Thematic Bible




Thematic Bible



Yahweh opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, "What did I do to you that you struck me these three times?"

but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}.


Balaam lift up his eyes, and he saw Israel dwelling according to its tribes, and the spirit of God was upon it. He {uttered} his oracle and said, "The declaration of Balaam son Beor, the declaration of the man [whose] eyes are closed, the declaration of the hearer of God's words, who sees the revelation of Shaddai, falling down but [whose] eyes are uncovered. read more.
How good are your tents, O Jacob, your dwellings, O Israel! They are spread out like valleys, like gardens on a river, like aloes planted by Yahweh, like cedars at [the] waters. He will pour water from his buckets, and his offspring [will be] like many waters; his king will be higher than Agag, and his kingdom will be exalted. God, who brings him out from Egypt, [is] like the strength of a wild ox for him. He will devour [the] nations [who are] his enemies; he will break their bones; he will pierce [them with] his arrows. He crouches, he lies down like a lion, and like a lioness, who will rouse him? [They who] bless you will be blessed, and [they who] curse you will be cursed."

[By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}.


but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}.

But {God became angry} because he was going, and the angel of Yahweh stood in the road as an adversary to him; he [was] riding on his donkey, and two servants were with him. The donkey saw the angel of Yahweh standing in the road with his sword drawn in his hand, and the donkey turned aside from the road and went into the field. And Balaam struck the donkey to turn her back [to] the road. The angel of Yahweh stood in the narrow path of the vineyards, [with] {a wall on either side}. read more.
When the donkey saw the angel of Yahweh, she pressed herself into the wall, and she pressed the foot of Balaam into the wall, so he struck her again. Then the angel of Yahweh went further ahead and stood in a narrow place where there was not a way to turn aside [to the] right or left. When the donkey saw the angel of Yahweh, she lay down under Balaam, so {Balaam became angry}, and he struck the donkey with [his] staff. Yahweh opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, "What did I do to you that you struck me these three times?" Balaam said to the donkey, "Because you made a mockery of me! If only I had a sword in my hand, I would kill you right now!" The donkey said to Balaam, "Am I not your donkey on which you have ridden all your life until this day? Have I been in the habit of doing this to you?" He said, "No." Then Yahweh exposed the eyes of Balaam, and he saw the angel of Yahweh standing in the road with his sword drawn in his hand, and he bowed down and worshiped to his face. The angel of Yahweh said to him, "Why have you struck this donkey three times? Look, I have come out as an adversary because your conduct is perverse before me. The donkey saw me and turned aside from me these three times. If she had not turned aside from my face, then I would have killed you and kept her alive." Balaam said to the angel of Yahweh, "I have sinned because I did not know that you [were] standing to meet me in the road. Now, {if it is displeasing to you}, I will turn back." The angel of Yahweh said to Balaam, "Go with the men, but speak only the word that I will speak to you." So Balaam went with the princes of Balak.


but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}.


[By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}.

Balaam answered and said to the servants of Balak, "Even though Balak gives to me his house full of silver and gold, I am not able to go beyond {the command of Yahweh} my God to do a little or a lot.

And Balak said to Balaam, "Did I not urgently send to meet with you? Why did you not come to me? Am I really not able to honor you?" Balaam said to Balak, "Look, I came to you now. Am I really able to speak anything at all? I speak the word that God puts in my mouth."

How can I curse [whom] God has not cursed, and how can I denounce [whom] Yahweh has not denounced?

He answered and said, "{Should I not speak} what Yahweh puts in my mouth?"

Balaam said to Balak, "Did I not speak to your messengers whom you sent to me, saying, 'If Balak gave to me the fullness of his house full of silver and gold, I am not able to go beyond {the command of Yahweh} to do good or evil, from my heart; what Yahweh speaks, I will speak'? And now, look, I [am about] to go to my people; I will advise you what this people will do to your people {in the following days}."


But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved.


Like a dog returning to his vomit [is] a fool reverting to his folly.

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved. For if, [after they] have escaped from the defilements of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and they are again entangled in these [things] [and] succumb to [them], the last [state] has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than having known [it], to turn back from the holy commandment that had been delivered to them. The [statement] of the true proverb has happened to them, "A dog returns to its own vomit," and "A sow, [after] washing herself, [returns] to wallowing in the mud."


but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}.


But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved.


but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}.


Stretch out your hands from on high; Rescue me and deliver me from many waters, from [the] hand of foreigners, whose mouth speaks falsely, and their right hand [is] a false right hand. O God, I will sing a new song to you. With a lyre of ten [strings] I will sing praise to you, read more.
who gives victory to kings, who rescues David his servant from [the] evil sword. Rescue me and deliver me from [the] hand of foreigners, whose mouth speaks falsely, and whose right hand [is] a false right hand,

Because the household gods speak deceit, and those who practice divination see a lie, and the dreamers of vanity speak in vain. Therefore [the people] wander like sheep; they are afflicted because there is no shepherd.

Thus says the Lord Yahweh: 'Alas, for the foolish prophets who [are] going after their [own] spirit, {and they did not see anything}! Your prophets have been like foxes among ruins. You did not go up into the breaches and repair a wall for the house of Israel to stand [firm] in the battle on the day of Yahweh. read more.
They saw falseness and {a lying divination}, the ones saying, 'Declaration of Yahweh!' and Yahweh did not send them, and they wait {for the confirmation of their word}. Have you not seen {a false vision} and spoken {lying divination}, and [you] said, 'Declaration of Yahweh!' but {I myself did not speak}. Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: 'Because of your speaking falseness and [because] you envisioned a lie, therefore, look! I [am] against you!" {declares} the Lord Yahweh. "And it will be my hand against the prophets who [are] seeing falseness and who [are] practicing lying divination. They will not be in the council of my people, and they will not be written [down] in the record [book] of the house of Israel, and into the land of Israel they will not come, and [then] you will know that I [am] the Lord Yahweh. Because, yes, because they led my people astray, {saying} 'Peace!' And [there is] not peace. And [when] anyone builds a flimsy wall, look, they coat it [with] whitewash.

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error,


But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved.

"Those are among [the ones] rebelling [against the] light; they do not recognize his ways, and they do not stay in his paths. {At dusk} the murderer rises; he kills [the] needy and [the] poor, and in the night he is like a thief. And [the] eye of [the] adulterer waits for dusk, saying, {'No eye will see me,'} and he places a covering [on his] face. read more.
He digs through houses in the darkness; by day they shut themselves in-- they do not know [the] light because morning likewise is to them deep darkness; indeed, they know about [the] terrors of deep darkness. "He himself [is] swift on [the] water's surface; their portion is cursed in the land. {No one turns toward the path of their vineyards}.

Discretion will watch over you; understanding will protect you, [in order] to deliver you from the way of evil, from a man who speaks devious things-- those who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in ways of darkness, read more.
those who are happy to do evil, [for] they delight in [the] deviousness of evil, {who are crooked in their ways}, and devious in their paths; [in order] to deliver you from a strange woman, from a foreign woman [who] flatters [with] her sayings, she who forsakes the partner of her youth and has forgotten the covenant of her God, for her house sinks to death, and to the dead are her paths. [Of] all who go to her, none shall return, nor do they reach paths of life.

For before the eyes of Yahweh [are] {human ways}, and all his paths he examines. His iniquities shall ensnare him, the evildoer, and in the vanity of his sin he shall be caught. He shall die {for lack of} discipline, and in the greatness of his folly he shall be lost.


But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved. For if, [after they] have escaped from the defilements of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and they are again entangled in these [things] [and] succumb to [them], the last [state] has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than having known [it], to turn back from the holy commandment that had been delivered to them. The [statement] of the true proverb has happened to them, "A dog returns to its own vomit," and "A sow, [after] washing herself, [returns] to wallowing in the mud."