Don’t Ask -- Tell

I just realized, thanks to Molly's question, that Abraham has a new relationship to God after the binding of Isaac.

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Abraham tells his unnamed servant what Lord Yahway will do! "He himself will send a messenger before you" [24:7].

Yahway will help this servant find a bride for Isaac because Abraham says so!

So can we children of Abraham, with faith, say what our God will do? Is this don't ask -- tell?

How comforting that we can with confidence say: God will bless us, comfort us, heal us, and send messengers to guide us to more and more loving relationships.

Lord Yahway's A Matchmaker

My friend Molly writes:

"Did Abraham find another nicer God after he rejected the violent one?"
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Lord Yahway's A Matchmaker

Abraham descends alone from the mountain where he almost sacrificed Isaac. Abraham never again will speak with his Lord Yahway (or with Isaac). Never again will Abraham be commanded by an inner voice. But Abraham still believes Yahway will guide in non-verbal ways.
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After Sarah dies, Abraham commands his servant to "go to my land and to my kin to get a wife for my son Isaac .... Yahway himself will send his messenger before you [24:4-7].

The servant does not see or hear a guide from Yahway. But when the servant's camels are watered by Rebecca at a well, the servant puts a ring on Rebecca’s nose, bracelets on her arms and "prostrates himself before Yahway ... who led me on the road of truth to get the daughter of my lord’s brother to be the bride for his son" [24:48].

Questioning Divinity

Kierkegaard's understanding of Abraham's story wildly freed me when I was young:

Kierkegaard thinks Abraham is ready to sacrifice his son just because God asks him. There is no reward for doing this. No reason to sacrifice Issac. Just because Abraham feels called to sacrifice Isaac, Abraham is willing: doing what he thinks is right--though the heavens fall.

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When I grew older I grew out of this untamed freedom: by carefully examining the biblical story I learned how Abraham freed himself from God's violence. Never again would Abraham listen to (or even hear) the voice of the God who almost moved him to kill his son.