Or HaChaim on Numbers 24:1/אור החיים על במדבר כ״ד:א׳

1 וירא בלעם כי טוב, Bileam realised that it was good in the eyes of G'd, etc. In view of the Midrash we quoted on 22,12 that G'd had told Bileam that he should neither curse the Israelites nor bless them seeing they were blessed already and had no need for his blessing, how could Bileam assume that it pleased G'd if he continued blessing this people? We must therefore understand Bileam differently. Up until now he had been forced to bless this people although initially G'd had told him not to bless them seeing they were blessed already. In view of his experience so far Bileam had found out that G'd had turned his intended curses into blessings. Seeing this was possible, Bileam now reasoned that G'd could also do the reverse, i.e. turn his voluntary blessings into curses. On the other hand, if we add what we explained on 23,5 that it had not really been Bileam who had pronounced the blessings but an angel using his mouth as the vehicle, Bileam now concluded that there was really no point in consulting all kinds of charms, etc. but that he might as well bow to the inevitable. ולא הלן כפעם, and he did not go as on previous occasions, etc. He concluded a) that there was no point in it, b) that the charms had proved ineffective anyway. He therefore decided to change his strategy and turned his face towards the desert, i.e. to examine how the Israelites had angered their G'd while they had travelled through the desert. He hoped to find something which would enable G'd to let him curse these people.

2We may also understand the word המדבר as related to דבור, speech; in Numbers 27,3 אבינו מת במדבר the Zohar volume 3 page 205 understands the word in that sense. If we follow this path Bileam referred to the fact that on each of the ten occasions on which the Israelites had angered G'd in the desert their sin consisted of what they said, i.e. דבור. Bileam was confident that amongst all the Israelites he was looking at there must have been a number who had been guilty of one or several of the rebellious comments which had angered G'd so often.

3We can also take our cue from another comment of the Zohar volume 2 page 157 in which the מדבר, desert, is described as the "home" of Satan, i.e. the angel of death and the forces at his command. Bileam looked towards this region in order to awaken the forces of Satan, etc. Satan's armies are all hostile to Israel. Bileam was careful to say פניו, "his face," using a word describing his anger. One of the means to draw G'd near is שמחה ולב טוב, joy and being of good cheer. On the other hand, one attracts the forces of Satan when one is in a vile mood, angry, etc. Bileam displayed his bad mood, פניו, in the direction of Satan to secure his help. An example of the use of פני "My (angry) face," is found in Exodus 33,14 where G'd describes His presence as dangerous to the Jewish people when He is in the frame of mind described as פני.

4There is still another way of explaining our verse. Bileam realised that only someone who is good himself is worthy to bless G'd's people, (compare Proverbs 22,9: "the generous man is blessed"); our sages in Sotah 38 suggest that in order to correctly understand this verse in Proverbs the word Yevorach "blessed," should be punctuated as if it had been written yevarech i.e. "he will bless." Inasmuch as Bileam was known for his avarice, he was obviously not suited to be the instrument G'd would choose to bless His people. Bileam now understood that he personally was unfit to bless the people and that the blessings which had come out of his mouth had been spoken by the angel. This is why he concluded that there was no point in heaping more sin upon himself by consulting his charms. Instead, he faced the desert, a place described in Exodus 18,5 as the place where G'd's Presence rests. Bileam made a spiritual turnabout, became a penitent, -but only in order to become worthy to bless the lsraelites.-The Torah informs us that he did not do so out of free volition, but לפנים, he did so in order to deceive G'd into believing he had done תשובה. Perhaps he did so only in order to fool the angel who had put the bar in his mouth. If he could get the angel to remove the bar, he would pronounce blessings of his own accord which were designed to cause harm to the people receiving same. According to Sanhedrin 105 he actually did so when he said כנחלים נטיו, "as valleys stretched out, etc." (24,6). The Talmud points out that this meant that the Israelites should not have orchards and vineyards. Fortunately, the Holy Spirit invalidated Bileam's evil intention, turning these so-called blessings into the real thing.