Talk:Binding of Isaac

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[edit] Inaccuracy

Whatever the original intent (which may never be totally elucidated) of the text, the episode has quite an effect on Abraham and Isaac; it is clear to Abraham and his progeny that human sacrifice is not acceptable.

The above statement is incorrect. Human sacrifice is acceptable to Abraham and his progeny. I give you an on-line summary reference. [1]

Perhaps, Abraham and his progeny are willing to sacrifice only NON-tribal humans.

Alternatively, that paragraph should state that many think that Abraham and his progengy did consider human sacrifice acceptable.

Or possibly the whole paragraph should be removed as inaccurate and irrelevant. Rednblu 19:52, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Wrong. That website does not prove that Abraham and the Jews approved of human sacrifice. It only proves that some fundamentalist Christian wrote a website making this ridiculous claim. He takes verses totally out of their literary and historical context, and twist them around to make the Israelites look like murderers. He is so distorted that he uses a much later work (the New Testament's claim that Jesus had to die) to try and "prove" that Jews living hundreds of years earlier approved of human sacrifice. Sorry pal, but if certain Christians want to believe that God wants them to sacrifice humans, then deal with those people. Don't lay such bizarre beliefs at the feet of the Jews. I have seen this insinuation made many times before, but never in academic journals...only on anti-Semitic websites. RK (talk) 23:31, 1 September 2003 (UTC)
I am suggesting, in view of Judges 11:30-40, that the paragraph
Whatever the original intent (which may never be totally elucidated) of the text, the episode has quite an effect on Abraham and Isaac; it is clear to Abraham and his progeny that human sacrifice is not acceptable.
of the article is inaccurate. Perhaps, we should delete the above paragraph entirely. Would you agree? Rednblu 23:53, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)
I changed "Abraham and his progeny" to "them both", which I think more clearly reflects the sentiments of this paragraph (ie "quite an effect on Abraham and Isaac") and is indisputable. Hope this keeps all happy. Martin 10:10, 2 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Amazing solution! Just brilliant! I can imagine Abraham and Isaac looking at each other and saying, "We made it through this. Geez! We will make it through anything." Yes I can see it! Absolutely brilliant! Rednblu 12:27, 2 Sep 2003 (UTC)
RK, you might try re-reading the essay that rednblu linked to, and see if you might have misinterpreted it. Martin 20:48, 4 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Nowhere in this article does it mention the Muslim tradition that it was Ishmael, not Isaac, who was "near sacrificed" or whatever you want to call it. Considering that this is the tradition of 1 billion people, it is a serious lacuna in the article. Danny 11:08, 2 Sep 2003 (UTC)

dictionary:lacunae —Preceding unsigned comment added by MartinHarper (talk • contribs) 11:56, 2 September 2003 (UTC)
Is this true? Is that in the Qur'an? Or is it a traditional story? Rednblu 12:27, 2 Sep 2003 (UTC)
The story is in the Quran, but told vaguely, without reference to either Isaac or Ishmael. The majority of Muslim commentators hold that Abraham never had a near-sacrifice with Isaac; they hold that it was with his brother, Ishmael. Was it Isaac or Ishmael? Muslim views RK 23:01, 3 Sep 2003 (UTC)

[edit] Mount Horeb

"The Bible states that God tests Abraham, by asking him to present his son, Isaac, as a sacrifice on Mount Horeb."

As far as I know, the near sacrifice of Isaac did not take place at Mount Horeb (a Google search reveals only the quaint websites concerning Mount Horeb, Wisconsin). According to the Bible, the Akedah took place at Mount Moriah:

1 After these things God tested Abraham. He said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am." 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." (Genesis 22:1-2)

A fairly thorough search of all available versions of the Bible at bible.crosswalk.com reveals that the word "Horeb" does not appear once in the entire book of Genesis.

Furthermore, Kierkegaard speaks of the location in question as "Mount Moriah" repeatedly in Fear and Trembling. (Particularly in Exordium.) --Dws (talk) 01:26, 26 October 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Removed text

Note: I had to give a lot of thought before removing the following text. I think a section of the article for the "atheist response" is a good idea, but the header ('An Atheist's response), the text ("It is fairly clear" with no source cited for the theory) and his edits to similar pages indicate that this is original 'research'.

=== An Atheist's response ===

It is fairly clear from the text that the "ram" portion of the story is a latter interpolation, and that in the original Abraham sacrificed Isaac as God commanded. Indications are:

* God rewards Abraham "because you have done this thing, and witheld not your only son" * God's reward to Abraham is out of proportion to the mere sacrifice of a ram * The line "And God spoke to Abraham a second time, saying ..." is an obvious join. It marks the resumption of the original text * Most poignantly, at the start of the story Abraham and Isaac go up the mountain, but afterward only Abraham is mentioned coming back down

Of course, in the Old Testament, children - along with wives, slaves, and livestock - are simply property. Nowhere in this story is there the idea that Isaac's life is not Abraham's to give. Whatever lives in a man's house is his. See also the story of Jephthah in Judges 11:29-40, and Leviticus 27:28-29

:28 Surely anything which a man permanently dedicates to the Lord from all that belongs to him, whether from people, animals, or his landed property, must be neither sold nor redeemed; anything permanently dedicated is most holy to the Lord.

:29 Anyone who is permanently dedicated from mankind must not be ransomed; he must be put to death. -- Antaeus Feldspar 02:51, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I agree with the removal of this but I disagree that there needs to be an "atheist's response" to this. This is not a matter of belief; it is a matter of narrative and interpretation. This entry is about explaining the story from the bible and interpreting its significance. Its contents should be the same for believers and non-believers. Would the entry on Shakespeare's Macbeth need to include a response from someone who doesn't believe Shakespeare exists? Whether or not Shakespeare exists, we have and can interpret Macbeth. The atheist response can go under the entry for God if you like, but it makes no sense here. --csloat 05:21, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)
The more apt analogy would be if we were trying to infer the meaning of Macbeth, and there were indications that some integral portion of the story had been interjected by some other author much later. If true, then this would impede an understanding of Macbeth as Shakespeare intended. However, the Shakespeare fans who grew up believing the play they learned was all written by him would be unwilling to entertain the possibility of later alterations and thus insist on interpreting the meaning of the story going only by the modern version. That is the proper analogy to what's happening here - assuming, in fact, that the changes the "atheist's response" describes are indeed true.--Daniel 14:54, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] removed text

I had not expected this section to survive long on the wiki. One does try to wave the flag occasionally, even knowing that you will quickly be trampled by the fanatical hordes.

However, removing it on the basis that it was "original research" - which I did not attempt to conceal - is certainly fair enough. I had overlooked that.

On the other hand, a fair bit of the wiki is uncited. I modified, as you may have noted, the page on Jephtha (another paragrah which I expect will not survive long). Is this paragraph:

Later, Jephtha went to war against the Ephraimites, who refused to aknowledge him. The story is remembered for the killing of the fugitive Ephraimites, who pronounced the Hebrew word shibboleth as sibboleth. In this rebellious action, 42,000 people lost their lives. (Judges 12:5,6)

also to be deleted because it is uncited, and looks like original research (note the misspelling)?

as to "csloat"'s response, I am in two or three minds.

Firstly, this is not a christian or "belivers" encyclopaedia. Also, while I labelled my section "an atheists" response, there are plenty of belivers - in other religions, in less literal versions of christianity - who do not nessesarily take the position that this story really happened as written. If we are talking about "interpretation", isn't "when it was written, they thought child sacrifice was ok, but then later they did'nt" an interpretation? The question then arises "Should we today accept the view of the original author, or that of the redactor? Which of these is the true will of god? Isn't our abhorrence of the idea just the influence of the liberal world?". Isn't this meat for discussion enough?

Another thought is that yes, the difficulties in this story can be disposed of by dropping the assumption that it ever really happened. But so can every other difficulty (how much gold was in the temple, what really happened after the resurrection, did Paul see a light or hear a voice, etc etc). Biblical scholarship and interpretation is a field in it's own right, and would hardly be helped by the addition of "On the other hand, this may all be just a load of do-do" on each page.

But, the page does discuss "the original intent of the author". My contention, that there were (at least) two authors, the second expurgating the first, would deserve a mention under that rubric. And my previous comment applies to the idea that the non-literal view does not add to the field of doctrinal interpretation. For instance: if we accept Earl Doherty's view that the Pauline epistles (with their christ "in the heavens") came first, and that the gospels were fictions written much later, isn't it worthwhile to then discuss what that implies for christians today? The fact that one takes a non-literal interpretation dos not nessesarily blow away doctrine as a field of inquiry.

I suppose the isssue is: what is the subject of this page? Is it "perspectives on Genesis 22"; or is it "attempts to reconcile the near sacrifice of isaac with modern attitudes towards child sacrifice, in the context of Christianity, Islam, and Juadism"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.10.231.229 (talk • contribs) 23:19, 28 October 2004 (UTC)

[edit] The {} sign/s

One or more of the sign/s: {{NPOV}}{{expansion}}{{Cleanup}} placed on this page without any discussion, explanation or reasoning have been removed pending further discussion. (The category Category:Bible stories is now up for a vote for deletion at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion#Category:Bible stories) Thank you. IZAK 08:12, 18 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Obscure midrash: Isaac was sacrificed?

Time and again I have come across the idea that, according to a minority of obscure classical rabbinic sources, Isaac really was sacrificed by Abraham, and then was miraculously resurrected. The classical midrashim that I have read say no such thing. Can anyone verify the following? If this is accurate, it surely is a minority view, but it would be interesting to note.

...Since Isaac appears subsequently (Chapoter 24 et seq.), advocates of these theories...content that God brought back Isaac from the dead. R. Jensen...reports that svereal ancient traditions refer to the ashes and blood of Isaac indicating that he died and was revived, citing the Babylonian Talmud, Ta'anit, 16a; Jerusalem Talmud, Ta'anit 2.1 (on the ashes); Mekhilta of R. Simeon ben Yohai, on Exodus 16.2 (on the blood); and that L. Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, n.29, supra, Vol.1, at p.281 et seq., and Vol. 5, p.251, recounts the tradition that Isaac was also the name of the ram.
Burton Caine, The Akedah: Angel Unbound, Conservative Judaism, Vol.52, No.1, Fall 1999

---

I checked up on one of the earliest sources. The Babylonian Talmud, tractate Taanit, page 16a, states:

And why do they place wood-ashes upon the Ark? — R. Judah b. Pazzi said: As if to say, I will be with him in trouble.4 Resh Lakish said: [As if to say] In all their afflictions He was afflicted.5 R. Zera said: When I first saw the rabbis placing wood-ashes on the Ark my whole body shook.
And why does everyone else put ashes on his head?- With regard to this there is a difference of opinion between R. Levi b. Hama and R. Hanina. One says: [To signify thereby], We are merely like ashes before Thee; and the other says: That [God] may remember for our sake the ashes of Isaac.6 What is the difference between them? — The difference is with regard to [the use of] ordinary dust.7
The Soncino Talmud, English translation

I checked the translation and commentary of Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz on this passage. He holds that it should not be understood literally, and rather that "the ashes of Isaac" should be understood as referring to the ashes of the ram. He notes that in traditional rabbinic thought, the sacrifice of the ram represents the sacrifice of Isaac. He brings forth the views of a few other commentators who also reject the idea that this verse means that Isaac actually was sacrificed. However, why are these commentators rejecting this view? Someone must be proposing this view for it to warrant being rejected.

Based on what I have read here and elsewhere, it seems to me that the following is most likely: Classical rabbinic tradition held that Isaac was not sacrificed, as Genesis tells us. However, this vague phrasing in the Babylonian Talmud can be read as meaning that he was sacrified. Unfortunately, we cannot know for certain the intention of the writers of the Talmud. (As the text of the Talmud was essentially written in shorthand, and underwent centuries of editing, it is impossible to know precisely the intention of any given person quoted in the Talmud.) This ambiguity caused some rabbis to question whether or not Isaac really died, and a few later rabbinic midrashim did in fact explicitly describe Isaac as dying, and then being resurrected. It seems to me that these views are not well known among most Jews, and would not be representative of mainstream Jewish thought, but they are an interesting minority view worth mentioning. Can anyone bring forth a direct quote from any of these later midrashim which do explicitly state that Isaac died and was resurrected? RK 21:48, Apr 11, 2005 (UTC)

I wonder if the author of the book of Hebrews was aware of this belief that Isaac actually died and was resurrected? He writes about the incident, "By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, "In Isaac your seed shall be called," concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense." Wesley 06:05, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Parallel between Genesis 22 and the ending of George Orwell's "Nineteen eighty-four"

There is an interesting parallel between Genesis 22 and the climax of George Orwell's "Ninety Eighty-Four." Winston is terrified of rats, and in Room 101, O'Brien uses these to destroy Winston's feelings for Julia ("Do it to Julia"), ensuring Winston's submission to the power of the Party. In the same way, in the incident in Genesis 22, Abraham puts obedience to God above his love of his own son Issac, an act of total submission. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.91.220.74 (talk • contribs) 14:04, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Name of this article

The common name for this event is the "Binding of Isaac", which gets almost 50,000 hits. "Near sacrifice of Isaac", in contrast, gets about 800, the majority of them Wikipedia links and mirrors. In accordance with Wikipedia:Naming conventions, I'm going to move the article. Jayjg (talk) 20:06, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

Looking at the titles of the artworks listed in this article, it occurred to me that a more common name for this event might be "Sacrifice of Isaac". Using the various pages that redirect here as a guide, I did searches on Google for the phrases below, listed in order from most hits to least. Even though this is the English Wikipedia, I did the searches for pages written in any language. Here are the results:
  • "Genesis 22" = 180,000
  • "Sacrifice of Isaac" = 96,300
  • "Binding of Isaac" = 43,100
  • "Akeda" = 42,900
  • "The binding of Isaac" = 34,500
  • "Akedah" = 31,600
  • "Dhabih" = 9,230
  • "Aqedah" = 9,210
  • "Akeida" = 7,120
  • "Akeidah" = 6,190
  • "Akedat Yitzchak" = 1,120
  • "Near sacrifice of Isaac" = 1,060
  • "Near-sacrifice of Isaac" = 1,060
Some of these phrases are inappropriate as titles for this article regardless of their popularity. For example, while "Genesis 22" is by far the most popular phrase in terms of hits, I don't think it is an appropriate title because it doesn't properly reflect the scope of this article, which is about an event with cross-cultural effects rather than a specific telling of that event. Another example, "The binding of Isaac" won't work because starting an article title with "the" doesn't jive with Wikipedia's naming conventions.
The results seem to have borne out my suspicion, that "Sacrifice of Isaac" is a far more common name for this event than either "Binding of Isaac" or "Near sacrifice of Isaac".
At first, I thought the phrase "Sacrifice of Isaac" to be inaccurate since I thought the term "sacrifice" was somewhat synonymous with "kill" which doesn't actually happen in the most common tellings of this event (hence the genesis, I suppose, of the term "near-sacrifice"). But looking at the Wikipedia article sacrifice, it occurs to me that the term probably refers to the whole ritual, not the specific part of it involving the actual act of killing. Therefore, regardless of the fact that the ritual isn't completed, it may nonetheless still qualify as the ritual of "sacrifice".
Given the above, I propose we rename (move) this article to the title "Sacrifice of Isaac" --Bryan H Bell (talk) 01:24, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Google is not always the arbiter, and in this case "Sacrifice of Isaac" is imprecise and actually wrong. Because Isaac was not actually sacrificed. I have not heard the term in common use. I firmly support the present naming, or alternatively Akeidat Yitzchak. JFW | T@lk 18:12, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Actually, if you add up all the various spellings of Akkeida with "Binding of Isaac" the result outweighs any other alternative. I submit that "Binding of Isaac" is the most suitable title by a long shot. JFW | T@lk 18:13, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for your comments, JFW. I don't consider Google to be the final word on popularity of a name, but it's probably a good place to start. If you can think of other means for determining what WP:NAME suggests as the main criteria for naming an article ("generally, article naming should prefer what the greatest number of English speakers would most easily recognize"), let's use them. Here's one method: I notice that the name most commonly used throughout history for works of art about the event is "Sacrifice of Isaac". As far as "Sacrifice of Isaac" being wrong because Isaac isn't actually killed, that's what I originally thought too (as I describe above). But then I considered that despite the uncompleted nature of the ritual, Issac was still the subject of the entire sacrifice ritual.
Good point about the various spellings of "Akeda", though I'm not sure I'd combine them with "Binding of Isaac" even if the terms are synonymns. When we're considering a variety of terms that describe the same thing, synonymns should be considered separately. But combining simply the spellings of "Akeda" I come up with 98,140, which beats "Sacrifice of Issac". My concern with using "Akeda", however, is that it's a word more commonly used in Hebrew than English. Since this is the English version of Wikipedia, we're looking for the most common name used by English speakers. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 18:51, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
My overall point is intuition tells me that, accurate or not, most English-speakers call the story the "Sacrifice of Isaac" not the "Binding of Isaac" and so, according to Wikipedia guidelines, we should go with the former name which is more commonly used. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 18:59, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Intuition is equivalent to original research, which is not permitted in Wikipedia articles. Sorry, I agree with the others that 'binding' is a much more appropriate term and would oppose any attempt to move the page. DanielC/T+ 22:56, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the input, however, I don't see how having a hunch about what the appropriate title of an article might be is the same as adding personal opinions to the content of an article. Moreover, my proposal is not based on a hunch, that was only the stimulus that encouraged me to consider that renaming might be appropriate. It was by checking one reliable source (Google searches) that I confirmed my suspicion. Since Google searches are themselves suggested in various Wikipedia guidelines as a way to determine the most common name for an article (for example, see WP:NCON), it seemed like a good place to start. There are perhaps other sources we could consult to determine what the most common term would be. I invite you or anyone else to submit ideas for other sources that might help. I'm open to using whatever name our sources suggest is most common. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 23:48, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Another point about the accuracy of the proposed name: you could consider the story to be about God commanding the sacrifice of Isaac, in which case the act doesn't need to be completed for the story to still be about the command to sacrifice Isaac. The same would be true if you considered the story to be about Abraham dutifully carrying out the preparations for the sacrifice of Isaac. Even if he doesn't finish, the story is still about his preparation to sacrifice Isaac. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 19:23, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I did the Google search again, but this time followed the WP:NCON suggestions to search only English pages and to filter out the word "Wikipedia" (to see what other people are using, not Wikipedia's own usage such as in this article). I also discovered that Google was combining "The binding of Isaac" into its results of "Binding of Isaac" giving a falsely inflated result, so I filtered out the other phrase in my search for each ("Binding of Isaac" -Wikipedia -"The binding of Isaac" for one and "The binding of Isaac" -Wikipedia -"Binding of Isaac" for the other). I ran into the same problem with "near-sacrifice" and "near sacrifice" but couldn't figure out a way to make Google ignore either the hyphen or the space. It doesn't much matter anyway because even if the total hits for "near sacrifice" are inflated, they're still way lower than everyting else. Here are the results I got:

  • "Genesis 22" = 194,000
  • "Sacrifice of Isaac" = 119,000
  • Akedah = 75,995
    • "Akedah" = 31,300
    • "Akeda" = 26,200
    • "Akeida" = 10,200
    • "Aqedah" = 7,360
    • "Akeidah" = 832
    • "Akedat Yitzchak" = 103
  • The binding of Isaac = 32,560
    • "The binding of Isaac" = 31,300
    • "Binding of Isaac" = 1,260
  • "Dhabih" = 16,800
  • Near-sacrifice of Isaac = 1,441
    • "Near-sacrifice of Isaac" = 884
    • "Near sacrifice of Isaac" = 557

I grouped different spellings of the same term together and subtotalled them above. These results suggest an even stronger separation between "Sacrifice of Isaac" and "Binding of Isaac". I also tried WP:NCON's suggestion to do a Google News search to see what major English-language media outlets are using, but the number of hits were too small to be helpful (2 hits at best for each). --Bryan H Bell (talk) 00:38, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I just noticed something remarkable when trying the Google searches. One of the links compared the Sacrifice of Isaac to the assasination of Yitzchak Rabin. On a hunch, I tried searching "Sacrifice of Issac" and "Binding of Isaac" excluding Rabin. Incredibly, of the 94,300 instances of Sacrifice, only 8,790 came up when excluding Rabin. Binding, which of course can't be applied to the assasination, came up with 42,000 without Rabin out of 43,300 with. Obviously, when talking about the event without political comparisons, Binding is far more used. Check it out and let me know what you think. Cheers, Keyed In (talk) 00:49, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Fascinating approach! But when I tried the searches you suggest, I got different results. I searched (using English pages only) "Sacrifice of Isaac" -Wikipedia -Rabin and got 75,700 total hits and I searched (again, English pages only) "Binding of Isaac" -Wikipedia -Rabin and got 6,730 total hits. What searches did you perform to get the results you gave? --Bryan H Bell (talk) 01:14, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
3 points for possible inconsistency:
  1. I didn't exclude wikipedia
  2. I searched all languages
  3. and possibly most important, I noticed that typing "keyword" -exclusion gives far different results than using the advanced search page and typing in the appropriate fields. I will continue to experiment and post back if I find out anything. --Keyed In (talk) 01:33, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
Now I'm really confused...I copied the line "Sacrifice of Isaac" -Wikipedia -Rabin straight out of your article and searched google only english articles, and I got 13,400!! why so different?? any ideas? Keyed In (talk) 01:36, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
Strange indeed. You might have "SafeSearch" enabled. Try the search using Google's advanced search page. Expand the Date, usage rights, numeric range, and more section and make sure SafeSearch is set to off. That'll give you unfiltered results (except for the filters you intend). --Bryan H Bell (talk) 01:48, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
You might also check to make sure no other filters are applied, such as Region. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 01:51, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
This is really strange- here's what I have:
1. "sacrifice of isaac" -rabin 8,150 English pages
2. "sacrifice of isaac" -Rabin 13,900 English pages
3. "sacrifice of isaac" -"Rabin" 8,150 English pages
4. "sacrifice of isaac" -"rabin" 13,900 English pages
This is not a typo- capital R results in more without quotes, and lowercase r results in more with quotes,
When I exclude wikipedia, it's even stranger:
5. "sacrifice of isaac" -rabin -wikipedia 7,630 English pages
6. "sacrifice of isaac" -rabin -Wikipedia 74,800 English pages
7. "sacrifice of isaac" -rabin -"Wikipedia" 74,800 English pages
8. "sacrifice of isaac" -rabin -"wikipedia" 13,400 English pages
How could excluding wikipedia result in more results??
I have no filters on (except English) and SafeSearch is off. I'm puzzled. Keyed In (talk) 01:56, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

(undent) I am seeing the same differences in results depending on how I capitalize my queries that you are seeing. This flies in the face of Google's search documentation The Essentials of Google Search which says "Google searches are NOT case sensitive. All letters, regardless of how you type them, will be understood as lower case. For example, searches for george washington, George Washington, and gEoRgE wAsHiNgToN will all return the same results." I don't understand either. Maybe it has something to do with using exact phrases or unwanted word filters. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 02:58, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I tried their example. George Washington and gEoRgE wAsHiNgToN differ by a margin of 450,000 pages! Completely strange. I wonder if different browsers will yield different results. I'm using IE7. Do you have multiple browsers to test this? Also check this link [2]. Seems to be an ongoing problem w/ google searches. If so, why does wikipedia recommend using it to determine usage? Keyed In (talk) 03:29, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
I see a margin of 600,000 between George Washington and gEoRgE wAsHiNgToN (no filters) when I use no language restrictions. When I restrict the results to English pages, the results are equal. I doubt different browsers would yield different results since the data on the page is generated by Google, not the browser. Nevertheless, I tried both IE7, Firefox, and Safari and the results were the same between the browsers. While I'm not ready to completely abandon Google searches as a tool for determining the popularity of a name, these anomalies do point to the need for corroborating sources. Not being an expert on theology or history, however, I'm uncertain which other sources might be good for determining how widely each name is used. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 14:51, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

General comment: The numbers from the google searches above show that the overall number of ghits that include "Binding" or a variant of it (including the Hebrew word in its various English transcriptions) are more than the number that include "sacrifice" or a variant, so there just doesn't seem to be a prima facia case that "Sacrifice of Issac" is used more than "Binding of Issac". The data from the source supplied just don't seem to support the thesis. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 13:48, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your comment. I'm not sure which of the Google search results above you're talking about. According to the results I added here on March 14, the number of hits for "Sacrifice of Isaac" is 119,000. The number of hits for "Binding of Isaac" is smaller at 32,560. Even if you're suggesting that we combine the results for "Akedah" with "Binding of Isaac", which as I said above I don't think we should do, the total hits is still smaller at 108,555. Perhaps you're looking at the results I added on February 20. In that case, if you're combining the various spelling of "Akedah" with "Binding of Isaac" then you're correct that there are more hits for "Binding of Isaac". However, those initial results include non-English pages and Wikipedia-related pages, both of which WP:NCON suggests we filter out. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 14:22, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
While there it's possible there's a slight preference (in Google anyway) for "Sacrifice of Isaac", it's not, in any event, a huge difference in numbers, and "Binding of Isaac" is clearly the more accurate term. I'm not seeing any support for this name change, and I certainly don't support it either. Jayjg (talk) 23:39, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for responding, Jayjg. I was particularly interested in your response since you originated this section on the talk page. It does indeed seem that so far consensus here among the editors favors "Binding of Isaac", which I will of course heed when it comes to making a decision whether or not to rename the page by the end date I (arbitrarily) set of March 20. I am confused by your assertion that the difference in number of hits is not significant between this article's current title and the one I propose. The number of hits for "Sacrifice of Isaac" (119,000) is over 2½ times larger than the number of hits for "Binding of Isaac" (32,560). Maybe I don't have a full understanding of statistical significance, but that seems to me like a big difference. How can it be insignificant? Also, on what basis do you assert that the term "Binding of Isaac" is more accurate? Is it the same basis I addressed earlier in this thread? --Bryan H Bell (talk) 02:29, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

It's been 4 weeks since I originally posted my proposal here to rename this article to "Sacrifice of Isaac". It's been 1 week since I placed notices on several user and WikiProject talk pages asking for input on my proposal. I feel it is therefore time for me to make a decision whether or not to go forward with my proposal. Four editors have responded that they oppose the proposal (JFW, Daniel, Shirahadasha, Jayjg). One editor seems to be neutral (Keyed In). The consensus therefore seems to be opposed to the name change, and to be in support of keeping the article as currently named ("Binding of Isaac"). I'll therfore leave the article name as is and consider the matter closed. Thanks to all of you for your participation! --Bryan H Bell (talk) 02:52, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Mormon View

The pearl of great price tells of Abraham being tied down by his own father in the book of Abraham. His Father was wicked and idolatrous himself. Abraham abhored human sacrifice. Was symbol of The father sacrificing the son. One story was abraham had to learn about abraham. He himself was saved by Jehovah earlier making it more heart wrenching. He met the test and since Isaac was the covenant son would of had to be raised from the dead. Hebrews in the new testament tells of that Abrahams faith. Jesus was also raised from the dead. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Southidaho (talk • contribs) 06:01, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Terah, Abraham's father, is mentioned briefly in Genesis 11, as well as in a genealogy, but for the most part, both the Old and New Covenant Books remain silent on him. This story about him you refer to is a clear addition made by Smith; it is hardly worth regard. In any case, what is this section? Is it a perspective? If it is, it seems only fitting it should remain here; the subject of the Akedah is most relevant to the Jewish and Christian communities. Of course a Moslem perspective is welcomed, too, seeing as it is the second most wide-spread religion. As for a Mormon view ... it seems ... to add little overall. And please, my friend, work on your grammar. I had a bit of trouble understanding. (Mr.Ligit was responsible for this comment) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.18.157.239 (talk • contribs) 21:27, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Good job!

What an incredible article! Congratulations and thank you to everyone who has worked so hard on this article. This is a great example of wikipedia's success: people working together on an informative article with a fair treatment on a controversial topic dear to three major world religions. I know it's not perfect but it is being perfected. Good job guys.

I would like to see more about Kierkegaard's views on this subject if anyone has sufficient knowledge to do so. The person who posted above made me think that we should also include the LDS view in the article. --Victoria h 18:53, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

It seems to be written in purple prose. Cansomebody fix this? --miqonranger03 18:53, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

How so? The whole thing? A section? Please offer an example to help us correct this. Anyway, I have to agree: This article, one of a religious nature, is beautiful ... It's great to see interfaith cooperation like this. I wish the article about Jesus of Nazareth had some clean-up work from this crew! The balance between the three faith systems here is really terrific, guys! Keep it up. Please! (Mr.Ligit was responsible for this comment) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.18.157.239 (talk • contribs) 01:29, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] BHI Addition (Welcomed?/Not Welcomed??)

I am a member of the so-called "Black Hebrew Israelites". We do not call ourselves by this name, but we do recognize it as a valid reference to groups of our kind. We are a fairly disorganized as religions go. We can best be described as "Sects" of Judaism, and Ethnic Christianity (an oxymoron to most).

Our claims have been called everything from "thought provoking" to "absurd", and none of the congregations in North America have gained much fame as "enlightened" spiritual groups.

Conversely. We are infamous for having disparate doctrines. I cannot post my view of this topic as being representative of all BHI groups. I am wondering if everyone who has contributed to this article has the complete backing of the organized religion that they represent?

We teach a very different view of the binding of Yitzchak, yet I fear that there is so much anti-BHI sentiment on wikipedia, that it will meet with a vigilant barrage of deletions, and I just don't have the time, and energy to keep fighting various editors.

Claiming to be the Israelites of the Bible is offensive to many, and you all need to understand that being descendants of slaves in America used to be offensive to many. At one time my ancestors were met with ridicule for even suggesting that they were "human". Later on they were met with indignation for suggesting that they should have civil rights. I just don't see how calling our self-affirmation in this area "fantastic" is any different a response from the status quos".

Moreh Qanaa Ben Yehudah —Preceding unsigned comment added by Moreh Qanaa (talk • contribs) 18:37, 5 September 5 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Expansion of "Christian Views" Section

It seems a bit odd to me that the Akedah, one of the most important types in our Faith, has so little representation from the Christian perspective. While I agree with everything said ... a small expansion effort wouldn't hurt. (Mr.Ligit was responsible for this comment) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.18.157.239 (talk • contribs) 21:27, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Muslim interpetation

First of all I'd like to echo other's comments and congratulate everyone on a great article.

I have just a minor point I'd like to raise about what I perceive to be a contradiction in the Muslim story (and which should probably be explained in the article). A pre-Islamic Arab story adopted by Muslims and included in the Hadiths tells of Abraham meeting a fully grown and twice married Ishmael (for the first time since him and his mother's flight) and building the Kaaba.

So when was this test by God supposed to have happened if Abraham had never met Ishmael before the construction? Or does this make sense in light of the Jewish belief that the son was in his early thirties (pre-Islamic Arabs learnt many similar stories from Jews, whom they envied until an Arabic book was revealed to one of their own; thus many stories in the Qur'an begin "And remember when..." confirming these tales and underlining God's involvement)?

Any thoughts? Zyxoas (talk to me - I'll listen) 00:23, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Another TV adaptation

Another TV adaptation of the story was the episode ALTARED STATES on XENA, which changes the names but follows the story of the command and the final reprieve. In the story the heroines think the command is a hoax perpetrated by "Iccas"'s wicked brother and rival, but after the brother dies, the voice of God retracts the command at the last minute, leaving the pagan heroines bewildered as to what really happpened. CharlesTheBold 19:45, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the new TV reference. I've added it to the article. Bryan H Bell 21:32, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The term "story"

I notice that on 02:05, April 17, 2007 the user Str1977 removed all instances of the word "story" from this article, which resulted in some awkward replacements (i.e. "The Binding of Isaac, in Genesis 22, is a story narration from the Hebrew Bible"). The user gave no reason for this edit so I can only speculate about their intent. I wonder if the change was due to the user's perception that the term "story" carries a connotation of "fiction" ("it's only a story") or "juvenile" ("Children's Bible stories") when they might consider the Binding of Isaac to relate an historical event. I'd like to find a way to refer to the Binding of Isaac that paints it as neither a fiction nor a historical fact. Until now, I had considered the term "story" to fit the bill (the Oxford English Dictionary defines "story" as "A recital of events that have or are alleged to have happened; a series of events that are or might be narrated.") but perhaps there is something better. The term "narration" seems awkward and inexact to me. Ideas? Bryan H Bell 21:29, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

"Narrative" would certainly be better than "narration," though there still may be a better word. Keyed In (talk) 22:37, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] In-Line Citations Needed

I added the nofootnotes template to this page. Although we've got a good list of references going on this page, none are referenced specifically in the text of the article. I suspect that there are a fair number of statements in this article that are unsupported, but without in-line citations there isn't any way to separate supported statements from unsupported ones. Let's improve this article by adding in-line citations. Bryan H Bell (talk) 06:05, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

I've split the "References" section into two sections:
1. "References" which contains the reflist template that will automatically fill in after people put in-line citations in the article's text.
2. "Further Reading" which now contains all the content from the previous "References" section.
You can copy entries from the "Further Reading" section and place them in the text of the article to get them to appear as footnotes in the "References" section.
I hope this helps. Bryan H Bell (talk) 06:17, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Abraham as schizophrenic

I've removed the following speculation that was added to this article on 04:39 May 11, 2008 by 208.3.137.73. It's an intriguing idea perhaps worthy of exploration in this article if we can find sources to support it:

No one seems to have explored the possibility that Abraham suffered from schizophrenia in that he heard voices telling him to kill his son, a commonly known symptom of this mental illness. Moreover, there is no hypothesis that this could be the reason for the origination of child sacrifice in general.

To improve this article, which is poorly sourced as it is, my feeling is that we should probably start taking a somewhat hard line on not permitting new material unless it's accompanied by reliable sources. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 05:42, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "The Parable of the Old Man and the Young"

  • The Parable of the Old Man and the Young: 1920 poem by Wilfred Owen. It used the binding of Isaac, altered to a successful slaughter, as an allusive metaphor for World War I.

Given that Owen died in 1918... this is a bit dubious --jftsang 19:26, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

1920 is the year the poem was first published, after Owen's death. I don't think the date he wrote it is known. Regardless, as with much of the information in this article, I agree that we should find a source for this and cite it. --Bryan H Bell (talk) 00:17, 30 May 2008 (UTC)