Bil'am

The Torah teaches us that Bil’am was extremely important at his time. This importance echoed into later times and to the Jewish sages who recognized how powerful he was. This power was so great, that rabbis said he was called to do the job of cursing because he had the same God given gifts as Moses- the power of speech.

Bil'am's name was so revered, that later generations recorded his prophecies on a wall at Deir Alla in the Jordan valley. The inscription is dated to the 8th century BC, and was written with red ink on wall plaster. The prophecies are of an end of days scenario, with apocalyptic ideas.

I remember learning the story of Bil'am many years ago, and I remember the discussion in class about a word that made us all wonder. Bil'am boasts, and the Torah records him saying the following “וּנְאֻם הַגֶּבֶר שְׁתֻם הָעָיִן”- U neum HaGever Shetum Ha’ayin (Num 24:3). The word Shetum was very confusing for readers because many related it to Setum which means “blocked”, but that didn’t make sense. To explain this we need to explain a short point about Hebrew phonetics and the graphic representation of the consonants. As some may know, Hebrew has two forms of ש, one with a dot on the right top side creating an SH sound. The other ש has the dot on the left side creating the sound of S. When realising this, we know that it means “one with an open eye” meaning that he had a clear sight of things spiritually. This teaches us how important the vowel points are in correctly understanding the text, one little dot can change it all. But with all due respect to power we learn that no matter how important you are if you stand against God you will fall and it says: “And Bil’am son of Be’or the sorcerer they slow by the sword (Num 31:8).