24:20 Then Balaam 1 looked on Amalek and delivered this oracle: 2
“Amalek was the first 3 of the nations,
but his end will be that he will perish.”
24:1 4 When Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, 5 he did not go as at the other times 6 to seek for omens, 7 but he set his face 8 toward the wilderness.
27:8 Then David and his men went up and raided the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites. (They had been living in that land for a long time, from the approach 9 to Shur as far as the land of Egypt.)
1 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Balaam) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
2 tn Heb “and he lifted up his oracle and said.” So also in vv. 21, 23.
3 sn This probably means that it held first place, or it thought that it was “the first of the nations.” It was not the first, either in order or greatness.
4 sn For a thorough study of the arrangement of this passage, see E. B. Smick, “A Study of the Structure of the Third Balaam Oracle,” The Law and the Prophets, 242-52. He sees the oracle as having an introductory strophe (vv. 3, 4), followed by two stanzas (vv. 5, 6) that introduce the body (vv. 7b-9b) before the final benediction (v. 9b).
5 tn Heb “it was good in the eyes of the
6 tn Heb “as time after time.”
7 tn The word נְחָשִׁים (nÿkhashim) means “omens,” or possibly “auguries.” Balaam is not even making a pretense now of looking for such things, because they are not going to work. God has overruled them.
8 tn The idiom signifies that he had a determination and resolution to look out over where the Israelites were, so that he could appreciate more their presence and use that as the basis for his expressing of the oracle.
9 tn Heb “from where you come.”