Before Hashem created man He created a group of angels. He asked the angels if he should create man. The angels said no, Hashem got angry and destroyed them. He created a second group with the same outcome. Then He created a third group. He asked this group the same question and they said that if they said no then He would destroy them, so they simple said "It is a bad idea because man cannot fight his yetzer (will), but You can do whatever you want." So Hashem created man. But then He told these angels that any time a man goes against yetzer these angels must gather together and give a bracha to that great man for whom the entire world was created. When your greatest enemy gives you a bracha that is the best bracha in the world.
When Paro was deciding what to do with the Jews he had three advisors, 1) Terach 2) Iyov 3) Bilam. Terach said not to kill the Jews and for this he was rewarded with his daughter marrying the savior of the Jews. Iyov was silent and for this he was punished with losing all of his possessions and his family. Bilam who truly hated the Jews gave Paro the advise to make all of the Jews slaves in Mitzriam. In fact, to make sure that the plan would work he used the mazalot and angels to bind the Jews in slavery forever in Mitzriam. Now, many years after this the Jews are about to enter Eretz Yisrael and Balak calls on Bilam, the Jews greatest enemy to curse them again to be locked out of eretz yisrael. Bilam was surprised to find out that they ever got out of Mitzriam because the only way that could happen was if Hashem had gotten rid of the mazalot that stopped the Jews from leaving. This is why he said that he could not do anything against the word of Hashem because all of the mazalot in the world could not stop Hashem. Now Bilam is standing on the top of the mountain prepared to give the Jews the greatest curse ever and out of his mouth comes great brachot. These brachot effected the Jews greatly, why? Because the brachot were from the Jews greatest enemy.
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Rav Brevda explains in his sefer on Tisha B'Av Yibane Hamikdash that the reason why avodah zara is such a big issue is because what should be is that you recognize that Hashem is your creator and that He created you. But by doing avodah zara you are saying that you created yourself, that you are your own god. Rav Brevda proves this from the nachash who said to Chava "if you eat from the tree you will be a god." Also from Paro who claimed that he created himself the Nile River. The reason why tanach is full of stories of avodah zara even though the desire for it was destroyed long ago is because any time someone acts like he is the creator and Hashem is not is doing avodah zara. (This next part is not Rav Brevda) This explains why the three sins 1) Avodah Zara 2) Murder 3) and Geloi Arayot are so bad is because each is acting like you are the creator and not Hashem. Avodah Zara was explained above, murder because just like a Hashem creates He also destroys and by you killing you are taking Hashem's job, and Geloi Arayot is creating a child that should not exist. He also explains what avodah zara is, it is using the creations that Hashem made (whether it be angels or mazalot or shaidim) to affect the physical world. This is what Bilam did, he used mazalot to fight the Jews. We know from a gemara in Brachot that Bilam knew what time of the day Hashem got angry. So the only way to stop him was for Hashem to not get angry during those days. So when Bilam tried to curse the Jews he could not. Bilam then realized that the only way to defeat the Jews was to make them no longer believe that Hashem was there master, but how could that be done? By getting them to do avodah zara and geloi arayot. So that is exactly what he did. But if they were truly servants of Hashem then why would they do that. Rav Pincus explains that it was the very fact that Hashem did not get angry that caused the Jews to sin. Bilam realized that the fear the Jews had for Hashem was not that of Yirat Romemut (Fear of Hashem's greatness) rather it was only Yirat Chait (Fear of Sin, due to fear of suffering for the sins). Now that Hashem had spent so many days not getting angry the Jews loosened in their Yirat Hashem because if there was no punishment then what was there to be afraid of? So Bilam used his weakness, that Hashem did not get angry, as his advantage and that is how he got the Jews to sin.
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