Such is the magic of the human spirit. When you make things start going your way, the whole world seems to bend in your favor.

The story of Bil'am and Balak in this week's reading takes place against the backdrop of Israel's long-awaited spiritual revival. After years of decline and failure, of being "grasshoppers . . . in our own eyes" and repeatedly incurring God's punishments for their waffling, the Israelites have finally turned things around, winning small wars and building momentum in advance of their entry into the Promised Land. Balak, king of Moab, is now terrified of this nation that "covers the face of the earth," and hires a seer named Bil'am to curse Israel.

From a literary standpoint, the story is out of place.  It's the only story, from Exodus to Deuteronomy, that unfolds as an independent unit so far away from Moses.  Thus, when the rabbis of the Talmud attributed authorship of the various books of the Bible, they said that Moses wrote "his book, the story of Bil'am, and Job."

Within that story is an even stranger story, that of Bil'am and his donkey. While riding in a narrow valley, the donkey sees a monstrous, sword-wielding angel of the Lord, and stops in her tracks. Bil'am, who can't see the angel, beats her. This repeats itself, until the third time, when suddenly the donkey speaks, Bil'am sees the angel, and he repents.

He then takes Balak for a ride, playing the role of donkey: Three times he sets up to curse the Israelite camp, each time blurting out a blessing instead of a curse. Like his donkey, Bil'am has to follow God in defiance of Balak's power-logic. "How goodly are your tents, O Jacob," he proclaims, "your tabernacles O Israel."

There's another layer to the donkey parable. The donkey, it seems, is Israel, possessing a divine truth, silently struggling under the lashes of power, driven by revelation to turn away from the path dictated by the violent overlords, eventually revealed and vindicated.

Bil'am, in turn, represents the nations of the world—perhaps the Egyptians who kept Israel enslaved through force.  When the donkey finally speaks, asking what it has done to deserve being beaten, Bil'am answers, "Because you have mocked me." Israel will always "mock" the nations just by refusing to follow the dictates of power.

In a different era, Balak's scheme might have worked.  Much later, during the time of the prophets, God has no problem using the armies of Assyria and Babylonia as a hammer for divine punishment. When Israel does wrong, God "hides his face" and lets the Balaks have their way. But now that the Israelites have affirmed their belief in themselves and in God's promise, the curses don't stick.

Thus, Bil'am offers more than a cautionary tale to the nations of the world.  He also sounds a moral calling: Have confidence in your ability to do right, to protect the weak, to reject absolute power-logic and make the world better—and you'll be on the right side of history, no matter how many times they try to beat you.

David Hazony is author of The Ten Commandments: How Our Most Ancient Moral Text Can Renew Modern Life, recently published by Scribner.