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Remember the Donkey
Today, as we remember Jesus’s ride on a borrowed donkey (from Bethphage village) down the Mount of Olives, today a steep incline, toward Jerusalem, I want to celebrate the donkey. A donkey (burro, ass) played a major role in Judeo-Christian history and especially our blessed Jesus’s life. A donkey was the symbol of peace.
 On the first day of Christmas as we looked at the popular figures of our creche scenes, we usually find a gray donkey. And maybe a foal one. This small sized oriental pack animal has always done what oxen and mules and Clydesdale-Percheron horses have done: carry loads. The first Egyptian Pharaohs buried their prized donkeys in their tombs with them. It is suggested Abraham loaded his donkey with wood and led it to the sight he was to sacrifice his son.
The first donkeys in American came on Columbus’ ships and crossed into our territory when the first bishop of Mexico traveled here in 1528. Be it jack or jenny, a donkey’s bray lasts for 20 seconds and can be heard for three kilometers. They seem to be good watchdogs for sheep but will attack any dog in scent range. In the Middle ages, hair pulled from the cross-shaped markings on donkeys backs and shoulders - supposedly marking where Jesus rode into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday - were treasured by Europeans as cures for measles and whooping cough and even a scorpion bite.
For 5000 years, the donkey has been a worthy animal, a humble creature best known for its stubbornness and its ability to go anywhere. Albino donkeys carried kings. Common donkeys carried mostly women and children while men walked beside them. My mother loved donkeys so we had a pair in a paddock on the farm, as does my brother’s widow today. But man has not always respected this beast of burden.
Remember those Biblical epic movies like Ben Hur when oversized men in togas whipped a stalled donkey to make it go faster of just plain GO!! The donkey characteristically had a mind of its own, putting its head down, its ears back and ignoring the wishes of his rider. But if and when the donkey decided to trot along, the rider often can’t stop him even through a painful bit and bridle. Did we ever stop to think maybe God used the blessed donkey to teach us about patience, hard work and loyalty?
In the book of Numbers the story about a donkey who saved Balaam, a respected legendary visionary is wonderful. Balak, King of the Moabs, sent elders to bring seer Balaam to his palace so he might talk prophetic things with him. He really wanted to send Balaam to curse the invading Israelites. Balaam refused. Yahweh told Balaam that he could not curse the Israelites because they were blessed. Balaam said: even if Balak gave me his house full of silver and gold, I could not go against the order of Yahweh my God in anything great or small.”
He said it and then, defying Yahweh’s wishes, Balaam set out on his life-long favorite donkey in the directions of the Moab kingdom. Yahweh grew angry at Balaam and placed an angel with a drawn sword in his hands in the middle of the road to halt him. Only the donkey saw the angel and cut off from the main road heading into the open fields. Balaam was furious and whipped the donkey to get him back on the road.
The angel appeared again as they passed through a vineyard walled on both sides. The donkey passed so close to the wall Balaam scraped his foot against it, making him madder. Balaam struck his steed more for behaving like this. Then a third time the angel of Yahweh greeted them in a place so narrow there was no room to pass. The donkey again spotted the angel and just plopped down flat on the ground with Balaam on his back. Balaam once again reacted with violence beating the donkey into submission. Nothing worked.
Yahweh, weary but still trying to get Balaam’s attention, as a last resort gave the donkey the power to speak human talk. The donkey asked Balaam: Why do you strike me? Have I ever behaved like this before? Balaam cries: “You have made a fool of me. If I had a sword in my hand I would kill you right now.”
The donkey continued: “Am I not your donkey which you have ridden all your life to this day? Have I been in the habit of treating you this way? Cannot you see I am trying to give you a message?” Balaam’s blind eye cracked open and he too saw the angel with the sword in the middle of the road trying to stop him. Balaam, ashamed of his stupidity, fell on his face mortified, and set out to return home. Yahweh told him, “If the donkey had not turned away from the angel with the sword, I would have killed you and let the donkey live!”
Stubbornness has its reward. The donkey tried to make Balaam do right, to keep him straight. Pig-headed about doing what he wanted to do, Balaam considered the donkey only a dumb creature of burden who used stubbornness to defy him. Often those around us try to show us when we are heading for disaster. We fail to notice because we don’t expect them to know our reasons, excuses, causes, nor do we want to admit that maybe they are right.
In Jesus’ life, we rarely read much about gallant horses. They served in wars, parades or in apocalyptic imaginings of the end times. Donkeys were cheaper transport for rich and poor alike throughout the Mediterranean - and still are today. They carried the heaviest loads of people, bales of grass, and other crops well-balanced on their tiny frame to prevent falling over even though a donkey’s hoof is small as a child’s foot. Yet donkeys made many milestone appearances in the Bible.
Moses’ wives rode donkeys. Samson used a donkey’s jawbone to slay a thousand Philistines. Then Yahweh praised His donkey creation in Job when He was questioning Job’s questioning of Him. The very pregnant teenager Holy Mary traveled by donkey to Bethlehem where she and Joseph were required to register under the order of King Herod. They traveled up and down those rocky hills or in deep sand, no stirrups, crudely paddled saddles: a painful excursion on such a thin beast with its prominent backbone. One wonders about the personality of the specific donkey called to carry the Mother of the Son of God to her destiny. Did it balk or was it aware of its call? As it is Holy Mary hardly made it to the door of the cave or barn before contractions came. Then peace arrived and she bore the beautiful baby who would shake the world and save us all.
In our manger scenes there is always a donkey or two, mixed with the wild ox, pigs, camels, cattle, mice, goats, dogs, farm horses, which probably didn’t hang out in sheep pastures in that epoch. But when Herod ordered the slaughter of all male children under the age of two, it was the donkey whose tiny speedy hooves rushed Holy Mary with her infant Jesus close to her breast and Joseph from the dangerous scenario to desert-bound Egypt, where they hid underground until God gave them the all clear sign to return. Once again, the donkey carried the burden.
Finally Jesus in his 30ties, aiming for the final arrival in Jerusalem and the sacrifice in store for him, chose and arranged or a special donkey colt, pre-destined to carry him in his entry to the Holy City for the Passover Celebration. It is said that because Jesus, Prince of Peace, entered on a donkey, the symbol of peace, it showed his enemies He had a peaceful rather than warlike intention. If the Messiah had wanted to stir up war, He would have entered on a more dashing and prancing warhorse. In that moment of Hosannas, it was the uncelebrated and very faithful donkey who stepped over the palm leaves strewn in his path and without a buck or a bray, carried his Holy passenger to his destiny.
So Remember the loyal donkey on this Palm Sunday and the special burdens he has born throughout the Bible. And the next time you pass one, give him a rub on his head or pat his neck in appreciation that this beast was the one chosen to carry our Savior the Christ child both in the womb our of which He was born, to the final week of His life on earth, which has saved for eternity those of us who believe.
~ Rev
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audrey@audreytaylorgonzalez.com
www.audreytaylorgonzalez.com
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