Bible Text: Genesis 22: 1-14, Matthew 10: 40-42 | Preacher: Rev. Berlin Guerrero | Series: 2020 | This story is named by Christians as “the sacrifice of Isaac” and by Jews as “the akedah” (the “binding” of Isaac). It has engendered debate over the centuries. Is it a story of an abusive God, a misguided Abraham, religious violence at its worst? Or is it a story of faith and obedience?

 

Human sacrifice

 

… is the act of killing one or more humans, usually as an offering to a deity, as part of a ritual. Human sacrifice has been practiced in various cultures throughout history. Victims were ritually killed in a manner that was supposed to please or appease gods, spirits or the deceased.

 

Human sacrifice has been practiced on a number of different occasions and in many different cultures. The reasons behind human sacrifice are the same that motivate religious sacrifice in general. Human sacrifice is intended to bring good fortune and to pacify the gods, for example in the context of the dedication of a completed building like a temple or bridge.

 

The story begins, “After these things God tested Abraham” (22:1). And what do “these things” include? God’s call to Abraham to go to a land he has never seen; God’s promise to Abraham that he will be the father of a great nation; the long years of Sarah’s barrenness; the birth of Ishmael; and at long last, the impossible birth of the boy they call “Laughter.”

 

Then Abraham, at Sarah’s insistence, casts out his first son, Ishmael, with great sorrow. And now, God demands a most horrible thing: “Take your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go4 to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I will show you” (22:2).

 

Abraham does what God demands, and sets out with his son. Abraham doesn’t say much. Isaac says even less, and one is left to imagine what they are thinking and feeling. The narrator uses repetition to heighten the poignancy: “The two of them walked on together,” as the father and son walk together in silence on the third day (22:6). Together in purpose, together in love. The narrator continually emphasizes the relationship between the two, as if we need to be reminded: “Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac.” “Isaac said to Abraham his father, “My father!” and he said, “Here I am, my son” (22:7).

 

“Here I am” — in Hebrew hineni. It’s the same word Abraham used to answer God’s call in verse 1: “Here I am.” Abraham is attentive to God, and equally attentive to his beloved son. Here I am.

 

And Isaac says, “See, we have fire, and wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” And Abraham, heart torn in two, says, “God will see to the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And, again, “The two of them walked on together” (22:7-8). Whether Isaac knew what was going to happen is a matter that is debated. Perhaps he did not, which makes Abraham’s pain all that much more acute. Perhaps he did, which makes Isaac, too, an example of great faith and obedience. The two of them walk on together, father and son, the son carrying the wood for his own sacrifice. The first century rabbis, with no connection to Christianity but with ample experience of Roman executions, said of this detail: “Isaac carries the wood for the sacrifice like one who carries his own cross.”

 

They reach the place of sacrifice, and Abraham builds an altar. Again, as if we need to be reminded, the narrator emphasizes the relationship between father and son. “He bound his son Isaac … Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to kill his son” (22:9-10). At that moment, the LORD calls to him with great urgency, “Abraham, Abraham!” And Abraham replies for the third and final time in the story, hineni, “Here I am.” One can imagine that his tone now is one of unspeakable relief and hope.

 

The LORD speaks, “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me” (22:12).

 

“Now I know.” This story does not subscribe to later notions of God’s perfect omniscience. This is a genuine test, and Abraham is free to decide what he will do. God neither knows nor pre-ordains how Abraham will respond. With an open mind about our knowledge of God, one could say that God imposes this one-time test on Abraham because God has risked everything on this one man, and God needs to know if he is faithful.

 

Abraham and his descendants are the means by which God has chosen to bless the whole world (Genesis 12:3). And Abraham has not always proven up to the task (the wife-sister charade, Hagar and Ishmael). Now God needs to know whether Abraham is willing to give up the thing most precious to him in all the world for the sake of being faithful to the God who gave him that gift in the first place. And Abraham passes this most excruciating of tests: “Now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.”

 

Then, as Abraham had told Isaac, God provides; God provides a ram to take the place of the beloved son. “So Abraham called that place ‘The LORD will provide’; as it is said to this day, ‘On the mount of the LORD it shall be provided’” (22:14).

 

“The Lord will provide”

For Christianity, the sacrifice of the beloved son has obvious resonance with Jesus’ death. In addition, the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice his son became for early Christians one of the greatest examples of his faith: “By faith Abraham, when put to the test, offered up Isaac … He considered the fact that God is able even to raise someone from the dead” (Hebrews 11:17, 19). In the history of Christian interpretation, Genesis 22 has continued to be understood as a story of faith against all odds, and as a foreshadowing of God’s self-giving in Jesus Christ.

 

But human sacrifice still happens but in another way. Consider: In the struggle for national liberation and independence by oppressed people’s and nations, there is a notion that the motherland sacrifices her best sons and daughters in the altar of martyrdom so that justice, freedom and genuine peace can be had.

 

But no longer is sacrifice to be acted upon by someone else but by the individual him or herself. Jesus said in John 15:

 

12 ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14You are my friends if you do what I command you.

 

So it becomes the sacrifice of self for the sake of others. Are you willing to give up your life for the sake of others?

 

Collectively as a church, how can the body of Christ present in the world become a living sacrifice offered in love and in obedience to Christ’s command to lay down one’s life for the sake of the people whom God loves?

 

Amen.