The Story of Balaam.

"A Drama of the Ruin of Conscience.” 
(I am indebted to Canon Liddon, J. N. Darby, and other writers, for some of the thoughts in this paper.)
Balaam, the son of Beor of Pethor, a native of Aram on the banks of the Euphrates, is one of the most mysterious characters brought before us in the Scriptures of ancient Israel.
Though this Mesopotomanian lived thousands of years ago, under social, political and religious conditions differing from our own, the record of his character has valuable lessons to teach us. For, after all, essential human nature has not changed. Its elemental passions, its temptations, joys and sorrows are the same. The top-soil have undergone some changes, but the bed-rock underneath is what it was thousands of years ago.
Balaam was one of the most extraordinary characters that have ever appeared amidst the kaleidoscopic changes of human history. The unique nature of his gifts made him a very eminent man in his age, a fascinating subject for the recorder's pen. Endowed with political sagacity, he was a close observer of contemporary events. He took a keen interest in the future of the neighboring peoples, the great monarchies of Central Asia. He even took in the significance of the coming of the navies of the Western powers to contribute their share towards the settlement of the everlasting Eastern question. If Balaam lived today—even if he were not a member of any cabinet of state—he would certainly have to be consulted in any matter of grave moment affecting the happiness and political fortunes of his country.
Another thing we have to consider; Balaam, though not a member of the chosen race of Israel, was in possession of a great fundamental truth. Living in the midst of polytheistic cults, he believed in the One God. It is true, he held his belief inconsistently. But in spite of the fact that he tried to combine with it the practices of the pagan spiritualism, he held to his monotheistic faith as the pivot of all his religious thinking. But that which appealed to the mind of Balaam more than anything else was the phenomenon of Israel, and for that reason, he has a place in the Hebrew Scriptures. He made no mistake in his reading, the significance of the arising of this young virile nation, which had for its choicest treasure the deposit of the faith and traditions of the patriarchs. Balaam knew of the divine promises that were to be fulfilled in and through their seed. In his judgment, Israel was the nation of destiny.
But not only was Balaam endowed with remarkable insight above many—he was also in possession of the mysterious gift of prophecy. He foresaw the coming of the Messiah, the Star that was to come out of Jacob and the Sceptre that was to arise out of Israel. His eyes filled with light from on high, pierced the vail of the unborn future, and he described under figures of poetical elevation, the setting up of His spiritual kingdom. No wonder that the destinies of the nation which was called into existence to give Him to the world should have afforded Balaam such an absorbing theme of investigation.
That God should go outside the fold of Israel for channels of inspiration need not surprise us. Only a narrow theology would confine Him to the institutions of His own creation. The scriptures abound with instances of the universality of spiritual operations. Melchizedek of Jerusalem, when it was the stronghold of the Jebusites, stood in priestly relations with the most-high God, and Abram gave him the honor of the tithes and bowed his head under his priestly benediction. Job knew nothing of Israel and yet there was none like him on the earth for piety towards God and the deepest questions of religious philosophy are discussed in his book. The doctrine of the divine sovereignty has been wrongly applied by those who have interpreted it in an exclusive sense. Properly understood, it reaches the Divine right to chose whom He will—even Gentiles outside the covenants of promise, as Paul argued in the dispensational parenthesis of Rom. ix-xi.
But Balak, the king of Moab, merely regarded Balaam as a very powerful wizard, whom he could use as a weapon of offense against Israel, the young nation of which he was genuinely afraid. He shared the common belief of his time that a curse, especially if it came from the lips of one who has great influence with the Deity, possesses a malign power. He had not the viewpoint of one who regards religion from the inside. Statesmen are apt to make a cynical use of the religious instincts of the people for their own ambitious designs. History furnishes numberless examples of this. Religion, whether true or false, has been made the ally of politics and statecraft. It is the result of looking at it only from the outside. Jeroboam, after his separation from the southern kingdom, made this mistake when he as a matter of political prudence, established the calf-worship at Bethel and Dan, to prevent his people going to Jerusalem to the national secretary of the undivided kingdom. Thus, the way was opened for worse evils, and he even afterwards had a tag attached to his name as the man "who caused Israel to sin."
Balak was exceedingly anxious to enlist the assistance of a man with the international reputation of Balaam. He endeavored to persuade him to make use of his occult powers against the people which he regarded as a military menace. He sent a deputation to his distant home with the Oriental bribes of divination in their hands. The effort ended in failure. He tried again, sending a more influential deputation made up of the friends of Moab and Midian, charged to make most flattering proposals. He evidently thought Balaam was only bargaining for a bigger fee. He was sufficient man of the world to hold the cynical doctrine that every man has his price. This time, Balaam only consented to accompany the Moabite and Midianite princes back to their land without committing himself to do the bidding of Balak to curse Israel.
The whole transaction opens a window into the real character of this man. It is a subject which has often been the theme of discussion. The early church devoted a good deal of attention to it and appears to have been divided into two camps of opinion. St. Augustine, for instance, regarded Balaam as a thoroughly bad man, a prophet of the devil, compelled by God to utter truths against his will. St. Jerome, on the other hand, held a somewhat different theory. He believed Balaam to have been at heart, a good man, a true prophet, but one who fell through allowing himself to be hypnotised by the temptations of avarice and worldly ambition.
The probability is that the truth lies somewhere between these two extremes. He appears to me to have been all along a man of mixed strands in his inner life. He had a certain knowledge of the one God and a clear sense of his duty based on this knowledge. He knew enough of God not to wish to trifle with Him. He would not have gone with the ambassadors of Balak without the Divine permission obtained in answer to prayer. But see how he acts. After receiving a plain command not to entertain the tempting offer of his royal client, he goes and prays about it again, as if it were still an open question. And behold, the awful result: God answered him according to the secret desire of his heart.
Let it ever be borne in mind that there is such a thing as the creation of a false conscience. We may wish for a certain thing to be our duty until we actually persuade ourselves into the certainty that it is our duty. Instead of at once acting on light when it comes and of doing the right when we know it, we pray for further light and knowledge of what is required of us and thus we can get into such a confused state of mind that we lose our discernment between the right and the wrong. The right which our better judgment has approved of, but from which we would like to be excused because of the worldly loss obedience to it entails, comes to be supplanted by the wrong which we secretly love. And in this manner, Balaam tricked his conscience. Let me cite the words of another: 
"There are two opposite motives which sway men. Some will give gold to be admired and wondered at, others will barter honors to get gold. In Balaam, the two are blended. We see the desire at once for honor and for wealth; wealth, perhaps, as being another means of insuring reputation. And so we have seen many begin and end in our own day—begin with a high-minded courage which flatters none; speaking truth, even unpalatable truth. But when this advocacy of truth brings, as it brought to Balaam, men to consult them, and they rise in the world and become men of consideration, then by degrees, the tone of truth is superseded and passes into a tone of influence. Or they begin with a generous indifference to wealth—simple, austere; by degrees they find the society of the rich leading them from extravagance, till at last, high intellectual and spiritual powers become the servile instruments of appropriating gold. The world sees the sad spectacle of the man of science and the man of God waiting at the doors of princes or cringing before the public for promotion and admiration." (F. W. Robertson)
Let us look at the final results. The mouthpiece of some of the most majestic prophecies in the whole range of the ancient Scriptures (see Micah vi.) ended by suggesting to Balak that a hideous temptation to iniquity should be placed in the way of a nation whom he could not curse because of its acknowledged moral superiority. He knew no enchantment prevailed against Jacob and no divination against Israel as long as that nation held fast to its integrity. But once get them into sin, Balaam using his very knowledge of the moral and ethical elevation of the God of Israel over the licentious rites of the pagan world of his time, he was persuaded the Divine favor would be withdrawn from them and they would become weak as other men. So reckoned the prophet and applying his very knowledge of God to the service of the devil, he taught Balak his vile secret. The 25th of Numbers shews how nearly his infernal artifice succeeded. The situation was saved by the zeal of Phineas, the grandson of Aaron, who publicly vindicated and re-established the holiness of the character of Jehovah before the eyes of all in the hour of national peril. But the greatness of the crime and the depth of the fall, on the part of the people, dwelt in the memory of successive generations, for even after hundreds of years, we find Hosea reminding his contemporaries how God found Israel:—
"Like grapes in the wilderness,
Like the first ripe figs in spring;
But they went to Baal-peor,
They consecrated themselves to that shameful idol,
And became abominations like their love." —Hosea 9: 10.
In Ps. 106: 28, it is said: "They joined themselves unto Baal-peor and ate the sacrifices of the dead"—that is, of dead idols, as contrasted with the Living God. As for Baalam, he died in battle fighting against the very cause, the final victory and supremacy of which he had at the cost of great personal sacrifice proclaimed as certain. 
I close with a few serious considerations which we may justly draw from the study of the subject of this paper.
1. The ministration of the most exalted truths may be altogether independent of the personal character of the minister. Our Lord foresaw a day on which many would hear from His lips: "Depart from Me, I never knew you!" even though they might protest "We have prophesied in Thy name, and in Thy name, done many mighty and wonderful works." Communion with Christ in a true life is worth more for the Kingdom of God than the most brilliant exploits in the way of public ministry.
2. It is possible for a man to make great sacrifices for Truth and to be at heart disloyal to it. We can easily imagine how Balaam congratulated himself on his return from Moab that he had been faithful to his light and refused to curse Israel at Balak's bidding; that he had preserved his reputation as a man of principle, seeing that compromise would have promoted him to high honor. But in the eye of heaven, greed was in his heart all the time. He still hoped against hope that somehow a via media would be found. He wanted to please himself without displeasing God. To keep on good terms with the God of Israel and with the King of Moab at the same time was his real object. He knew God would not curse the good, and so he schemed to make Israel wicked, to bring the curse on them. He would not transgress a rule yet did not scruple to violate a principle.
3. The desire for personal salvation in heaven is not religion. It is one thing to wish to be saved, and another thing to have a passion for the triumph of the Will of God. Balaam said: "Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last bed be like his,” but he died as one of the enemies of the Lord. It is one thing to desire a happy death and another to hunger and thirst for a holy life.
And now what is the Remedy, for the same temptation is with us also? It is so to apprehend the Divine revelation to man that the heart will love God. Balaam knew much about God but did not love Him. If he had loved Him, he would not merely have acquiesced in the Divine will, he would have adored it, would have delighted in it. He would not have prayed the second time about a settled matter. He would have said as the Blessed Son of Man said in His day: "My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me and to finish His work." The doing of that will involved the Cross and the pathway of rejection leading to it. But the perfect Servant said: "I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. I gave my back to the smiters and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair and hid not my face from shame and spitting."  But for all who will follow in His footsteps, it will be found true at last, that "the world passeth away with the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God, abideth forever. " M. I. Reich.
“The Hebrew Christian Alliance Quarterly” 1921