I don’t have a pet. I remember a talking a horse and donkey on TV – Francis the talking mule and Mr. Ed. I must watch these soon – I loved them. 😀.
And I remember animals singing in The Jungle Book. There was the sinister snake – maybe that was influenced by the serpent in the garden of Eden.
And there’s also a talking donkey in the Old Testament.
Maybe most would see it as a myth. But the Bible isn’t a book of myths. God is capable of doing miracles. Miracles are rare even in the Bible. This one might seem bizaare, but animals do think and communicate. The conversation surrounds what the donkey would have been thinking or wanting to communicate.
God choose to reveal what was in the donkey’s mind to Balaam. Might it have been some sort of an internal vision that Balaam had rather than something that really happened? Would Balaam have known? I think of an incident that the Apostle Paul reported in the New Testament, where he was unclear as to what happened to him:
2 Corinthians 12:2
2 I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know—God knows.
Though he uses the third person, the context suggests that he was speaking about himself. There’s a lot that we don’t know. Some things in the Old Testament feel like myths – such as Lot’s wife turning into a pillar of salt. When I get to heaven and ask all my questions, I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a myth. But because the Bible doesn’t say it was a myth, I take it to be true. It doesn’t cost me anything to believe it. Like “the boy who cried wolf”, the key thing is the lessons learnt from the incident – do what you’re told.
The fact that Jesus accepted the truth of the Old Testament convinces me to accept it. He mentioned several martydom’s of the Old Testament that hostile Jews caused, including that of Abel (murdered by Cain) ( See Matthew 23:35). So, how could I see the Cain and Abel story as a myth if Jesus took it literally? Of course, someone might say that he was speaking about a different Abel. But I prefer to just accept it. The Bible has some puzzles, but so does science and life in general.
The book of Revelation is full of symbols, but I’d love to see every creature that ever existed come back to life and singing praise to God:
Revelation 5:13
13 Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, saying:
“To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb
be praise and honor and glory and power,
for ever and ever!”
Hibernia Gospel 