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.
12:1 These are the statutes and ordinances you must be careful to obey as long as you live in the land the Lord, the God of your ancestors, 57 has given you to possess. 58
15:1 At the end of every seven years you must declare a cancellation 59 of debts. 15:2 This is the nature of the cancellation: Every creditor must remit what he has loaned to another person; 60 he must not force payment from his fellow Israelite, 61 for it is to be recognized as “the Lord’s cancellation of debts.”
30:1 “When you have experienced all these things, both the blessings and the curses 64 I have set before you, you will reflect upon them 65 in all the nations where the Lord your God has banished you.
30:1 “When you have experienced all these things, both the blessings and the curses 66 I have set before you, you will reflect upon them 67 in all the nations where the Lord your God has banished you.
A song of ascents, 70 by David.
122:1 I was glad because 71 they said to me,
“We will go to the Lord’s temple.”
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 Heb “and he said.” The referent (the
51 sn Who told you that you were naked? This is another rhetorical question, asking more than what it appears to ask. The second question in the verse reveals the
52 sn The Hebrew word order (“Did you from the tree – which I commanded you not to eat from it – eat?”) is arranged to emphasize that the man’s and the woman’s eating of the fruit was an act of disobedience. The relative clause inserted immediately after the reference to the tree brings out this point very well.
53 tn The Hebrew construction in this sentence uses an independent nominative absolute (formerly known as a casus pendens). “The woman” is the independent nominative absolute; it is picked up by the formal subject, the pronoun “she” written with the verb (“she gave”). The point of the construction is to throw the emphasis on “the woman.” But what makes this so striking is that a relative clause has been inserted to explain what is meant by the reference to the woman: “whom you gave me.” Ultimately, the man is blaming God for giving him the woman who (from the man’s viewpoint) caused him to sin.
54 tn The words “some fruit” here and the pronoun “it” at the end of the sentence are not in the Hebrew text, but are supplied for stylistic reasons.
55 tn Heb “and your houses,” referring to entire households. The pronouns “you” and “your” are plural in the Hebrew text.
56 tn Heb “the
57 tn Heb “fathers.”
58 tn Heb “you must be careful to obey in the land the
59 tn The Hebrew term שְׁמִטָּת (shÿmittat), a derivative of the verb שָׁמַט (shamat, “to release; to relinquish”), refers to the cancellation of the debt and even pledges for the debt of a borrower by his creditor. This could be a full and final remission or, more likely, one for the seventh year only. See R. Wakely, NIDOTTE 4:155-60. Here the words “of debts” are not in the Hebrew text, but are implied. Cf. NAB “a relaxation of debts”; NASB, NRSV “a remission of debts.”
60 tn Heb “his neighbor,” used idiomatically to refer to another person.
61 tn Heb “his neighbor and his brother.” The words “his brother” may be a scribal gloss identifying “his neighbor” (on this idiom, see the preceding note) as a fellow Israelite (cf. v. 3). In this case the conjunction before “his brother” does not introduce a second category, but rather has the force of “that is.”
62 tn For the term “hate” as synonymous with rejection or disobedience see note on the word “reject” in Deut 5:9 (cf. NRSV “reject”).
63 tn Heb “he will not hesitate concerning.”
64 tn Heb “the blessing and the curse.”
65 tn Heb “and you bring (them) back to your heart.”
66 tn Heb “the blessing and the curse.”
67 tn Heb “and you bring (them) back to your heart.”
68 tn The Hebrew term translated “Lord” here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay).
69 sn Psalm 122. The psalmist expresses his love for Jerusalem and promises to pray for the city’s security.
70 sn The precise significance of this title, which appears in Pss 120-134, is unclear. Perhaps worshipers recited these psalms when they ascended the road to Jerusalem to celebrate annual religious festivals. For a discussion of their background see L. C. Allen, Psalms 101-150 (WBC), 219-21.
71 tn Heb “in the ones saying to me.” After the verb שָׂמַח (samakh), the preposition בְּ (bet) usually introduces the reason for joy.