FROM CHAOS TO COMMUNITY: Rites of Passage

Many times, when I’ve heard preachers interpret the meaning of this story, they have said something about how it points to the absolute trust, obedience, and faithfulness Abraham had in God. Abraham’s trust and faith was so great that he was willing to murder his son if that was what God required.

I want to suggest that we approach this text with an honest and critical eye, not as a story about the depth of Abraham’s faith, but as the starting point for the legacy of the strength and perseverance of Isaac, who not only survived abuse, violence, and near-death at the hands of his father, but who also rose to become a pillar of faith, the second of the three patriarchs of the Hebrew faith tradition.

WHAT THINGS?
by Dawn Chesser
This passage starts out by saying, “After these things God tested Abraham.”

What things?

Well, one of these “things” is the story of Hagar and Ishmael being deported from their home and sent out to the wilderness. [continue reading]

Isaac was the only one of the three patriarchs whose name was never changed. He was also the only one never to leave the promised land of Canaan. And he was the longest living patriarch, not dying until the age of 180. In spite of some of my criticisms of Isaac’s marriage to the much younger Rebekah (see preaching notes for next week), he was the only patriarch who was faithful to his wife. Rebekah brings her maids with her into the marriage, but there is no record that they became Isaac’s concubines in spite of the fact that Rebekah was thought to be barren for many years before she became pregnant and gave birth to Jacob and Esau.

“After these things” (see sidebar), God said Abraham was going to be tested. Abraham said fine. God told Abraham to take his beloved son Isaac (now a teenager) up to the mountain and offer him as a sacrifice. Abraham obeyed. He summoned his boy to go with him into the mountains for a father–son camping trip. And let’s be clear: this wasn’t just down the road a piece, as we say in Tennessee. This was a three-day journey for Abraham and Isaac. They had a lot of time to talk as they walked and hiked together for three days.

HOW OLD WAS ISAAC
AT HIS BINDING?
by Taylor Burton-Edwards
Genesis gives us no direct statement of Isaac’s age when today’s story takes place. Artistic depictions of Isaac in the scene vary from a young boy to a what appears to be a teenager.

What might be most reasonable to conclude? Two paths would seem to lead to the conclusion that Isaac was likely at least a late teenager.
[continue reading]

When they finally arrived at the site, right away Abraham began the work of setting out the wood for the sacrificial offering. Perhaps Isaac thought his father was simply preparing a campfire to cook dinner. But this was no benign campfire. Abraham was building an altar upon which he is going to tie down his son to make a sacrificial burnt offering to the Lord. Then, somehow, Abraham managed to wrestle Isaac to the ground, tie him up, and bind him to the altar.

As I try to imagine this scene, I am reminded of a turning point in my father’s relationship with each of my two brothers. When we were little kids, one of the greatest memories I have of our family is of my father getting on the floor and wrestling with us. He would pin us down and intone, “hoo-hoo-hoo” into our ears, which tickled us almost to the point of pain, until we screamed “uncle,” signifying that it was time stop. My dad always stopped the torture at a cry of “uncle.”

Playing with my dad this way was wonderful and awful all at the same time. Our wrestling matches would throw our entire family room into a state of chaos as we each vied for my father’s attention. Sometimes we would try to work together to pin my dad down. He would pretend that we were making progress, but being bigger and stronger, eventually he would just flip us over. We lost every time.

As I grew into a teenage girl, my father stopped wrestling on the floor with me. But the practice continued with each of my brothers. As my brothers got bigger and stronger, I would watch with glee as it became harder and harder for my father to take them down. Finally, with each one of them, the day came when the tables turned and my brothers became stronger than our father. It was my father who was forced to scream “uncle.”

When that happened, it was the end of the wrestling matches in our family. I think of those events as marking a transition in the relationship between my father and each of my brothers. Taking my father down was a rite of passage through which each of my brothers declared his manhood.

The writer of Genesis does not provide a description of how it was that Abraham was able to take Isaac down. As my colleague has noted, Isaac was likely at least seventeen years old. Even if he was not yet fully grown, he was no longer a child. I wonder if Abraham had to physically wrestle with Isaac. I wonder if, as in my family, it might have been a family game they played together. I wonder if Isaac was getting closer to the point of his own declaration of manhood.

However it went, in the case of Abraham and Isaac, Abraham won the match. He not only took his son down, but he bound him with ropes and tied him to the sacrificial altar. And then he took out his knife to brutally slash his son’s throat.

Right at that moment, an angel cried out to Abraham, saying that now the Lord knew that Abraham feared God, since he was willing to wrestle his son to the ground, bind him, murder him, and offer him as a sacrifice. The ram appeared in the bush, and Abraham left his son and ran to catch it. He cut Isaac loose and offered the ram in place of his son Isaac as his sacrifice. And the Lord again promised Abraham numerous blessings and offspring because of his faithfulness.

But what about Isaac? What happened to him? How did this terrible thing change his life story? Was it a rite of passage, a decisive and life-altering moment of transition for him? How did it affect his life going forward? Did it deepen his faith, or shatter it?

WHAT DO GOD’S PEOPLE DO WITH THIS HORRIFYING STORY?
by Taylor Burton-Edwards
I grew up in a very Jewish neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio. By very Jewish, I mean that nearly all of the people in a three-block radius of my home were Jewish. There was an Orthodox Jewish synagogue less than a block away. The Jewish Community Center, about four blocks away, was the primary community gathering place. The best restaurant in the area (in my view!) was Tillie Nabolski’s Nasherei, and on High Holy Days (Passover, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur), I (as a Gentile) was often one of two or three students in my elementary school class.

I did not adequately appreciate all I could have learned from growing up in this environment at the time. But one of the things I recognize this has given me is that... [continue reading]

My colleague Taylor Burton-Edwards’s conversation with Rabbi Schwartz has been invaluable to me in sorting out what to say next. I think that we have to simply name this horror as “deafening” and simply stand with our Jewish forebears and siblings in naming the abuse and refusing to try to make sense of it. Because it doesn’t make sense, and it certainly does not do anything for me in terms of elucidating my own faith journey.

I think it is particularly important to note that Abraham’s actions precipitate not just the end of his relationship with Isaac, but also with Sarah and with the Lord God. It would appear that alongside these changes in relationship, it also brought an end to the cycle of abuse of this family.

After the binding of Isaac, Abraham returns to Beersheba. Isaac apparently settles in Beer-laihai-roi. And in the very next chapter, Sarah dies in Hebron. Abraham was apparently not with her, since he has to travel to Hebron and negotiate with the Hittites to purchase her burial plot. When we hear news of Isaac, it is when Rebekah is brought to him to be his wife. He has come from Beer-lahai-roi and has settled in the Negeb (Genesis 24:62).

One way to end the cycle of abuse is by closing the door to relationships with those who have abused. Perhaps this was Isaac’s choice, and if it was, it speaks volumes about his character. It is courageous to decide to leave one’s family at such a young age. It is courageous that Isaac chose a new home for himself. It is courageous that he chose to locate in a place that was connected not to Abraham or Sarah, but ironically, to Hagar and Ishmael. Isaac’s choice to go further south to Beer-laihai-roi to set up a farming operation and build his life there may have put him nearer to his half-brother and his brother’s mother. Perhaps he “cast himself” out of the abusive family dynamic into which he was born and reconnected with others who had also left behind this part of their lives. I don’t know. I’m only speculating.

What I do know is that in the aftermath, the family has been scattered. What I do know is that there is no record of Isaac abusing Rebekah, or being unfaithful to her, or having children with concubines when Rebekah is believed to be barren. What I do know, in short, is that the cycle of abuse seems to end with Isaac. Not only has Isaac managed to pass through this transition to adulthood, but he has not carried forward the legacy of abuse perpetrated by his father.

Was it a turning point? Was it some sort of horrific rite of passage that Isaac had to pass through in order to live into God’s vision for the chosen people? It has all the hallmarks of a major life transition: chaos, disorder, disruption, violence, and a resettling into a new identity. Isaac emerges from this episode as a strong, courageous and competent young adult. He is no longer a boy. He has become a man.

My only issue with Isaac, as we will discuss next week, is the way in which Rebekah comes to be his wife. But there is grace there as well, in that the relationship they build seems to permanently redeem the family from its cycle of abuse.

The good news in this story for me is that God was present with Isaac and Abraham. God provided in the midst of turmoil and chaos. Isaac was spared, and God’s promises came to rest upon him.

The good news is that God gave Isaac the strength and the courage to leave a situation of abuse and to seek a new life for himself, perhaps in the company of his half-brother.

The good news is, indeed, that God has provided, and God does provide, and God is providing, even in the midst of abusive systems and the horrific actions human beings level against one another, often in God’s name. Lord, have mercy.

God will provide. God will make a way. That is part of our family legacy.

May it always be so.

What Things

by Dawn Chesser

This passage starts out by saying, “After these things God tested Abraham.”

What things?

Well, one of these “things” is the story of Hagar and Ishmael being deported from their home and sent out to the wilderness. We talked about this story last week.

After that, there is a story about how Abimelech, the king of Gerar, tried to take Sarah as a wife. But Abimelech realized the strength of Abraham’s God when God came to him in a dream and told him to return Sarah to Abraham because Abraham was a prophet. God told Abimelech that if he didn’t do it, he would die. But if he did, Abraham would pray for him to live. So Abimelech did what God asked. After that, Abimelech gave Abraham and Sarah some land, and Abraham prayed for Abimelech’s healing and the restoration of his family because they had been stricken with barrenness.

So then Abimelech made another appearance. He came to Abraham with the commander of his Army and said, “I know God is with you. I’ve been loyal to you, and I trust you and your God will be loyal to me as well.” Abraham complained that some of Abimelech’s servants had seized his well. Abimelech responded that he didn’t know anything about it. So Abraham took a sheep and an oxen and gave them to Abimelech and made with him a covenant. Abraham set apart seven lambs. Abimelech asked what it meant and Abraham told him that accepting the seven lambs would mean that he had witnessed that Abraham had dug the well at Beersheba. Abimelech agreed to the covenant and left, and Abraham planted a tree in the name of the Lord to signify the spot where he was to reside in the land of the Philistines.

It was after all this that we come to this decisive moment for Abraham that begins with the line, “After these things God tested Abraham.”

How Old Was Isaac at His Binding?

by Taylor Burton-Edwards

Genesis gives us no direct statement of Isaac’s age when today’s story takes place. Artistic depictions of Isaac in the scene vary from a young boy to a what appears to be a teenager.

What might be most reasonable to conclude? Two paths would seem to lead to the conclusion that Isaac was likely at least a late teenager.

First, Isaac appears to have had to be able to fend for himself independently immediately after this incident, since he is not named among those who returned with Abraham to Beersheba (Genesis 21:19). Indeed, Isaac appears to have instead gone further south to Beerlaihairoi to set up a farming operation and build his own household near there (Genesis 24:62). Setting up an independent household was not the work of boys, but of young men.

Second, the Bible tends to depict a strong parallelism in the events of the first families within and across generations. For two striking examples, Abraham and Isaac both pawn off their wives as their sisters (Abraham did this three times!), and in one instance both to a Philistine ruler named Abimelech (Abraham in Genesis 20 and Isaac in Genesis 26). And Isaac (via a servant) and Jacob both first encounter their future wives at a well in Haran (Genesis 24 and 29). Since the effect of this binding of Isaac is what appears to be a permanent separation between Isaac and Abraham until Abraham’s burial, which was also the effect of the expulsion/deportation of Hagar and Ishmael, it would be quite plausible to suggest a parallelism in age (16-17) may be implied as well.

Taken together, we may surmise that we are to understand that this incident took place when Abraham was around 117 and Isaac was around 17, and that it is intended to mark a decisive end of Isaac’s childhood and an equally decisive beginning of his adulthood.

What Do God's People Do With This Horrifying Story?

by Taylor Burton-Edwards

I grew up in a very Jewish neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio. By very Jewish, I mean that nearly all of the people in a three-block radius of my home were Jewish. There was an Orthodox Jewish synagogue less than a block away. The Jewish Community Center, about four blocks away, was the primary community gathering place. The best restaurant in the area (in my view!) was Tillie Nabolski’s Nasherei, and on High Holy Days (Passover, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur), I (as a Gentile) was often one of two or three students in my elementary school class.

I did not adequately appreciate all I could have learned from growing up in this environment at the time. But one of the things I recognize this has given me is that I simply cannot impose a “Christian” reading onto Hebrew Bible texts and call it good. Before I can come to “Christian” conclusions, I want to know how Jewish readers experience this text now and may have experienced it as close as we can get to the time of Jesus, and then, from there, where I can, if I can, make sense of it in light of our Rabbi, Jesus.

There are few texts more troubling to me in the Hebrew Bible than today’s reading from Genesis 22, the Akedah (binding) of Isaac, as it is known in Judaism. So part of my preparation for this series has been to consult a local rabbi where I live (Beth Schwartz, Rabbi of Temple Israel in Columbus, Georgia) to gain deeper insight and Jewish voice and vision. Rabbi Schwartz gave me several key points about this story within Judaism and led me to a book, which I also commend to any who wish to go deeper.

First, she described Genesis 22 as “deafening.” The story is told so dispassionately, so graphically, and yet so subtly in what it says and does not say that the horror of it shines through on multiple levels.

Second, Judaism has simply continued to ask all kinds of questions of it, down to the level of individual words. Where is Isaac at the end? Why does God ask Abraham to do this? Was it God or Satan who asked for the offering, and was it God or Satan who halted it? Judaism continues to seek to live with and ask all of these questions, and many more beside.

Finally, there is the double aftermath of this story on relationships. The family is exploded, none of them living anywhere near each other after this. Isaac does not attend his mother’s burial, and he never sees his father again until his burial. The scattering of the family is often seen in Judaism as witness to how abusive and destructive Abraham’s action had been and the enduring impact of this abuse on the whole family system. Even the relationship between Abraham and God is radically changed. God never speaks to Abraham again after this.

The heart of the book Rabbi Schwartz commended, The Last Trial, by Shalom Spiegel, is a discussion of centuries of rabbinical commentary on this story and liturgical practice that draws from it. It raises even more questions. Did Abraham kill or even fully offer Isaac as a burnt offering, and perhaps God resurrected Isaac? Did Isaac consent to being bound and offered, and if so, how and why? Does God require human blood, or blood at all, to sanctify The Name? Along the way, Rabbi Spiegel cites numerous historical instances of Jewish martyrdom in the face of Christian persecution in which the accounts specifically cite the story of the binding of Isaac as precedent.

I’ve often experienced Christians, myself included, coming to this texts with “answers” to seek to tame its dangerous edges and core. What we might learn from our siblings in Abraham is to let the story be as dangerous as it is and join our questions and disturbance with theirs in ways that may lead us all to join in what many rabbis have described as God’s movement away from the Throne of Justice and to the Throne of Mercy.