Sure, I can be a bit stubborn, and more than one person has called me that not-nice name before. But the story is the real reason for the name of the blog.
It always strikes me that Balaam just carried on a conversation with his donkey. I think I would have been out of there in a split second.
Anyway, here's the story.
But now God’s anger flared up at him for going, and the angel of the LORD took up a position on the road as his adversary. As Balaam was riding along on his donkey, accompanied by two of his servants, the donkey saw the angel of the LORD standing in the road with sword drawn. The donkey turned off the road and went into the field, and Balaam beat the donkey to bring her back on the road.
Then the angel of the LORD stood in a narrow lane between vineyards with a stone wall on each side. When the donkey saw the angel of the LORD there, she pressed against the wall; and since she squeezed Balaam’s leg against the wall, he beat her again.
Then the angel of the LORD again went ahead, and stood next in a passage so narrow that there was no room to move either to the right or to the left. When the donkey saw the angel of the LORD there, she lay down under Balaam. Balaam’s anger flared up and he beat the donkey with his stick.
Then the LORD opened the mouth of the donkey, and she asked Balaam, “What have I done to you that you beat me these three times?”
“You have acted so willfully against me,” said Balaam to the donkey, “that if I only had a sword at hand, I would kill you here and now.”
But the donkey said to Balaam, “Am I not your donkey, on which you have always ridden until now? Have I been in the habit of treating you this way before?”
“No,” he replied.
Then the LORD opened Balaam’s eyes, so that he saw the angel of the LORD standing on the road with sword drawn; and he knelt and bowed down to the ground.
But the angel of the LORD said to him: “Why have you beaten your donkey these three times? I have come as an adversary because this rash journey of yours is against my will. When the donkey saw me, she turned away from me these three times. If she had not turned away from me, you are the one I would have killed, though I would have spared her.”
- NAB
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