“They have wandered off the right road and followed the footsteps of Balaam son of Beor, who loved to earn money by doing wrong. But Balaam was stopped from his mad course when his donkey rebuked him with a human voice” (2 Peter 2:15-16 NLT).
While it’s hard to make a definitive statement, it appears God qualified His permission to allow the prophet Balaam to accompany a delegation of Moabites who approached him with a proposal to curse the Israelites. We find that qualification in Numbers 22:20: “If the men come to call you, rise and go with them…” (NKJV). However, the following verse tells us that Balaam rose the next morning and departed with the Moabite ambassadors seemingly of his own accord.
Balaam’s apparent readiness to act on an invitation to curse those whom God sought to bless may shed light on the events that followed…
“But God was angry that Balaam was going, so he sent the angel of the Lord to stand in the road to block his way. As Balaam and two servants were riding along, Balaam’s donkey saw the angel of the Lord standing in the road with a drawn sword in his hand. The donkey bolted off the road into a field, but Balaam beat it and turned it back onto the road.
Then the angel of the Lord stood at a place where the road narrowed between two vineyard walls. When the donkey saw the angel of the Lord, it tried to squeeze by and crushed Balaam’s foot against the wall. So Balaam beat the donkey again. Then the angel of the Lord moved farther down the road and stood in a place too narrow for the donkey to get by at all.
“This time when the donkey saw the angel, it lay down under Balaam. In a fit of rage Balaam beat the animal again with his staff. Then the Lord gave the donkey the ability to speak. ‘What have I done to you that deserves your beating me three times?’ it asked Balaam. ‘You have made me look like a fool!’ Balaam shouted. ‘If I had a sword with me, I would kill you!’” (Numbers 22:22-29).
The most noteworthy incident in this passage is open to debate. Was it the fact that God caused a donkey to speak a human language, or the fact that Balaam engaged in a conversation with a talking donkey as though there was nothing out of the ordinary?
Either way, Balaam’s donkey responded to him with a perfectly logical question…
“’But I am the same donkey you have ridden all your life,’ the donkey answered. ‘Have I ever done anything like this before?’ ‘No,’ Balaam admitted” (Numbers 22: 30).
So far, Balaam’s donkey has demonstrated greater composure than Balaam himself. But then again, Balaam’s donkey knew something he didn’t, as we’ll see next.