King James Version · Egypt and Sinai
Numbers 24
Touch any underlined name to see who or where it is. Tap a verse number to see where it is taken up elsewhere.
And when saw that it pleased to Israel, he went not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments, but he set toward . And lifted up his eyes, and he saw Israel abiding in his tents according to their tribes; and of came upon him. And he took up his , and said, the son of hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said: He hath said, which heard the words of , which saw the of , falling into a trance, but having his eyes open: 5How goodly are thy tents, O , and thy tabernacles, O Israel! As the valleys are they spread forth, as gardens by the river’s side, as the trees of lign aloes which hath planted, and as cedar trees beside the waters. He shall pour the water out of his buckets, and shall be in many waters, and his king shall be higher than , and shall be exalted. brought him forth out of ; he hath as it were the strength of an unicorn: he shall eat up the nations his , and shall break their bones, and pierce them through with his arrows. He couched, he lay down as a lion, and as a great lion: who shall stir him up? is he that blesseth thee, and is he that curseth thee. And ’s was kindled against , and he smote his hands together: and said unto , I called thee to mine , and, behold, thou hast altogether them these three times. Therefore now flee thou to thy place: I thought to promote thee unto great ; but, lo, hath kept thee back from . And said unto , Spake I not also to thy which thou sentest unto me, saying, If would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the of , to do either good or bad of mine own ; but what saith, that will I speak? And now, behold, I go unto my people: come therefore, and I will advertise thee what this people shall do to thy people in the . And he took up his , and said, the son of hath said, and the man whose eyes are open hath said: He hath said, which heard the words of , and knew the knowledge of , which saw the of , falling into a trance, but having his eyes open: I shall see him, but not now: I shall behold him, but not nigh: there shall come a Star out of , and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel, and shall smite the corners of , and destroy all the children of Sheth. And shall be a possession, also shall be a possession for his ; and Israel shall do valiantly. Out of shall come he that shall , and shall destroy him that remaineth of the city. And when he looked on , he took up his , and said, was the first of the nations; but his latter end shall be that he for ever. And he looked on the , and took up his , and said, Strong is thy dwellingplace, and thou puttest thy nest in a . Nevertheless the shall be wasted, until shall carry thee away . And he took up his , and said, Alas, who shall live when doeth this! And ships shall come from the coast of , and shall afflict , and shall afflict , and he also shall for ever. And rose up, and went and returned to his place: and also went his way.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Egypt and Sinai, 1450 BC to 1200 BC ›
Israel in and then out of Egypt, at a period when Egypt was an imperial power that also controlled Canaan. The nation is formed as a people with a law before it has any land.
- Egypt
- The New Kingdom at its imperial peak, with a professional army, a chariot corps, and control reaching up through Canaan. Ramesses II reigns for sixty-six years and covers the country in monuments to himself. Egyptian power in this period is the reason Canaan is garrisoned rather than free.
- The Hittites
- The other superpower, in what is now Turkey, and Egypt's rival for the Levant. The two fight the largest chariot battle of the ancient world at Kadesh, then sign a treaty whose text survives from both sides. Hittite treaty form, with its historical prologue, stipulations, witnesses, blessings, and curses, is the shape the Sinai covenant takes, which is one of the stronger arguments for the antiquity of that material.
- The Aegean
- Mycenaean Greece: warrior kings in stone citadels at Mycenae and Pylos, keeping palace accounts in Linear B. The world of the Trojan War stories, whatever lies behind them.
- Further afield
- The Shang dynasty in China is casting extraordinary bronzes and writing questions to its ancestors on ox bones. In Mesoamerica the Olmec are beginning the first civilisation of the Americas.