Isaac

“ Isaac.—“Can a man receive instruction after he is dead?”
Satan.—“O thou son of a mother much to be pitied, knowest thou not that thy father is leading thee to death?”
Isaac.—“Nevertheless I shall follow him.”
Satan.—“Then all the tears and prayers of thy mother, beseeching Heaven to grant her a son, end in this! All the pains and grief in childbearing! All the afflictions she laid on Hagar and Ishmael! All the care she has taken of thy youth! All the love she has expended upon thee! All these things for nothing!” ”

“ That I marvel much of old father Isaac,
Being so godly a man, why he is so slack
To bring his son Esau to a better stay.
HANAN. What should he do in the matter, I you pray?
ZETHAR. O, it is no small charge to fathers, afore God,
So to train their children in youth under the rod
That, when they come to age, they may virtue ensue,
Wicked pranks abhor, and all lewdness eschew,
And me-thinketh Isaac, being a man as he is—
A chosen man of God, should not be slack in this.
HANAN. Alack, good man, what should he do more than he hath done? ”

“ But hast thou one blessing and no mo, my father?
Let me also have some blessing, good sweet father.
ISAAC. Well, nature pricketh me some remorse on thee to have.
Behold, thy dwelling-place the earth's fatness shall have,
And the dew of heaven, which down from above shall fall:
And with dint of sword thy living get thou shall,
And to thy brother Jacob thou shalt be servant.
ESAU. O, to my younger brother must I be servant?
O, that ever a man should be so oppressed!
ISAAC. Thine own fault it is, that thou art dispossessed. ”

“ I have done according as thou badest me: arise, I pray thee, sit and eat of my venison, that thy soul may bless me.
27:20 And Isaac said unto his son, How is it that thou hast found it so quickly, my son? And he said, Because the LORD thy God brought it to me.
27:21 And Isaac said unto Jacob, Come near, I pray thee, that I may feel thee, my son, whether thou be my very son Esau or not. ”

“ He stands upon his feet, walks a few steps, and falls. Isaac is stronger than ever. He lifts his fainting comrade, takes him in his arms, staggers on, reaches the empty and desolate house, and discovers a beaten path leading southward. ”

“ This Isaac climbs the mountain to the place of sacrifice, with no illusions as to what He is going up the mountain for. He knows that He goes up to be the lamb of the offering, and knowing it, He goes. Therefore let us love Him with love as persistent as was His own, who discerning the end from the beginning, willed to be born and to live because He had resolved to die, for you and me and every man. ”

“ I will bless all nations in thy seed; the Christ. As Abraham had died without receiving these promises made to him also; and as Isaac knew they were to inherit together; the promise of "all these countries" to him was equivalent to an assurance that he should rise from the dead; when he would see his father and the Christ in possession of the land; and his descendants increased to a great multitude, and then become a mighty nation exclusively occupying it; and all the nations happy and contented under the dominion of Christ. ”

“ Isaac was an elect one, as surely as Abraham; a stranger with God in the earth; one who used his altar as well as carried it. He was meditating in the field when he got his Rebecca, and he had prayed for the mercy, when Esau and Jacob were given to him. We speak of character in him only, when we thus contrast him with another. We speak of the living, practical ways of a saint; and we see in him what was below a witness for God abroad, though amiable and devout at home. This is found in Isaac; and kindred things are still found, again I may say, as many of us know to our humbling. ”

“ For as his laughing sprang from the contrast between the idea and the reality; so through a miracle of grace the birth of Isaac gave effect to this contrast between the promise of God and the pledge of its fulfilment on the one hand, and the incapacity of Abraham for begetting children, and of Sarah for bearing them, on the other; and through this name, Isaac was designated as the fruit of omnipotent grace working against and above the forces of nature. ”

“ And he took Isaac and laid him on the altar, and he knew that God was able to take Isaac away, and yet that Isaac should be to him a seed. And having completed the sacrifice of Isaac in his mind, though not in deed, God showed Abraham’s righteousness and virtues to all succeeding generations. And then the angel of God called to him, and told him not to stretch out his hands over the young man, and do him no harm whatsoever. And God said unto him, “Behold, it is manifest that thou lovest Me, for thou hast not spared thy beloved son for My sake. ”

“ Isaac, for aught that appears, is as willing as Abraham; we do not find that he raised any objection against it, that he petitioned for his life, that he attempted to make his escape, much less that he struggled with his aged father, or made any resistance: Abraham does it, God will have it done, and Isaac has learnt to submit to both, Abraham no doubt comforting him with the same hopes with which he himself by faith was comforted. Yet it is necessary that a sacrifice be bound. The great sacrifice, which in the fullness of time was to be offered up, must be bound, and therefore so must Isaac. ”

“ No brave words, no act of kindness, can quicken the courage of the fainting boy. What shall Isaac do—stay and die with him, or try to find his own way out? Sad the parting, the younger lying down to die upon a mossy bank, the older turning away alone, lost in the wilderness.
With faltering steps, Isaac pushes on, and discerns a house. No one is there, but he knows there must be white men not far away. With quickened pulse, he turns back to the dying boy, awakens him from sleep, rubs his eyes, bathes his temples, cheers him with encouraging words. ”

“ Isaac for the same reason that Lot had to be separated from Abraham and Esau from Jacob, because they were not of the seed from which Israel was destined to spring; that even before the birth of Ishmael we have the prophecy told to Hagar, "And he shall be a wild ass of a man; his hand shall be against every man and every man's hand against him" (Genesis 16. 12) . ”

“ The purpose of the command was to test faith, even more than to test whether earthly love or heavenly obedience were the stronger. There is a beautiful and instructive climax in the designations of Isaac in verse 2, where four times he is referred to, 'thy son, thine only son,' in whom all the hopes of fulfilment of the divine promise were concentrated, so that, if this fruit from the aged tree were cut off, no other could ever grow; 'whom thou lovest,'—there the sharp point pierces the father's heart; 'even Isaac,' in which name all the ties that knit him to Abraham are gathered up. ”

“ Isaac was the only and dearly beloved son of his father: Jesus Christ is the only-begotten and beloved Son of God, in whom His Father is well pleased. Isaac was obedient to his father, and was willing, out of obedience, to give up his life, letting himself be bound, and waiting patiently for his death-stroke: Jesus Christ was obedient to His Heavenly Father, unto death, even unto the death of the Cross. ”

“ In Isaac we see that family that is "born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God," and who stand in liberty; as the apostle says, "Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise." We are Abraham's seed, so many Isaacs, children of the freewoman, or in the adoption, if we be Christ's. ”

“ When Isaac was sixty, and Abraham a hundred and sixty, Esau and Jacob were born. Before their birth, the Lord said to Rebekah, "Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger". ”

“ Through faith Abraham, when put to the test, sacrificed Isaac, yes, was ready to sacrifice his only son, although he had received the divine promises and had been told, "It is through Isaac that your family name will be carried on," for he believed that God was able to raise men even from the dead. In a sense, he did receive his son back from the dead.
Through faith, also, Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau, even telling them of things to come. Through faith Joseph, as he was dying, thought of the time when the Israelites would go out of Egypt and gave orders about his own bones. ”

“ The most precious thing Abraham had was that son who was walking beside him. And besides his love for his boy, God had promised that Isaac should live to have a son, and that by and by the Saviour should come into the world as one of Isaac's great-great-great-great-grandchildren!
Isaac was now grown into a strong young man, but he went with his father; and though he asked him on the way, Where was the lamb for the burnt offering? He was satisfied with his father's answer, "My son, God will provide Himself a lamb for a burnt offering." ”

“ Isaac prayed to God for his son Jacob, but he did not ask the mediation of his father Abraham in his behalf; and when Jacob in his turn supplicated an especial blessing upon his grandsons Ephraim and Manasseh, though he called with gratitude to his mind, and expressed with his tongue, the devotedness both of Abraham and of Isaac to the Almighty, yet we do not find him appealing to them, or invoking their intercession with Jehovah. ”

“ There was nothing extraordinary or supernatural in his conception, as there was in Isaac's; he was born after the flesh (Gal. iv. 29) , representing those that expect justification and salvation by their own strength and righteousness. (2.) That the children of the promise are counted for the seed. Those that have the honour and happiness of being counted for the seed have it not for the sake of any merit or desert of their own, but purely by virtue of the promise, in which God hath obliged himself of his own good pleasure to grant the promised favour. Isaac was a child of promise ”

“ The intentional offering up Isaac, with its result, was probably that transaction in which Abraham, more clearly than in any other, “saw the day of Christ, and was glad.” He received Isaac from the dead, says St. Paul, “in a figure.” This could be a figure of nothing but the resurrection of our Lord; and, if so, Isaac’s being laid upon the altar was a figure of his sacrificial death, scenically and most impressively represented to Abraham. The place, the same ridge of hills on which our Lord was crucified; the person, an only son, to die for no offence of his own; the sacrificer, a father ”

“ Soon after they came to the house, and Isaac and Sarah came to greet them, and they sat down in the courtyard of the house. But Isaac said to his mother Sarah, "Mother, I am sure that the man who is sitting with my father is not of the race of men that live on the earth." Just then Abraham called to Isaac, "Isaac, my son, draw water from the well, and bring it to me in a basin, that we may wash the stranger's feet, for he has come a long journey." So Isaac ran and fetched the water to his father ”

“ The child Isaac was shown to every visitor, and all were astonished at his resemblance to Abraham. Both the babe and his father were so much alike that it was impossible to distinguish one from the other, and all doubt as to whose it was vanished before such evidence of likeness to the father, and before the fulness of Sarah's breasts. But as confusion was likely to arise through the striking similarity between father and son, Abraham besought God to give him wrinkles and white hair, that he might not be mistaken for the babe Isaac, or the babe Isaac be mistaken for him. [24]
7. ”

“ This refers to Isaac for Isaac sired Jacob, who alone is more important than all of them, for he fathered the twelve tribes, and sustained the upper and the lower, while Isaac supported the higher in supernal holiness and Ishmael only below. Therefore the verse, "Who can utter the mighty acts of Hashem," refers to Isaac, as explained above. The words, "declare all His praises," refers to Jacob. When the sun connects with the moon, many stars shine from them. "And these are the generations of Isaac, Abraham's son." ”

“ Isaac had been dead ten years, and Jacob had attained the age of one hundred and thirty. Having arrived at Beer-sheba on his way thither, he offered sacrifices to the God of Isaac. On this occasion, God spake unto him, and said, "I am God, the God of thy father; fear not to go down into Egypt: for I will there make of thee a great nation: I will go down with thee into Egypt; and I will also surely bring thee up again: and Joseph shall put his hand upon thine eyes." In this promise Jacob was re-assured of a resurrection to life. The action of putting the hand upon the eyes represents death ”

“ They are a study of themselves; and no "rules of interpretation", or of "logic", are of any value to the understanding of the things which they reveal.
A parable was enacted by Abraham in offering up Isaac. The things transacted were real, but they were also parabolic, or figurative, of something else, even of the sacrifice and resurrection of the Seed, or Christ. After the death of Isaac, and when Jacob was waxing old, Joseph was selected from among his sons by the arrangements of God to be the typical representative of the future Seed, through whom the promises were to take effect. ”