THE BOOK OF GENESIS. VOL. II. could, no doubt, have submitted without hesitation; but when, to the eye of reason, he saw the precept arrayed against the promise of God, and an act enjoined directly at variance with all the attributes of a Being holy, just, and true, he could not but be conscious of an inward struggle, ineffably severe. But the faith which had triumphed before, triumphed now; and as he came forth from the terrible ordeal, like gold tried in the furnace, how pertinently may we conceive an approving God addressing him in the language of the "All thy vexations Were but my trials of thy love: and thou Hast strangely stood the test." CHAPTER XXII. If those portions of history are most replete with interest and instruction which exhibit to us illustrious characters in trying situations, having their virtues put to the severest test, yet holding fast their integrity, conquering difficulties, and rising superior to temptation by the power of moral principle, then the ensuing narrative of Abraham's last and greatest trial prefers the strongest claims to our attention. It is an event preeminently memorable in the life of the patriarch. Whatever signal instances of faith and obedience have hither-poet :to distinguished his conduct, they are all eclipsed by that which we are now called to consider. At the very time when we are prompted to congratulate the happy sire, and flatter ourselves that his tribulations have an end; that the storms which ruffled the noon of life are blown over, and the evening of his age is becoming calm and serene, the sorest of his struggles yet awaits him. The loss of a beloved child would, under any circumstances, have been a grievous affliction; but in the present case he finds himself required to submit to a bereavement which threatened to extinguish the hopes of the world. Nor was this all. The fatal blow was to be struck with his own hand! And in this he was called to obey a mandate in which the divine counsel seemed so evidently to war with itself, that his bosom could not but be torn with a conflict of emotions, such as the mere grief of a father could never occasion. To a command which should merely put to the proof his paternal affection, he VOL. II. 1 The command here given to the patriarch to sacrifice his only son has ever been so fruitful a theme of cavil with the enemies of revelation, that it will be proper, in the outset, to advert with some particularity to the objections usually urged against it. The command, it is said, is inconsistent with the attributes of a Being of perfect justice and goodness. But to this it may be replied, that the assertion rests upon no sufficient grounds. As God is the author and giver of life, he surely can, without the least shadow of injustice, take it away when and in what manner he pleases. It cannot be supposed that he conferred life either upon Abraham or Isaac, upon the terms of taking it away only in one certain manner, or in the way most agreeable to them. It was given in this, as in all other cases, under the ordinary reserve of his own indisputable right of resumption in any mode that might seem to him best. There is un- from being concerned in guarding great doubtedly something shocking in the minds from great trials, that it is rather idea of a parent's taking away the life evinced in granting them. Nor are we of his own child; but when this is done to estimate such a dispensation by the in obedience to an express command slight and transient anxieties or pains of from a competent authority, then that the trial itself, but by the lasting joy which would otherwise be a sin be- that awaits and rewards the triumph. comes a duty, and whoever would im- Add to this the incalculable advantages pugn the act, must necessarily impugn that would redound to mankind at large the authority from which it proceeds. from such an example. No one can doubt To human view it might appear a very that every signal instance of devout barbarous deed in a father to order a submission to the will of God under the son to be beaten to death with rods be- pressure of sharp temptations is among fore his eyes; yet the conduct of Junius the stablest supports and the most powBrutus, who passed this sentence upon erful incitements to a similar conduct his own children, is usually considered under similar circumstances. Every as having been fully justified by the such example is a new and shining light circumstances which occasioned it. set up on high to guide, enlighten, and And did Abraham owe less obedience cheer us in the path of duty. But while to God than Brutus to his country? we find, in these considerations, an ample Indeed, had the command been actually vindication of the wisdom and equity of executed, we should have been bound, this command, perhaps a still more ade. by our antecedent knowledge of the quate estimate will be formed of it, if we perfections of the Deity, to regard it as view it in another light. It has genewise, just, and good; though we might rally been held that the present comnot, from our limited powers, have been mand was imposed merely as a trial of able to see the reason of it; for a di- Abraham's faith; and seeing the deed vine command necessarily supposes wis-was not executed, it has been affirmed dom, justice, and goodness in the highest that there was nothing unworthy the possible degree. But this was not the divine goodness in having instituted case. God never intended that the such a trial; all which may be readily command should be actually executed. admitted: but as Bp. Warburton has His purpose was to make trial of Abra-suggested, it hardly accounts for all the ham's faith and obedience; to make circumstances; and it may be well to him perfect by suffering; and in him state, in a condensed form, the theory of to propose to all coming generations an that learned divine in regard to it. He illustrious example for their imitation supposes that Abraham was desirous of in the various trying services and sacri- becoming acquainted with the manner fices to which the voice of duty might in which all the families of the earth call them. And will any one affirm should be blessed in him; and upon that God may not, without impeaching this he builds the conclusion that the his wisdom, his justice, or his mercy, command was imposed upon him chiefput true religion to the test ?-the test ly with the design of teaching him by of severe and repeated trials-the bet-action, instead of words, and thus enater to display, to perfect, and to crown it? Great virtue has a right to be made conspicuous. It is sinking the merit of all true moral heroism to withold from [tion of the sacrifice of Christ. it the occasions of exercising itself. bling him to see and feel by what means this great end should be accomplished. In other words, that it was a prefigura This theory the author founds upon The justice of God, therefore is so far that passage of the Gospel of John 8 A ND it came to pass after these | Abraham, and said unto him, Abra a the command to sacrifice his only son. In this transaction therefore, he would have a lively figure of the offering up of the Son of God for the sins of the world; and not only so, but the inter 56. in which the Lord says to the unbe- Abraham must have rejoiced to see, and lieving Jews, 'Your father Abraham re-seeing which he was glad. But there joiced to see my day; and he saw it is nothing recorded of Abraham in the and was glad.' It is evident, from the Old Testament, from which it could be reply made by the Jews to this asser-inferred that he saw Christ's day in tion, that they understood the expression this sense, if he did not see and feel it in to see in its most literal sense; while it is equally evident, that when they objected to the possibility of a man, not yet fifty years old; having seen Abraham, our Lord did not correct them in the notion which they had formed as mediate system of typical sacrifices unto seeing. It was not, however, himself der the Mosaic economy was reprepersonally, whom our Saviour asserted sented by the prescribed oblation of the that Abraham rejoiced to see, but his ram instead of Isaac. day; by which cannot be meant the On the whole, we regard this as a veperiod of his sojourn upon earth, but the ry rational and plausible hypothesis, and circumstance in his life which was of one that derives no little support from the highest importance, and mainly the place where the scene of the transcharacteristic of his office as the Re-action was laid. If the design of the deemer. That the term will admit of command had been simply a trial of this interpretation is indubitable, from Abraham's faith, it is not easy to see the frequent use made, in a similar why he should have been required to sense, of the word hour. Thus, when go to such a distance to perform an act our Lord repeatedly says, 'My hour is that might as well have been performnot yet come'-'the hour is at hand, ed anywhere else. But when we find and the Son of Man is betrayed into him directed to go to the site of Jerusathe hands of sinners;' when he prayed lem, and to rear his altar, and offer up that 'if it were possible the hour might his sacrifice, on or near the very spot pass from him' where it is said, that where the Saviour was afterwards actu'no man laid hands on him, because ally crucified, we cannot well avoid seehis hour was not yet come;' and again, ing in the incident a designed typical 'that the hour was come when the Son and prophetical character. But a fuller of Man should be glorified,'-in all these view of the event in its various bearinstances it is evident that the wordings will be gained from the explanadoes not signify a mere portion of time, tions that follow. from which no one can be saved by its passing from him; but some particular circumstance or circumstances in his life, which were peculiar to him as the Redeemer. The peculiar circumstance, however, which constituted Jesus the Redeemer of the world, was the laying down of his life; and this it was which 1. And it came to pass after these things. Heb. After these words. That is, we suppose, not merely after the things recorded in the preceding chapter, but after all the previous trials which Abraham had been called to pass through. Notwithstanding he may have hoped for a period of tranquil rest in the de b 2 And he said, Take now thy | land of Moriah; and offer him there son, thine only son Isaac, whom for a burnt-offering upon one of the thou lovest, and get thee into the mountains which I will tell thee of. C Heb. 11. 17. 2 Chron. 3. 1. of their hearts. In this sense of trying, putting to the proof, bringing to the test, the original term in many other instances is used in reference to the Most High and always in such a way as to leave his attributes unimpeached. Thus Deut. 13. 3, 'For the Lord your God O nissah) proveih you, to know (i. e. to make known) whether ye love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul.' 2 Chron. 32. 31, 'In the business of the ambassadors God left him (770 lenassotho) to try him, that he might know all the evil that was in his heart.' Indeed, in some cases we find this kind of trial made a subject of petition on the part of good men, as if they regarded it as a special favor. Ps. cline of life, after the various trials and conflicts, the dangers and deliverances through which he had passed; yet he is once more reminded that he is still in the flesh, that the days of his warfare are not yet accomplished, and that he must arm himself for a far more fiery trial than any he has yet endured. We cannot but feel for the venerable patriarch thus suddenly awakened from his state of repose, and summoned to a new and unparalleled conflict; but the event teaches us that a believer's trials are not confined to the commencement of his course; that the longest period of rest and peace may be succeeded by a sore temptation; and the severest conflict be reserved for the last.- -T God did tempt Abraham. Heb. nis- 26. 2, 'Examine me, O Lord, and (0) sah, tried, proved. Gr. Eπεipnoε, id. This nassani) prove me; try my reins and my literal rendering of the term, which is heart.' And so with a different word, actually given in the old Geneva ver- but to the same effect, Ps. 139. 23, 24, sion, 'God did prove Abraham,' goes at 'Search me, O God, and know my once to correct the erroneous impression heart: try me, and know my thoughts, that might possibly be received from and see if there be any wicked way in our English word 'tempt,' which usually me, and lead me in the way everlasting. has the sense of exciting to sin. But And we find Paul, 2 Cor. 13 5, employ in this sense we are expressly assured ing the corresponding Gr. term, wher by James 1. 13, that God is not tempted enjoining as a duty to be performed by of evil, neither tempteth he any man;' Christians towards themselves, the very he neither deceives any man's judgment probation, which is indicated by the Heb nor perverts his will, nor seduces his word; 'Examine (Tεipagɛrɛ try) your affections, nor does any thing else that selves, whether ye be in the faith; can subject him to the blame of men's prove your own selves.'-————¶ Behold, sins. Temptation in this bad sense al- here I am. Heb. hinnini, beways proceeds from the malice of Sa- hold me. Arab. What is thy pleatan working on the corruptions of our sure?' The patriarch's prompt obown hearts. God may, however, con- scquiousness to the slightest call of sistently with all his perfections, by his God is strikingly set forth in this reply. providence, bring his creatures into cir- It exhibits him as presenting himself in cumstances of special probation, not for the divine presence, ready at a mothe purpose of giving him information, ment's warning to enter upon any ser but in order to manifest to themselves vice that might be enjoined upon him, and to others the prevailing dispositions without first waiting to know distinctly |