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164 but “in a divine vision.” For the second time he sees the na- tion protected, as it came out of Egypt, by a god with spread- ing rams’ horns, and envisions Israel as a nation that “like a lion will arise.” When the Moabite king protests, Balaam explains that no matter what gold or silver he be offered, he can utter only the words that God puts in his mouth. So the frustrated king gives up and lets Balaam go. But now Balaam offers the king free advice: Let me tell you what the future holds, he says to the king—‘*that which will come about to this nation and to your people at the end of days”—and proceeds to describe the di- vine vision of the future by relating it to a “star”: I see it, though not now; I behold it, though it is not near: A Star of Jacob is on its course. A Scepter from Israel will arise— Moab’s quarters it will crush, all the Children of Seth it will unsettle. NUMBERS 24: 17 Balaam then turned and cast his eyes toward the Edomites, Amalekites, Kenites, and other Canaanite nations, and pro- nounced an oracle thereon: Those who will survive the wrath of Jacob shall fall into the hands of Assyria; then Assyria’s turn will come, and it shall forever perish. And having pro- nounced that oracle, “Balaam rose up and went back to his place; and Balak too went on his way.” Though the Balaam episode has naturally been the subject of discussion and debate by biblical and theological schol- ars, it remains baffling and unresolved. The text switches effortlessly between references to the Elohim—‘gods” in the plural—and to Yahweh, the sole God, as the Divine Pres- ence. It gravely transgresses the Bible’s most basic prohibi- tion by applying to the God who brought the Israelites out of Egypt a physical image, and then compounds the transgres- sion by envisioning Him in the image of “a ram with spread- ing horns”—an image that has been the Egyptian depiction of Amon (Fig. 71)! The approving attitude toward a profes- THE END OF DAYS