Genesis records no conversation between Abraham and Isaac on Mount Moriah, but at some point Abraham told him, perhaps in the words suggested by Martin Luther: “You, my dearly beloved son, whom God has given me, have been destined for the burnt offering.” 1 Josephus records these words by Abraham:
My child, having asked with myriad prayers from God that you be born to me, when you came into life, there is nothing that I did not take trouble with regard to your upbringing, nor was there anything that I thought would bring me greater happiness than if I should see you grown to manhood and when I died, I should have you as the successor of my realm.
But since it was by God’s wish that I became your father and again since, as it seems best to Him, I give you up, bear this consecration nobly, for I concede you to God, who requires now to obtain this honor from us, in return for the fact that He has been a benevolent helper and ally to me.
Since you were born out of the course of nature, depart now from life not in a common fashion but sent forth by your own father to God, the father of all, by the rite of sacrifice. I think that He has judged that you are deserving to be removed from life neither by disease nor by war nor by some other of the afflictions that are conditioned by nature to befall humanity, but that He would receive your soul with prayers and sacrificial rites and would keep it near Himself.
And you will be a guardian for me and supporter in my old age, wherefore also I especially reared you, by offering me God in place of yourself. 2
Martin Luther surmised that Abraham must have also spoken to Isaac of the resurrection of the dead and the fulfillment of the promise that in Isaac the world would be blessed: “God has given a command; therefore we must obey Him, and since He is almighty, He can keep His promise even when you are dead and have been reduced to ashes.” 3
And Philo reports Abraham telling Isaac that, “to God all things are possible, including those that are impossible or insuperable to men.” 4
Isaac replied, according to Josephus, that he did not deserve “to have been born in the first place, if he were … to spurn the decision of God and his father and not readily offer himself to the wishes of both, when even if his father alone were choosing this it would have been unjust to disobey.” 5 Thus, as a midrash reports, “was Isaac reconciled to his death, in order to obey his Maker’s command.” 6
Perhaps Abraham spoke also of the symbolic significance of sacrifice, that since its institution with Adam it represented the Savior’s future sacrifice, and that Isaac’s sacrifice – as the only human sacrifice that God had ever commanded – would be uniquely symbolic of that of the Savior?
Genesis reports that Abraham “bound Isaac his son” (Gen. 22:9), memorialized in the word Judaism still uses to refer to this event: the Akedah, or “binding” of Isaac. 7 Genesis contains not the slightest hint of any struggle, and several sources relate that Isaac actually asked his father to bind him, lest at the last minute he lose his nerve and spoil the sacrifice.
The Targum of Pseudo-Jonathan reports Isaac as saying: “Bind me well that I may not struggle at the anguish of my soul, and that a blemish may not be found in your offering.” 8
According to Al-Tabari, Isaac 9 implored his father:
Fasten my bands so that I do not move about, and tie back your garments so that none of my blood splashes on them, lest Sarah see it and be saddened. 10
Jewish tradition further recounts that Isaac urged his father, once he returned home, to break the news gently to Sarah in a way and setting that she would not harm herself out of grief. 11 A modern rabbi notes that, “even when his life was in mortal danger, Isaac’s main concern was not for his own safety but for his parents.” 12 In Judaism, Isaac remains the exemplar of the commandment to love God with all your soul. 13
In the words of Clement, Isaac “cheerfully yielded himself as a sacrifice.” 14 Isaac’s greatness is seen in the fact that while Abraham had heard the directive for the sacrifice directly from God, Isaac had heard it only from Abraham, another human being. But Isaac did not question the source, for according to John Taylor, he “knew very well … that it was in obedience to a commandment of God; he knew very well that his father had communicated with the Lord and received revelations from him.” 15
They were absolutely united, proceeding, noted Rashi, “with a common mind.” 16 In the words of Elie Wiesel, “The sacrifice was to be their joint offering,” and “father and son had never before been so close” as “Isaac lay on the altar, silently gazing at his father.” 17 Melvin J. Ballard added that Abraham “must have given his son his farewell kiss, his blessing, [and] his love.” 18 Islamic tradition similarly reports that Abraham kissed his son good-bye. 19
And as Abraham, following the pattern of Adam, always performed sacrifice in the name of Jesus Christ (see Moses 5:8; 6:52), so he would have done on this occasion, offering a prayer for acceptance of the sacrifice. But it is an Islamic text from the early 1600s that purports to provide the contents of that unique prayer, beginning with a striking allusion to Abraham’s previous visit to heaven recounted in the Apocalypse of Abraham. “Most High and Omnipotent Sovereign! May all the Celestial potentates of thy blessed seraphic choirs give praises to thy Holy Name, with their melodious and echoing hymns, for ever and ever!” 20
It is a touching and poignant reminder to God of when Abraham had once been lovingly welcomed at the divine throne, an allusion to the highest moment of fellowship between God and Abraham, and the occasion when God had shown Abraham his future posterity – who God had subsequently promised would come through Isaac.
Later in the prayer, Abraham gratefully acknowledges the Lord’s goodness, and implores His grace: “We have hourly tokens of thy great and boundless love towards us … I am now, Lord, upon the point of accomplishing what thou hast commanded me to perform; grant, therefore, I beseech thee … that I may be illuminated with thy grace, so that I may be able perfectly to complete what I have taken in hand to thy honour and glory.” 21
These words are a veritable window into the soul of Abraham, who in his mortal moment of deepest distress was unfailingly grateful for the Lord’s unfailing goodness. Like his admiring descendant Nephi, Abraham did not know the meaning of all things, but knew that God loved him (see 1 Ne. 11:17).
And so, with a perfectly submissive heart, he pled for strength to perform the almost undoable task. It is the consummate demonstration of what the Lord requires of Zion, as he said in a latter-day revelation: “the Lord requireth the heart and a willing mind” (D&C 64:34, and see verse 22).
At this most difficult moment, did Abraham remember when he himself had been on a pagan altar, and had prayed to God for help? In contrast now, Isaac did not, could not, pray for help, for God himself had asked for this sacrifice. But it was more than Isaac laying on the altar; it was Zion itself, for had not the Lord Himself promised that “in Isaac” would the world be blessed and through him the Messiah and Zion be born?
Indeed, if the ancient concept of sacrifice “suppose[d] the putting to death of the unique in terms of its being unique, irreplaceable, and most precious,” 22 then this surely was the ultimate sacrifice, as Abraham and Isaac well knew. And yet, in the words of the Qur’an, Abraham and his son “together … submitted to God’s will.” 23 The word submitted is a conjugation of the Arabic verb islam, the word chosen by Muhammad for his new religion, which he insisted was actually a restoration of the religion of Abraham. Abraham’s submission is the great paradigm for his Muslim descendants.
How hard was this for Abraham? With this act, said John Taylor, Abraham saw “all his hopes blasted,” and among the thoughts “crowding upon his mind” was the expectation of being left “a dry root, helpless, hopeless, tottering on the grave without any heir.” 24 Jewish tradition similarly reports that Abraham expected to live “a few days only” after completing the sacrifice, 25 and reports that the agony he underwent caused his hair to turn white on this occasion 26 – a detail captured in Rembrandt’s haunting painting of the scene. 27 The painting also shows the tears streaming down Abraham’s face, the same tears described in both Jewish 28 and Islamic tradition, the latter of which speaks of the ground becoming soaked with their tears. 29
Meanwhile, “Isaac, seeing his father’s hand, with knife in it, fall down against him, did not flinch.” 30 But then Isaac saw something else, as reported by the Targum of Pseudo-Jonathan: “The eyes of Abraham were looking at the eyes of Isaac, and the eyes of Isaac were looking at the angels on high. Isaac saw them but Abraham did not see them.” 31
How does one explain Abraham’s actions? What made it possible to perform this near-impossible deed? Faith, answers W. F. P. Noble:
It furnishes the only key to the questions that rise unbidden as we read the story – a fond and doting father, how could Abraham undertake the task? How was he able to contemplate imbruing his hands in the blood of his son? How did his reason withstand the shock? How did his heart not break? How had he the nerve to disclose the dreadful truth to Isaac, to kiss him, to bind his naked limbs, to draw the knife from its sheath and raise his arm for the blow? How did not the cords of life snap under the strain, and Abraham, spared the horrid sacrifice, fall dead on the altar – a pitiful sight, a father clasping within his lifeless arms the beloved form of his son? It is by the power of faith he stands there, the knife glittering in his hand, his arm raised to strike. 32
Rabbinic texts tell of the angels weeping and pleading with God to stop the sacrifice. 33 It was then, as Genesis recounts, that “the angel of the LORD” 34 called out of heaven, “Abraham, Abraham” (Gen. 22:11). As recounted in Jubilees, Abraham was “startled.” 35 In Rembrandt’s painting, the knife is dropping from Abraham’s hand as his eyes look up toward the voice – eyes full of a supernal submission and a profound peace that defies description. The voice continued, as Genesis reports: “for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me” (NRSV Gen. 22:11-12).
But Jubilees has a different reading of the verse: not “now I know” but “now I have shown.” 36 Shown to whom? To Abraham, for one: the reason for this trial, said President Hugh B. Brown, was that “Abraham needed to learn something about Abraham.” 37
And the world needed to learn something from Abraham. A few verses later, Jubilees reports God as saying, “I have shown to all that thou art faithful unto Me.” 38 The Midrash Rabbah similarly interpreted the Genesis verse to mean not “now I know” but rather “now I have made it known to all,” 39 and added that when the angel called Abraham’s name twice, it was both “to him and to future generations.” 40
Hence by this trial, says the medieval Jewish commentator Abravanel, God “made a demonstration,” holding Abraham up “as an example and banner to all.” 41 According to the nineteenth-century British reverend Ashton Oxenden, “truly such an act of faith … was never seen either before or since.” 42 But if the great Abraham could withstand a test unique among mortals, it is unique only in degree, for modern revelation tells that the Latter-day Saints “must needs be … tried, even as Abraham, who was commanded to offer up his only son”(D&C 101:4). 43
Notes
1Pelikan, Luther’s Works, 4:112.
2Judean Antiquities 1.228-31, in Feldman, Josephus, 90-92. Original has brackets around the phrase “out of the course of nature,” words supplied by Feldman to fill in a lacuna in the Greek text.
3Pelikan, Luther’s Works, 4:112-13.
4On Abraham 33, in Philo VI, 89.
5Judean Antiquities 1.232, in Feldman, Josephus, 92.
6Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, 3:163, quoting Midrash Vayyosha.
7See generally Encyclopaedia Judaica, 2:480-87.
8Bowker, Targums and Rabbinic Literature, 225, quoting the Targum of Pseudo-Jonathan on Genesis 22:10. See also Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer 31, in Friedlander , Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer, 227; and Jasher 23:61, in Noah, Book of Yashar, 62.
9Al-Tabari’s report does refer here to Isaac, not Ishmael.
10Brinner, History of al-Tabari, 91.
11Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, 3:144.
12Miller , Abraham Friend of God, 169.
13Ibid., 172, quoting Sifrei, Devarim 32.
14Clement, The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians 31, in Ante-Nicene Fathers, 1:13.
15Journal of Discourses, 18:325.
16Bowker, Targums and Rabbinic Literature, 231, quoting Rashi.
17Wiesel, Messengers of God, 102, 96.
19Reuven Firestone, “Abraham,” in McAuliffe, Encyclopaedia of the Qur’an, 1:10.
20Rabadan, Mahometism Fully Explained 1:166 (some commas omitted, capitalization normalized, and spelling of “seraphick” changed to “seraphic”). This work is an English translation of a text purportedly written in 1603.
21Ibid. (some commas omitted, capitalization normalized).
23Qur’an 37:103, in Cragg, Qur’an, 120. The son is unnamed in the Qur’an; but in context, as well as in most of Muslim tradition, the son was Ishmael.
24Journal of Discourses, 14:361.
25Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 1:280.
26See Brown, Kelch, and van Thiel, Rembrandt, 181.
27I refer here to the 1634 painting hanging in the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, not the other one finished by a student.
28See Genesis Rabbah 56:8, in Freedman, Midrash Rabbah, Genesis, 1:498.
29See Reuven Firestone, “Abraham,” in McAuliffe, Encyclopaedia of the Qur’an, 1:10; and see Brinner, History of al-Tabari, 91.
304 Maccabees 16:20, in Charlesworth, Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, 2:561.
31Targum of Pseudo-Jonathan on Genesis 22:10, in Maher, Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, 79-80.
32Noble, Great Men of God, 65.
33See Moshe J. Bernstein, “Angels at the Aqedah: A Study in the Development of a Midrashic Motif,” in Dead Sea Discoveries: A Journal of Current Research on the Scrolls and Related Literature (Leiden: Brill, 2000) 7:3, 278-83; Jasher 23:66-68, in Noah, Book of Yashar, 62; and Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 1:281-82.
34Genesis 22:11, in King James and most translations.
35Jubilees 18:10, in VanderKam, Book of Jubilees, 106.
36This reading, which is in the Latin manuscript only and is supported by the later verse in Jubilees referred to in the next note, was adopted by Charles , Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, 2:40. See discussion in VanderKam, Book of Jubilees, 107, note on 18:11.
37As reported by Truman Madsen in his Book of Mormon class in the fall of 1971 at Brigham Young University. Dr. Madsen had just finished a tour of the Holy Land with President Brown.
38Jubilees 18:16, in Charles , Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, 2:40.
39Genesis Rabbah 56:7, in Freedman, Midrash Rabbah, Genesis, 1:497.
Genesis Rabbah 56:7, in Freedman, Midrash Rabbah, Genesis, 1:496.
41Leibowitz, Studies in Bereshit, 190.
42Oxenden, Portraits from the Bible, 48.
43See also Doctrine and Covenants 132:51: “I did it, saith the Lord, to prove you all, as I did Abraham, and that I might require an offering at your hand, by covenant and sacrifice.”