The Thorny Bush and Isaac:  The ‘Akedah’ (or) the binding of Isaac – Genesis 22

“It took the Lord (approximately) sixty years to prepare Abraham for this climactic event.”[1]  From the promise in Genesis 12 to the birth of Isaac in Genesis 21 was a period of 25 years.  From his birth to this episode was a time frame of over 30 years.

Abraham knew the love of God – but not the judgment of God.  Abraham is now ready! “The Lord never does put us to the test until we are ready for it.”[2] Abraham is now ready; let’s look at his story.

Verse 1: It came about after these things, that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” (1^st time used at the beginning of story)  “Here I am”(Heb. Hin-nah-ni)  means, “ready Lord,” “at your service,” “yes, sir,” “at once.” This word reflects submission. After many years he is now a yielded vessel at the feet of a holy God. Now comes the ultimate test.

Verse 2: Then He said, “Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you.”  “Abraham is reminded of the dearest possession of his life.”[3] Scholars attest that the patriarch told nothing of his purpose to Sarah.”[4] “Only” son (Hebrew, Yachid, “the unique one, one and only”), it has the same idea as “only begotten.”

Isaac was the “promised (one) child that was foretold.” “Somehow, we approach this scene with fear and trembling…we can (almost) hear God saying to us what He said to Moses… ‘Take off thy shoes, for the ground whereon thou standest is holy ground.’”[5]

“Your only son.”   “What does God mean, ‘your only son’? Abraham had other sons. He had Ishmael who was born thirteen years prior to Isaac.  He had many sons afterward. God however, recognized as a fit sacrifice only one son, the miraculously born, supernaturally given, promised son, Isaac. In Abraham we see the love of God which surpasses understanding.

“Moriah (eight centuries later) became the site of the temple where all the sacrifices were offered, where God tore the Temple curtain in two (so) that free access might be (made) for all the people of God….”[6]

This is indeed the same area in which our Lord was crucified for our sins and is a beautiful picture (that) the Holy Spirit gives to us centuries before the Lord came.

Verse 3: So Abraham got up early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him and his son Isaac; and he split wood for the burnt offering, and set out and went to the place of which God had told him.

“Early in the morning.”  I don’t believe Abraham slept that night. Perhaps he wrestled and agonized with God as he did for Sodom and Gomorrah.

I find an interesting parallel in the fact that our Lord, “early, (the) morning of His crucifixion, after the evening of the Passover meal came (to) Gethsemane.”[7]

The Scriptures tell us that He, Jesus, “began to be deeply distressed and troubled.” (Mark 14:33)

There Jesus agonized, wrestling with His Father and praying, “Father, if it is Your will, remove this cup from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done” (Luke 22:42).  It is appropriate that the Lord went to Gethsemane. Gethsemane means “wine press or oil press.”

That fateful morning of betrayal and arrest the record tells us that Jesus “being in agony, prayed more earnestly. And His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground” (Luke 22:44).  Jesus was being “pressed”, yielding to His father’s will and purpose. Abraham, also was being pressed.

Verses 4 – 6: On the third day Abraham raised his eyes and saw the place from a distance. ⁵ Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey, and I and the boy will go over there; and we will worship and return to you.” ⁶ And Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac, and he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on together (1^st time stated. Isaac did not know yet). 

“Saw the place afar from a distance.” “His vision included more than a mountain in the land of Moriah. He saw past the deed to the resurrection, past the type to the fulfillment, past Isaac to the (Messiah). The New Testament will not permit any other interpretation. ‘By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac; and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, Of whom it was said, That in Isaac shall thy seed be called: Accounting that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead’ (Hebrews 11:17-19).

Our Lord reminded the Pharisees of this fact, ‘Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad.’ John 8:56”[8]

“Worship” means to “bow low, to “yield”, to “submit”. “We will return to you.” Abraham fully believed that God would indeed raise Isaac from the dead due to the fact that God’s word is true. God stated that through the promised child “all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 12:3).

Notice, He “took the wood and laid it on Isaac his son” (tied the wood on his back). Abraham was 100 years older than Isaac. Isaac could easily have resisted, but did not.  Here is a true picture of our Lord, who said, “For this reason the Father loves Me, because I lay down My life so that I may take it back. ¹⁸ No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it back” (John 10:17,18). Isaac bore the wood, as Christ bore the cross.”[9]

“Fire and knife.” As the wood points to the cross, “Fire” in the Scripture has the meaning of judgment. It was a flame and a sword that guarded Eden. It was fire which destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, and very significantly the place of eternal judgment is called the lake of fire. “Knife”, a butcher knife, a sacrificial knife, used in sacrificing animals. “A knife in Scripture speaks of the Word of God.”[10] “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword…” Hebrews 4:12

“God foreknew and foresaw that man would sin. Even before man was created, God had ready a plan of salvation which included the death of His Son.  Jesus is the ‘Lamb slain from before the foundation of the world.’ (Revelation 13:8)

“Two of them went together.” The father and son proceeding step (by) step up the hill.”[11]  (Burnt Offering, Heb. Olah – a step, stairs, Holocaust – going up in smoke, Ascending, An Ascent Offering. Here we have perfect agreement. Abraham did not have to force his son to climb up. They were both agreed and of one mind.”[12]   The son was obedient unto death.

Verses 7,8: (only recorded conversation between Isaac and Abraham)   Isaac spoke to his father Abraham and said, “My father!” (Avi, last word Abraham wanted to hear) And he said, “Here I am (Hin-nah-ni – 2^nd time used, I am with you), my son.”

And he said, “Look, the fire and the wood, but where (Eifoh, Ayeh), is the lamb for the burnt offering?”(Where did the lamb go? How come there is no lamb?  Am I the lamb?)  ⁸ Abraham said, “God will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” Or, Elohim Yir-eh –lo- “God will provide Himself.” Or,My son – I don’t know son how this will unfold). So the two of them walked on together. (Now Isaac knows, and he still walked together with His father).

The question pierced Abraham’s heart like a knife. “God will provide.” Jehovah-Jireh, ‘the Lord will see to it’, The Lord will provide.

“My son” is an expression of tenderness.  As though Abraham was sparing Isaac from unnecessary pain and detail. Abraham fully intended to sacrifice his son…To spill his blood, to burn his body. He did not know there would be a ram in the bushes. He leaves this painful issue with a merciful God.

What a marvelous truth of the atonement! When no one else could pay, God said, ‘I will pay the price.’ That answer satisfied Isaac, ‘and the two of them went together.’”[13]

Verses 9,10: Then they came to the place of which God had told him; and Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood, and bound his son (Tied him on top of the wood with the rope that he tied the wood upon Isaac’s back) Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. ¹⁰ And Abraham reached out with his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. 

Notice “the staccato phrases that heighten the tension. (The short, abrupt, pithy statements).  Abraham seems to move ‘like a sleep-walker.’”[14]  (being numb, or receiving bad news, death)

Abraham actually binds his son. Isaiah said about the Messiah, ‘it pleased the Lord to bruise Him…’”[15]  “The center of the scene shifts from the father to son and back to the father, for the Lord is emphasizing the fact that both were going to the sacrifice together, obeying, yielding, co-operating even as the heavenly Father and the Lord Jesus Christ did at Calvary.

With the consent of Isaac, Abraham binds him…and lays him on the altar.”[16] Another important point is that on top of the mountain there was no one around except Abraham and Isaac. “When they went to the place of sacrifice, they took two men along…but when they came to the mountain, Abraham said, ‘You two stay behind.’

When that awful moment came Abraham lifted up his (knife). There was no one around, no one to witness it, no one to see it. Why? The scene was too sacred, too holy. Do you see the picture? When the Son of God went up to Calvary, His father went with Him, and was right there at Calvary, holding His Son’s hand as He walked up the mountain.  But there were two other men also, one on the right hand, and one on the left.

(Then) the time came for the sacrifice, the time for that holy scene which no eye might behold. Just as Abraham denied the two men who went with them to see the actual transaction, so also did God. (You see) for when the time came, every one must be shut out, and no one must see. From the sixth hour ‘there was darkness over the whole earth until the ninth hour’ (Matthew 27:45).

For three hours no human eye beheld what took place on the Cross of Calvary. The Father snuffed out the lights of heaven, He pulled down the shades of the sky, separated Himself with His Son alone.”[17]  The Father seems to say to His son, ‘I’ve got to go now. The rest of the way you will have to go all alone, by yourself, all alone.’ “At the end of those three black hours we hear a cry, a piercing cry from the Son of God upon the Cross, (Eli, Eli, Lama Sabachthani) ‘My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ Alone He had to die and pay the price, so that you and I would never have to be alone…so that we would never have to experience the loneliness of being forever forsaken.”[18] At that very moment He bore our sin.

Verses 11 – 13: But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.”(3^rd time) ¹² He said, “Do not reach out your hand against the boy, and do not do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.” ¹³ Then Abraham raised his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him was a ram caught in the thicket by its horns; and Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering in the place of his son.

The word thicket in the Hebrew is savek which means to entwine, an entwining vine, tree or thorny brush. Meaning that thorns entangled the ram’s head – Similarly, Jesus had a crown of thorns upon His head.

The record states that Isaac died. “By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac; and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotton son,” (Hebrews 11:17). “Accounting that God was able to raise him up from the dead” (Hebrews 11:19). “How long was Isaac dead? Three days. Exactly three days. Abraham actually offered up his son in the sight of God. As far as Abraham was concerned, Isaac was really dead.

When Abraham started out on the journey early that morning he had no other idea than that God meant what He said and that he must after three days put Isaac to death on Mt. Moriah. For three days he considered his son, Isaac, dead (On the third day Abraham raised his eyes and saw the place, vs. 4), …Isaac had been dead in the mind of Abraham for three days and now all of a sudden he is returned to life.”[19] What a wonderful picture that after three days Isaac was raised from the dead. Abraham knew the joy of resurrection “upon the (very) mountain where the Son of God was to be slain.”[20]

“Abraham believed in the death and the resurrection of his son.”[21] Abraham believed the gospel. Paul referred to this when he stated, “And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen by faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, ‘In thee shall all nations be blessed’” (Galatians 3:8).

Verse 14: And Abraham named that place The Lord Will Provide, as it is said to this day, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.” Jehovah-Jireh, the Lord will provide. The Lord will see to it. “In the Mount of the Lord it shall be provided” “should be translated, ‘In the mount the Lord shall be seen.’”[22]

Abraham understood all the meaning of these things. We hear Jesus saying in John 8:56, ‘Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad.’” [23]

Abraham’s loyalty, to his Creator and to his son, is uncompromising – all the way to the unknowable end.  Abraham going up that mountain, is like a horseman riding two steeds at once, with one foot in one stirrup of each horse. Suddenly, the two horses, who had been galloping together begin to diverge.  He will stand there, with a foot on each, and not abandon either. Abraham was loyal to God and to Isaac. He was there for both of them. Here am I.  The Lord shall be seen, He will provide, He did provide.

Oh, how He loves you and me!

Shalom and Blessings,

Dr. Jeff

 

Footnotes:

[1]  M.R. DeHaan, “Adventures in Faith, Studies in the Life of Abraham,” (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1953), p. 153.

[2]  Ibid., p. 153.

[3]  W.H. Griffith Thomas, D.D., “Genesis, A Devotional Commentary”, (Eerdmans Publishing, Grand Rapids, 1946), p. 195.

[4]  Ibid., p. 620.

[5]  M.R. DeHaan, “Adventures in Faith, Studies in the Life of Abraham”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1953), p. 156.

[6]  Donald Grey Barnhouse, “Genesis, A Devotional Exposition”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1973), p. 197.

[7]  M.R. DeHaan, “Adventures in Faith, Studies in the Life of Abraham”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1953), p. 160.

[8]  Donald Grey Barnhouse, “Genesis, A Devotional Exposition”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1973), p. 199.

[9]  Ibid., p. 200.

[10]  Ibid., p. 162.

[11] H.C. Leupold, D.D., “Exposition of Genesis, Volume II”, (Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, 1964), p. 625.

[12] M.R. DeHaan, “Adventures in Faith, Studies in the Life of Abraham”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1953), p. 162.

[13]  Ibid., p. 164.

[14] W. Gunther Plaut, “The Torah, A Modern Commentary, Genesis”, (The Union of American Hebrew Congregations, New York, 1974), p. 206.

[15] Donald Grey Barnhouse, “Genesis, A Devotional Exposition”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1973), p. 201.

[16]  Ibid., p. 202.

[17] M.R. DeHaan, “Adventures in Faith, Studies in the Life of Abraham”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1953), p. 164-165.

[18]  Ibid., p. 165.

[19]  Ibid. p. 166.

[20]  Ibid. p. 167.

[21]  Ibid., p. 167.

[22] Donald Grey Barnhouse, “Genesis, A Devotional Exposition”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1973), p. 204.

[23] M.R. DeHaan, “Adventures in Faith, Studies in the Life of Abraham”, (Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, 1953), p. 168-169.