Numbers 16:28

16:28 Then Moses said, “This is how ¹  you will know that the Lord has sent me to do all these works, for I have not done them of my own will. ² 

Numbers 22:29

22:29 And Balaam said to the donkey, “You have made me look stupid; I wish ³  there were a sword in my hand, for I would kill you right now.”

[16:28]  ¹ tn Heb “in this.”

[16:28]  ² tn The Hebrew text simply has כִּי־לֹא מִלִּבִּי (ki-lo’ millibbi, “for not from my heart”). The heart is the center of the will, the place decisions are made (see H. W. Wolff, Anthropology of the Old Testament). Moses is saying that the things he has done have not come “from the will of man” so to speak – and certainly not from some secret desire on his part to seize power.

[22:29]  ³ tn The optative clause is introduced with the particle לוּ (lu).