Sermons and Divrei Torah
Akedat Yitzchak
by Karen Haber
(Dvar Torah - Rosh Hashanah 5763)
When Rabbi Goldstein first called me with the honor of doing the Dvar
Torah I anxiously accepted followed by my next question – “Which
day do you think will have the fewest people at Shul?” She laughed –
thinking that I was joking – and stated that my best bet was the 2nd
day of Rosh Hashanah. I humbly accepted, hung up the phone & felt complete
fear as I realized that I had just volunteered to do the Dvar Torah for the
Akedah.
We begin the Akedah with God asking Abraham to take his son “Thine only
son, whom you love, even Isaac, and get thee into the land of Moriah, and
offer him there for a burnt offering….” Abraham and Isaac rise
early in the morning – with no word to Sarah I may add – and travel
three days – time enough to change his mind – until they reach the
appointed place. Abraham prepares the alter, binds his son, and just before
sacrificing Isaac, Abraham’s hand is stayed by the voice of an angel who
says “Lay not thy hand upon the lad…” And Abraham lifted his
eyes, saw a ram caught in the thicket by his horns and offered him up as a
burnt offering instead of his son.
Now for my confession: year after year I listen to the story of the Akedah
with great anxiety and discomfort. I squirm in my seat, bite my nails and,
at some point, I lean over to my husband and whisper: “doesn’t
everyone get it – Abraham was psychotic, maybe schizophrenic, what
other explanation could there be?” My husband shoots me a warning
glance, shakes his head at my simplicity at which point I look cranky and
irritated and resume my proper posture of obedient acquiescence. But inside
I am really confused. How can Abraham, my forefather, have not argued with
God for the sake of his son Isaac? Why could be argue for the righteous of
Sodom and Gomorrah but not his own son? How could he have not informed Sara,
his wife, the mother of his son of his intentions? And what about the sacred
bond between parent and child… the betrayal of trust? How heart wrenching
and pathetic when, in the only dialogue between father and son, Isaac says,
“Behold the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt
offering?” I wanted a forefather who argued with God, who struggled
out loud with the absurdity of the command, who cried on his wife’s
shoulders at the bitterness of God’s request – I wanted the
Modern Man!
So, it is in this light that I began to examine the Akedah to challenge my
self righteous condemnation of Abraham. First, I had to grapple with the
monumental paradox that God ordered Abraham to commit the gravest of sins,
the sacrificial slaughtering of another human being. That Abraham who had
argued with God so eloquently over the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah
acquiesced so readily to the request of God. What kind of God requests the
sacrifice of ones child as a test of faith? Certainly not the God of mercy,
justice and compassion that I had grown to love?!
And yet, maybe God did not command the sacrifice of Isaac. We are all familiar
with the nature of figurative speech characteristic of the Hebrew Bible. In
the story of Hagar and Ishmael we are told that “God opened Hagar’s
eyes” and she saw a well. Maimonides states that this is only a
figurative way of saying Hagar now saw what she had not noticed before.
Is it not possible that when we read “God talked to Abraham” that
this is to be interpreted in the same way that God opened Hagar’s eyes?
Walter Russell Bowie, author of “Exposition of Genesis” suggests
that when we read “God spoke to Abraham” we are told of something
that went on in the mind of Abraham… “An inward voice seemed to
press upon his conscience and he thought it was the voice of God.” Could
the words “God spoke to Abraham” be figurative in speech? –
could it mean that Abraham felt with all his heart that God wanted him to
sacrifice Isaac? Martin Buber (1952) states that this introduces an important
ambiguity; was this indeed Gods will or not? Numerous theologians have
suggested that a thoughtful reading of the Akedah can lead to the conclusion
that perhaps it was not the voice of God that asked Abraham to sacrifice his
son in the first place. Even if one assumes a more traditional belief that
God did request that Abraham bring Isaac to the altar, we must acknowledge
that verse 1 starts with the words “God put Abraham to the test.”
These words are intended to assure the reader that God has no intention of
allowing Abraham to sacrifice Isaac – he wanted only to test Abraham.
So, if God did not actually ask Abraham to bring Isaac to the altar, or if
God did ask but did not intend for the sacrifice to be completed then what
is the point? One argument is that the story of the Akedah clearly promotes
an end to human sacrifice. We know that during the time of the Akedah infant
sacrifice, however rare, was a Canaanite practice and, to some degree, took
hold among the Israelites. The prophets repeatedly denounce human sacrifice
and Deuteronomy legislates against it. The Akedah may be seen as one more
strategy to eliminate human sacrifice entirely from the Hebrew people. Louis
Berman (p 129, Akedah) states “The Akedah speaks gently but firmly to
the Hebrews by choice and to those Hebrews that had fallen under the sway of
their Canaanite neighbors, listen my dear kinsfolk, even Abraham believed with
all his heart that God wanted him to sacrifice his son. However, at the last
moment he was commanded, “Do not raise your hand against the boy or do
anything to him.” Thus God made it clear to Abraham and to Israel for
all time that God does not want children to be sacrificed.” Eli Wiesel
notes that the Akedah promotes the sanctity of life. “In the Jewish
tradition man cannot use death as a means of glorifying God. Every man is an
end unto himself, a living eternity.” I would argue that if the Akedah
provides an absolute prohibition against human sacrifice and highlights the
value of human life then the story is the blue print for the ten commandments.
It prepares us – morally and spiritually for the gift of the commandments.
It is within this framework that God’s request for Abraham to sacrifice his
son is consistent with a God of mercy, compassion and kindness.
But now my next problem – Abraham! How do I reconcile the apparent discrepancy
between Abraham my forefather – a man of great moral strength, integrity,
leadership and commitment with the Abraham who was ready to sacrifice his son to
God without even a question?!! Rabbi Teluchkin suggests that this moral conflict
is more apparent than real;” Abraham’s readiness to obey God’s
command shows him to be ethically deficient by later standards but not by those
of his age. The test came at a time when human sacrifice was still an acceptable
practice and that, therefore, in terms of its own age it was merely the extreme
test. (Plaut, 150). The request may seem harsh and bitter but not incomprehensible.
It has even been suggested that Abraham felt extreme skepticism and disappointment that
God should ask for the sacrifice of Isaac. However, Abraham could not plead for
Isaac because being granted a special favor would not tell Abraham the true nature
of God. Abraham had to know whether God respected human life in general and whether
he protected children – all children. To find out, he had to test God –
tempting him by complying with his command (Brown, 1982, pg. 21). It has been suggested
that what makes Abraham the father of our people is that he was able to recognize that
the real voice of God did not want him to sacrifice his child. (Berman, pg. 132).
Okay, if a main message of the Akedah is an end to human sacrifice how can we see
relevance in this message today? Louis Berman states that “if we see in the
prohibition of child sacrifice a moral note that a child’s welfare comes
first and deserves priority over the wishes and interests of parents, church
or state then the Akedah is indeed relevant to our time.” Rabbi Plaut suggests
that the story of the Akedah may be read as a paradigm of a father / son relationship:
In a way every parent seeks to dominate his child and is in danger of seeking to
sacrifice him to his parental plans and hopes. In the biblical story. God is present
and can stay the father's hand. In all too many repetitions of the scene God is absent
and the knife falls” (Plaut, pg. 150 The Torah). It is the very absence of
descriptive detail that enables Isaac to stand for all children – whatever their
age or characteristics and however the get along with their parents (Berman pg. 60).
Similarly, the absence of dialogue or motivation attributed to Abraham allows him
to stand for all fathers.
So this year – when we hear the shofar blow – the ram's horn that was
substituted for Isaac – let us all ask ourselves whether there are parents,
children, or loved ones that we may unintentionally sacrifice to our own ideals or
unfulfilled dreams and let us aim to loosen the ropes and, in doing so, honor
the spirit of the Akedah.
Shana Tova.
Sermons and Divrei Torah
Additional Resources
Elul: Period of Preparation
Yamim Noraim: Days of Awe
Rosh Hashanah: Introduction
Shofar Symbolism
The Custom of Tashlich
Yom Kippur: Introduction
G'mar Chatima Tova...
