“... Secondly, Philo and the Rabbis insist that Balaam was a villain. Despite this, Philo contends that his words about Israel were genuinely prophetic. Balaam spoke his first oracle as one possessed by the prophetic spirit (προφητικοῦ πνεύματος ἐπιφοιτήσαντος) which had ridded him of his soothsayer’s craft, since it was not right for magical sophistry to dwell alongside most holy possession (Vit. Mos. I. 277); the second oracle he prophesied in words not his own (Vit. Mos. I. 283, 286); and the third he spoke ἔνθους, inspired by God (Vit. Mos. I. 288). Balaam contributed nothing to the oracles: he spoke as God’s instrument, expounding another’s words, without employing his own reason (Vit. Mos. I. 277, 283). Even as a Gentile soothsayer, Balaam accurately predicted the future (Vit. Mos. I. 264–265). Inspired by God, therefore, his prophecy was to be of exceptional quality. So much is evident when Philo’s words are juxtaposed with LXX’s account of Balaam: never do the latter refer to him as προφήτης or say that he spoke in προφητεία, saying only that the Spirit of God came upon him. Rather, it is the Targums which most closely reflect Philo’s belief that Balaam’s oracles about Israel were those of a remarkable prophet. Where MT records that Balaam ‘took up his parable’, the Targums specify that he ‘took up the parable of his prophecy’ (Num. 23:7; 24:3, 15 in TN, PJ, FTV, FTP; Num. 23:18 TN, PJ). The spirit of God which came upon him (MT of Num. 24:2) was, for TO and PJ, ‘the spirit of prophecy from before the Lord’. ...”