How lovely are your tents, O Jacob, your dwellings, O Israel!
Parallel translations
- WEB How goodly are your tents, Jacob, and your tents, Israel!
- KJV How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel!
- NKJV “How lovely are your tents, O Jacob! Your dwellings, O Israel!
- NASB How pleasant are your tents, Jacob, Your dwelling places, Israel!
- NLT How beautiful are your tents, O Jacob; how lovely are your homes, O Israel!
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Balaam exclaims how lovely Israel's tents and dwellings are. The hired curser instead praises the beauty of God's people.
Overview
Looking on the vast camp, Balaam bursts into admiration for Jacob and Israel, names recalling the patriarch and the covenant nation. The beauty he sees is not merely aesthetic but the fruit of God's blessing on a people in covenant order. This opening line of praise sets the tone for an oracle that overflows with images of fruitfulness and royal destiny.
Cross-references & the web
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Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
In the wilderness Christ is the water from the rock, the bronze serpent lifted up that the dying might look and live (John 3:14), and the star and scepter that Balaam saw rising out of Jacob.
How Numbers 24:5 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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