Was God wrong to tell Abraham to sacrifice Isaac?
One of the more puzzling and questionable stories found in the Old Testament has to do with God calling on Abraham to offer his son as a sacrifice. Sometimes known as “The Binding” (Hebrew: the Akedah), the story is found in Genesis 22. It is admittedly a worrying portion of Scripture, given that it seems God is commanding Abraham to do something he has elsewhere forbidden, as in Jeremiah 7:31.
There are different ways to deal with this problem. One is to simply dismiss the entire chapter. Or to claim God was wrong. Or to claim that God is the author of evil. Or that we should reject God, at least in this instance. And Christians too of course can have legitimate questions about all this. Consider a brief exchange I recently had with one social media friend:
Her: Bill, the story in the bible I have the hardest time accepting us when Abraham is asked to sacrifice his own son Isaac! I will never accept that story as acceptable because it goes against God’s own commandment of “Thou Shall Not Murder” so it doesn’t even remotely make sense that God should ask Abraham to do that! Yes I understand God Himself sacrificed his own Son but we as humans are asked not to murder
Me: Thanks. It was more a test of faith and trust – as we know, God provided the sacrifice. God already knew what was in Abraham’s heart, but perhaps Abraham needed to know as well. And if a good and loving God told him to do this, then it did make sense. In the same way we metaphorically are called to give our own children (or spouses, or careers, or anything and everything) up to God – we too are to be willing to make great sacrifices for God. And as we read in Gen 22:8, Abraham already seemed to know that God would provide a different sacrifice.
Her: Bill, He asked Abraham to murder his own son, that’s not right & goes against His own commandment, it didn’t make one iota of sense, that’s not good or loving & imagine the trauma Isaac went through as well.
Me: There are many things in Scripture that we as fallen, finite and fallible human beings might question. But we must take real care in actually thinking that we are wiser, more loving, and more moral than God is. That is a risky place to be in. That does not mean we stop asking questions, but it means we show a bit of humility, knowing that he is God and we are not. Again, Isaac was NOT killed.
Those are some of the brief replies that one can make about this perplexing narrative. But more things can be said. Let me offer a few more short responses. One, God is the author of life and death, and he can both give life and take it away. That is his prerogative. Two, this was, as I mentioned, a test. God knew he was not going to take Isaac’s life. The question is, how about Abraham? He believed God would provide an alternative: “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” (v. 8).
Three, Abraham was the subject of great promises given by God. He was promised descendants coming from him being as numerous as the stars in the skies (Gen. 15:5-6). Four, he had already experienced the miraculous in having the womb of Sarah opened by God (Gen, 21:1-3). So he could believe that God was quite able to resurrect his son if he did sacrifice him (see Heb. 11:17-19)
Five, as the ‘father of faith’ that Paul and others would appeal to (eg., Romans 4:9), he was indeed strong in faith, and God allowed him to see this worked out in this episode. Six, he became a type or prefiguring of God being willing to offer his own son for our sins. In that sense, God will not ask us to do something that he was not willing to do himself.
Seven, mention must also be made of Isaac’s deep trust, both in his father and his father’s God. And eight, we too are called to at least metaphorically sacrifice what and who we love most for the sake of the Kingdom. Jesus spoke about this when he even warned about loving one’s parents more than loving God (Luke 14;26).
But still, this was a very real test for Abraham and a very difficult one. And ethical questions can remain. Obviously, oceans of ink have already been spilled on this matter. Atheists and God-haters are happy to say that God is an ogre and an evil monster because of things like this.
And as mentioned, believers too can have real questions about the whole affair. In addition to the points that I raised above, a few more things can be said. First let me offer some philosophic and apologetics remarks, and then close with some theological and devotional comments.
As to the former, Paul Copan in his helpful 2011 volume, Is God a Moral Monster? devotes a full chapter to the Akedah. Recall that Abraham already experienced God’s goodness and faithfulness in the past, so in a sense he was well-prepared for this extreme test: “Because Abraham already knew God’s faithful – and even tender – character and promises, he was confident that God would somehow fulfil his promise to him, however this would be worked out.” He goes on to say this:
We’ve seen that the narrative context of Genesis reveals repeated divine assurances and confirmations that Isaac was the child of promise and instrument of blessings to the nations. Abraham truly knew that Isaac would live to adulthood and have offspring in fulfillment of God’s promise; so, if necessary, God would bring Isaac back from the dead: “we will return,” Abraham promised his servants. So if Abraham knew God would fulfill his covenant promise, then Abraham’s taking innocent human life in this case—according to God’s command—was morally permissible.
As to the latter, here are some thoughts on the episode from some well-known pastors and preachers. James Montgomery Boice says this:
This test involved a conflict apparently within the words of God himself. God had promised posterity through Isaac. But God had now also commanded Abraham to kill him. How could this problem be resolved? There were only two ways. Abraham could have concluded that God was erratic, wavering from one plan to another because he did not know his own mind. This had not been Abraham’s experience of God. The long wait for the son had taught him better than that. Or Abraham could have concluded that, although he – being finite and sinful – was unable to see the resolution of the difficulty, God could nevertheless be trusted to have a resolution, which he himself would certainly disclose in due time. This was the harder of the two solutions to accept, but Abraham’s experience of God led him in this direction.
Abraham acted in a manner consistent with his knowledge of God. That is, he trusted him, concluding that whatever God’s purposes may or may not have been in this situation, God had at least shown that he could not be his enemy. God was his friend. When the command to sacrifice Isaac was first given, Abraham did not understand how, if the command were carried out, the promise could be fulfilled. But that was alright. Abraham left the difficulty with God, which is the essence of true faith. What is faith? Faith is believing God and acting upon it. That is what Abraham did. God had shown that he could be trusted, so Abraham believed God and acted, even though he could not understand the solution to the difficulty.
And some thoughts from Stuart Briscoe:
While it is clear that typology is part of revelation and therefore that the interpretation of types is a valid means of communicating the truth, we should be careful not to be too exuberant in our perceptions of types or too creative in our interpretations thereof. With that in mind we may see in Isaac a type of the Suffering Son who willingly submitted Himself unreservedly to the Father’s will. In Abraham we have a poignant picture of the Father who “did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all” (Rom. 8:32) and in the ram a type of the Lamb who died as a substitute for the sins of the world.
When I was a boy I heard a preacher say, “I have five sons and I would not offer up any one of them for any one of you! But God had only one Son and He offered Him freely for the sins of a world that did not even heed His action nor desire His grace.” I have not forgotten that and when I look at Abraham’s action I see something equally unforgettable! Truly a high point of faith!
Lastly, a few words from R. Kent Hughes. In his expository commentary on Genesis, he shows us the relevance of all this:
We see that the God who tests is also the God who provides—the Tester is the Provider. Both truths are actual fact, but they must be appropriated by faith. When God tests you, he will provide for you. So we see that the Lord who tests is the Lord who provides. That is what we need to see about God. As we go through the tests of growing a greater faith, as God tests us and stretches us, we believe, and he provides. He always has provided. He provides for every believer. He always has. So when we are called to give our “Isaacs”—those things that are most precious to us—we need to understand when we do it that God is Jehovah Jireh—God provides.
Amen and amen.
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