Balaam," JAOS,
XXXV (1915), 389. It should be noted that Oppenheim normalizes cAmau
as Ama'e, but with no explanation, ANES, p. 557. Curiously, Albright
does not mention in his 1950 article that Yahuda in 1945 had identified
vmf of Numbers 22:5 as the proper noun cAmu, an Egyptian designation for
Aramaeans. Yahuda gave a number of references to Egyptian literature.
Yahuda, "The Name of Balaam's Homeland," pp. 547-51.
For later notes by Albright on the identification of vmf with
cAmau, cf. "The Old Testament and the Archaeology of the Ancient East, "
159
To the present writer, the translation of Hebrew vmf as a
Proper place name in Northern Syria, cAmau, seems to be quite satisfactory.
it would appear that this word is an example of a rare instance in which the
ancient word was not known to the later Jewish scholars, both in Alexandria
and among the later Massoretes. In both the LXX and the MT the word of
our text was preserved and interpreted, even though the original meaning
was lost. Albright's suggestion has been followed by Moriarty,1 Wiseman,2
and Beegle.3 It has been accepted by several new Bible translations,4 but
The Old Testament and Modern Study: A Generation of Discovery and Research,
ed. H. H. Rowley (Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1951), pp. 33--34; Yahweh
and the Gods of Canaan: A Historical Analysis of Two Contrasting Faiths
(Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1968), p. 15, n. 38. In
this last work Albright relates Hebrew vmf to Akkadian cAmau and Egyptian
cAmaw; again, with no reference to Yahuda.
1 Frederick L. Moriarty, "Numbers," The Jerome Bible Commentary,
ed. Raymond E. Brown, Joseph A. Fitzmyer and Roland E. Murphy (2 vols.,
bound as one; Englewood Cliffs, N. J. : Prentice-Hall, Inc. , 1968), I, 95.
2 D. J. Wiseman, "Alalakh," Archaeology and Old Testament
Study: Jubilee Volume of the Society for Old Testament Study, 1917-1967,
ed. D. Winton Thomas (Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1967), pp. 121-22.
3 Having noted the Shalmaneser and the Idrimi evidence, Beegle
states that "an inscription from the time of Amenophis II (about 1435-1420
B. C,) tells of Pharaoh capturing a Syrian land named 'Amaw. ' The two
fifteenth-century inscriptions confirm that there was a province of Amaw
along the Euphrates, and the ninth-century text locates Pitru within that
area, " Dewey M. Beegle, Moses, The Servant of Yahweh (Grand Rapids:
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1972), pp. 320-21.
4 R S. V., "in the land of Amaw; " N. E. B., "in the land of the
Amavites;" S. B. J. "au pays des fits d'Ammav;" J. B., "in the land of the
sons of Amaw.
160
rejected by others.1
The present writer would also observe that if the events of our
narrative are placed within the framework of the "early" dates for the Exodus
(ca., 145 B. C.) and Conquest (ca. 1405 B. C.), the expectation of the name
persisting for 200 years (until ca. 1250 B. C.), is made unnecessary. In fact,
one may say that the citations in Egyptian, Akkadian, and Hebrew literature
all date from the same century.
Hence, we suggest that the translation of Numbers 22:5, which
relates to the origin of Balaam, read as follows:
So he sent messengers to Balaam the son of Beor,
at Pethor, which is near the River [Euphrates],
in the land of the sons of Amau.
Balaam is a North-Syrian from the northern Euphrates valley, near the Haran
of the patriarchal stories.3
1 Torah, "in the land of his kinfolk;" N. A. S. B. , "in the land
of the sons of his people." Noth and his translator seem to be unaware of
Albright's discussion. Noth translates, "the land of his fellow country-
men. " James D. Martin, his translator, adds: "The RSV with no apparent
justification, has 'the land of Amaw'. " Noth, Numbers, p. 173, and note.
2 This is suggested by Albright; cf. his quotation on p. 158,
above.
3 The mention of "Haran" is not to be taken as justification for
the view expressed in the Talmud [ Sanhedrin 105a ] that Balaam is to be
equated with Laban (!); nor does it lend credence to the view that Balaam
might be a descendant of Laban, as was suggested by Andrew Fuller, Ex-
pository Discourses on the Book of Genesis, Interspersed with Practical
Reflections, The Complete Works of the Rev. Andrew Fuller. With a Memoir
of His Life by Andrew Gunton Fuller, ed. Joseph Blecher (3 vols; Philadelphia:
American Baptist Publication Society, 1845), III, 128-29.
161
Moreover, Balaam's introductory bicola in his first oracle agrees
with this view, though there the statement is more general:
From Aram, Balak has brought me,
Moab's king front the mountains of the east.
[Num. 23:7a]
The term Aram in this verse is expanded in Deuteronomy 23:5 [Eng. v. 4] to
Aram of the Two Rivers [MyirahEna MraxE], i. e., Mesopotamia. The phrase,
“The mountains of the east" in Numbers 23:7a [ Md,q,-yrer;hame] has been
pressed by Yahuda to mean an explicit reference to a location in Northeast
Syria, as in the Story of Si-Nuhe.1 However, in both the text of Numbers and
the story of the Egyptian, Si-Nuhe, the term seems best taken as a general
reference to Northeast Syria.2
It may be added that an entirely different approach has been
taken by L. Yaure in an article written in 1960.3 He states that the term
hrvtp should not be read as a place name with a directive ending, but as
l He compares the construction of Genesis 29:1, and finds the
two in perfect accord, "where Qedem is on the way to Haran." Yahuda, "The
Name of Balaam's Homeland," pp. 549-50. A translation of the Egyptian
text which describes the travels of an Egyptian official of the mid-twentieth
century B.C. [Middle Kingdom], may be found in ANET, pp. 1 8-22,
2 The translator of the Story of Si-Nuhe in ANET, John A. Wilson,
states that Qedem is "Semitic for 'the East' generally. A vague term, either
in the writer’s ignorance of Asiatic geography or intentionally vague for a
area." ANET, p. 19, n. 10.
3 L. Yayre, "Elymas--Nehelamite--Pethor," JBL LXXIX (Decem-
ber, 1960), 297-314.
162
an Aramaic nomen agentis meaning the interpreter." His reasons include the
following considerations: (1) the geographical distance demanded by a location
of Pethor on the upper Euphrates of some 400 miles is too far for the repeated
trips demanded by the story; (2) the ancient versions understood the term as
a title rather than a city name;1 (3) the Jerusalem Targum agrees with the
ancient versions;2 and (4) the title, "the interpreter" fits the character of
Balaam.
There are elements in this thesis that are attractive, but there
seem to be problems that outweigh them. Yaure seems to be alone among
moderns to argue that "Pethor" is not a location. Indeed, Noth regards this
word as "the only factual information" concerning the origin of Balaam that
we have.3 More important, however, than the charge of being "alone," is the
observation that in presenting his thesis, Yaure has had to dismiss the testimony
of Deuteronomy 23:5 [Eng. v. 4].4 Moreover, he in fact dismisses what he
l He cites the Vulgate and the Peshitta, mentioned above in the
present paper, p. 154. Yaure explains the LXX word phathoura to be a phonetic
transliteration of the Aramaic pathorah, which he takes to be an epithet; ibid.,
p. 311.
2 "He sent messengers to Laban the Aramean who is Balaam; . . .
his place of residence is in Padan which is Pethor, so called after his name
pathor helmaiia." Here Yaure says the term "Pethor" is explained as an
epithet, ibid., p. 312.
3 Noth, Numbers, p. 173.
4 He speaks of the Deuteronomist as specifically stating, and
sanctioning, what Yaure regards to be an error. Yaure, "Elymas--Nehe-
lamite—Patheor.” p. 310.
163
has taken to be the intended meaning of Numbers 23:5:
So far as our traditional text is concerned, it is evident that
its writer--be he the original author or, more probably, a later reviser—
understood the "pethorah" as a Hebrew locative indicating that Balaam
wars a resident of the city called Pethor.1
Hence, Yaure rejects internal biblical evidence both from the
primary passage (Num. 22:7) and from latter references (e.g. Deut, 23:5
[Eng. v. 4]). His emending the Hebrew text on the basis of the versions is
precarious procedure on methodological grounds. It would be a better approach
to regard the versional evidence as suspect due to the translators' difficulty
with the place name Pethor which they did not recognize.
Summary
In the light of present evidence we may summarize that Balaam
was from Northern Syria, from a city called Pethor (Pitru), and an area called
Amau. He is thus from the upper Euphrates valley. He is not Israelite, Edom-
ite, Moabite, Ammonite, Musrite, Hittite; but Aramaean.
The Character and Role of Balaam
Introduction
The issue of the character of Balaam is replete with problems
and the views are multifarious. How are we to understand this figure whom
l Ibid.
164
one writer has termed "a monstrosity of prophecy"?1 The question concerning
the character and role of Balaam is not a new question, but has been a matter
of debate for centuries. Hengstenberg surveys the issue by listing a number
of writers in opposing camps. He lists as supporters of the position that
Balaam is to be regarded as a false prophet the following: Philo, Ambrose,
Augustine, Gregory of Nyssa, Theodoret, and many Roman and Reformed theo-
logians. Conversely, he lists those figures who have regarded Balaam as a
true prophet to include: Tertullian, Jerome, Buddeus, Deyling, and Benzel.2
The difficulty in assessing the role of Balaam in our narrative
is of such massive proportion, that Bishop Butler regarded Balaam with aston-
ishcd incredulity. He writes:
So that the object we have now before us is the most astonishing
in the world: a very wicked man, under a deep sense of God and
religion, persisting still in his wickedness, and preferring the wages
of unrighteousness, even when he had before him a lively view of
death, . . . Good God, what inconsistency, what perplexity is here.3
A more modern expression of the difficulty was uttered by Vriezen. Vriezen
1 A. B. Davidson, Old Testament Prophet , ed. J. A Paterson
(Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1903), p. 10; cited by William Deller Jaggers,
"The Nature of the Balaam Oracles" (unpublished master's thesis, Southern
Baptist Theological Seminary, 1955), p. 35.
2 Hengstenberg, The History of Balaam, pp. 340-41.
3 Joseph Butler, "Upon the Character of Balaam," The Works of
the Right Reverend Father in God, Joseph Butler, D. C. L. , Late Lord Bishop
of Durham, (2 vols.; Oxford: At the University Press, 1850), II, 80.
165
regards Balaam as a "singular personality, " but who finds it "difficult to give
any real shape to his person."1
Balaam has been called a prophet of Baal,2 a clairvoyant,3
a man of “deep insight into the mysteries of life,"4 an ecstatic,5 and even
an early example of a "dervish."6 Our problem becomes more complex when
1 Th. C. Vriezen, The Religion of Ancient Israel, trans. by
Hubert Hoskins (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1967), pp. 208-209.
2 A suggestion made by Vriezen, ibid., p. 208, n. 20.
3 Cf. Walther Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament, trans.
by J. A. Baker, "The Old Testament Library," ed. G. Ernest Wright, et al.
(2 vols,; Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1961, 1967), I, 296. This
was also the opinion of von Orelli: "Balaam is rather an example of a clair-
voyant. . . . Here by outward incitements the physico-mental torpor is in-
duced, which makes a man the channel of words, whose meaning he himself
does not know." C. von Orelli, Old Testament Prophecy (Edinburgh: T. & T.
Chu k, 1892), p. 17.
4 Alexander R. Gordon, The Prophets of the Old Testament (New
York: George H. Doran Company, 1916), p. 16.
5 "Der erste im AT geschilderte ekstatische Prophet ist Bileam."
A F. Puuko, "Ekstatischc Propheten mit besonderer Reruksichtigung der
finnish-ugrischen Parallelen," ZAW, LX.III (1935), 23. For an evaluation of
ecstasy in the prophets of Israel, see Leon J. Wood, "Ecstasy and Israel's
Early Prophets,” BETS, IX (Summer, 1966), 125-38; Hobart E. Freeman, An
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