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A set of parallels between the Balaam pericope and the encounter with Edom in Num. 20.14-21 form a literary allusion to the latter, which also draws on elements in the Jacob cycle – especially in Genesis 27. I suggest that these parallels encourage us to associate Balaam with Edom – as do Gen. 36.31-32 and other previously discovered evidence. A key to understanding these literary connections is the sword motif in Num. 20.14-21 and Num. 22.21-35, which points back to "you shall live by your sword" in Gen. 27.40. The allusion seems to present Esau's sword blessing and Balaam's intended curse as futile against the divine will. Another layer of meaning of the Balaam-Edom connection becomes clear when we consider the biblical motif of Edom as a symbol of the "nations" (Israel's enemies), as well as Frisch's recent proposal that Balaam's jenny is a symbol of Israel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Proverbs 30.1b represents a well-known textual conundrum that is regularly resolved by re-dividing and re-pointing the consonantal text of MT. The typical emendation to the initial 'words of Agur' results in a text that has this figure lament his weariness. Adopting in part this common emendation while also taking a cue from an older suggestion by Charles C. Torrey, this article contends that an Aramaic Vorlage to the initial three verses of Prov. 30 lies behind the current MT. The proposal explains better than most other suggestions how the corrupted MT of Prov. 30.1b emerged. Unlike most commentators who accept the common emendation to the line but who do not discuss much Agur's weariness, the proposal also explains why Agur experiences fatigue by considering several key biblical and Second Temple intertexts to Prov. 30.1-4. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There have been few, if any, exegetically based arguments for why we should interpret biblical characters as non-disabled if the text mentions their involvement in an accident or states that they sustained an injury but does not mention a recovery. Instead, we arrive at such interpretations based on an assumption of non-disability as normative rather than arguments from the text. Using Balaam's accident in Numbers 22:25 as a test case, this article analyzes the strength of the often unstated reasons for interpreting characters as nondisabled or unimpaired after they experience an accident or injury. We find that these reasons depend more on reading non-disability into the narrative rather on making a textual argument for why we should interpret these characters as unimpaired or nondisabled. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Biblical tale of Balaam and his taking donkey was elaborated in the Babylonian Talmud: Balaam commits bestiality with the animal and this is accounted one of his failings as a pagan prophet, which accumulate as he tries and fails to curse the Children of Israel. This aspect of testing, probably transmitted by Jews of Iran and Sasanian Mesopotamia, probably becomes the source of an Iranian folk myth about a demonic ass called "mantrier". The myth enters Armenia from there and becomes a legend about the trial that a Christian holy man successfully overcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Smerdyakov, the likely fourth brother—a bastard, an epileptic, a murderer, a suicide—is glaringly excluded from the tripartite Karamazov soul of the appetitive Dmitri, the rational Ivan, and the spiritual Alyosha. But to dismiss him as an inexplicable freak of nature is to dismiss the entire sobornost, or spiritual community, of Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov. This paper carefully examines the character of Smerdyakov, and argues that his willful self-denial of all aspects of life and humanity—his tripartite rejection of the Karamazov soul—culminates in the murder of his father Fyodor. However, I also maintain that Smerdyakov serves as Dostoevsky’s warning to Russia’s next generation of “gentlemen,” for this “Balaam’s ass” will give Russia occasion to reorient and restore her fracturing soul. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article departs from the traditional view that the episode involving Balaam and his donkey (Num. 22.21–35) is an independent insertion that disrupts the Balaam narrative (Num. 22–24). Instead, the focus here is on the manner in which, within this episode, Balaam displays certain characteristics that are associated elsewhere in these three chapters with the Moabite king Balak. Comparison with two other texts, Genesis 38 and 1 Samuel 25, reveals that the presence of such a role-reversal in the donkey episode renders it an indispensable component of the larger narrative. Each of these three texts thus instantiates a trope in which a role-reversing interlude interacts closely with its surrounding context to highlight the rich human complexity of a central figure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Levinas establishes an intriguing connection between idolatry and ontology. This connection is aptly illustrated by the biblical character of Balaam, the ambiguous Mesopotamian prophet or sorcerer of Numbers 22-24, who is almost never mentioned in Levinas's work but who is present, albeit hidden, in the talmudic reading 'Contempt for the Torah as Idolatry.' A deconstruction of this talmudic reading uncovers Balaam's footprints. It also clarifies different meanings of idolatry-exposing its ontological violence, but also, perhaps, its necessity for ethics and law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Moses' endangerment in Exodus 4:24-26 in which Yahweh sought to kill him has perplexed scholarship as to its rationale: why kill Moses, the one chosen to deliver Israel out of slavery? Scholarly responses to this pericope tend to identify causality for Moses' endangerment that is both Moses' doing and external to the call and journey. The following article suggests that Moses' endangerment is a formalized rite of passage which is part of a wider, literary unit. As such, Moses is endangered precisely because he has undertaken this journey and for no other reason; his jeopardy is both internal to the narrative and a functional component of his mission. The paper proposes that this wider, literary unit is also the framework around which the story of Balaam's journey in Numbers 22 is built. As such, Exodus 4 and Numbers 22 are read, and best understood, in conversation with one another. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes that the variant Baλaά in the text of Jude 11 be read in light of theological tendency in the Bodmer codex, especially as evidenced in the christological variants of. Initially, scholarly opinion dismissed the 'Balaak' reading as nothing more than an inexperienced copyist's careless mistake. Though recognizing the older view to be unsatisfactory, recent explanations are also inadequate. Given neutral or positive traditions about Balaam in Judaism, and in the context of the early Christian belief that the Spirit of Christ inspired the OT Prophets (including Balaam), the article makes a case for reevaluation of the variant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]