Early Judaism- A Comprehensive Overview

one who fears the Lord. You have not refused me your firstborn son.”

(Jub.18:9-11)

This passage is basically a rewording of the biblical verse cited above, Gen.

22:12, but the author ofJubileeshas done something that the biblical text

did not: he has supplied the actual instructions that God gave His angel

before the angel cried out to Abraham. God instructs the angel, “Tell him

not to let his hand go down on the child and not to do anything to him, be-

cause I know that he is one who fears the Lord.”

The author ofJubileesloved little subtleties. God’s instructions to the

angel are identical to what the angel says in Genesis — except for one

word. God does not say “nowI know”; He simply says, “I know.” For the

author ofJubilees,such a scenario explained everything. The angel may not

have known how the test would turn out, but God certainly did. “Iknow

that he is one who fears the Lord,” He tells the angel inJubilees —in fact,

I’ve known it along! Thus, the words that appear in Genesis, according to

Jubilees,do not exactly represent God’s command, but the angel’s reword-

ing of it. It is the angel who only now found out what God had known all

along.

As for Abraham’s hiding his intentions from Isaac — once again it all

depends on how you read the text. Ancient interpreters noticed that the

passage contains a slight repetition:

Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and put it on his son

Isaac; then he took the fire and the knife,and the two of them walked to-

gether.But Isaac said to his father Abraham, “Father?” And he said,

“Here I am, my son.” And he said, “Here is the fire and the wood, but

where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God Himself

will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.”And the two of

them walked together.(Gen. 22:6-8)

Repetition is not necessarily a bad thing, but ancient interpreters generally

felt (in keeping with Assumption 3) that the Bible would not repeat itself

without purpose. Between the two occurrences of the clause “and the two

of them walked together” is the brief exchange in which Abraham appar-

ently hides his true intentions from Isaac. Here Abraham’s words were, at

least potentially, ambiguous. Since biblical Hebrew was originally written

without punctuation marks or even capital letters marking the beginnings

of sentences, Abraham’s answer to Isaac could actually be read as two sen-

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james l. kugel

EERDMANS -- Early Judaism (Collins and Harlow) final text
Tuesday, October 09, 2012 12:04:00 PM