In Numbers 22:1–41, the rebuke is actually given by an angel and not the donkey. The donkey simply complains of ill treatment (Numbers 22:21–41). In further reflection on this passage, a number of Jewish Targums actually have the donkey rebuking Balaam.1. Targum Neofiti states the following: And the donkey said to Balaam: Where are you going, wicked Balaam? You lack understanding! What! If you are not able to curse me who am an unclean beast, and die in this world and who do not enter the world to come, how much less are you able to curse the sons of Abraham, of Isaac and Jacob, on whose account the world was created from the beginning, and for whose merits it is remembered before them?
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The message which Peter seeks to convey is that Balaam should have known better. He was a man who should have perceived the spiritual reality (threat of death) only to be oblivious to the danger.3 The voice of the donkey should have helped Balaam to realize that he is mad for thinking that he can oppose God’s will and get away with it.4 The heretics are similarly foolish in thinking that they can sin with impunity; even a donkey knows better.5 Therefore just as Balaam perished in the divine judgment on Midian (Numbers 31:8) along with those he persuaded to act immorally (Numbers 31:15–17), these teachers will likewise perish when the judgment of God falls on them.6
15 Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray. They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing,