1
”And God met Balaam, And God came to Balaam’.
2
He replied: A king was once sitting on his throne in his palace when a leper came to the gate. Who is knocking at the gate? he asked. They said: A certain leper. He said: He must not enter here and defile the palace. I know that if I tell this to a messenger he will take no notice, and my son will come in and be defiled by contact with him. I will therefore go and threaten him so that he shall go away from the abode of my son and not defile him. So the king got up and went to him and threatened him, saying: Leper, leper, keep away from the path of my son, and if not I will tell the sons of my handmaidens to cut you in pieces.
3
Then the friend of the king called at the door. Who is it? said the king. They replied: Your friend, So-and-so. He said: It is my friend, the beloved of my soul; no other voice shall call him in save mine. The king then cried out saying: Enter, beloved of my soul, my own friend; prepare the palace that I may converse with him.
4
So when Balaam, who was rejected of men like a leper, called at the gate of the King, the latter, on hearing, said: The unclean leper shall not enter and defile my palace. It is necessary for me to go and threaten him so that he shall not approach the gate of my son and not defile him. Therefore it says, “God came to Balaam”. He said to him: Leper, leper, “thou shalt not go with them, thou shalt not curse the people for he is blessed”. You shall not come near my people either for good or for evil, being wholly unclean. But of Moses it is written, “He called unto Moses”, with the voice of the King and not through a messenger, “from the tent of meeting”, from the holy palace which higher and lower angels desire to approach but are not allowed.
5
BALAK SON OF ZIPPOR KING OF MOAB. Above (v. 4) Balak was called “king to Moab”, to show that he was only appointed king for the emergency, not like “the first king of Moab” (Num. 21, 26), who was an hereditary monarch. Balaam, however, out of his pride called him “king of Moab”, as if to say: See how great a king sends to me!