Numbers 22:28
And the LORD opened the mouth of the ass, and she said unto Balaam, What have I done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me these three times?
And the Lord opened the mouth of the ass, and she said unto Balaam,.... This was a very extraordinary and miraculous affair, and effected by a supernatural power, that a dumb creature, which had not organs endued with speech, should speak so plainly and distinctly, as is after expressed; and yet it should not be thought incredible, for what is it that Omnipotence cannot do? wherefore there is no need to say, as some Jewish writers {i}, that this was all done in a visionary way, and not really and literally performed; nor can Heathens well object to the verity of it, if they believe what they themselves report concerning one of the asses which carried Bacchus over a river, to which, for reward, he gave the power of speaking with an human voice {k}; though it is very probable the fable was framed from this story, and frequently do their writers speak of other brute creatures endued with speech; so Homer {l} represents Xanthus, the horse of Achilles, having the faculty of speech given it by Juno: Pliny says {m}, it is commonly reported among the wonderful things of the ancients, that an ox spoke; and Livy {n} frequently makes mention of an ox spoke speaking in divers places, and of one particularly that said,
"Rome, take heed to thyself;''
not to take notice of a lamb in Egypt in the times of Bocchoris that spoke, related by Aelianus {o} and others; nor of the ram of Phrixus, or the dog at Ariminum, and the elephant of Porus in India, with others Bochart {p} has collected together: the words spoken by the ass were as follow:
What have l done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me these three times? and just so many times she had been smitten by him,
{i} Maimon. Moreh Nevochim, par. 2. c. 42. Ben Gersom in loc.
{k} Hygin. Poet. Astronomic. l. 2. c. 23. "Lactant, de falsa Relig". l. 1. c. 21.
{l} Iliad. 19. "prope finem".
{m} Nat. Hist. l. 8. c. 45.
{n} Hist. l. 24. c. 10. l. 27. c. 11. l. 28. c. 11. and l. 35. c. 21.
{o} De Animal. l. 12. c. 3.
{p} Hierozoic. par. 1. l. 2. c. 14. col. 197, 198.