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Gerhard von Rad on Genesis 22[1] The exposition is much more accurate when it discovers in the narrative above all the idea of a radical test of obedience. That God, who has revealed himself to Israel, is completely free to give and to take, and that no one may ask, “What doest thou?” (Job 9:12; Dan 4:32), is without doubt basic to our narrative. But one must be careful not to interpret the story in a general sense as a question about Abraham’s willingness to obey and accordingly to direct all interest to Abraham’s trial (as a “showdown for Abraham’s religion,” Pr.). Above all, one must consider Isaac, who is much more than simply a “foil” for Abraham, i.e., a more or less accidental object on which his obedience is to be proved. Isaac is the child of the promise. In him every saving thing that God has promised to do is invested and guaranteed. The point here is not a natural gift, not even the highest, but rather the disappearance from Abraham’s life of the whole promise. Therefore, unfortunately, one can only answer all plaintive scruples about this narrative by saying that it concerns something much more frightful than child sacrifice. It has to do with a road out into Godforsakenness, a road on which Abraham does not know that God is only testing him. There is thus considerable religious experience behind these nineteen verses: that Yahweh often seems to contradict himself, that he appears to want to remove the salvation begun by himself from history. But in this way Yahweh tests faith and obedience! One further thing may be mentioned: in this test God confronts Abraham with the question whether he could give up God’s gift of promise. He had to be able (and he was able), for it is not a good that may be retained by virtue of any legal title or with the help of a human demand. God therefore poses before Abraham the question whether he really understands the gift of promise as a pure gift (cf. the comparable disputing of a legal claim, ch. 48:8-14). Finally, when Israel read and related this story in later times it could only see itself represented by Isaac, i.e., laid on Yahweh’s altar, given back to him, then given life again by him alone. That is to say, it could base its existence in history not on its own legal titles as other nations did, but only on the will of him who in the freedom of his will in history permitted Isaac to live. Is it too much to expect that the one who could tell such a story did not also make rather lofty demands on the thought of his hearers? |