(For an introduction to this series see Ghosts Around the Manger).
Abraham rose with the sun, though he had not slept. He saddled his donkey and summoned two servants. He took an ax and strode toward a pile of wood at the edge of the clearing where their tents were pitched. Confused, the servants hurried after him.
“Master, allow us the pleasure of cutting the wood for you,” the older of the two offered.
Abraham silenced them with a wave of his hand. The command to make the sacrifice to God had been given to him. He would not delegate this part of his obedience to servants. He ordered them to prepare enough food for a week’s journey. Abraham cut the wood, stacked and bundled it, and placed the tools for making a fire in his saddle bag. He strapped the sheathed and sharpened knife to his belt. He had everything he needed to worship except the sacrifice itself. Abraham crossed the camp site and stood at the entrance to Isaac’s tent.
When finally received, a long awaited gift is accepted with gratitude. The giver is honored, appreciated, revered. The longer one lives with the gift, however, the more focused on the gift he becomes. The gift is cherished. The giver, all but forgotten. Was this why God had issued such a loathsome dictate, so impossible a demand?
“Sacrifice your son.” The word had come to him out of the silence.
“Your only son.” The one thing you cherish most in the world.
“Isaac.” Your laughter, your joy, your life.
“Whom you love.”
Abraham had pondered these words all night, planned the journey and readied the knife that would sever him from the destiny God had promised. He pulled back the flap to Isaac’s tent and entered.
The four of them, Abraham, Isaac and the two servants traveled for three days. Words were few. The heat, oppressive. Ahead of them the air danced in torrid rhythms like transparent waves on an invisible sea. Mt. Moriah loomed before them, seeming no nearer than when it had appeared at the end of the first day’s journey. Abraham, looking up now and then, hoped that they would never reach the mountain, that the illusion of its perpetual distance would become a blessed reality.
On the third day, that faint hope vanished like a desert mirage.
Abraham ordered the servants to remain behind with the donkey while he and the boy went to worship.
“Then we will come back to you,” he said loud enough for the boy to hear. No need to add anxiety to the pain that was to come. Abraham would bear the burden of knowledge alone.
He took the utensils for the fire from the saddle pouch and lifted the bundled wood from the servant’s shoulder. He placed the bound wood on his son, shuddering with the thought that soon, he would bind his son and place him on the wood. He felt the knife slap against his thigh with every step.
As the two of them walked on together the boy spoke.
“Father?” His voice was deeper now than Abraham remembered. How quickly the time had passed.
“Yes, my son.”
“The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
The question stabbed Abraham’s heart and he almost stumbled.
“God himself will provide the lamb, my son.”
When they reached the place, Abraham built an altar, staking stone upon stone, the largest first, then the smaller ones into a neat, cylindrical pile. He’d built altars at Shechem, Bethel, Hebron and Beersheba. Never had he raised an altar in such a place as this. Nor for such a purpose.