Asher Studies

The Aqedah (“Binding;” Genesis 22:1-19)

Personal Context

Being my ornery self, one morning I asked my mother if she would be able to sacrifice one of her children like Abraham did with Isaac.  Given my mother’s only-but-God devotion, I thought she would easily offer her children up to God.  First, it was hypothetical and second, she had already devoted us to work for God – she prayed her whole adult life that we would commit ourselves to furthering God’s ministry as ministers, wives of ministers, choir directors, Bible teachers, and if possible, missionaries. But I was taken aback when she said, “I don’t know if I would be able to sacrifice any of my children to God.  It would be too difficult.” It’s not that she found a problem with the command; God forbid that she (and I) would ever question God or anything in the Bible.  She understood the gravity of the command and was conflicted whether she had that level of conviction.

With my studies, I began to read different interpretations which questioned the ethics of God asking Abraham to sacrifice Issac – Is it right for God to ask Abraham for child sacrifice? When I encountered these interpretations, I was thinking to myself, “how dare we, as mere creatures, ask God such questions?”  Yet one needs to pause and think about the cultural context of the interpreters, how does the perspective of the reader impact the way in which they come to understand the text. My mother was of a certain generation from Korea that did not question but was encouraged to memorize and embody the knowledge and wisdom of authority figures, whether it be the dictatorial leaders in Korea, Bible, or God. And the interpreters that questioned the divine command had lived through the Holocaust. Should we not question authority, including religious authorities who supposedly speak on behalf of God, if they transgress moral law?

While we cannot fully explore the contexts of all the interpreters, we will be looking at the ancient context and then some later interpretations to see what the Aqedah has come to mean to them.  This classic story has come to signify different perspectives but at its core, one can argue that there is a level of dis-comfort with God’s demand from Abraham.  One would think it was because of the child sacrifice but it initially wasn’t.  The discomfort primarily stemmed from not knowing why God asks Abraham out of nowhere to offer Isaac?  Only later, did interpreters find discomfort with the actual demand itself, the child sacrifice.

Ancient Context

In the ancient world, child sacrifices appear to have been part of religious practices of certain communities.  One could even argue that it was a common practice within Yahwism, i.e. an integral part of Israelite cult.  So it was probably not ‘shocking’ for God to ask Abraham to sacrifice Isaac.  The ancient audience, the Israelites, believed that the gods and God expected sacrifice. But the question was why, “Why did God ask Abraham to offer Isaac?”  Did Abraham do anything that would make God question his allegiance?  And why Isaac, not Ishmael or anything else?  Did Isaac do anything that would have warranted God to demand a sacrifice?  So many questions and therefore so many interpretations.  Since the text is ambiguous at best, interpretations have tended to be far-ranging.

Child Sacrifice in Ancient Israel

The Bible is replete with accusations about the Canaanite religious practices that included child sacrifice (Deuteronomy 12:29-31; 18:9-13).  But can we believe that the Canaanites actually sacrificed their children just because the ancient authors accused them? After all, the ancient Israelite authors implicated their enemies and neighboring countries of many ‘abominable’ religious practices.  It may have been a ploy to differentiate themselves from what they perceived to be foreign practices.  However, they were also willing to concede that some Israelite kings have misled the people to follow the Canaanites in sacrificing their children to foreign gods (2 Kings 17:14-17) as well as YHWH (Ezekiel 23:39; Jeremiah):

Moreover, this they have done to me: they have defiled my sanctuary on the same day and profaned my Sabbaths. For when they had slaughtered their children for their idols, on the same day they came into my sanctuary to profane it. This is what they did in my house. (Ezekiel 23:38-39)

And they go on building the high place of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire—which I did not command, nor did it come into my mind. (Jeremiah 7:31)

Based on archaeological, literary, and epigraphical findings, we know that there was extensive child sacrifice in Carthage in the Phoenician world.  But the question is, was there child sacrifice in the ancient Near East, specifically in the land of Israel?  This is difficult to assess.  From the biblical diatribes against certain kings, like Ahaz (2 Kings 16:3) and Manasseh (2 Kings 21:6), one may think that while not prevalent, child sacrifice was considered to be an acceptable practice whether it was done in the name of a foreign god or perhaps even YHWH.  The prophet Jeremiah actually pinpoints Tophet, located in the valley of Ben Hinnom (Gehenna which in modern Judaism is hell), as the site where child sacrifice was performed in Israel (Jeremiah 7:31; 19:5-6).  Since archaeologists have not been able to locate the site, they have not been able to confirm the accusations of child sacrifice.

Nevertheless, we have recovered a stele, Mesha Stele (Moabite Stone), dated to 840 BCE which while not confirming accusations of child sacrifice, actually corroborates the battle between Omri’s son and the king of Moab, Mesha.  According to the biblical narrative, the king of Moab sacrifices his firstborn son to Chemosh, turning the battle in favor of Moab (2 Kings 3:26-27).  This account of the fight is recounted in the Mesha Stele where the Moabite king acknowledges Chemosh as the god who helped him defeat Omri, the king of Israel.  However, he does not mention that he had sacrificed his son to win the battle.

While we may not have concrete archaeological evidence for child sacrifice, it wouldn’t be farfetched to say that child sacrifice was a religious practice in the land of Israel and its neighboring countries.  The prevalence of biblical references to child sacrifice would point to the likelihood that it was a rare but acceptable practice within the land of Israel.  While the biblical authors were not particularly fond of the practice, some Yahwists may have thought that YHWH expected and wanted child sacrifice.

This forms the background to the Aqedah story.  Child sacrifice or God’s demand for child sacrifice was an acceptable religious practice in Israel.  Therefore, God asking Abraham to offer Isaac as a burnt offering would not have initially raised eyebrows.  Nevertheless, this very story may not have had the same reception later, triggering various interpretations.  So God’s command to Abraham to sacrifice Isaac was probably not problematic at first but readers would have wanted to know why. Why did God ask Abraham to offer his son? Here is where we turn to various interpretations to understand the literary context in which the Aqedah came into being.

Literary Context and Later Interpretations

How does the surrounding literary context help us understand the why of God’s test? Does it provide any clues to help us unpack the Aqedah? Are there any internal literary hints that would point to God’s motivation? We will look at the story carefully to dissect the tension.

In the previous chapter, Genesis 21, Abraham sends Ishmael away with Hagar (vv. 1-21).  Consequently, Abraham now has only 1 son in his household, Isaac, the son born to Sarah.  Then the story shifts away from family dynamics to inter-tribal conflict with Abimelech of the Philistines over a well.  Nothing here would indicate that there was a problem in the way Abraham acted before God.

Then in Genesis 22, God decides to test Abraham:

Some time later [literally, “after these matters”], God tested Abraham.

וַיְהִ֗י אַחַר֙ הַדְּבָרִ֣ים הָאֵ֔לֶּה וְהָ֣אֱלֹהִ֔ים נִסָּ֖ה אֶת־אַבְרָהָ֑ם

Because the text does not really explain what had actually happened between Genesis 21:34 to Genesis 22:1, interpreters have tried to translate “after these matters/deeds” to explain the “why” of God’s test. 

Because one couldn’t add to the canonical (closed) texts, ancient interpreters tried to interpolate the phrase, “after these matters” to explain what had occurred prior to the test.  Some interpretations pinpoint the problem with Abraham who offended God.  In forming a covenant with Abimelech in the previous chapter, Abraham disobeyed God according to Rashbam (Samuel ben Meir, 1085-1158):

And it came to pass, after these events. Every place where it says “after these events,” [the text] is connected to the preceding section… So too, here, “after these events” [refers to the previous section where] Abraham made a covenant with Avimelech [king of the Philistines], on behalf of himself and his grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and he gave him the seven ewes. God was angry about this, for the land of the Philistines was within the borders of Israel, and God had commanded regarding them “do not let anyone live” …Therefore, “And God tested Abraham” … that is to say, “You were boastful with the the son that I gave you to establish a covenant between your children and their children. Now, go and offer him as a burnt offering, and we will see what good the covenant you made was.”

Then according to Rabbi Yossi Ben Zimra, Abraham was punished for failing to offer anything to God:

[To what does “after” refer?] Rabbi Yochanan said in the name of Rabbi Yossi ben Zimra: “After the words of Satan.” For it says (Gen 21:8), “And the child grew up and was weaned.” Satan said to the Almighty: “Sovereign of the universe! To this old man You graciously granted the fruit of the womb at the age of a hundred, yet of all that banquet which he prepared, he did not have one turtle-dove or pigeon to sacrifice before you!” God replied, “Yet were I to say to him, ‘Sacrifice your son before me,’ he would do so without hesitation.” Straightway, “God did test Abraham… And he said, ‘Take, I pray, your son’ [Gen 22:1]. (Sanhedrin 89b)

The test was necessary to demonstrate to Satan that Abraham was faithful to God.  It was not a random, fickle test to appease a curious God but a response to what had occurred previously.  The phrase, “after these matters” allowed ancient interpreters to fill in the detail. While it is impossible to say whether anything actually happened, one can sense within these interpretations, discomfort with the test.  They felt the need to explain the “why”.

If not trying to justify the test by providing a reason for the test, other interpreters have tried to explain the virtue of the test itself.  The test was not to see if Abraham was a man of faith but to demonstrate for future generation, the virtue of Abraham.  As Radak (R. David Kimchi, 1160-1235) states:

But the truth is that this test was in order to show the nations of the world Abraham’s complete love of God. And this was not done for those generations, but rather for the later generations that believe in the Torah that Moses, peace be upon him, wrote by God’s word, and in its stories, so that they would know how far Abraham’s love of God extended and would learn from it to love God with their whole hearts and their whole souls.

The test was not for Abraham but for us, the ones who need the example of Abraham to learn to obey.

While the interpretations tried to explain the failure of the text to provide the why, the story in of itself focused on the faithfulness of Abraham. Out of the blue, God decides to test Abraham; we really do not know the why of the test. From a literary, not a theological perspective, the story masterfully portrays an obedient servant of God.  God calls Abraham once (similar to Isaiah 6:8) and Abraham responds.  Compared to other instances of divine call where God (or the Christ figure) is impelled to call out twice:

Hebrew Bible

• Jacob, Jacob (Genesis 46:2)
• Moses, Moses (Exodus 3:4)
• Samuel, Samuel (1 Samuel 3:10)

New Testament

• Martha, Martha (Luke 10:41)
• Simon, Simon (Luke 22:31)
• Saul/Paul (Acts 9:4)
• eli (“my God”), eli (“my God”) (Matthew 27:46)

It demonstrates more than anything, Abraham’s openness and preparedness for the divine call.  

And when God commands Abraham to offer his son as a burnt offering, Abraham is not hesitant.  He does not delay or argue with God. It’s not because the gravity of the request is lost on Abraham.  God reminds Abraham of what Isaac means to him. God says:

Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah.

Let’s take a look at how God refers to Isaac – your son, your only son, whom you love.  God could have just said Isaac but the author wanted the reader to fully understand who God wanted.  The narrator wanted to intensify the bond between a father and his only remaining child. 

Without a word or hesitation, Abraham wakes up at the crack of dawn (וַיַּשְׁכֵּ֨ם אַבְרָהָ֜ם בַּבֹּ֗קֶר) and prepares for the trip to Moriah. He doesn’t know the exact destination but he trusts that God would show him the spot as to where he will offer his son.  Not a word is spared as Abraham, Isaac, and his 2 servants travel to Moriah.  Though Abraham knows that he is to offer up Isaac, he tells his servants that they will both return:

“Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”

Does Abraham know something that the audience does not know?  Does Abraham believe that God will change the divine mind?  Or was he just trying to allay the fears of the servants, who given their cultural and religious background was familiar with child sacrifice.

So the father and child walk together to the site.  Isaac notices that they have everything for a burnt offering except for the lamb so he asks,

The fire and wood are here … but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”

How painful it would have been for a father to hear that question because he knows that he cannot tell his own son that he is the sacrifice.  But Abraham answers, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.  Note how many times, Isaac is referenced as a child of Abraham (v. 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 16). One cannot overlook such a repetition.

Once everything is arranged on the altar, Abraham binds (aqedah) his son and lays him on top of the wood.  One is prompted to ask, how old is Isaac that he is able to speak, walk, and carry the firewood but did not resist Abraham.  Was Isaac not strong enough to overpower his father or did Isaac, being obedient, willingly offer himself to his father?  Again the story does not provide details.

So interpreters chimed in. According to some interpreters, Isaac, the father of Judaism, was the paragon of obedience:

[Abraham tells Isaac that he is to sacrifice himself:] Isaac, however, since he was descended from such a father, could be no less noble of spirit [than Abraham], and received these words with delight. He said that he never would have been worthy of being born in the first place were he not now to carry out the decision of God and his father and submit himself to the will of both. (Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, 1:232)

Even though he was older and strong enough to fend for himself, he willingly offered himself to be the sacrifice.  This theme comes up in Christian circles where Isaac, or the ram caught by its horns, prefigures Christ.  The way in which Isaac was willing to be sacrificed resembled what Christ does for all of humanity. See how Tertullian explains the parallels:

Isaac, being led by his father to be a victim, and carrying himself the firewood, at that moment was a figure of Christ’s death, submitting himself to his father as a victim and lugging the [fire]wood of his own passion. (Tertullian, Latin Christianity, chapter 10)

Depending on the artist, many iconography of the Aqedah address this very issue; in their portrayals, they differ as to the age of Isaac and his willingness or unwillingness to be sacrificed.  In Chagall’s painting, Isaac is much older and a willing sacrifice because he is unbound. Contrast this painting with Caravaggio’s painting, where Abraham is forced to bind Isaac and press him to stay on the altar.

As the images differ in the depiction of Isaac, they are consistent in their portrayal of Abraham. Abraham does not seem to show any reluctance. So interpreters have wondered, Did Abraham know that God will provide a lamb or did he, trusting in the divine promise, believe that God will resurrect Isaac:

Rabbi Judah says: “Once the sword reached his throat, Isaac’s soul left his body. Once [God/the angel] made his voice heard between the two cherubs, and said (Gen 22:12): “Do not lift your hand against the boy” his soul returned to his body. [Abraham] untied him and he stood on his feet. Isaac thus came to see [or “know”] that resurrection is a Torah principle, that all of the dead are destined to rise. At that moment, [Isaac] opened his mouth and said: “Blessed are you, O God, who resurrects the dead.” (Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer, chapter 31)

What did Abraham put his trust? In the promise and the concept of resurrection?  Since we know that ancient Israel did not have a concept of the resurrection but was a later Persian (?) influence on the Israelite view of the afterlife, Abraham probably did not believe that Isaac would be resurrected.  So what did Abraham expect from God – did he really trust God’s promise that Isaac would receive the patriarchal blessing? It is not clear but what is on the line is not Abraham’s faith but God’s promise – will God fulfill the promise, even with the command to offer Isaac? And how? Will God provide Abraham and Sarah another child? Again, we don’t have the answer from the text but Abraham just follows through with the divine demand.

The divine messenger calls Abraham twice to get him to stop what he was doing.  But why twice when before Abraham was responsive after God calls out once. Abraham was intent on killing Isaac; he needed to be shaken from his concentration on slaying his son. Rather than withdrawing a demand for burnt offering, God shows Abraham a ram which he is to offer in place of his son.  God wanted a sacrifice, whether it was Isaac or the ram. Because of what Abraham was willing to do, an angelic being reiterates the blessing, as if to affirm the reason why Abraham was selected as the patriarch of Israel.

Yet we may still ask, should God have asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac?  Perhaps with our modern sensibilities, child/human sacrifice seems extremely problematic.  Forget the ancient culture where child sacrifice was the norm. How can an unchanging, merciful God demand a child to be killed?  So the question is why does God demand that Abraham sacrifice his child.  Why couldn’t God test Abraham another way. What is interesting is the context in which child sacrifice usually occurs. Usually, child sacrifice is a reflection of how much a person is willing to give up for a request.  It is a sign of the supplicant’s desperation rather than a test of their faithfulness. In that way, this test is unique.  Abraham does not need to demonstrate anything in that he does not request anything.  It is all about God needing to know, wanting to test Abraham. Perhaps this is why the story is dis-comforting; God, who is omniscient, needing to know Abraham’s heart.¹

Given that Isaac is Sarah’s only child, one could ask, where was Sarah in all this drama?  Was she a willing parent in Abraham’s decision to obey or was she even included in the discussion?  The text is silent about Sarah and her whereabouts during this test.  Yet later interpreters have highlighted the possible rift between Abraham and Sarah.  

According to the ending of the Aqedah, Abraham returns and stays in Beersheba.  Yet in 23:2, Sarah is in Kiriath Arba (Hebron) where Abraham goes to mourn her death:

Sarah lived to be a hundred and twenty-seven years old. She died at Kiriath Arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham went to mourn for Sarah and to weep over her. (Genesis 23:1-2)

So one can ask, why is Abraham in Beersheba and Sarah in Hebron which is approximately 30 miles north of Beersheba?  

Noticing the distance between Abraham and Sarah, some ancient interpreters explained that Sarah left Beersheba to die in Hebron:

Abraham’s intention from the beginning was for him and his wife to be buried in the land of Canaan, since the land of Israel atones for sin… Therefore, when she (Sarah) felt that her powers were waning and feebleness was coming upon her, and she knew that she would not live much longer, she commanded [her servants] to bring her to Hebron to die… since it is in the land of Canaan… And thus “Abraham came” from Beersheba, which was in the land of the Philistines and not the land of Canaan. Abraham had not purchased a burial plot, since he didn’t want to be buried in Beersheba, and he wasn’t living in the land of Canaan such that he could purchase a burial plot, and things remained this way until Sarah died. (R. Isaac quotes his brother, R. Ephraim)

But some interpreters have concluded that Sarah did not approve of Abraham’s decision to obey and died from the shock of the news:

…Sarah died from this same pain (hearing Isaac was to be sacrificed), and that is why the story of the Akedah is juxtaposed to the death of Sarah. Gen Tab 58:5 (Vilna)

In Pirkei de Rabbi Eliezer provides a more detailed account:

When Abraham returned from Mount Moriah, Samael became angry, since he saw that his heart’s desire of stopping Abraham from performing a sacrifice failed. What did he do? He went and said to Sarah: “Did you hear what is happening elsewhere in the world?” She said to him: “No.” He said to her: “Abraham took his son Isaac to slaughter him, and sacrificed him on an altar as a burnt offering.” Sarah began to cry and weep, three cries for the three shofar blasts and three crying weeps for the three weeping shofar blasts (i.e., the tekiah, teruah, tekiah blasts of Rosh Hashanah). Then her soul left her, and she died. (Pirkei deRabbi Eliezer 32)

Whereas Abraham had other children, Ishmael and later through Keturah (Genesis 25:1-4), Sarah only had only one child, Isaac. This sacrifice would have completely shattered her and overturned her life.

Questions

• Was child sacrifice part of religious practices in Israel? Explain. How does this impact the way in which the ancient audience might have heard/read the story?
• Why did God decide to test Abraham? Does the story give us any clues?
• How would you describe Isaac’s portrayal?
• Where was Sarah in the story? Did she know what was happening? Is the author even remotely interested in her whereabouts?

Personal Reflection

• Do you think God is above or bound by ethics/moral law?
• Do you think Abraham should have questioned God’s command or was he ‘right’ in obeying God to the very end?
• If the author is focused primarily on Abraham, do interpreters have the responsibility of highlighting the perspectives of Isaac and Sarah? Or do we not have enough information about their perspectives and should not conjecture about their role in the story?

Final Observation

The Aqedah is a troubling story for the modern audience because of child sacrifice. It was more acceptable in the ancient context because child sacrifice was a common religious practice in the ancient world.  While God asking Abraham to offer Isaac was not so problematic in the ancient context, what was more puzzling was why God decided to test Abraham out of nowhere. Wouldn’t the test actually undermine the divine promise to the patriarchs/matriarchs?  Why would God need to test Abraham at this point? But these were not the only questions. What was Abraham thinking when he agreed to the command? Was Isaac a willing or unwilling victim?  And where was Sarah in all this?

So many questions because of the ambiguity and gaps which interpreters have tried to creatively fill by reading into and between texts.  But at the end of the day, we really don’t know. Maybe that is the power of the story, not in the details but in the ambiguity.  Abraham doesn’t know why God tested him; he doesn’t know why he had to offer his son up as a burnt offering; he didn’t know where he needed to go; he didn’t know what would happen at the location God was going to show him; and most importantly, he didn’t know what would happen to the divine promise.  This is the ultimate faith, to go without knowing.  This is consistent with the Abraham narratives where he goes, trusting in God, but without knowing anything beyond the initial command, “Go.”

For me, this story is powerful because it is consistent with real life. In life, we don’t know how our lives would unfold.  We may feel a nudge or a strong call but that may be all we know.  Yet when we walk out in faith, it is primarily taking the first step.  We may have a million thoughts, million questions, million doubts; nevertheless, we have to trust that God is with us, for us.

I am not saying that we cannot question God.  We can question God, whether we believe God speaks through pastors, elders, parents.  We have to question because we don’t really know if it is the voice of God.  We have the responsibility to test the voice of God; but once we know, we need to take a step forward into the unknown.

1. See David Fried, Reclaiming the Aqeidah from Kierkegaard, Lehrhause, October 22, 2018, who lays out the debate between Kierkegaard and Kant. Should one suspend ethics when it comes to a divine command or does moral law transcend even God? ↩︎