What Jesus' Brother Jude Wanted Us to Know | Verse 11, Part 4 | The Error of Balaam
The second historical example that Jude gives to show the timeless characteristics and tendencies that all false teachers have is that of the godless, false-prophet, Balaam. Balaam was a prophet for hire in the days of the Israelites. If you wanted him to pronounce some kind of blessing, then you simply pay for the blessing. If you needed him to curse someone, then you pay for the curse. The success rate of said pronouncements, demonic activity notwithstanding, were a matter of superstitious gullibility.
Jude was not the only one to use this particular example. Balaam was also mentioned by the Apostle Peter. If you’ve been staying up to date with this series you will have seen how Jude continues to play off of Peter’s second epistle as Jude gives his own timely warning for what Peter had said before.
Peter never used Cain as an example like Jude did, but he most certainly referenced Balaam and had this to say about him and his spiritual progeny:
“They have hearts trained in greed. Accursed children! Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray. They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing, but was rebuked for his own transgression; a speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet's madness” (2 Pet 2:14–16).
Yes, this is the prophet that we all learned about in Sunday school who had to be rebuked by his beast of burden, yet there is much, much more to the story behind this man.
Jude, likewise, says, "Woe to them! For they . . . abandoned themselves for the sake of gain to Balaam's error." | Jude 11
So what exactly happened with Balaam that has caused him to be one of the three preeminent examples of false religion for all time? He is first introduced in the book of Numbers, the fourth book of the Pentateuch, or Torah.
The background, here, is that Israel is working their way closer to the promised land and already beginning the process of cleaning Canaanite house as God had directed them. In chapter 21, Israel destroys the nation of Arad in the Negeb, for starters (v. 3). Sihon, king of the Amorites, militarily rebuffed Israel, not allowing them to pass through Amorite land on their journey, resulting in their utter destruction as well (v. 24). Next, and further north, was King Og, ruler of Bashan, who also came out against Israel—their fate was the same and there was “no survivor left” (v. 35).
This takes us into chapter 22, where “the people of Israel set out and camped in the plains of Moab beyond the Jordan at Jericho. [They were not at Jericho, which is situated in the promised land itself, but they were across from it on the opposite side of the Jordan River]. And Balak the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. And Moab was in great dread of the people, because they were many. Moab was overcome with fear of the people of Israel (vv. 1–3).
So convinced of their demise was King Balak that he bemoaned of it to the Midianite elders: “This horde will now lick up all that is around us, as the ox licks up the grass of the field” (v. 4). Left to himself, he knew it would just be another day in another field for the massive ox, Israel.
Enter Balaam.
Balaam was sought out by King Balak as a response to his dilemma. He was apparently a well-known practitioner of divination who could be hired to bestow blessings, or pronounce curses, or perhaps give prophetic utterances. Much like people today pay fees for palm readers to give them hidden and mystical revelation, so did Balak send his elders “with the fees for divination in their hand” to purchase Balaam’s services (v. 7). His mission, should he choose to accept it, is to curse Israel.
As the account unfolds, Balaam actually hears from Yahweh who tells him not to go with Balak’s entourage as Israel is a blessed nation. Balaam listens—probably more of an acquiescence—and relays this to the elders who then leave and inform the king. Undeterred, Balak just sends a larger and more important entourage with an even more dazzling offer of honor and wealth, to which Balalam, interestingly, replies: “Though Balak were to give me his house full of silver and gold, I could not go beyond the command of the Lord my God to do less or more” (22:18) (emphasis mine).
Truth be told, Balaam is never once recognized in Scripture as being a child of God, so his reference to Yahweh as “the Lord my God” is not to be seen in a meaningful or salvific sense. It is best to understand this as his legitimate understanding of who he is communicating with and that he knows enough to acknowledge Yahweh as the true God who is sovereign over all people. It is also probably not a stretch to say that Balaam is seeking to establish his own legitimacy by claiming a personal connection to this God in front of his desperate clients. These details are important to keep in mind as we consider why Peter and Jude used this man as a preeminent example of the subtle teachers of heresy in the modern church.
Though Balaam knows full well that Israel is blessed and that his hands are tied, Scripture implies that he was drawn to the bounty that was promised in return for the fulfillment of this royal request. He asks for another night to sleep on it and God, again, communicates with him, but this time He says, “If the men have come to call you, rise, go with them; but only do what I tell you” (v. 20).
Here, the sovereignty of God and the responsibility of man are on full, harmonious display. Balaam is completely responsible for his greedy desire to chase wealth and notoriety, rather than truth, while God is completely in control of how Balaam’s sinful bent will be used. Balaam has evil intentions; God has holy ones—all in the same sequence of events. Ultimately, God’s will reigns supreme.
This explains why God was suddenly angry that Balaam did in fact get up in the morning and go with the princes of Moab. God was angry because of the greed in his heart, which is one of the very things that the Apostle Peter tied his indictment to: “[The false teachers] have hearts trained in greed. Accursed children! Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray. They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing” (2 Pet 2:14–15).
Ultimately, as chapters 23 and 24 of Numbers play out, Balaam is unable to do anything that Balak requests as he is under the direct order of Yahweh to bless Israel and, unfortunately for Balak, curse Moab instead. It is safe to say that truer words have not been spoken from the mouth of Balaam as when he was directed by the Lord of Heaven and Earth.
The activity of Balaam does not end here, though. Lest we be tempted to think that he was content to do God’s will and lose out on his once-in-a-lifetime false prophet jackpot, we are told of just how cunning and egregious and out-for-gain that Balaam really was.
In Numbers 25, we read: “The people began to whore with the daughters of Moab” (v. 1).
We need a quick refresher, here. God’s explicit warning through Moses in Exodus 34 was to never approach the inhabitants of the land and “take of their daughters for your sons, [lest] their daughters whore after their gods and make your sons whore after their gods” (v. 16).
Well, it happened.
“[The Moabites] invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods, and the people ate and bowed down to their gods. So Israel yoked himself to Baal of Peor. And the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel” (Num 25:2–3).
The result was that the chief offenders in Israel were killed first by the sword, but then there was a plague that God inflicted on Israel that started spreading until the last offender was killed. By the time this happened, verse nine tells us that 24,000 people died by the plague!
So how exactly did this come to be? Numbers 31 completes our understanding of this low point in Israel’s history.
The LORD instructed Israel to inflict God’s punishment on Midian for their wickedness that tempted Israel in the first place. They killed Balaam in the process who was apparently still in the vicinity. When the army of Israel returned with the plunder, Moses saw that they also kept—as if they forgot the very reason they got into trouble in the first place—the women!
Moses’ response?
“Have you let all the women live? Behold, these, on Balaam's advice, caused the people of Israel to act treacherously against the Lord in the incident of Peor, and so the plague came among the congregation of the Lord” (v. 15–16) (emphasis mine).
Did you catch that? Balaam had actually found another way to bring about God’s curses on Israel, which he could only have done with an accurate knowledge of Mosaic theology. We cannot miss this. Balaam was obviously knowledgeable of the Law of Moses, subtle in his scheme, and successful in his bringing about the moral downfall of a large part of the congregation of Israel.
So he couldn’t articulate a profitable curse against Israel? Fine, says he. He advises Balak to get the young women to seduce the Israelite men into sexually immoral relationships, leading ultimately to idolatrous activity in the face of Yahweh—the very activities that God said He would curse.
Balaam gets what he wanted the whole time—money. Yet, it ends up being at the expense of his own life.
It is precisely for these reasons that both Peter and Jude point to Balaam as the epitome of false teachers’ characteristics. He has forever been known as one of the worst offenders for scheming against God’s people.
Moses writes about him again in Deuteronomy 23; He is recorded in the book of Joshua (13:22; 24:9–10); He is recalled in Nehemiah 13; He is used as a reminder in Micah 6 to warn the people of Israel again.
As we saw, the Apostle Peter follows suit, continuing the practice of using Balaam as a reminder of the wicked subtlety of false teachers, which Jude then reemphasizes. What is interesting is that the audiences of both Peter and Jude are clearly Jewish, for the most part, as no explanation is given as to who Balaam is—they know full well.
The hearkening back to Balaam’s sin does not stop with Jude, though. Indeed, the Apostle John also refers to this historical event as he relays Christ’s message to the church in Pergamum:
“You have some there who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, so that they might eat food sacrificed to idols and practice sexual immorality” (Rev 2:14).
It is this very indictment by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself that Peter and Jude are so desperately trying to protect their churches from—something we ought to still be mindful of today. As Jude said, the false teachers are those who turn God’s grace into an opportunity for the flesh—who place stumbling blocks before you.
Jude, as I will explain in upcoming posts, goes on to say in verse 12 that “these [teachers] are hidden reefs at your love feasts.”
Friends, we must, then, heed the warnings that have been passed down through thousands and thousands of years of faithful teaching. All false teachers will be like Balaam. They will know enough of the truth to be deadly.
The Apostle John said, “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 Jn 4:1).
Charles Spurgeon knew the danger of false teaching and how subtle it always is. He put it this way:
“Discernment is not knowing the difference between right and wrong. It is knowing the difference between right and almost right.”
In Christ Alone,
Ben
