There are many explanations why on Rosh Hashanah, we read the story of the Akedah, wherein Abraham is tested by binding his son, Isaac, on an altar for ritual slaughter. Largely, these detail the lessons we learn from Abraham’s perspective and the oath that God’s messenger shares with him. But what lesson might we learn from Isaac?
On the second day of Rosh Hashanah, we read in the Torah about the second recorded event of the life of the second patriarch, Isaac — the first being the unlikely circumstances of his birth — the second son of Abraham (the first being Ishmael). Even in this story, Isaac is really a secondary character.
Abraham is being put to the test (Genesis 22:1-2). Abraham coordinates the multi-day travel logistics, all the way from packing for the journey through binding Isaac to burnt offering wood that he cut down himself and raising his hand with a knife in it to slaughter his son (Genesis 22:3-10). Abraham is the one rewarded by Divine messenger for his efforts (Genesis 22:16-18). Furthermore, after the ram is sacrificed in place of his son, Isaac completely disappears from the narrative. We don’t read or hear how he felt at any time throughout this trial as its object rather than its subject. But I’d venture to suggest that Isaac was exhausted from the travel and trekking the wood up the mountain, concerned when his father tells him, only after asking, that a sacrificial animal will be provided for them through Divine providence, and, at best, sad, scared and resigned while Abraham binds him and prepares to strike. This is the trauma that Isaac has to live with for the rest of his life. It is of little wonder that he is gone from the rest of the story! Who would stick around after being untied from an assured death sentence?
We don’t hear anything from Isaac until we return to the traditional parashah (weekly Torah portion) text, learning in subsequent chapters in Genesis that his father’s servant introduces him to Rebekah (Genesis 24), with Isaac consummating their marriage in his now-deceased mother’s tent. This cycle of living under the looming shadow of his father continues for years, as Isaac returns to the wells where Abraham had once dug in Gerar, re-digging, and even does as his father did in pretending that his wife was his sister for fear of reprisal.
There are four well-documented physiological trauma responses that take place in humans and animals during an emergency, commonly referred to as fight, flight, freeze and fawn. It appears in the Akedah text that Isaac is temporarily frozen, paralyzed from moving or perhaps even fawning, submitting to the will of his father and, unbeknownst to him, of God and God’s test for Abraham. And then Isaac disappears after Abraham removes the ram from the thicket, when presumably flight — the effort to physically remove oneself from the dangerous situation — has set in. Interestingly, Isaac appears to embody three of the four trauma responses but never engages in the fourth response of fight, aggressive behavior to ward off a threat. Perhaps the exhaustion of the journey and carrying his own altar’s wood up Mount Moriah prevented him from being able or willing to engage in such a response. But even after this altercation, it is never documented that Isaac threatened or in any way mistreated his father. Instead, he takes the time he needs to process this trauma, beginning the cycle anew of his father’s behavior.
Isaac’s story doesn’t end with the traumatic cycle of violence repeating itself. Rather, he unearths his father’s history and behaviors, and ultimately, chooses a different path for himself. In the digging project, he expands with new wells (Genesis 26). He remains monogamous with his wife, even when Rebekah is thought to be unable to conceive, waiting 20 years before they have Esau and Jacob. When his father dies at the age of 175, Isaac joins his half-brother Ishmael, whom his parents had previously cast out from their home, to bury their father together (Genesis 25:9). Whereas Abraham shunned his concubine and first-born, it is Isaac who makes efforts to repair the relationship for a common goal, and it is Isaac who settles both before and after burying his father beside Beer-lahai-roi, the place where a pregnant Hagar (Ishmael’s mother and Sarah’s maidservant) spoke with God after Sarah mistreats her (Genesis 16:6-14).
Isaac doesn’t exude the heroism of his father. Rather, Isaac stays behind, and in doing so, repairs relationships that Abraham broke along his way. He makes up with his half-brother and makes it a point to bury the father who tried to slaughter him years earlier. He re-digs and expands on his father’s old wells, and creates a new treaty with Abimelech in Gerar. Even on Isaac’s deathbed, after his own beloved wife helps his younger son, Jacob, deceive him into receiving his blessing (Genesis 27:1-29), he finds a way to bless his older son, Esau, as best he can, without changing the blessing he’s already gifted to Jacob (Genesis 27:30-40).
The fourth-century commentary Genesis Rabbah says, in explanation of God telling Isaac during a famine not to go to Egypt (Genesis 26:3), that “Rabbi Hoshaya said: [God said:] ‘You are an unblemished burnt offering; just as a burnt offering, if it goes outside the curtains, it is disqualified, you, too, if you go out of the Land of Israel, you are disqualified.’” (Genesis Rabbah 64:3) Isaac is permanently marked by his binding as a Divine burnt offering, even though he is not actually sacrificed. That marked trauma lives with and accompanies him for at least 143 years.[1]
In some ways, it defines his limitations. But Isaac moves past mere survival; he carves out spaces for himself that improve his surroundings. While Abraham shows faith through action and bravery, Isaac shows faith through introspection and resilience.
Reading this story that defines Isaac’s life, both in his struggles and his efforts to help others move beyond traumatic events, every year on the second day of Rosh Hashanah reminds us that we, too, have moments that try to limit or scare us, or even endanger our lives, regardless of our agency in the situation. But it is critical that we take the time we need to understand these moments, and in turn, strengthen our collective resilience, moving forward to make our world a less traumatic and more welcoming and inclusive place, this year and every year.
[1] The Bible does not explicitly state when the Akedah occurs, and the Talmudic rabbis argue various ages for Isaac, the oldest being 37, based on Sarah’s death in Genesis 23. Isaac is the longest-living of the biblical patriarchs, recorded as passing away at 180 years old.
