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, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.'
Here in Genesis 22 we find the story of Abraham being asked of God to sacrifice Isaac to him.
This is a fascinating story. Let us read and think about this s-l-o-w-l-y. Evangelicals focus on the result of this story, that Abraham obeyed God and God blessed him. It is correct to focus on this as it is the point of the story. But let's stop and think about this s-l-o-w-l-y.
God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac as a burnt offering. It is a rather problematic request, isn't it? Consider Deanna Laney:
Dr. Park Dietz said Deanna Laney believed God ordered her to kill her children last Mother’s Day weekend. “She struggled over whether to obey God or to selfishly keep her children,” Dietz testified.
Laney, a 39-year-old stay-at-home mother who homeschooled her children, has pleaded innocent by reason of insanity to charges of capital murder and serious injury to a child in the deaths of 8-year-old Joshua and 6-year-old Luke and severe injury to then-14-month-old Aaron.
Dietz said that Laney, who is deeply religious, had a series of delusions on the day of the killings. He said she saw Aaron with a spear, then throwing a rock, then squeezing a frog and believed God was suggesting she should either stab, stone or strangle her children.
Laney at first resisted, but she felt she had to do what she perceived to be God’s will to prove her faith, he said.
There is no question that today Laney is at the least a really poor listener to God and at best mentally ill. But might God ask someone to sacrifice their children to him? He did it once before. Why not again?
Interestingly, Laney was said to struggle over whether to obey God or not and that at first she resisted. Our narrator in Genesis 22 does not give any hint as to whether or not Abraham struggled or resisted. Yet in Genesis 21 when Abraham sent Ishmael away, the narrator tells us that Abraham was distressed. Why not a narrative comment here in this distressing passage?
Would struggle or resistance on Abraham's behalf indicate disobedience?
Does the lack of struggle or resistance raise questions as to Abraham's love for his son?
Once again, we have stumbled upon a text that just doesn't work too well as a proof text for family values. But I'll keep reading. I'm sure it's in here someplace!
2 comments:
The only thing that helps me make sense of what seems a nonsensical request is Hebrews 11:17-19: By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had received 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 raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death.Abraham knew justice; he knew that when he lied to two kings about his babe-ly half-sister/wife that he was disobeying God and jeopardizing relationships of all kinds for generations to come. He learned mercy: the ram in the bush was provided by God to substitute for the son that God required.
And God never asked Abraham to do anything He wasn't willing to do Himself.
I have this funny feeling that you're going to discover something totally deep and awesome. I'm waiting expectantly.
God, reveal yourself through the scriptures he reads.
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