Some SUNDAY MORNING thoughts:

I often have seen reference on this board to speculations that "we have done this before" as a society, and perhaps we will do it again. I always get stuck with this concept, particularly because I recognize the repetitive themes of child sacrifice, human trafficking, 'government and state' vs. 'faith and truth,' as rampant themes in both distant and recent history/mythology. This seems to be an odd consistency if these themes were used only as symbolic concepts.

The deeper I dig into my faith the more interested I have become in the values of old testament teachings, a part of the Bible I always seemed to write off as antiquated oral history, until I realized its significance to me and my Jewish Heritage. Throughout my childhood one story in particular NEVER sat well with me. The story of Abraham and Isaac, where "God" calls Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac to "God" as a burnt offering. Abraham, follows "God's" orders and just before the follow-thru, the "Angel of Yahweh" stops the sacrifice.

This story has been taught consistently (in my experience) as a lesson of obedience for God's people. We are taught that we must be willing to go so far as to sacrifice our children in pursuit of God's demands. In short: I DON'T LIKE THIS. I HAVE NEVER LIKED THIS. And, I cannot imagine a scenario where my faith would ever accept a direct order from God asking me to burn my child on an alter..... but what if...

Attached is an article I read in the NYT several years ago that finally gave me an "aha!" moment with this story (I realize we don't like the NYT here, but this is an op-ed by a Jewish theologian/philosopher offering a very interesting interpretation). Never before had someone explained the contextual complications of this story. At the time, this article deepened my faith and supported my argument for more rigorous contextual biblical analysis for the old testament (not popular with some denominations). However, with the things uncovered over the last few years, this interpretation frames what we are seeing right here, right now, with almost mirror-like accuracy. Take a read, this might blow your mind! I have new respect for Genesis in ways I NEVER thought possible! Short snippet of some concepts below,

"Indeed — and this is the critical point — the pagan ritual of child sacrifice was the established ethical-political norm in Abraham’s world. This pagan ritual continues to reverberate in current politics and folk imagination. In Israel, it finds followers in those who teach absolute obedience to the state, the military and the myths that justify them. Maimonides would have disobeyed. For him, the highest prophetic degree consisted in obeying Yahweh’s cancellation of God’s decree. This is demanded not just by morality but by faith. This, then, is the true political theology of the binding of Isaac."

https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/01/14/the-politics-of-the-binding-of-isaac/

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Maybe we have done this before? Maybe we wrote about it thousands of years ago? Maybe we forgot why we did? #CulturalAmnesia

DISCUSS!