There is a reason that an ancient Israelite penned an anti-child-sacrifice polemic;
To his disgust, Israelites were sacrificing their own children.
This horrific truth surfaces a few times throughout the literature they left to us. The book Judges (chapter 11) tells of an early Gileadite war-hero, Yifthah, who sacrificed his daughter after a successful campaign against the Ammonites. A late 8th-century Judahite king, Ahaz sacrificed his son (2 Kings 16). There are other examples. But according to others professing to speak on behalf of Yahweh, such a practice was abominable (Ezekiel 23). And so, Genesis 22 tells of the moment when Yahweh declares to the world that this is so.
But sacrificing children was not the only abomination practiced by some, and maybe even many, of the ancient Israelites. There were other things, horrific atrocities, staring our ancient author in the face, which even he blindly endorsed, as repulsive as they were in the eyes of the god for whom he tried to speak. In this week’s entry, we therefore offer an retelling of Genesis 22, one which does not end with a Patriarch of Israel soiling his very soul with sin.
A brief commentary follows.
Then, after these things, Elohim tested Abraham and said to him;
“Abraham!”
And Abraham said, “I’m here!”
And He said, “Take your son; Your only son, whom you love. And take of your animals; The firstborn of your flock; The most prized of all that is in your hands; And you shall go to the land of Moriah and bring an offering on one of the mountains, the one that I will show you.”
Then Abraham got up early in the morning and saddled his donkey and took his two lads, and Isaac his son, as well as his ram, and split some wood for the offering, got up, and set out to the place that Elohim had said to him.
On the third day, Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place from afar. And Abraham said to his lads; “Remain here with the donkey; I, and the lad and the ram, we will go together and bow down, then we shall return to you.”
Then Avraham took the woods for the offering and placed them on the ram, and gave to Yitzhak his son the fire and the knife, and the three of them went together.
Then Yitzhak said to Abraham his father, “Father!”
And he said, “I am here, my son!”
And Yitzhak said, “I see the fire, the wood, the knife, and the ram. Why do you need me, as well?”
Then Abraham said, “Elohim will make clear His mind to us, when we arrive at the place which he has shown us, my son.”
And the three of them went together.
Then they came to the place which Elohim said to them; And Abraham built there an altar, and arranged the wood, and he and Yitzhak bound the ram and placed it on the altar above the fire. And Abraham sent forth his hand and grasped the knife in order to slaughter his ram.
But then an agent-of-Yahweh called to him from the heavens, and said, “Abraham! Abraham!”
And he said, “I am here!”
And he said, “Do NOT send forth your hand against the ram; Don’t do a thing to him! Now I know that you fear Elohim; Though, you do not know Elohim; For you have not withheld your hand from spilling the blood of the innocent. To do so is abomination."
Abraham lifted up his eyes, trying to understand, when behold! He saw a goodly tree, lustful to the eyes and lovely to look at amongst the bushes; And Abraham went and took from its fruit, and brought it up onto the altar in place of the ram.
Then Abraham called the place “Yahweh-shall-see”.
And the agent-of-Yahweh called to Abraham from the heavens a second time, saying, “Thus says Yahweh; I swear, if you take this to heart and never again send forth your hand against the innocent, be it for my sake or for any other; Then I will surely bless you, and shall surely make abundant your seed, as the stars of the heavens and as the sand on the shore of the sea, and your seed shall take possession of the gates of your enemies. And all the nations of the earth who follow in your lead shall be blessed by your seed, if you heed that which you hear today.”
And Abraham offered the fruit, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.
Commentary
In the traditional version, the ram that Avraham ultimately slaughters is found trapped in the thicket. Here, Avraham brings the ram with him, the ram in the thicket being replaced by the goodly tree. Perceptive readers of Genesis might realize that this is not just any tree that we are encountering for the first time. Rather, the description of this tree matches the description of the goodly tree, lustful to the eyes and lovely to look at in the middle of the Garden-of-Delight (Genesis 3), the place where initially, all sentient life lived in harmony. How interesting that Yahweh directed Avraham to this very location to teach him this very lesson! While the significance might be lost on Avraham, it ought not to be lost on the reader; Avraham is encountering Eden. Not just physically and spatially, but also in practice. All life is sacred, and no one has the authority to take another’s life in pursuit of divine approval. Doing so renders someone deserving of the harshest of condemnations; Abomination.
In fact, note that Yahweh never even asked Avraham for a slaughter-offering. And so by offering up the fruit, Avraham was still fulfilling that which Yahweh had asked for even at the beginning.
While in the traditional version, Yahweh’s promises to Avraham are the reward for Avraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son, here the promises are very much conditional on both Avraham’s and his descendants’ ongoing commitment to fulfilling Yahweh’s expectations. Doing so takes us back to Eden, as it did for Avraham. This is not only desired, but expected and even demanded of us. Failure in this is intolerable.
Note also Yahweh’s complement/criticism of how Avraham responded to the initial demand. At the same time, Avraham shows both his zeal for his god, but also his misunderstanding, for one who truly knows Yahweh would know that he would never condone the taking of innocent life; You fear Him, though do not know Him.
What should Avraham have done in order to truly pass the test? Perhaps fallen on his face crying, and said "This thing I cannot do, but will immediately and joyfully offer up my own life, if you truly thirst for blood, O-Lord!" I imagine Yahweh would have lifted him up, kissed him, and invited him and his descendants back into Eden forever.
This version ends with a play on a line that, in the traditional version, was said about Avraham back in chapter 15; That Avraham trusted in Yahweh, and in his well-placed trust, he was deemed righteous. In the version above, he is labeled righteous after his final offering of the fruit, which shows that, in learning this lesson, he is truly becoming attuned to the mind of his god.
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