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| "Ram in Thicket" (Royal Death Pit, Ur of Chaldees) British Museum |
I believe it may be the test of a new faith in its early stages of development and that just might have implications for our journey of faith today. How do we commit to leave behind what has become an impediment to our lives and our communities' future?
We'll begin looking at some oral tradition regarding Abraham's background and an integral symbol in the narrative text, the Ram caught in the thicket.
Biblical Archaeolgy:
The Ram in a Thicket is one of a pair of figures excavated in Ur, in southern Iraq, and which date from about 2600-2400 BC. One is currently exhibited in the British Museum in London. the other is in the University of Pennsylvania Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. .
Biblical Literary Criticism:
In Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature, the literary critic Erich Auerbach considers the Hebrew narrative of the Binding of Isaac, along with Homer's description of Odysseus's scar, as the two paradigmatic models for the representation of reality in literature. Auerbach contrasts Homer's attention to detail and foregrounding of the spatial, historical, as well as personal contexts for events to the Bible's sparse account, in which virtually all context is kept in the background or left outside of the narrative. As Auerbach observes, this narrative strategy virtually compels readers to add their own interpretations to the text. (from Wikipedia, Binding of Isaac)
Genesis 22:1-14
22:1 After these things God tested Abraham. He said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am."
22:2 He said, "Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I shall show you."
22:3 So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac; he cut the wood for the burnt offering, and set out and went to the place in the distance that God had shown him.
22:4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place far away.
22:5 Then Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey; the boy and I will go over there; we will worship, and then we will come back to you."
22:6 Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on together.
22:7 Isaac said to his father Abraham, "Father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." He said, "The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?"
22:8 Abraham said, "God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son." So the two of them walked on together.
22:9 When they came to the place that God had shown him, Abraham built an altar there and laid the wood in order. He bound his son Isaac, and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.
22:10 Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to kill his son.
22:11 But the angel of the LORD called to him from heaven, and said, "Abraham, Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am."
22:12 He said, "Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me."
22:13 And Abraham looked up and saw a ram, caught in a thicket by its horns. Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son.
22:14 So Abraham called that place "The LORD will provide"; as it is said to this day, "On the mount of the LORD it shall be provided."
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