ff. is held to be compiled with editorial
additions from the two ancient documents (900-700 B.C.) commonly denoted by
the symbols J and E The distribution of the material between the two
documents is uncertain; but some such scheme as the following is not
improbable. The references to portions the origin of which is especially
uncertain are placed in brackets ( ).

The present narrative, therefore, is not really a single continuous story,
but may be resolved into two older accounts. In combining these two and
using them as a framework for the poems, the compilers have altered, added
and omitted. Naturally, when both documents made statements which were
nearly identical, one might be omitted; so that neither account need be
given in full in the composite passage. The two older accounts, [v.03
p.0232] as far as they are given here, may have run somewhat thus:
restorations of supposed omissions are given in square brackets [ ].

(i) J. xxii. 3b-5a to "Beor" (5c to "to the land"--7, 11, 17, 18). Balak,
king of Moab, alarmed at the Israelite conquests, sends _elders_ of Moab
and Midian to Balaam, son of Beor, to the land of _Ammon_, to induce him to
come and curse Israel. He sends back word that he can only do what Yahweh
commands.

The land of _Ammon_. The current Hebrew Text has the land of _ammo_, _i.e._
as EV, "his people," but _Ammon_ is read by the Samaritan Pentateuch, the
Syriac and Vulgate Versions and some Hebrew MSS., and is accepted by many
modern scholars.

xxii. 22-35a to "Balaam," also "Go" and "So Balaam went." Nevertheless
Balaam sets out with two servants to go to Balak, but the Angel of Yahweh
meets him. At first the Angel is seen only by the ass, which arouses
Balaam's anger by its efforts to avoid the Angel. The ass is miraculously
enabled to speak to Balaam. Yahweh at last enables Balaam to see the Angel,
who tells him that he would have slain him but for the ass. Balaam offers
to go back, but is told to go on.

Speaking animals are a common feature of folk-lore; the only other case in
the Old Testament is the serpent in Eden. Maimonides suggested that the
episode of the Angel and the conversation with the ass is an account of a
vision; similar views have been held by E. W. Hengstenberg and other
Christian scholars. Others, _e.g._ Volck in Hauck's _Realencyklopadie_ (s.
"Bileam"), regard the statements about the ass speaking as figurative; the
ass brayed, and Balaam translated the sound into words.