Bible Strands
Numbers 22:28
Then the LORD opened the donkey’s mouth, and she said to Balaam, “What have I done to you that you have beaten me these three times?”
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The LORD speaks through a donkey to Balaam immediately after the prophet strikes the animal three times for refusing to proceed.
The words — וַיִּפְתַּח (va-yiphṯaḥ) means "and he opened," and מֶה (meh) translates to "what?"
The thread — The event is referenced in 2 Peter 2:16 as a divine rebuke, while Exodus 4:11 grounds God's power to grant speech.
Why it lands — The text records God physically enabling speech to confront unjust violence, requiring the reader to acknowledge that divine correction operates outside natural or human expectations.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
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?
Cross-references
- 2 Peter 2:16 But he was rebuked for his transgression by a donkey, otherwise without speech, that spoke with a man’s voice and restrained the prophet’s madness.
- Exodus 4:11 And the LORD said to him, “Who gave man his mouth? Or who makes the mute or the deaf, the sighted or the blind? Is it not I, the LORD?
- Luke 1:37 For no word from God will ever fail.”
- 1 Corinthians 1:19 For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
- Romans 8:22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until the present time.