Balak

The Parsha tells us the miracle of the donkey speaking to Bilam. It said, “Why did you hit me these three times?” It also said, “behold I am your donkey that you rode on me from before until now; did I ever do you any damage?”

Rashi writes that because the donkey gave Bilam tochacha which he was not able to withstand, Hashem killed the donkey. Hashem did this so that people shouldn’t say, “this donkey won over Bilam with its tochacha which Bilam couldn’t answer.” Therefore, Hashem had pity on the kavod habriyos of Bilam and killed the donkey. Rav Chaim Shmuelevitz points out, had Hashem left the donkey alive there would have been a tremendous kiddush-Hashem. People would say, “מה רבו מעשיך ה’!” Still Hashem looked away from His own honor kaviyochol and killed the donkey so that there would not be any embarrassment to Bilam, despite that it would have enhanced the kavod-Hashem!

The Mishnah teaches: ten things were created at the beginning of creation on erev Shabbos at bein hashmashos. One of them was a special creation of the mouth of the donkey to be able to speak which was a shinui hateva – a change in the general nature of the world. Rav Chaim asks: why was this necessary? It wasn’t in order to save Bnei Yisrael because we see that Bilam went anyhow, although it tried to stop him. Hashem stopped his klalos in a different way. Rather, says Rav Chaim, this was only in order to help prevent Bilam from going to do an aveira, of being mekalel Bnei Yisrael. Around 2,000 years earlier, at the end of creation, Hashem created the miraculous mouth of the donkey to speak, just for the purpose to save Bilam harasha from doing an aveira! Here too we see Hashem’s great rachamim!

Just as Hashem acts with rachamim and chesed even to those undeserving, so too, we have to follow in His ways; as the passuk states, “and you shall go in His ways.” A person is meant to perfect himself and become complete by improving both bein adam la’makom and bein adam la’chaveiro. Then a person will be similar to Hashem. The Aseres HaDibros consists of ten dibros, five of which emphasize and relate mainly to a person and Hashem and the other five refer to a person and his friend. This hints that a person must work on both of these areas to become the adam hashaleim.

May Hashem help us act toward others with kindness and mercy by following after His ways!