The story of Balaam and Balak is one wild ride, filled with ego, failed magic, and a divine sense of humor.
According to Legends of the Jews, when Balaam finally made his way to the border of Moab, he sent word to Balak, the king, announcing his grand arrival. Balak, eager to meet the prophet who could supposedly curse Israel, went out to greet him.
Now, Balak wasn't exactly rolling out the welcome wagon with open arms. Instead, he immediately started complaining! Pointing to the boundary lines, he accused Israel of violating ancient agreements set way back in Noah's time, agreements meant to keep nations from encroaching on each other's territory. He brought up the examples of Sihon and Og, two kings whose lands Israel had entered.
Then, dripping with sarcasm (or so we imagine), Balak greeted Balaam with: "Did I not twice send unto thee to call thee? Wherefore camest not thou unto me? Am I not able indeed to promote thee to honor?" Funny enough, as the story goes, Balak was actually prophesying his own future! He thought he was going to heap glory upon Balaam, but, in reality, Balaam would leave in disgrace, unable to fulfill Balak's wicked wish.
Now, any decent person (or, frankly, any prophet who actually cared about helping someone) would have told Balak that trying to curse an entire nation was a terrible idea, a path to ruin. But Balaam? Oh no. Balaam was all about boosting his own reputation. According to Ginzberg's retelling in Legends of the Jews, he bragged about being the last prophet among the heathens.
And here's where it gets really interesting.
Balaam, puffing out his chest, offered Balak this bit of advice: "The ancestor of that nation erected to God an altar upon which, thrice annually, he offered up seven oxen and seven rams; do thou, then, erect seven altars, and offer up on each seven oxens and seven rams." In other words, try to out-sacrifice them! Mimic their rituals, but do it bigger and better.
Can you imagine the scene? Balaam, the self-proclaimed last prophet, convinced he could manipulate God with sheer volume of burnt offerings.
Well, God, as the story goes, wasn't impressed. In fact, according to Midrash Rabbah, God basically laughed. He thought, "Every beast of the forest is Mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills. I know all the fowls of the mountains: and the wild beasts of the field are Mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is Mine, and the fullness thereof. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats?"
Ouch.
It's a pretty cutting rebuke. The idea that God, the creator of everything, could be swayed by animal sacrifices? It’s almost…insulting.
So, what do we take away from this bizarre encounter between a power-hungry king and a boastful prophet? Maybe it's a reminder that true power isn't about curses or sacrifices, but about something far deeper. And maybe, just maybe, that the divine has a pretty good sense of humor.