After finally receiving permission from Hashem to go with Bolak’s agents, Bilaam woke up early the following morning and saddled his donkey to prepare for the trip (Bamidbar 22:21). Rashi explains that Bilaam had such personal hatred toward the Jews that when he received permission to travel to curse them, he awoke early and personally prepared his donkey with zrizus [alacrity] so that he could leave quickly. Hashem remarked, “Wicked one, their forefather Avrohom already preceded you when he woke up early when departing for the akeidah and personally saddled his donkey for the trip (Bereishis 22:3).” What is the deeper lesson to be taken from Bilaam’s zrizus in attempting to curse the Jewish people, and in what way did the fact that Avrohom already “beat him to it” protect us from his curses?
The following insightful moshul [parable] will help illustrate the answers to these questions. A man who hadn’t been known in his youth for his intellectual abilities went on to become a great talmid chochom. When asked about the key to his success, he attributed it not to his natural talents, but to his unparalleled diligence and perseverance in his learning. He explained that he moved into an apartment in which one of his neighbors was a bartender who worked late hours, and the other neighbor was a newspaper delivery boy who worked early in the morning. Every night when he grew tired and wanted to close the sefer he was learning and retire for the night, he asked himself how he could stop learning when his neighbor was still awake working hard to make a few dollars. In the morning, he was roused from his sleep by the delivery boy’s loud alarm clock. He again wondered, “If my neighbor is already awake serving his boss, shouldn’t I wake up to serve my Boss?”
In light of this moshul, we can now appreciate Rav Moshe Feinstein’s answer to our questions. He explains that Hashem expects the Jewish people to learn Torah and perform mitzvos with at least as much effort and exertion as the non-Jews invest in accomplishing and attaining their personal goals and desires. The wicked Bilaam intended to create an accusation against the Jews when he demonstrated his commitment to his beliefs by waking up at the crack of dawn. Fortunately, Hashem was able to defend us by pointing out that our righteous forefather Avrohom had already done the same thing when serving Hashem at the akeidah. Let us learn from the dedication of workaholics to working for their temporal bosses and use it to inspire ourselves to reach higher levels in serving the ultimate Boss. (R’ Ozer Alport)