But was rebuked for his iniquity
Which was not merely going along with the messengers of Balak,
for he had leave from the Lord so to do, ( Numbers
22:20 ) ; but going along with them with a desire to curse
Israel, when it was the will of God he should go and bless them,
in order to get Balak's money; so that his governing iniquity was
covetousness, which led him to other sins; and for this he was
rebuked by the angel, ( Numbers
22:32 ) , as well as reproved by his ass, ( Numbers
22:28 ) : for
the dumb ass,
as it was naturally so, the ass on which he rode,
speaking with man's voice;
which was supernatural and miraculous, for it was God that opened
the mouth of the ass: the mouth of that ass is said, by the Jews
F13, to be one of the ten things
created between the two evenings on the sixth day of the
creation; that is, as the gloss on it says, concerning which it
was decreed, that its mouth should be opened to speak what this
ass said; and the occasion of it may be seen in ( Numbers
22:22-30 ) . Lactantius F14 observes, that there are two
stars in the constellation of Cancer, which the Greeks call the
"asses"; and which, the poets feign, are those that carried
Liberus over a river, when he could not pass it; to one of which
he gave this for a reward, "ut humana voce loqueretur", "that it
should speak with man's voice"; a fable, no doubt, hatched from
the sacred history, and said in imitation of this ass. Which
forbad the madness of the prophet:
and so Balaam, though a diviner and soothsayer, is called by the
Jewish writers F15; who, they say, was first a
prophet, and then a soothsayer, from whom Jerom F16 seems
to have received the tradition; who says, that he was first a
holy man, and a prophet of God, and afterwards, through
disobedience, and a desire of gifts, was called a diviner; for
his eyes were opened, and he saw the vision of the Almighty; and
the Spirit of God came upon him, and he prophesied many things
concerning Israel, and the Messiah, and others, ( Numbers
24:4-9 Numbers
24:16-24 ) . His madness lay in going with the messengers of
Balak, ( Numbers
22:21 ) , in order to curse Israel, contrary to the will of
God, ( Numbers
22:12 ) ; and it is madness in any to oppose God in his
counsels, purposes, providences, and precepts; and every sin,
which is an act of hostility against God, has madness in it; and
this of Balaam's was forbid by his ass, and he was convinced of
it. Very appropriately is mention made of this dumb ass, when the
persons here spoken of were as natural brute beasts, and worse
than them, ( 2 Peter 2:12
) .
F13 Pirke Abot, c. 5. sect. 6. & Jarchi in ib. Sepher Cosri, par. 2. p. 254.
F14 De falsa Religione, l. 1. c. 21.
F15 Pesikta, Ilmedenu & Gerundensis apud Drus in loc. T. Bab Sanhedrin fol. 106. 1. Aben Ezra in Numb. xxxii. 28.
F16 Tradition. Heb. in Genes. fol. 69. D.
