Abrahams Sacrifice

Lore & Background

According to the narrative in Genesis 22, God commands Abraham to offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice. After Isaac is bound to an altar, a messenger from God stops Abraham before he can complete the sacrifice, saying, "now I know you fear God." Abraham looks up and sees a ram and sacrifices it instead of Isaac. The passage states that the event occurred at "the mount of the LORD" in "the land of Moriah." Abraham then named the place 'Jehovah-jireh' (lit. 'God will provide'). 2 Chronicles 3:1 refers to "mount Moriah" as the site of Solomon's Temple, while Psalm 24:3, Isaiah 2:3 and 30:29, and Zechariah 8:3 use the term "the mount of the LORD" to refer to the site of Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem, the location believed to be the Temple Mount. In the Samaritan Pentateuch version of Genesis 22:14, the phrase YHWH yireh is taken to mean "in the mountain the Lord was seen"—the mountain being Mount Gerizim. In Jewish interpretation, Maimonides in The Guide for the Perplexed argues the story contains two "great notions": first, Abraham's willingness to demonstrate the limit of humanity's capability to both love and fear God; second, the story exemplifies how prophetic revelation has the same truth value as philosophical argument. Rabbi Ari Kahn, writing on the Orthodox Union website, states: "Isaac's death was never a possibility – not as far as Abraham was concerned, and not as far as God was concerned. God's commandment to Abraham was very specific, and Abraham understood it very precisely: Isaac was to be 'raised up as an offering', and God would use the opportunity to teach humankind, once and for all, that human sacrifice, child sacrifice, is not acceptable." The sages of the Talmud (Taanit 4a) state unequivocally that such behavior "never crossed God's mind," referring specifically to the sacrificial slaughter of Isaac. In Christian views, the binding of Isaac is mentioned in Hebrews 11:17–19: "By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, 'In Isaac your seed shall be called', concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense." Early Christian preaching sometimes accepted Jewish interpretations; Hippolytus of Rome says in his Commentary on the Song of Songs, "The blessed Isaac became desirous of the anointing and he wished to sacrifice himself for the sake of the world" (On the Song 2:15). Other Christians saw Isaac as a type of the "Word of God" who prefigured Christ, supported by symbolism such as Abraham sacrificing his son on the third day of the journey (Genesis 22:4), or Abraham taking the wood and putting it on his son Isaac's shoulder (Genesis 22:6).

Reader's Guide

The narrative of the sacrifice and binding of Isaac is traditionally read in synagogue on the second day of Rosh Hashanah. The practice of the Kabbalists, observed in some communities but not all, is to recite this chapter every day immediately after Birkot hashachar. The Book of Genesis does not tell the age of Isaac at the time. Some Talmudic sages teach that Isaac was an adult aged thirty seven, likely based on the next biblical story, which is of Sarah's death at 127 years, being 90 when Isaac was born. Rabbinic tradition closely links this timeline to her death, teaching that the sudden news of the event caused her passing out of either grief or intense joy. Isaac's reaction to the binding is unstated in the biblical narrative. Some commentators have argued that he was traumatized and angry, often citing the fact that he and Abraham are never seen to speak to each other again; however, Jon D. Levenson notes that the biblical text never depicts them speaking before the binding, either. In the Genesis Apocryphon discovered in the Qumrannic Caves Scrolls (Dead Sea Scrolls) in 1946, Hebrew tribal patriarch Lamech, son of Methuselah converses with Abraham who also speaks in first and third person narratives. Various scholars suggest that the original story of Abraham and Isaac may have been of a completed human sacrifice, later altered by redactors to substitute a ram for Isaac, and some traditions, including certain Jewish and Christian interpretations, maintain that Isaac actually was sacrificed. In addition to being addressed by modern scholarship, this biblical episode has been the focus of a great deal of commentary in traditional sources of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

Did You Know?

• The name 'Jehovah-jireh' means 'God will provide' (Genesis 22:14).
• Some Talmudic sages teach that Isaac was an adult aged thirty seven at the time of the binding.
• The sages of the Talmud (Taanit 4a) state that child sacrifice 'never crossed God's mind,' referring specifically to the sacrificial slaughter of Isaac.
• In the Samaritan Pentateuch version of Genesis 22:14, the phrase YHWH yireh is taken to mean 'in the mountain the Lord was seen'—the mountain being Mount Gerizim.
• The binding of Isaac is mentioned in the New Testament in Hebrews 11:17–19, where Abraham is said to have concluded 'that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead.'