Puzzling Passage: Genesis 22:1-14
1 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied. 2 Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.” 3 Early the next morning Abraham got up and loaded his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about. 4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. 5 He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.” 6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, 7 Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?” “Yes, my son?” Abraham replied. “The fire and wood are here,” Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” 8 Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together. 9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied. 12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.” 13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”
Right from verse 1, we see God calling for Abraham to sacrifice Isaac in order to test Abraham. It was not an easy test because verse 2 says Isaac is his only son, and so the promise to him having uncountable descendants is at stake here. Yet verse 5 shows us that Abraham believes he will be back with his only son unscathed. In verse 10, we see God assess whether Abraham passed the test by looking at Abraham’s intentions. Just with Abraham taking the knife, God already considered it done. What new knowledge did God gain through this whole incident? Verse 12 states: “Now I know that you fear God because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.” Note that the attribute of God that the author wishes to highlight in this whole episode is: “God sees”, or “God provides” (v14).
Why it is Puzzling:
It is puzzling to find a good God asking His follower to murder an innocent person. A good God would not ask people to do immoral things. Elsewhere in the Bible, we see in many places where God Himself condemns child sacrifices. So how can Abraham be justified in proceeding with the plan to kill an innocent person?
Alternative interpretation:
Keep the focus on Abraham passing a test (v1 & v12). Does Abraham trust in God’s promises? Since Isaac is his “only son” (v2) – if Isaac died, then the promise of a nation from Abraham’s descendants becomes lost. So Abraham has to believe that God will miraculously raise Isaac from the dead.
Hebrews 11:17-19 states:
“By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.”
Verse 5 is significant for even before Abraham set off, he already knew Isaac would return unharmed. Two big questions emerge out of this episode: Why can Abraham be so confident that: 1) he really heard such violent instructions from God and 2) God is able to return Isaac unharmed?
From Gen. 12-21, we see God having a unique relationship with Abraham, appearing to him, speaking to him in very personal ways, and performing miracles for him. This would mean Abraham’s receiving violent instruction from God is unique and unrepeatable since nobody else can claim to have such unique experiences with God. So if a person says he heard from God to kill his colleague and justify it with Gen. 22, it will not work because he cannot claim to have the experiences of Gen. 12-21 to give him the confidence that 1) it is really from God, and 2) the victim will turn out unharmed in the end.
However, there are still issues with such an interpretation:
It still does not answer the question of why would God test Abraham in such a manner – using human sacrifice. God could perhaps test Abraham by asking him to give up all his material wealth. In answering that, we need to first affirm that God needs to know that Abraham fear him (v12); that Abraham honors God/ have high regard for God. Other things like wealth may not work because maybe Abraham was not so concerned about wealth, so God had to make Abraham sacrifice what was dearest to him. The other possibility, which is admittedly speculation (as this thought is not explicitly stated in the Bible) is that Abraham sacrificing his only son might be something that gives God a judicial right to sacrifice his own Son. Only when God can find a human willing to sacrifice his only son for God can God have the judicial right to sacrifice His only Son for the world.
Many have preached on this passage and have taught on how we can apply Gen. 22: be like Abraham!
The “be like Abraham” sermon goes like this: since Abraham sacrificed Isaac for the Lord, what are the things you value that God is asking you to sacrifice for Him? However, this will not work because you are applying specific instructions that are specifically directed at Abraham – and that is only specific to Abraham and no one else. For example, if someone says he senses God telling him to give up Netflix based on Gen. 22, then what is stopping another person from saying he senses God telling him to kill his goldfish? So you see this kind of interpretation can be very dangerous. So don’t even go there.
It is a better fit to apply Gen. 22 like this: Abraham obeyed God, trusting God would provide while not knowing how God would provide, such that Isaac will remain unharmed and he will continue to have many descendants through Isaac. This will work because you are applying information about God’s unchanging attributes that emerged from the narrative. The character of God being trustworthy (He will provide) and the attribute of God being all-powerful (He can provide). And this coheres with the author’s intention in the first place.
For example, James 1:5 says: “ If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.”
Rightly applying Gen. 22, we would not know how wisdom will be given to us when we ask – maybe the wise thoughts just enter our subconscious. Or maybe through friends offering us good counsel. Or Maybe a random advert we see on the bus triggers some wise thoughts. We do not know how, but we know that if we ask, we will receive since from Abraham’s story, we know that God is trustworthy and all-powerful and His promise to us in James 1:5 will hold true.
The point:
Be very clear as to what is unique to Abraham (therefore cannot apply to us) and what we can apply in Gen. 22. Making sacrifices for God is a legit application, for example, from verses like Matt. 16:24. The danger of drawing such applications from Gen. 22 is the possible extreme application from extremists finding justification to harm innocent living beings from an instruction from God that is essentially unrepeatable due to the unique relationship Abraham has with God.