Balaam was hired by Balak to curse the Israelites. Three times, he tells Balak to built seven altars and sacrifice seven bulls, and three times, the Lord has him bless the Israelites instead of curse them. I can understand Balaam blessing them, since the Lord was going to kill him and his donkey in the last chapter, but I don’t understand why he’s being such a jerk about having Balak build the altars and sacrifice, knowing he’s not going to curse anyone.

In Numbers 25, the Israelites have sex with the women of Moab, and worship Baal, their god. Yu can imagine how pissed off the Lord is. He sends a plague through the camp (VD?), and has the leaders killed. The only reason that no more than 24,000 Israelites died of the plague is because Phinhesus, grandson of Aaron, kills an Israelite and his wicked Moab woman.

Tomorrow: Numbers 24-25