(21) When he arose in the morning, Balaam saddled his ass and departed with the Moabite dignitaries. (22) But God was incensed at his going; so an angel of the Eternal placed himself in his way as an adversary. He was riding on his she-ass, with his two servants alongside, (23) when the ass caught sight of the angel of the Eternal standing in the way, with his drawn sword in his hand. The ass swerved from the road and went into the fields; and Balaam beat the ass to turn her back onto the road. (24) The angel of the Eternal then stationed himself in a lane between the vineyards, with a fence on either side. (25) The ass, seeing the angel of the Eternal, pressed herself against the wall and squeezed Balaam’s foot against the wall; so he beat her again. (26) Once more the angel of the Eternal moved forward and stationed himself on a spot so narrow that there was no room to swerve right or left. (27) When the ass now saw the angel of the Eternal, she lay down under Balaam; and Balaam was furious and beat the ass with his stick. (28) Then the Eternal opened the ass’s mouth, and she said to Balaam, “What have I done to you that you have beaten me these three times?” (29) Balaam said to the ass, “You have made a mockery of me! If I had a sword with me, I’d kill you.” (30) The ass said to Balaam, “Aren't I the ass that you have been riding all along until this day? Have I been in the habit of doing thus to you?” And he answered, “No.” (31) Then the Eternal uncovered Balaam’s eyes, and he saw the angel of the Eternal standing in the way, his drawn sword in his hand; thereupon he bowed right down to the ground. (32) The angel of the Eternal said to him, “Why have you beaten your ass these three times? It is I who came out as an adversary, for I am opposed to your errand. (33) And when the ass saw me, she shied away because of me those three times. If she had not shied away from me, you are the one I should have killed, while sparing her.”
(ו) עֲשָׂרָה דְבָרִים נִבְרְאוּ בְּעֶרֶב שַׁבָּת בֵּין הַשְּׁמָשׁוֹת, וְאֵלּוּ הֵן, פִּי הָאָרֶץ, וּפִי הַבְּאֵר, וּפִי הָאָתוֹן, וְהַקֶּשֶׁת, וְהַמָּן, וְהַמַּטֶּה, וְהַשָּׁמִיר, וְהַכְּתָב, וְהַמִּכְתָּב, וְהַלּוּחוֹת. וְיֵשׁ אוֹמְרִים, אַף הַמַּזִּיקִין, וּקְבוּרָתוֹ שֶׁל משֶׁה, וְאֵילוֹ שֶׁל אַבְרָהָם אָבִינוּ. וְיֵשׁ אוֹמְרִים, אַף צְבָת בִּצְבָת עֲשׂוּיָה:
(6) Ten things were created on the eve of the Sabbath at twilight, and these are they: [1] the mouth of the earth, [2] the mouth of the well, [3] the mouth of the donkey, [4] the rainbow, [5] the manna, [6] the staff, [7] the shamir, [8] the letters, [9] the writing, [10] and the tablets. And some say: also the demons, the grave of Moses, and the ram of Abraham, our father. And some say: and also tongs, made with tongs.
(1) Now the serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild beasts that the Eternal God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say: You shall not eat of any tree of the garden?” (2) The woman replied to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the other trees of the garden. (3) It is only about fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden that God said: ‘You shall not eat of it or touch it, lest you die.’” (4) And the serpent said to the woman, “You are not going to die, (5) but God knows that as soon as you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like divine beings who know good and bad.” (6) When the woman saw that the tree was good for eating and a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable as a source of wisdom, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave some to her husband, and he ate.
... That which happened to Balaam on the way, and the speaking of the ass, took place in a prophetic vision, since further on, in the same account, an angel of God is introduced as speaking to Balaam...
Samuel Shuckford, 1728
[T]he serpent could not, of himself, speak the words, which according to Moses, came from him. But [...] The tongue of the serpent might be so vibrated, or moved, by some invisible agent, as to utter the sounds, or words, which, [...] Eve heard. This, I think, must readily be allowed by any one, who considers how the tongue of Balaam’s ass was moved [... The Serpent’s] tongue was, indeed, moved in a way which he had not been accustomed to move it, and made such sounds as he never made before or since. [...] In all this there was plainly a miracle.
-From Talking Animals in the Bible: Paratexts as Symptoms of Cultural Anxiety in Restoration and Early Eighteenth-Century England jecs_316 437..452 ANN CLINE KELLY
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1754-0208.2010.00316.x
Animal Speech as Revelation in Genesis 3 and Numbers 22 by Cameron B. R. Howard 2008
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/229909375.pdf
The donkey then deploys two rhetorical questions that by their nature do not require answers, though Balaam still feels compelled to give one inadequate reply. She asks him, “Am I not your donkey, which you have ridden all your life to this day? Have I been in the habit of treating you this way?” Remarkably, rather than point to the fiery supernatural being blocking the road, the donkey appeals to the companionship—albeit a companionship forged through servitude—she and Balaam have shared. She puts her own subjectivity first, insisting that Balaam acknowledge the trust he owes her. Rather than serving as a folkloric convention that utters a few words to move the plot along, this talking animal is not only a character in its own right, but a self-aware, even “rounded” character. The fullness of the donkey’s characterization at this point in the story contrasts with the deflation of Balaam’s importance. Balaam’s final, terse “no” in response to the donkey’s questions is hardly worthy of a person who is expected to curse an entire people...
After conversing with the snake and the donkey, Eve and Balaam themselves acquire revelatory sight and knowledge of divine will. Thus the snake and donkey are revealed as mediators of divine revelation, possessing a closer relationship to God than their human counterparts. The texts’ anthropocentrism, while still present, is mitigated by the privileging of the animals’ revelatory agency over that of the humans’...
Robert Rabinowitz - Parashat Balak - Limmud Dvar Torah 2008
It was illuminating to think about the story of Balaam's donkey on metaphorical lines. The miracle of the donkey has two component parts. First, the donkey sees something that Balaam fails to see. Second, the donkey unexpectedly speaks the truth. So the miracle is essentially about seeing and speaking correctly. This, of course, matches the overall message. Balaam is on his way to view the Children of Israel (seeing) prior to cursing them (speaking).
Then we come to the metaphor of the donkey. The donkey is a humble beast of burden, something that the prophet Zachariah uses to add moral depth to his vision of the Messiah entering Jerusalem on a donkey. Balaam the prophet, riding on top of the donkey, represents the usual order, with the powerful and honoured riding on the back of the humble, poor and meek. But, by first demonstrating Balaam's lack of control and then by threatening to overturn the power hierarchy by dropping to the floor, the donkey "mocks" Balaam.
The donkey represents the simple-minded but faithful and honest aspect of the human personality. Balaam represents the self-deceptive arrogance of that part of the personality that seeks to aggrandize itself through wealth, power and even learning. In order for the story to be effective, it must be comical. It is only through the humiliation of what mussar calls the ego that the lesson of obedience and faithfulness can be learned.
Parshat Balak The Snake and the Donkey by Talia Weisberg - Yeshivat Maharat June 2021
Where the snake uses his shrewdness to undercut his Master, the donkey is faithful and seeks to serve her master loyally. The snake speaks to incite Chava to sin and mortality, whereas the donkey speaks to protect Bilaam from being killed. Rabbenu Bachya brings a kabbalistic idea that the snake was animated by the satan, whereas the donkey was animated by Hashem. In addition, the genders are swapped in these two stories, with a male animal speaking to a female human in Bereishit and a female animal speaking to a male human in Balak. Although the punishment for the snake is explicit, the reader never learns of a reward for the donkey’s actions.
Both stories begin with the animal asking a question, the human responding, the animal speaking again, and then the human seeing something. In Chava’s case, “the woman saw that the tree was good for eating and a delight to the eyes” (Gen. 3:6), and in Bilaam’s case, “the LORD uncovered Balaam’s eyes, and he saw the angel of the LORD standing in the way” (Num. 22:31). These parshiot are also connected by curses. Because the snake convinced Chava to eat from the Eitz Hada’at, God cursed both the snake for his role in humanity’s downfall and Adam and Chava for the sin they committed. The donkey successfully saved Bilaam from being killed by the angel in the road, and the curses that he was supposed to deliver against the Jewish people failed.
Given that the snake and donkey are the only two talking animals in Tanach, there is something to be learned from the various differences and similarities in their stories. The episode of Bilaam and the donkey can be understood as a replay of the incident of Chava and the snake, but with the ending it should have had. A sneaky, irreverent animal is replaced by a dependable, steadfast one; a sin against God that brings a curse upon humanity is replaced by an adherence to God’s word that brings blessing into the world. Although Bilaam is not the most obvious analog to Chava, the two biblical figures are more easily connected by their interactions with talking animals, for better or for worse. The Talmud (Sotah 47a) notes that Balak is Ruth’s ancestor, which also makes him the ancestor of Mashiach, who will arrive riding on none other than a donkey (Sanhedrin 98a). While it remains to be seen whether Mashiach’s donkey will also be able to talk, it is clear that the Jewish people’s history and future is unexpectedly yet inextricably linked with this humble beast of burden.