Rogland's post)
Date: Sun, 30 Jun 2002 19:10:16 -0400
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Dear George,
I find this a good solution to what is a difficult passage. Also interesting
is that God is working on two levels in your scenario: at the contemporary
level with Abraham and also with an rye to later times
-----Original Message-----
From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu]On
Behalf Of george murphy
Sent: Saturday, June 29, 2002 4:47 PM
To: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Binding of Isaac (Was Re: Scripture and the ASA; Robt Rogland's
post)
In a discussion of "Scripture and the ASA" I wrote the following
on 19 June.
G) To take a different tack, if creation is fundamentally
dynamic & evolutionary, it's not surprising that the ethical sense of
human beings would also evolve. & if God limits divine action to what
is within the capacity of creatures, then ~3000 years ago God had to
work with people for whom massacres, slavery, &c were the way things
were done.
H) That there is ethical advance within scripture is shown by
the progression from Gen.4:23-24 (unlimited vengeance) to Ex.21:23-24
(defined & limited retribution) to Mt.5:38-39 (non-resistance).
...................................
J) The suggestion of G) above is still disturbing, but the
problem it presents is similar to that of God's creative action through
natural selection. & as with that, an adequate answer has to be sought
in the cross - where God experiences execution as a breaker of the law.
(N.B. I say "an adequate answer has to be sought ...". I am not
claiming that this just makes the problem of exterminations, slavery &c
in the OT go away.)
The OT reading for tomorrow is Gen.22:1-13, "The binding of
Isaac." It caused me to reflect further on what I said above.
This is one of those "disturbing" texts - God commanding Abraham
to sacrifice his son. It's not less terrible for being a "test" because
Abraham would have had to think that God was the kind of deity who could
make such a demand. OTOH, both Jews and Christians have seen it as a
central part of their traditions. From at least the second century it
has been seen as a foreshadowing of the Passion of Christ.
So how are we to think of this? Clearly we aren't called to
sacrifice our children as burnt offerings. Here's one approach along
the lines I suggested earlier. I assume here that there was an
historical Abraham and something like the basic events described in the
text happened.
In the culture in which Abraham lived, human sacrifice, and
especially the sacrifice of children to fertility deities in Canaan, was
practised. It would not have been surprising if the thought came to
Abraham: "If the worshippers of other deities have this supreme degree
of devotion, should my offering to my God be any less? Maybe my God
does demand my firstborn." It would have been a natural temptation at
that place & point in history.
God "tempts no one" (Jas.1:13) - but "tempt" & "test" are quite
close. (Modern versions generally say that God "tested" Abraham but KJV
& DRC say he "tempted" him.) "Temptation" comes from our surroundings
&, primarily, our own hearts & heads. While God does not "tempt"
Abraham, in the sense of trying to get him to do something wrong, God
makes use of the temptation which contemporary religious ideas offer in
order to test him.
By doing this God first of all provides a dramatic story that
will tell Abraham's descendants that God does not demand child sacrifice
- that it is to be done away with. Further reflection by future
generations will bring out deeper insight into the nature of faith
(Heb.11:17-19, Kierkegaard &c), God, the death of Christ, &c.
The liberal reaction is likely to be that God should have found
a better way to do this that didn't violate the rights of the child &c.
But if God was going to act in history, a culture in which child
sacrifice was considered acceptable and even admirable was what God had
to work with.
Shalom,
George
George L. Murphy
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
"The Science-Theology Interface"
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