Numbers 23 · a question people ask
"He has not seen iniquity in Jacob." Hadn't Israel sinned?
They had, and Numbers says so plainly. The LORD said the men who came out of Egypt "have tempted me these ten times" (14:22), and not long before this, "The people spoke against God and against Moses" (21:5). Two chapters later Israel "joined himself to Baal Peor" (25:3). Yet the oracle, spoken as the word the LORD put in Balaam's mouth (23:16), says: "He has not seen iniquity in Jacob. Neither has he seen perverseness in Israel" (23:21). Readers take the line in two main ways. Both agree that Israel had sinned, that God had punished sin and pardoned it (14:20, 21:6), and that the line stands inside a blessing Balaam "can’t reverse" (23:20).
How Christians read it
Where Christians differ, Favor sets out the main views side by side and doesn't pick one.
He doesn't count it against them
Some read the line as God not holding Israel's sin against them. Moses had prayed, "Please pardon the iniquity of this people", and the LORD answered, "I have pardoned according to your word" (Numbers 14:19-20). A psalm says, "Blessed is the man to whom the LORD doesn’t impute iniquity" (Psalm 32:2), and Micah says God "pardons iniquity" (Micah 7:18). On this reading God, looking at the people he has blessed, doesn't count their sin, and the next words say why: "The LORD his God is with him" (23:21).
Numbers 14:19-20 · Psalm 32:2 · Micah 7:18 · Numbers 23:21
He sees no trouble for them
Others read the two Hebrew words as trouble rather than wrongdoing. Brown-Driver-Briggs gives aven as "trouble, sorrow, wickedness" and amal as "trouble, labor, toil"; amal is Joseph's "all my toil" (Genesis 41:51) and Israel's "our toil" in Egypt (Deuteronomy 26:7), and aven is the "trouble" in "He who sows wickedness reaps trouble" (Proverbs 22:8). On this reading the line says God sees no misfortune coming on Israel, nothing a curse could bring, which fits the lines around it: "The LORD his God is with him" (23:21) and "Surely there is no enchantment with Jacob" (23:23).
Genesis 41:51 · Deuteronomy 26:7 · Proverbs 22:8 · Numbers 23:21 · Numbers 23:23
The verses
“He has not seen iniquity in Jacob. Neither has he seen perverseness in Israel. The LORD his God is with him. The shout of a king is among them.”
“The LORD said, “I have pardoned according to your word; but in very deed—as I live, and as all the earth shall be filled with the LORD’s glory— because all those men who have seen my glory and my signs, which I worked in Egypt and in the wilderness, yet have tempted me these ten times, and have not listened to my voice;”
“The people spoke against God and against Moses: “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no bread, there is no water, and our soul loathes this disgusting food!” The LORD sent venomous snakes among the people, and they bit the people. Many people of Israel died.”
“Israel joined himself to Baal Peor, and the LORD’s anger burned against Israel.”