22:1 Some time after these things God tested 1 Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am!” Abraham 2 replied. 22:2 God 3 said, “Take your son – your only son, whom you love, Isaac 4 – and go to the land of Moriah! 5 Offer him up there as a burnt offering 6 on one of the mountains which I will indicate to 7 you.”
22:3 Early in the morning Abraham got up and saddled his donkey. 8 He took two of his young servants with him, along with his son Isaac. When he had cut the wood for the burnt offering, he started out 9 for the place God had spoken to him about.
22:4 On the third day Abraham caught sight of 10 the place in the distance. 22:5 So he 11 said to his servants, “You two stay 12 here with the donkey while 13 the boy and I go up there. We will worship 14 and then return to you.” 15
22:6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and put it on his son Isaac. Then he took the fire and the knife in his hand, 16 and the two of them walked on together. 22:7 Isaac said to his father Abraham, 17 “My father?” “What is it, 18 my son?” he replied. “Here is the fire and the wood,” Isaac said, 19 “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” 22:8 “God will provide 20 for himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son,” Abraham replied. The two of them continued on together.
22:9 When they came to the place God had told him about, Abraham built the altar there 21 and arranged the wood on it. Next he tied up 22 his son Isaac and placed him on the altar on top of the wood. 22:10 Then Abraham reached out his hand, took the knife, and prepared to slaughter 23 his son. 22:11 But the Lord’s angel 24 called to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am!” he answered. 22:12 “Do not harm the boy!” 25 the angel said. 26 “Do not do anything to him, for now I know 27 that you fear 28 God because you did not withhold your son, your only son, from me.”
22:13 Abraham looked up 29 and saw 30 behind him 31 a ram caught in the bushes by its horns. So he 32 went over and got the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. 22:14 And Abraham called the name of that place “The Lord provides.” 33 It is said to this day, 34 “In the mountain of the Lord provision will be made.” 35
22:15 The Lord’s angel called to Abraham a second time from heaven 22:16 and said, “‘I solemnly swear by my own name,’ 36 decrees the Lord, 37 ‘that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 22:17 I will indeed bless you, 38 and I will greatly multiply 39 your descendants 40 so that they will be as countless as the stars in the sky or the grains of sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession 41 of the strongholds 42 of their enemies. 22:18 Because you have obeyed me, 43 all the nations of the earth will pronounce blessings on one another 44 using the name of your descendants.’”
22:19 Then Abraham returned to his servants, and they set out together 45 for Beer Sheba where Abraham stayed. 46
22:20 After these things Abraham was told, “Milcah 47 also has borne children to your brother Nahor – 22:21 Uz the firstborn, his brother Buz, Kemuel (the father of Aram), 48 22:22 Kesed, Hazo, Pildash, Jidlaph, and Bethuel.” 22:23 (Now 49 Bethuel became the father of Rebekah.) These were the eight sons Milcah bore to Abraham’s brother Nahor. 22:24 His concubine, whose name was Reumah, also bore him children – Tebah, Gaham, Tahash, and Maacah.
2:1 The heavens and the earth 50 were completed with everything that was in them. 51
3:1 Now 52 the serpent 53 was more shrewd 54
than any of the wild animals 55 that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Is it really true that 56 God 57 said, ‘You must not eat from any tree of the orchard’?” 58
1 sn The Hebrew verb used here means “to test; to try; to prove.” In this passage God tests Abraham to see if he would be obedient. See T. W. Mann, The Book of the Torah, 44-48. See also J. L. Crenshaw, A Whirlpool of Torment (OBT), 9-30; and J. I. Lawlor, “The Test of Abraham,” GTJ 1 (1980): 19-35.
2 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Abraham) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
3 tn Heb “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
4 sn Take your son…Isaac. The instructions are very clear, but the details are deliberate. With every additional description the commandment becomes more challenging.
5 sn There has been much debate over the location of Moriah; 2 Chr 3:1 suggests it may be the site where the temple was later built in Jerusalem.
6 sn A whole burnt offering signified the complete surrender of the worshiper and complete acceptance by God. The demand for a human sacrifice was certainly radical and may have seemed to Abraham out of character for God. Abraham would have to obey without fully understanding what God was about.
7 tn Heb “which I will say to.”
8 tn Heb “Abraham rose up early in the morning and saddled his donkey.”
9 tn Heb “he arose and he went.”
10 tn Heb “lifted up his eyes and saw.”
11 tn Heb “And Abraham.” The proper name has been replaced in the translation by the pronoun (“he”) for stylistic reasons.
12 tn The Hebrew verb is masculine plural, referring to the two young servants who accompanied Abraham and Isaac on the journey.
13 tn The disjunctive clause (with the compound subject preceding the verb) may be circumstantial and temporal.
14 tn This Hebrew word literally means “to bow oneself close to the ground.” It often means “to worship.”
15 sn It is impossible to know what Abraham was thinking when he said, “we will…return to you.” When he went he knew (1) that he was to sacrifice Isaac, and (2) that God intended to fulfill his earlier promises through Isaac. How he reconciled those facts is not clear in the text. Heb 11:17-19 suggests that Abraham believed God could restore Isaac to him through resurrection.
16 sn He took the fire and the knife in his hand. These details anticipate the sacrifice that lies ahead.
17 tn The Hebrew text adds “and said.” This is redundant and has not been translated for stylistic reasons.
18 tn Heb “Here I am” (cf. Gen 22:1).
19 tn Heb “and he said, ‘Here is the fire and the wood.’” The referent (Isaac) has been specified in the translation for clarity. Here and in the following verse the order of the introductory clauses and the direct discourse has been rearranged in the translation for stylistic reasons.
20 tn Heb “will see for himself.” The construction means “to look out for; to see to it; to provide.”
21 sn Abraham built an altar there. The theme of Abraham’s altar building culminates here. He has been a faithful worshiper. Will he continue to worship when called upon to make such a radical sacrifice?
22 sn Then he tied up. This text has given rise to an important theme in Judaism known as the Aqedah, from the Hebrew word for “binding.” When sacrifices were made in the sanctuary, God remembered the binding of Isaac, for which a substitute was offered. See D. Polish, “The Binding of Isaac,” Jud 6 (1957): 17-21.
23 tn Heb “in order to slaughter.”
24 sn Heb “the messenger of the
25 tn Heb “Do not extend your hand toward the boy.”
26 tn Heb “and he said, ‘Do not extend…’”; the referent (the angel) has been specified in the context for clarity. The order of the introductory clause and the direct discourse has been rearranged in the translation for stylistic reasons.
27 sn For now I know. The test was designed to see if Abraham would be obedient (see v. 1).
28 sn In this context fear refers by metonymy to obedience that grows from faith.
29 tn Heb “lifted his eyes.”
30 tn Heb “and saw, and look.” The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh, “look”) draws attention to what Abraham saw and invites the audience to view the scene through his eyes.
31 tc The translation follows the reading of the MT; a number of Hebrew
32 tn Heb “Abraham”; the proper name has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.
33 tn Heb “the Lord sees” (יְהוָה יִרְאֶה, yÿhvah yir’eh, traditionally transliterated “Jehovah Jireh”; see the note on the word “provide” in v. 8). By so naming the place Abraham preserved in the memory of God’s people the amazing event that took place there.
34 sn On the expression to this day see B. Childs, “A Study of the Formula ‘Until this Day’,” JBL 82 (1963): 279-92.
35 sn The saying connected with these events has some ambiguity, which was probably intended. The Niphal verb could be translated (1) “in the mountain of the Lord it will be seen/provided” or (2) “in the mountain the Lord will appear.” If the temple later stood here (see the note on “Moriah” in Gen 22:2), the latter interpretation might find support, for the people went to the temple to appear before the Lord, who “appeared” to them by providing for them his power and blessings. See S. R. Driver, Genesis, 219.
36 tn Heb “By myself I swear.”
37 tn Heb “the oracle of the
38 tn The use of the infinitive absolute before the finite verbal form (either an imperfect or cohortative) emphasizes the certainty of the blessing.
39 tn Here too the infinitive absolute is used for emphasis before the following finite verb (either an imperfect or cohortative).
40 tn The Hebrew term זֶרַע (zera’) occurring here and in v. 18 may mean “seed” (for planting), “offspring” (occasionally of animals, but usually of people), or “descendants” depending on the context.
41 tn Or “inherit.”
42 tn Heb “gate,” which here stands for a walled city. To break through the gate complex would be to conquer the city, for the gate complex was the main area of defense (hence the translation “stronghold”).
43 tn In the Hebrew text this causal clause comes at the end of the sentence. The translation alters the word order for stylistic reasons.
44 tn Traditionally the verb is taken as passive (“will be blessed”) here, as if Abraham’s descendants were going to be a channel or source of blessing to the nations. But the Hitpael is better understood here as reflexive/reciprocal, “will bless [i.e., pronounce blessings on] themselves/one another” (see also Gen 26:4). Elsewhere the Hitpael of the verb “to bless” is used with a reflexive/reciprocal sense in Deut 29:18; Ps 72:17; Isa 65:16; Jer 4:2. Gen 12:2 predicts that Abram will be held up as a paradigm of divine blessing and that people will use his name in their blessing formulae. For examples of blessing formulae utilizing an individual as an example of blessing see Gen 48:20 and Ruth 4:11. Earlier formulations of this promise (see Gen 12:2; 18:18) use the Niphal stem. (See also Gen 28:14.)
45 tn Heb “and they arose and went together.”
46 tn Heb “and Abraham stayed in Beer Sheba. This has been translated as a relative clause for stylistic reasons.
47 tn In the Hebrew text the sentence begins with הִנֵּה (hinneh, “look”) which draws attention to the statement.
48 sn This parenthetical note about Kemuel’s descendant is probably a later insertion by the author/compiler of Genesis and not part of the original announcement.
49 tn The disjunctive clause gives information that is important but parenthetical to the narrative. Rebekah would become the wife of Isaac (Gen 24:15).
50 tn See the note on the phrase “the heavens and the earth” in 1:1.
51 tn Heb “and all the host of them.” Here the “host” refers to all the entities and creatures that God created to populate the world.
52 tn The chapter begins with a disjunctive clause (conjunction + subject + predicate) that introduces a new character and a new scene in the story.
53 sn Many theologians identify or associate the serpent with Satan. In this view Satan comes in the disguise of a serpent or speaks through a serpent. This explains the serpent’s capacity to speak. While later passages in the Bible may indicate there was a satanic presence behind the serpent (see, for example, Rev 12:9), the immediate context pictures the serpent as simply one of the animals of the field created by God (see vv. 1, 14). An ancient Jewish interpretation explains the reference to the serpent in a literal manner, attributing the capacity to speak to all the animals in the orchard. This text (Jub. 3:28) states, “On that day [the day the man and woman were expelled from the orchard] the mouth of all the beasts and cattle and birds and whatever walked or moved was stopped from speaking because all of them used to speak to one another with one speech and one language [presumed to be Hebrew, see 12:26].” Josephus, Ant. 1.1.4 (1.41) attributes the serpent’s actions to jealousy. He writes that “the serpent, living in the company of Adam and his wife, grew jealous of the blessings which he supposed were destined for them if they obeyed God’s behests, and, believing that disobedience would bring trouble on them, he maliciously persuaded the woman to taste of the tree of wisdom.”
54 tn The Hebrew word עָרוּם (’arum) basically means “clever.” This idea then polarizes into the nuances “cunning” (in a negative sense, see Job 5:12; 15:5), and “prudent” in a positive sense (Prov 12:16, 23; 13:16; 14:8, 15, 18; 22:3; 27:12). This same polarization of meaning can be detected in related words derived from the same root (see Exod 21:14; Josh 9:4; 1 Sam 23:22; Job 5:13; Ps 83:3). The negative nuance obviously applies in Gen 3, where the snake attempts to talk the woman into disobeying God by using half-truths and lies.
55 tn Heb “animals of the field.”
56 tn Heb “Indeed that God said.” The beginning of the quotation is elliptical and therefore difficult to translate. One must supply a phrase like “is it true”: “Indeed, [is it true] that God said.”
57 sn God. The serpent does not use the expression “Yahweh God” [
58 tn Heb “you must not eat from all the tree[s] of the orchard.” After the negated prohibitive verb, מִכֹּל (mikkol, “from all”) has the meaning “from any.” Note the construction in Lev 18:26, where the statement “you must not do from all these abominable things” means “you must not do any of these abominable things.” See Lev 22:25 and Deut 28:14 as well.
59 tn Heb “Sarah.” The proper name has been replaced in the translation by the pronoun (“she”) for stylistic reasons.
60 sn Mourn…weep. The description here is of standard mourning rites (see K. A. Kitchen, NBD3 149-50). They would have been carried out in the presence of the corpse, probably in Sarah’s tent. So Abraham came in to mourn; then he rose up to go and bury his dead (v. 3).
61 tn Grk “getting up, predicted.” The participle ἀναστάς (anasta") has been translated as a finite verb due to requirements of contemporary English style.
62 tn Or “made clear”; Grk “indicated beforehand” (BDAG 920 s.v. σημαίνω 2).
63 tn Grk “great.”
64 sn This famine is one of the firmly fixed dates in Acts. It took place from
65 tn Or “whole Roman Empire.” While the word οἰκουμένη (oikoumenh) does occasionally refer specifically to the Roman Empire, BDAG 699 s.v. οἰκουνένη 2 does not list this passage (only Acts 24:5 and 17:6).
66 tn Grk “world, which.” The relative pronoun (“which”) was replaced by the demonstrative pronoun “this” and a new sentence was begun in the translation at this point to improve the English style, due to the length of the sentence in Greek.
67 sn This is best taken as a parenthetical note by the author. Claudius was the Roman emperor Tiberius Claudius Nero Germanicus, known as Claudius, who ruled from
68 tn Grk “Paul saying in his defense”; the participle ἀπολογουμένου (apologoumenou) could be taken temporally (“when Paul said…”), but due to the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, the participle was translated as a finite verb and a new sentence begun here in the translation. BDAG 116-17 s.v. ἀπολογέομαι has “W. ὅτι foll. τοῦ Παύλου ἀπολογουμένου, ὅτι when Paul said in his defense (direct quot. foll.) Ac 25:8.”
69 tn Grk “I have sinned…in nothing.”
70 tn Grk “against the law of the Jews.” Here τῶν ᾿Ιουδαίων has been translated as an attributive genitive.
71 tn Or “against the emperor” (“Caesar” is a title for the Roman emperor).
72 sn See the note on Porcius Festus in 24:27.
73 tn Or “stand trial.”
74 tn Grk “concerning these things.”
75 tn Grk “said.”
76 tn Or “before the emperor’s” (“Caesar” is a title for the Roman emperor).
77 tn Although BDAG 175 s.v. βῆμα 3 gives the meaning “tribunal” for this verse, and a number of modern translations use similar terms (“court,” NIV; “tribunal,” NRSV), since the bema was a standard feature in Greco-Roman cities of the time, there is no need for an alternative translation here. Here of course Paul’s reference to “Caesar’s judgment seat” is a form of metonymy; since Festus is Caesar’s representative, Festus’ judgment seat represents Caesar’s own.
78 tn That is, tried by an imperial representative and subject to Roman law.
79 sn “I have done nothing wrong.” Here is yet another declaration of total innocence on Paul’s part.
80 tn BDAG 506 s.v. καλῶς 7 states, “comp. κάλλιον (for the superl., as Galen, Protr. 8 p. 24, 19J.=p. 10, 31 Kaibel; s. B-D-F §244, 2) ὡς καί σὺ κ. ἐπιγινώσκεις as also you know very well Ac 25:10.”
81 tn BDAG 20 s.v. ἀδικέω 1.b has “intr. be in the wrong (Ex 2:13) εἰ ἀδικῶ Ac 25:11.”
82 tn BDAG 764 s.v. παραιτέομαι 2.b.β, “οὐ παραιτοῦμαι τὸ ἀποθανεῖν I am not trying to escape death Ac 25:11 (cp. Jos., Vi. 141).” To avoid redundancy in the translation, the English gerund “dying” is used to translate the Greek infinitive ἀποθανεῖν (apoqanein).
83 tn Or “but if there is nothing to their charges against me.” Both “if” clauses in this verse are first class conditions. Paul stated the options without prejudice, assuming in turn the reality of each for the sake of the argument.
84 sn That is, no one can hand me over to them lawfully. Paul was aware of the dangers of a return to Jerusalem.
85 tn Or “to the emperor” (“Caesar” is a title for the Roman emperor).
86 tn That is, with his advisers.
87 sn See the note on Porcius Festus in 24:27.
88 tn Or “to the emperor” (“Caesar” is a title for the Roman emperor).
89 tn Or “to the emperor.”
90 sn “To Caesar you will go!” In all probability Festus was pleased to send Paul on to Rome and get this political problem out of his court.
91 sn See the note on King Agrippa in 25:13.
92 sn See the note on Porcius Festus in 24:27.
93 tn Or “set free.”
94 tn Or “to the emperor” (“Caesar” is a title for the Roman emperor).