Sanhedrin 105a (קה.) — the Talmud in English

“My lawgiver” —

this is Ahithophel 719 ,

who came from Judah [

who came from the tribe of Judah ].

“Moab

is My washing basin” —

this is Gehazi, who was stricken because of the matter of washing .

“Upon Edom I shall cast My shoe” —

this is Doeg

the Edomite .

“Over Philistia, raise a cry” —

the ministering angels said before the Holy One, blessed be He: Master of the universe! If David, who slew the Philistine and caused Your children to inherit Gath,

raises the claim that You are granting a share in the World-to-Come to Doeg and Ahithophel, his enemies,

what will You do for him

to appease him?

He said to them: It is incumbent upon Me to make them friends with one another,

and then David will forgive them for what they did to him. This is the meaning of “raise a cry”—an expression of friendship.

It is written in the Book of Jeremiah:

“Why has this people, Jerusalem, turned away with a perpetual turning away, etc.?”

Rav said: The congregation of Israel gave the prophet a decisive answer.

The prophet said to Israel: Repent!

For

your forefathers who sinned —

where are they?

They said to him,

the Israelites:

And your prophets, who did not sin—where are they?

As it is stated: “Where are your forefathers, and the prophets,

will they live forever?”

This was the prophet’s claim and Israel’s response.

He said to them,

the prophet:

Your forefathers returned and acknowledged the truth. As it is stated: “But My words and My statutes that I commanded My servants the prophets, etc.” [

And the end of the verse is: “Did they not overtake your forefathers, so that they returned and said: As the Lord of hosts planned to do to us, according to our ways and according to our deeds, so He did to us”] .

Samuel said:

They answered him with a decisive answer in the following manner:

Ten people came

and sat before him [

before the prophet].

He said to them: Repent!

They said to him: A slave whose master sold him, or a woman whom her husband divorced—does either have any claim upon the other?

Likewise, since the Holy One, blessed be He, sold us to Nebuchadnezzar and drove us away from Him, He no longer has any claim upon us!

The Holy One, blessed be He, said to the prophet: Go, say

to them: “Where is the bill of your mother’s divorce with which I sent her away? Or who is My creditor to whom I sold you? Behold, because of your iniquities you were sold, and because of your transgressions your mother was sent away.”

And this is what Reish Lakish said: What is the meaning of that which is written, “David My servant,” and “Nebuchadnezzar My servant”?

How could the Holy One, blessed be He, equate and compare the wicked Nebuchadnezzar with David, His servant?!

Rather,

it was revealed and known before Him Who spoke and brought the world into being that Israel would eventually say this,

that they were now Nebuchadnezzar’s servants and that the Holy One, blessed be He, had no further claim upon them.

Therefore, the Holy One, blessed be He, anticipated this and called

Nebuchadnezzar

His servant.

From now on, even if Nebuchadnezzar did indeed acquire them, he himself was the servant of the Holy One, blessed be He. And

when a slave acquires property, whose slave is he, and whose property is it?

All the property belongs to the master!

“And what you have brought upon your spirit shall not be; [

what you imagine will not be] ,

namely, what you say: We shall be like the nations, like the families of the lands, to serve wood and stone. As I live, declares the Lord God, surely with a mighty hand, with an outstretched arm, and with outpoured wrath

I shall reign over you.”

Rav Naḥman said: Would that the Merciful One become angry with us with all such wrath and redeem us [

Would that this anger mentioned in the preceding verse—“with outpoured wrath I shall reign over you”—would come upon us, so that the Holy One, blessed be He, would redeem us against our will and reign over us].

“And He shall discipline him for judgment; his God shall instruct him.” Rabba bar bar Ḥana said,

this is the decisive answer that Israel gave the prophet:

The prophet said to Israel: Repent!

They said to him: We cannot,

because

the evil inclination rules over us.

He said to them: Discipline

the

inclinations [

This is the meaning of “And He shall discipline him for judgment”].

They said to him: “His God shall instruct him.”

The god of the evil inclination should instruct us how to discipline it and overcome it .

We learned in our Mishna:

Four commoners: Balaam, Doeg, Ahithophel, and Gehazi.

“Balaam” —

its meaning is:

without a people ,

that is, he has no share with the people of Israel in the World-to-Come.

Alternatively: “Balaam” —

he ruined a people.

He confused Israel through the counsel he gave Balak, and twenty-four thousand Israelites were killed because of him.

“Son of Beor” —

son of one

who had intercourse with an animal [

an animal ]. Balaam had intercourse with his donkey.

The tanna taught: He,

that same man, Balaam’s father , was called

Beor,

and that same man

was Cushan-Rishathaim,

and

he

was the one called

Laban the Aramean.

The Gemara now explains why he was called by these names:

That same man was called

Beor —

because

he had intercourse with an animal [

an animal] .

He was also called

Cushan-Rishathaim —

because

he committed two acts of wickedness against Israel:

One in the days of Jacob,

for he was Laban the Aramean, who sought to uproot everything;

and one in the days of the judging of the judges,

after the death of Joshua, as it is stated: “The anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and He delivered them into the hand of Cushan-Rishathaim.”

And what was

his true

name? Laban the Aramean was his name.

It is written “

Balaam

the son of Beor,” and

on the other hand

it is written, “His son was Beor,”

which implies that Beor was Balaam’s son!

Rabbi Yoḥanan said:

In truth, Beor was Balaam’s father. Nevertheless, Scripture called him “his son, Beor,” implying that he was Balaam’s son, because

his father

of Balaam

was his son in prophecy.

Balaam was greater than he in prophecy.

Since the Mishna listed Balaam among those who have no share in the World-to-Come, it follows that specifically

Balaam

is the one who does not come to the World-to-Come. But

other gentiles

come

to it [

they come to life in the World-to-Come]!

Whose opinion is the Mishna?

It is Rabbi Joshua’s.

As it was taught in a beraita, Rabbi Eliezer says:

It is written:

“The wicked shall return to the netherworld, all the nations that forget God.”

And the verse is expounded as follows:

“The wicked shall return to the netherworld” —

these are the sinners of

Israel.

“All the nations that forget God” —

these are the sinners of

the gentile nations. This is the statement of Rabbi Eliezer.

Rabbi Joshua said to him: Is it stated “

the wicked shall return to the netherworld

among all the nations” ,

which would indeed imply as you say, that the sinners of Israel would be like all the nations, who have no share in the World-to-Come?

But it is not

so

stated; rather, “all the nations that forget God”!

Rather,

this is the meaning of the verse:

“The wicked shall return to the netherworld,” and who are they [

and who are those wicked?] —

“All the nations that forget God,”

such as Balaam and the other wicked of the nations of the world. But the rest of the nations have a share in the World-to-Come.

And that wicked man himself gave an indication concerning whether

he would have a share in the World-to-Come, for thus

he said: “May my soul die the death of the upright,

and may my end be like his.”

If my soul dies the death of the upright,

meaning that I die a natural death, in my bed,

then may my end be like his,

like that of the people of Israel, so that I will have a share in the World-to-Come.

But if not,

if I do not die a natural death,

I shall go to my people,

to Gehinnom .

It is written in the portion of Balak:

“The elders of Moab and the elders of Midian went.”

The tanna taught: Midian and Moab had never been at peace with one another.

This may be compared to two dogs that were in a flock and were angry [

enraged ]

with one another.

A wolf came upon one of them.

The other one said [

the second dog]: We are indeed angry with one another. But

if I do not help him —

today

the wolf

will kill him, and tomorrow it will come upon me

and kill me, because there will be no one to help me.

Therefore, although there had been no peace between them,

they both went —

and killed

the

wolf.

So too here: although Moab and Midian had never been at peace with one another, nevertheless, because of their fear of Israel, they made peace with each other.

Rav Pappa said: This is what people say: When a rat and a cat [

a rat and a cat], which are never at peace with one another,

hold a celebration [

they made a feast from the milk of the unlucky one].

At the beginning of the account it is written: “The elders of Moab and the elders of Midian went, with their charms in their hands, and they came to Balaam and conveyed Balak’s message to him.” “He said to them: Spend the night here, and I shall return an answer to you, etc.” And at the end it is written:

“The princes of Moab remained with Balaam.”

But the princes of Midian,

who initially came with the princes of Moab to Balaam and are not mentioned at the end —

where did they go [

where did they go]?

Once he said to them

Balaam:

“Spend the night here, and I shall return an answer to you

as the Lord will speak to me,”

they said

to themselves: If so, if Balaam intends to do only what the Lord will tell him, he will be of no use to us, because surely the Lord will not speak evil against Israel. For the Holy One, blessed be He, is Israel’s father —

is it possible [

that]

a father hates his son?!

Rav Naḥman said: Insolence is effective even toward Heaven.

For

initially it is written

that the Holy One, blessed be He, said to Balaam:

“You shall not go with them.” And ultimately,

after Balaam said, “Spend the night here, etc.,” which was insolent toward Heaven, as he thought to himself: Perhaps I will persuade the Holy One, blessed be He, and He will agree,

it is written

that the Holy One, blessed be He, said to him:

“Arise, go with them.”

Rav Sheshet said: Insolence —

it is royalty without a crown [

that is, it is great authority, lacking only the royal crown].

As it is written,

David said:

“I am young and anointed king today, while these men, the sons of Zeruiah, are too strong for me, etc.”

That is, I am not greater than they, except in that I am anointed as king.

Rabbi Yoḥanan said: Balaam —

was lame [

crippled]

in one leg.

As it is stated: “And he went alone.” [“

Alone” is an expression of displacement, as in: “the thighbone that was dislocated from its place” [Ḥullin 54b]. That is, it was dislocated from its place. Here too, his leg was dislocated and he became lame].

Samson

was lame

in both legs

was.

As it is stated

in Jacob’s blessing to Dan:

“A serpent on the road, a viper on the path, that bites the horse’s heels” [

“A viper” implies “twice alone”], and Samson was from the tribe of Dan.

Balaam —

was blind in one eye. As it is stated: “One with an open eye.” [“

Open” means open . As Onkelos translates it: “whose sight is clear.” That is, one of his eyes was open. This implies that the other eye was closed].

Balaam

practiced sorcery with his organ [

like one who raises the dead with his organ]

did.

For

here it is written,

concerning Balaam:

“He fell, with his eyes uncovered,” and there it is written,

in the Scroll of Esther:

“And Haman fell upon the couch, etc.,”

and when Ahasuerus saw this, he said: “Will he also conquer the queen with me in the house?” This refers to intercourse. It follows that Balaam, too, performed his sorcery with his organ.

It was stated: Mar Zutra said:

Balaam

practiced sorcery with his organ .

Mar, the son of Ravina, said: He had intercourse

Balaam

with his donkey.

The one who says that he practiced sorcery with his organ —

as we said,

for this is learned from the fact that here it is written: “He fell, with his eyes uncovered,” and concerning Haman it is written: “And Haman fell upon the couch.”