
Imagine the story I’m fixing to tell happening in this day and age. An elderly man, 100 years old, decides to send one of this children into the wilderness, the child’s only provisions being a loaf of bread and some water in ONE SKIN. Why? Because his wife was jealous of the child of the slave woman who Abraham had fathered (and who Sarah had GIVEN to him as a slave) and told him to send that child away. A voice Abraham presumed to be god told him not to worry, he’s take care of the child.
Genesis 11:8-15
8 The child grew and was weaned, and on the day Isaac was weaned Abraham held a great feast. 9 But Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking, 10 and she said to Abraham, “Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac.”
11 The matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son. 12 But God said to him, “Do not be so distressed about the boy and your slave woman. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring[b] will be reckoned. 13 I will make the son of the slave into a nation also, because he is your offspring.”
14 Early the next morning Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He set them on her shoulders and then sent her off with the boy. She went on her way and wandered in the Desert of Beersheba.
15 When the water in the skin was gone, she put the boy under one of the bushes. 16 Then she went off and sat down about a bowshot away, for she thought, “I cannot watch the boy die.” And as she sat there, she[c] began to sob.
Can you imagine the emotional suffering of Hagar? Here she was, a slave who, through sex with Abraham, had a child and probably thought that would protect her and her child. but even Abraham listened to his b*** wife and threw her and her son out with almost on provisions to survive a wilderness. Imagine being so distraught that you tried to save your son under a bush and then sobbed. She certainly was not putting him on a pyre, tying him up and looking to slice him up
Abraham probably had more than just these children, but another one he had was named Isaac. The voice told him to go take the child and sacrifice him. Old man ties up his son and gets a sacrifice pile ready, along with his knife but at the nick of time god tells him never mind and what a great guy he is to be obeying in this fashion.
22 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
2 Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”
This is an evil god and only a bad father would be willing to do that.
3 Early the next morning Abraham got up and loaded his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about. 4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. 5 He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”
6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, 7 Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?”
“Yes, my son?” Abraham replied.
“The fire and wood are here,” Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
8 Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.
How horrifying. Abraham, who we already know is a liar and sent another son away from his household, lies again to Isaac to prevent him knowing that Isaac was the burnt offering. Think of what the heck Isaac was thinking as his dad tied him and placed him on top of a pyre and then was holding a knife over him. It’s monstrous.
9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
Abraham was all prepared, after trying up his child, to kill him with a knife but heard another voice. Yeah.
12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram[a] caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”
15 The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time 16 and said, “I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, 18 and through your offspring[b] all nations on earth will be blessed,[c] because you have obeyed me.”
So.. quid pro quo. god of voices is transactional.
Is there any doubt that this is a mythological story? Nope. But more than that, it is a story that, if believed, means it’s okay for people to act on voices they hear in their heads and it is noble to drive out children into the wilderness or attempt to kill them for god. WHO ACTUALLY BELIEVES THAT? Really sounds like it could be a Criminal Minds type story where a murderous creep who demands obedience praises the old man who is willing to do anything, except that the old man is delusional.
Now, let’s compare modern times. I’ll bet there are really old men who hear voices and are confused. And there are parents who kill children because they think god told them to. I also remember Son of Sam where he thought a demon in the form of a dog told him to kill.
God told me to kill boys, says mother
A Texas woman who stoned two of her children to death and seriously injured a third on Mother’s Day last year told psychiatrists she was driven to kill by a message from God and that she was sure they would rise again from the dead.
Jurors in the trial of 39-year-old Deanna Laney watched a gruelling video-tape made just days after the murders in which she told a prison psychologist, Phillip Resnick, that she felt she had no choice but to bludgeon her children.
“I felt like I obeyed God and I believe there will be good out of this,” she explained in the interview, looking wide-eyed and sometimes smiling. “I feel like he will reveal his power and they will be raised up. They will become alive again.”
For me, this is not okay. I do not believe in trying to deliberately harm children. In fact, if I knew a neighbor had thrown out a child or was trying to kill him on a pyre, I’d call CPS. I definitely would not revere this mythological story and use it as a morality object lesson in which Abraham is praised for unflinchingly being ready to murder Isaac in the name of obedience to a voice in his head. One might argue that the bible was written for a different time, in which it was acceptable to murder children or at least espouse a reason for why it was ultimately okay. If so, and if people NOW believe that children should be cared for and not abandoned or murdered (witness some groups that are completely against abortion for any reason) , should the bible be followed as a moral guide? I think not.