Why did God tell Abraham to sacrifice Isaac?
Sometime later God tested Abraham.
He said to him, "Abraham!"
"Here I am," he replied.
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."
Early the next morning Abraham got
up and saddled 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. On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the
place in the distance. 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."
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, 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?"
Abraham answered, "God himself
will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son." And the two of them
went on together.
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. Then he
reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. But the angel of the
LORD called out to him from heaven, "Abraham! Abraham!"
"Here I am," he replied.
"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."
You must not worship the Lord your
God in their way, because in worshiping their gods, they do all kinds of
detestable things the Lord hates. They even burn their sons and daughters in
the fire as sacrifices to their gods.
Why would God command Abraham to
sacrifice his own child?
First, we should realize what God
was not doing:
God was not tempting Abraham. God was not enticing Abraham to do wrong, but was testing
him to see if he would do what was right. (See the article on tempting).
God was not instituting or condoning
child sacrifice. As seen in Deuteronomy 12:31 and
the other passages above, God abhors child sacrifice. It's important to
remember that God prevented the sacrifice from actually occurring. He did not
desire the sacrifice as an act of worship or for any other reason beyond
testing Abraham.
God was not telling Abraham to do
wrong. God has the right to take human
life (see the article on God's moral
authority) and could therefore authorize Abraham to do so in a
particular case. Note that had Abraham decided of his own accord to sacrifice
Isaac, he would have been wrong and his act would have been condemned by God
(as were other human-initiated sacrifices).
Why then would God give this
command? The point was for Abraham to demonstrate that he trusted God
completely and placed him above all else, even his own son.1
Though God of course already knew that Abraham had faith in him, it was
necessary for Abraham to prove it through action. "His faith was made
complete by what he did" (James 2:21-23).
Because of his actions, not only God but Abraham, his family and future
generations knew that Abraham trusted God. This trust was important because it
indicated that Abraham had the proper relationship with God (he was treating
God as God deserves to be treated) and could benefit from God's good plans for
his life.
Wasn't it wrong for Abraham to obey
God?
God's command to Abraham was not
wrong, for God has the right to take human life (see the article on God's moral
authority) and therefore had the right to command Isaac's death.
Abraham had known God for many years prior to this, so he knew God's character
and knew that God had the right to give this command. Had Abraham initiated the
sacrifice or followed the order of someone who was not authorized by God, then
his act would have been wrong.
Furthermore, Abraham knew that God
had promised him offspring through Isaac, so this gave him reason to believe
that God did not intend for Isaac to die permanently:
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. (Hebrews
11:17-19)
Some have questioned whether Abraham
truly loved Isaac if he was willing to sacrifice him. But the passage itself as
well as other places in Genesis point out that Abraham did love Isaac:
- Isaac was the only child of his beloved wife Sarah, the son promised to him by God (Gen 17:19)
- He held a feast on the day Isaac was weaned (Gen 21:8)
- God refers to Isaac as "your only son, Isaac, whom you love" (Gen 22:2)
- He made a special effort to get Isaac a godly wife (Gen 24:1-4)
- Isaac received all of the inheritance (Gen 25:5)
While Genesis doesn't record
Abraham's emotional reaction to God's command that does not mean carrying it
out was an easy thing for him to do.
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