Dealing in Absolutes

In a faithful tradition devoted to its God, people are not inclined to kill; neither is a God committed to His covenant with His people likely to command His people to kill. Where the Akedah, or “Binding of Isaac” is concerned, its protagonist, Abraham, was aware of such equilibrium. Prophesied before the Akedah, however, is Abraham’s future fatherhood of the nations of Israel; Abraham is also aware that, when he concedes to God’s request to sacrifice his son Isaac, no harm will come to Isaac. Abraham seems to realize that if he is to be the father of a great religious nation, he must be possessed of an unshakeable faith, and to be as such, he must question the ostensibly unreasonable request given to him by his “just and right” God. It is debatable by these terms that the test most significant in the Akedah is not given to Abraham by God, but rather to God by Abraham, but if Abraham is such a theonomous man, as he is traditionally hailed, is this truly the case?

“He said, ‘Take, please, your son, your favored one, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of the Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the heights that I will point out to you.’” In great contrast to Abram’s initial call to faith, this was the request of God, given to Abraham, asking him to partake in yet another biblical covenant between man and God. To this request, Abraham complies immediately, though in his submission there are exhibited ties between the Akedah and the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, in which God unjustly plans to raze both cities without distinction between the evil and the innocent. Abraham says to God in the latter story, “Far be it from You! Shall not the judge of all the earth deal justly?” And, astonishingly, to Abraham, the LORD complies, conceding to Abraham that for a certain number of innocents, the cities will be spared. Such is also the case in the Akedah, as Abraham pleads silently for his son’s life with his obedience. Therefore, any trepidation Abraham may have felt as a result of God’s request (the Tanakh divulges none) would be not in suffering the potential loss of his son, but would rather come from Abraham’s realization that such action was outside of the previously established character of God.

Undoubtedly, God’s terms are made obvious in the Akedah, but if the true test is given not to Abraham, but to God, what must the terms of Abraham’s test be? By his use of the Hebrew particle of entreaty, “na,” which translates roughly to “please” in English, God communicated his intentions to Abraham, and as a result, Abraham expects no harm to come to his son Isaac. In taking his son to the place of sacrifice he has prepared, Abraham tells his servants to linger farther away, saying, “We will return to you.” In this statement, Abraham lays the framework of his wordless expostulation: he goes to the place of sacrifice with every intention to obey the will of God, whom he fears, but knows in his heart that the murder of Isaac is not God’s true will. In this, he expects not that Isaac will die, but that God will intervene. Abraham successfully interprets the will of God without being told, and therefore embodies both sides of the long-fought philosophical battle between autonomy and theonomy; there is proof of this in Abraham’s sacrifice of the ram after the messenger of God calls off the sacrifice of Isaac. Abrahams takes the ram and gives it to the glory of God of his own accord, without command, and yet, while the text presupposes that Abraham does only what God commands, as God commands it, the sacrifice of the ram is pleasing to God’s will. However, it is not God himself who praises Abraham for this final action, but rather, His messenger, the angel, speaks to Abraham a second time, saying, “By Myself, I swear, the LORD declares: because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your favored one, I will bestow My blessing upon you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars of heaven and the sands on the seashore; and your descendants shall seize the gates of their foes. All the nations of the earth shall bless themselves by your descendants because you have heard My voice.” Ironically, by this hearing of God’s voice is Abraham cut off entirely from God and those he loves; he never speaks with God again, he has lost his son Ishmael, his son Isaac and wife Sarah leave him.

Under the stipulations of the Akedah, perhaps Abraham did indeed test the faithfulness of God’s word to His people, in which case, God seemingly “passes” Abraham’s test. However, under the requisites of God’s core character, which outline God as omniscient and omnipotent, theoretically, no man on earth could truly test the will of God, as God will already know the outcome. A test is not required therein of God, but rather of Abraham, who finds the solution to the ethical paradox of the Akedah and “passes” God’s test by displaying devotion and awe. In this “passing” is God’s perpetual patriarch born, with his faith substantiated not by doubt, but by appropriate inquisition.

Abraham was asked to take his son Isaac into the “land of the Moriah,” a place associated with the Temple Mount, or Mount Moriah, a highly sacred site in the heart of the Old City of Jerusalem. However, this is not specifically stated in the passage where God makes his entreaty to Abraham. In the Christian biblical tradition, the area known as the “land of the Moriah” may also be interpreted as including Calvary, the place where it is believed Jesus Christ the Messiah was crucified. If this proposition of locale is valid, not only is Abraham’s faith in God acute, but his professions are also prophetic: “God will see to the sheep for His burnt offering,” and, “On the mount of the LORD there is vision.” In disparity with the juxtaposition of Christ, however, God does not truly desire the death of Isaac. In the case of the Akedah, God deals only in the lessons of absolutes: the absolute of the sanctity of human life, the absolute of Divine authority and reason, and the absolute faith possessed by Abraham.