על חיי משה, ספר א נ״אOn the Life of Moses, Book I 51
א׳
1[280] Balak suffered tortures inwardly as he listened to these words, and, when the speaker ceased, he could not contain his passion. “Are you not ashamed,” he cried, “that, summoned to curse the enemy, you have prayed for them? It seems that all unconsciously I was deceiving myself in treating you as a friend, who were secretly ranged on the side of the enemy, as has now become plain. Doubtless also your delay in coming here was due to your secretly harbouring a feeling of attachment to them and aversion for me and mine. For, as the old saying goes, the certain proves the uncertain.”
ב׳
2[281] The other, now liberated from the possession, replied: “I suffer under a most unjust charge and calumny, for I say nothing that is my own, but only what is prompted by God, and this I do not say or you hear now for the first time, but I said it before when you sent the ambassadors to whom I gave the same answer.”
ג׳
3[282] But the king, thinking either to deceive the seer or to move the Deity and draw Him from His firm purpose by a change of place, led the way to another spot, and from an exceedingly high hill shewed the seer a part of the enemy’s host. Then again he set up seven altars, and, after sacrificing the same number of victims as before, sent him away to seek good omens through birds or voices.
ד׳
4[283] In this solitude, he was suddenly possessed, and, understanding nothing, his reason as it were roaming, uttered these prophetic words which were put into his mouth. “Arise, O King, and listen. Lend me a ready ear. God cannot be deceived as a man, nor as the son of man does He repent or fail to abide by what He has once said. He will utter nothing at all which shall not certainly be performed, for His word is His deed. As for me, I was summoned to bless, not to curse.
ה׳
5[284] There shall be no trouble or labour among the Hebrews. Their God is their shield for all to see, He Who also scattered the fierce onset of the ills of Egypt, and brought up all these myriads as a single man. Therefore, they care nothing for omens and all the lore of the soothsayer, because they trust in One Who is the ruler of the world. I see the people rising up as a lion’s cub, and exulting as a lion. He shall feast upon the prey, and take for his drink the blood of the wounded, and, when he has had his fill, he shall not betake himself to slumber, but unsleeping sing the song of the victorious.”