Balaam in Fausset's Bible Dictionary

(Hebrew balam) "not of the people" (Israel), a "foreigner"; else bilam, "the destroyer of the people," corresponding to the Greek Nicolaos, "conqueror of the people" (Revelation 2:14-15), namely, by having seduced them to fornication with the Moabite women (Numbers 25), just as the Nicolaitanes sanctioned the eating of things sacrificed to idols and fornication. The -am, however, may be only a formative syllable. He belonged to Pethor, a city of Aram Naharaim, i.e. Mesopotamia (Deuteronomy 23:4). "Balak, the king of Moab" (he says, Numbers 23:7), "hath brought me from Aram, out of the mountains of the E.," a region famous for soothsayers (Isaiah 2:6). Pethor, from pathar, "to reveal," was the head quarters of oriental magi, who used to congregate in particular spots (Daniel 2:2; Matthew 2:1), Phathusae, S. of Circesium. It is an undesigned propriety, which marks the truth of Scripture, that it represents Balak of Moab, the descendant of Lot, as having recourse to a diviner of the land from which Lot came when he accompanied Abraham to Canaan...